July 6, 2025 • 42 mins
#225 today’s guest is olga khazan— a journalist and author known for her work on health, science, and social science topics. she is currently a staff writer at the atlantic and has previously written for the new york times, the los angeles times, the washington post, forbes, and other publications.
in this episode, we break down the five traits that make up your personality and exactly how you can change your personality for the better.
we talk about:
• what *actually* shapes your personality type
• the five traits that make up your personality
• popular personality tests + if they’re accurate
• how your personality traits affect your daily life
• if your personality traits are changeable or fixed
• the most common traits people want to change
• life hacks for changing your personality traits
• benefits of changing certain personality traits
• dealing with fears over self-growth + change
• changing your personality to fit in
• myths around personality psychology
• advice for gen z on shaping your personality
mentioned:
• olga’s writing at the atlantic
• weird
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Sheep Assisted, the Gen.
Z mental health podcast. I'm your host, Sadie Sutton.
Let's get into it. So a lot of people have asked me
that like, why should I change for other people?
And I really think the answer islike, you shouldn't.
I don't think you should change to fit in with other people.
I think it's really more for youdon't think about where you're
going to fit in or like how other people are going to like
(00:21):
you more. Think about what you stand to
gain and how you can boost your own mood and get more out of
life. Hello, you guys, and welcome
back to another episode. She persisted.
I'm so excited you guys are here.
If you follow on Instagram, you saw a little teaser.
I walked around a little independent bookstore in Boston
this weekend. And whenever I go to a
(00:42):
bookstore, I love to visit my podcast guests via seeing their
books. It is like the coolest pinching
moment to big. Oh my God, I know that person.
I interviewed, that person we talked about that book that's
now like on the shelf in this random location in this random
city or in this airport. It's like the coolest, most
surreal thing. Like one day I want to have in
my office as a psychologist or as a researcher, whatever it is,
(01:04):
a bookshelf and would be in my podcast studio.
One day when I have a podcast studio, a bookshelf with every
single book from every single podcast guest I've had.
And it's like the sheep resistedcollection.
Anyways, if you saw that little walk down memory lane.
And I was talking about episodeswith guess whose books I found
in the bookstore. I also teased 2 upcoming
episodes, one of which is today's episode.
(01:26):
We have Olga Kazan on the podcast.
She is the author of the new book Me But Better, which is a
fascinating book about how to change your personality and the
science of personality change. So if you're like, OK, that
sounds super interesting. I don't know where to start.
This is the episode for you because we go over the basics of
like how do we define personality like there's all
(01:46):
these things out here and we talk about the Enneagram, we
talk about personality types. We talk about the scales that
are typically used in psychology.
When we talk about personality, we talk about what we know about
it, like is it changeable What influences personality and then
we talk about different ways that you can effectively change
your personality. Real activities, you can go out
into the world and do people to surround yourself with to shift
(02:09):
certain traits and traits that alot of people want to shift.
Why you might want to change these things, how it relates to
your mental health, because there is one personality trait
in particular that is really correlated with a lot of mental
health challenges. Like if you wanted to shift that
and make yourself like less prone to thinking in certain
ways and behaving in certain ways, it's not necessarily super
(02:30):
great for mental health and sometimes worth thinking about
in the context of this episode. Olga is a journalist and author
known for her work on Health Science and social science
topics. She is currently a staff writer
at The Atlantic and has previously written for The New
York Times, the Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post,
Forbes and many other publications.
And so in this episode, we are talking about her new book,
which you guys can find whereverbooks were sold, like I did this
(02:52):
weekend in Boston, which was so fun.
Like I said, it's called me but better LinkedIn the show notes,
but we breakdown the five personality traits that make up
your personality, the ones that we know the most about according
to psychology, the ones that aremost predictive of things in
life. And we talked about exactly how
you can change your personality for the better.
And if you're listening to this and you're like, OK, what about
(03:12):
self acceptance? Like what about this idea of
just like accepting ourselves aswe are?
Like, I don't know if I want to change who I am.
We talked about that because Olga's previous book, which
you've probably seen on a shelf somewhere, is called weird.
And it's about the power of being an outsider in an insider
world. And so we talked about the
importance of like embracing whoyou are and it's more or like
(03:33):
when you're kind of having a conflict or you feel like this
isn't serving me right or this is really keeping me from like
this goal I have or being this best version of myself.
And not in a like, I'm not good enough.
So I'm going to change this, butlike to be the best version of
myself. It might be effective to look at
shifting this trade if that makes sense.
So we come at this from a lot ofperspectives.
(03:53):
I adore this conversation with Olga.
I know you guys will learn so much from listening to this.
And I loved all the anecdotes and research that Olga wove into
this conversation. You guys have to check out both
for books if you like this conversation and I'm talking so
much in this intro, but I just cannot wait for you guys to
listen because it's such a greatepisode.
And if you guys like the episode, make sure to subscribe,
(04:13):
turn on automatic downloads, andshare on social media.
If you tag me, I'll repost. You'll be entered into our
monthly giveaway to and win a Starbucks gift card on me and
thank you guys for supporting the podcast.
It means the world. I love when you comment and send
me messages about the episode. Like nothing makes me happier.
And you guys really loved last week's episode.
I got some really sweet messagesand comments about it and that
(04:34):
just like made my whole life. It was the best.
I shared them with so many people.
I was like, Oh my God, they likethe episode.
You might have seen them on Instagram.
Also also, I want to mention before we dive in again getting
sidetracked. If you ever send me anything, I
will never like post it without blurring a name or if it seems
like something that's like specific to you or like not
related to, I would never share that.
So I just wanted you guys to know if you're ever like, I
(04:55):
liked an episode, I wanted to like share, but I don't want
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(05:15):
along or like feel free to shareabout the episode, but I always
remove any identifying information or any other things
that are not related to like people that are enjoying the
episode. So with that, let's dive into
the science of personality change.
Well, thank you so much for joining me today, Olga.
I'm so excited to have you on Sheep Persisted.
I have been following your work for a while, and I'm really
excited to sit down with you today and just dive in and get
(05:38):
your perspective on a number of things that are really relevant
to Gen. Z.
Yeah, I'm excited too. Thanks for having me.
So I would love to give a littlebit of background to listeners
who are completely coming in blind.
Maybe they've seen a book at thebookstore, they're headed
through the airport, they've seen the cover before, but they
don't know your background. They don't know your story.
(05:59):
Tell me how you ended up writingyour background as a journalist
and also having this special team, this interest in
personality and that kind of part of identity and sense of
self. Yeah, So I've been a journalist
at The Atlantic since 2013, and I've covered different things.
I don't only write about psychology, but I've written a
lot about psychology. And I want to say it was like
(06:23):
several years ago, I came acrossthis research that was like, you
can change your personality. And I was like, that's weird
because first of all, like, isn't personality stable?
And also, why would you want to change your personality?
That sounds like not something most people want to do.
And so I started kind of like reading more and more about it
(06:45):
and interviewing the researcherswho study personality.
And what I kind of came to realize is that, like, your
personality traits are almost like tools that help you achieve
your goals in life. So personality, it encompasses a
lot more than like what we like and dislike.
It's sort of like the way you approach the world and the way
you approach different situations and how you react to
(07:07):
adversity or challenges. And a lot of times the way that
we react to things is maybe likenot the best way.
Like maybe, you know, maladaptive, as we say in
science, Like you might be kind of like overreacting to a
situation, or you might be like writing off an opportunity just
because you think it's not like a natural fit for you.
(07:28):
And a lot of those kind of instances are dictated by
personality traits is like, how do you approach situations like
that? And I, and I noticed that in my
own life, there were a lot of things that were kind of going
wrong that were pretty clearly influenced by my, my own
personality traits. So I wanted to kind of tackle
those and honestly just kind of like experiment with this
(07:52):
research protocol that I was reading about to see if it would
work on me. Yeah, I am so excited to dive
into the protocol itself and howwe test and understand
personality and these parts of personality that were maybe not
so effective because I have a lot of thoughts there because as
you know, like mental health outcomes and also some other
(08:13):
maybe more positive areas of life can overlap with
personality a lot. But I would love to start for
people that haven't taken intro to psych or they're just
listening to this on their morning commute, this idea of
personality. Again, we get into the weeds
with how we define these things,but it can get confusing because
colloquially we'll talk about personality and it can be really
(08:33):
different from what it mean froma research standpoint or from a
psychology concept. So how can we understand
personality? Like, is it how we talk?
Is it the relationships we show up in?
Is it how we think about things?Is it how much we're feeling?
How can we understand personality as a concept before
we work to change it or understand it in other people?
(08:56):
Yeah. So it's kind of all of those
Brent Roberts, who's like the big personality researcher and
sort of defines it as thoughts, feelings and behaviors, right?
So it's, you know, someone comesat you with an idea.
Let's go to Bali, Indonesia thisweekend on a last minute
getaway. But I think absolutely not are.
You, yeah. Are you like wait, no, I have
plans already. Or like, are you like, yeah, I
(09:18):
totally would love that. I'll like throw.
Everything I have no plans and the no plans can't be changed.
Exactly. Yeah.
Or like, yeah. So everyone is going to have a
different reaction to that. And that's part of your
personality is like how like what's like sort of the first
thing that comes to your mind when something like that
happens. You know, what are your values?
What are you interested in? What do you pursue?
(09:38):
What do you think about? And the way that this is
measured is through 5 traits, openness to experiences,
conscientiousness, extroversion versus introversion,
agreeableness and neuroticism versus emotional stability.
And so those are like two sides of one coin.
And so I can go deeper into eachof those, but those are kind of
(10:00):
like the five traits that researchers think this is your
personality, like where you rankon each of these is sort of the
kind of person you are. And if we have a good sense of
where you are on each of these, we can paint a pretty good
picture of who you are as a person.
Yeah. So I'm curious before we dive
into what all of those things can correlate to how they
(10:22):
generally change as we age and as we go through life, and if we
can intentionally change them. I'd first love to kind of hear
your thoughts on personality tests because the different
traits you just described are what we see in a lot of
research. It's like very common in a lot
of psychology studies and outcomes.
And we have a really good understanding of like what
neuroticism is correlated with and what extroverts are more
(10:45):
likely to do. But there's also like a lot of
other personality tests that float around like some people
love their Zodiac signs. There is like the I'm totally
going to butcher the name of this, but it's like letters and
numbers together and. Abraham Yes, people love that
one. People feel strongly about their
enneagrams, like they identify in a big way.
(11:06):
And so I'd love your thoughts onthese other ways that people are
describing personalities. Is it kind of like building on
this initial foundation that's been established completely
different? Why is this the way that so much
research looks at personality tocompare to these other metrics
and measures? Yeah, so I always like hate this
(11:27):
part because people are like, you'll probably my enneagram
from Michael Damian, like people.
Won't really. It's for.
You yeah yeah, exactly for you, yes yes.
So like I totally think that like for fun or just interest or
like even to like know more about yourself, you can totally
take these tests Enneagram MBTI Myers Briggs is another one.
You can even do a horoscope, youknow, if you want and they can
(11:51):
be interesting and fun. Some of them are like sort of
valid, like Myers Briggs has some elements of validity to it.
I would say. Like where those go wrong is
that they put people in categories.
So it's like if you've ever taken a Myers Briggs, it's like
introverted, you know, judging thinker, you know, something
like that. And it's like really, none of us
(12:11):
are like totally introverted or totally extroverted or, you
know, a total like Judger. Like if you think about it, like
sometimes you make judgments, but sometimes you're more
emotional. I forget what the other one is,
but like, you know, sometimes you're kind of introverted, but
like right now you and I are being kind of extroverted.
So, you know, it's like it's, it's where those go wrong,
(12:33):
according to researchers, is that they put people in
categories. And So what they like about the
big 5, which is that what I described earlier, those five
traits is that they're all in a spectrum.
So you could be, you know, 30% introverted or, you know, 80%
extroverted, but you're not necessarily all the way one way
or the other because we all like, at the end of the day,
need a little bit of that opposite side.
(12:56):
Like we're never going to be 100%.
That would not be a good thing to be all the way over to one
side. Yes, 100%.
And I think understanding where you fall on that spectrum,
especially because we know so much about personality with that
structure, can be really helpful.
I took Angela Duckworth's Grit Lab class this last year and one
(13:17):
of the big units was personalityand understanding where you fit
on the Big 5. And then where that maps on to
like different career interests and values and how you can show
up in a way that's really aligned with how you are as a
person. And not like just forcing
yourself into these different boxes.
We'll talk about can do that. Can you shift yourself to fit in
these different contexts? But not even in like a what is
(13:39):
my personality like compared to others, but like what is my
personality like? So how can I put myself in
context that allow me to thrive can be so helpful when you
understand where you fit on those spectrums and where you
feel your best and how you show up your best and how you can set
yourself up for success without like, fighting against yourself.
Totally, Yeah. So I would love to talk about
(14:02):
the different traits, the Big 5,and what we know about these
different traits because like you mentioned, there's so much
research that's been done using the structure of personality.
And my mind instantly goes to neuroticism because there's so
much research on how that correlates with mental health.
But could you kind of explain tous how those different
personality traits actually showup in areas that we think of on
(14:26):
a day-to-day basis? Maybe it's relationships, maybe
it's career, maybe it's school setting, like thought processes.
How do those actually come to play in our day-to-day lives?
OK, I'm going to go a little outof order because it starts, the
acronym starts with openness, but that's the most challenging
one to explain. So all sort of
conscientiousness, which is likethe trait that your boss loves,
(14:50):
the trait where you're always making your bed, you're always
on time, you never forget where you.
Left. The bed is out of the frame on
purpose right now. These are people who are neat
freaks. There are morning people, they
are organized, They are very like meticulous in pursuing
their goals. You don't have to like keep them
on task. They sort of keep themselves on
task. Yeah.
(15:11):
So this is something that peoplereally love to like, first of
all, cultivate in themselves. And then again, bosses and and
other like internships and things are all like kind of
sorting for conscientiousness basically.
Yeah. Extroversion and introversion
are pretty self explanation. One thing I will say about
extroversion is people think it's like, are you the life of
(15:31):
the party? But it's really like how much
you seek out other people and activity in general.
It's not so much like like, so for people who are like wary of
experimenting with extroversion,it can be something like joining
a book club and sort of listening kind of more than you
talk. But just like that, that feeling
(15:52):
of being around, being around people, being in a community is
sort of what extroversion is allabout.
Agreeableness is sort of the cuddly like warm trait.
So more so than extroversion, it's like you're just always
thinking about other people. You have this like really kind
heart. You're just putting others needs
in in front of yours, Empatheticand warm.
(16:15):
You know, it's kind of how people describe you.
And neuroticism, you alluded to,is another one that people
really like to change or try to change.
And because it is correlated with anxiety and depression, it
has a lot of like negative thinking kind of component.
Like it's sort of like you get into those negative thought
(16:37):
spirals with neuroticism and youkind of have a hard time getting
out. Like so everything is sort of
goes from bad to worse when whenbad things happen to a neurotic
person. And that was one that I really
struggled with and that I workedon for the book.
And so openness is a little bit funny because it is sort of a
catch all for a bunch of different things.
(16:57):
But the best way to describe openness is sort of that example
that I gave you earlier of like,hey, you want to go to Bali this
weekend and, like, an open person would be like, yeah,
totally. Or like, yeah, you'd be in
tickets. Yeah.
Like an open person with, like, an unlimited budget and no job.
Yeah. But, you know, even just smaller
things like, hey, you want to goto this restaurant you've never
tried, eat this dish you've never heard of, like, go to this
(17:21):
foreign movie in this abstract art exhibit.
They're just like up for whatever and new experiences and
new things make them really excited and they they are not
the people who will like rewatchthe office for the millionth
time while eating like. Doing that right now, not.
That there's anything wrong withthat?
Yeah, I love the Office rewatch,but yeah, they're kind of on the
(17:45):
opposite side of that. Yes.
And you alluded to this earlier where like right now in this
conversation, we're being more extroverted, we're open and that
we'd never met before doing thisinterview.
Are these traits that are constant in all these different
silos of our lives? Or are these personality traits
kind of dependent on who we're around or the context that we're
(18:07):
in? Like how much do these change on
a day-to-day basis depending on what environment we're in?
I will tell you several different theories.
Yeah, I love that. Theory one, this is like more
like, I would say proven at thispoint is we basically all change
throughout our lives. So most of us will change on at
(18:28):
least one trait over the course of our lives.
If you think about, I mean, I, Iguess most of your listeners are
young, but if you, if you look at like your parents, like
they're not like what they were,were like in high school, right?
Like they're, they're pretty different.
Like we all kind of mature as weget older because we're in these
roles, Like we get jobs and we have families and we end up
having to adapt to these roles and our personalities kind of
(18:51):
change along with that. And just like life throws things
at you and you kind of you kind of change a little bit to to
adjust to that. OK theory #2 is that we all kind
of reflect the people that were around.
So if you think about it like when I went to college, so I
grew up in an area where nobody swore or used cuss words.
(19:11):
Yeah. And then I went to college at a
college where everyone's swore and use cuss words.
And so I came home from my firstlike, fall break or winter break
or something, and I was like, F this, F that.
Like, just like every other wordwas an F bomb.
And my friends were like, whoa, what happened to you?
You crossed over to the dark side.
(19:32):
So that wasn't like a personality change.
But that's an example of how thepeople that you're around to
influence the way you behave andthe way you think and what you
think about and, and what you want.
Sometimes even, you know, And then theory #3 which is what I
really like focus the book on isthat if you have things about
yourself that you would like to change, whether it's just some
(19:53):
habit that you don't really likeor some element of your life
that you're maybe not enjoying as much or isn't serving you
that well, people actually have the ability to change.
On those traits in a shorter period of time than they would
naturally. OK, we're going to dive into
when people intentionally changehow they do that, but I'm really
curious the reasons why people are drawn to change their
(20:17):
personality. And we'll also touch on like,
your first book is so fascinating about being seen as
like weird or being ostracized and also a driver of change
depending on the person. And so I'm curious from the
interviews that you've done and the research that you've done in
this area, what are the reasons that people want to change their
personality rather than a behavior or a context or a
(20:39):
relationship? Yeah.
So it's definitely like behaviors and contexts and
relationships can also be thingsthat that you can change and
like that that might be necessary instead of a
personality change. But I will say that a lot of
things that we kind of want to improve about our lives are
often related to personality change.
(21:01):
So like, I often hear from people like, but I don't want to
change my personality. I just want to make more friends
and be more organized and, like,be less anxious.
And I'm like, those are three personality traits.
Yeah. Yeah.
So a lot of these things that we're kind of like, this isn't
working for me are actually related to personality.
And so I for the book, I interviewed a lot of people who
had something like they wanted to stop drinking or one person,
(21:23):
like, really wanted to start a business, but she just was like,
very disorganized. Like, I had trouble, like,
following through on things. And so she wanted to work on
organization, you know, lots andlots of, I met lots of people
working on anxiety cuz I, I did a big meditation class.
So like, it's basically when they realize that there's some
goal that they have or somethingthat they would like to do that
(21:45):
like whatever they're currently doing isn't helping them meet
that goal. Or it's like whatever habits or
like thought patterns they're having is like derailing them.
And so that's usually when people are kind of prompted to
do some sort of personality change.
And are there certain ones that people are really drawn to
changing? Like everyone wants to be more
(22:06):
open or people are really tryingto be more extroverted?
Or it is just so context dependent on that lived
experience and what isn't feeling aligned?
So a lot of people in the studies, the most common traits
that people try to change are conscientiousness, neuroticism
and extroversion. And I think that they're trying
to do extroversion because they want more friends, because a lot
(22:28):
of them are done on college students the the studies.
And so, yeah, so it's, I think, yeah, I think probably in that
order is like, but if you think about college, it's like trying
to get your work done and tryingto make friends and like trying
to be less anxious and stressed out.
So that kind of naturally fits. But across most studies, those
are the like the three most common ones.
(22:49):
So you mentioned. Earlier that our personality
kind of generally. Shifts across our lifetime.
And like if you are in a new role or in a new relationship,
that can also shift your personality.
Can you give us kind of a baseline of how much your
personality changes without likean intentional intervention
It's. Hard to say because like all of
these are like it'll be like half of a standard deviation or?
(23:12):
Whatever. Yeah.
So it's like, it's hard to quantify in that way.
But like, so definitely like thenatural lifelong change is more
gradual. Like you're not gonna notice
day-to-day and like week to weekthat you're changing.
Like you're just gonna graduallykind of shift.
And then, you know, maybe you goto your high school reunion, you
know, in 20 years and people arelike, whoa, like you were super
(23:36):
shy in high school, but now you're really outgoing.
So it'll be something like that,right?
So the, what I'm talking it out is more like people doing
activities and behaviors every single day so that the changes
happen almost like week to week and month to month.
And an example of this is like, so for extroversion, one of the
things that I did is I signed upfor an improv class, which is
(23:58):
very against the grain of like what I'm naturally like.
Like, I'm not a performer and I actually like don't even really
like improv that much as an art form, but I just, I kind of just
jumped into it. And honestly, I could see the
change in probably like a few weeks where I was going from
being like very scared and terrified and having like almost
like panic levels of stage rightto like this is fun.
(24:21):
I'm looking forward to it. It was within probably like a
few like a couple months or like8 weeks ish, you know, and I
don't know, I, I, so that kind of gives you a sense of like a
more compressed period of time because you're actively working
on it versus like it just sort of naturally unfolding.
Can you give us some other examples of like interventions
(24:43):
and ways that people are workingto shift to these trades if they
want to be less neurotic or moreconscientious, or you mentioned
like openness, extroversion withimprov.
What are some of these other protocols that people are
following things they're trying to shift these traits more
rapidly? So I would say for neuroticism,
the one that I kept coming across and people like hate that
(25:06):
this is the case. But honestly, it's like various
forms of mindfulness and like just like Buddhist adjacent
thoughts. And I think it's really because
when you're anxious, you keep kind of jumping forward into the
future or you're jumping into the past.
Like you're like, what went wrong yesterday and like what's
(25:26):
going to go wrong tomorrow? And you're like kind of never
just in the present moment. And a lot of like enjoying life
is about being in the present moment.
Like there was 1 Buddhist quote I came across that was like,
life exists only in the present moment.
And it, it basically is just saying that like our lives are
made-up of every single minute that we live.
(25:48):
Like that is what makes up how happy we are.
It doesn't really matter what happened yesterday and what's
going to happen tomorrow. Like learning to kind of
appreciate the present moment will inevitably make you happier
because the present moment is kind of all you have.
So anything that kind of focusesyour mind on the here and now
and on the life you're actually living is gonna help you become
(26:11):
less neurotic. And that ultimately,
unfortunately, it comes down to like mindfulness and meditation.
Yes, yes. It really is one of those things
where it's like the people who like hate the mindfulness the
most or the most neurotic people.
Like the person. There was like one other woman
in my meditation class who hatedit.
And she was like, we were both super anxious, like high
(26:33):
achievers. Like she was a doctor and she
was all stressed out. And I was like a journalist.
And then everyone else who like,really enjoyed it was like, I'm
a part time yoga teacher. And you're like, yeah.
Checks out. Yeah, So, yeah.
So that's neuroticism, extroversion.
I would just sign up for activities with other people.
It's like pretty straightforwardfor conscientiousness.
(26:53):
That's an interesting one because the problem there is
like, so Angela Duckworth, actually I interviewed her for
the book, and she is like a conscientiousness guru.
Like she, she knows all about this, but one of the things that
she kind of pointed out is that all the things that you do to be
a conscientious person are really, really boring.
(27:14):
So you're like practicing your instrument, or you're doing like
laps in a swimming pool, or you're filling out your taxes,
or you're like sending a bunch of emails, or you're doing stuff
that is like kind of tedious. But what conscientious people
are able to do is to connect those tedious tasks to a bigger
(27:35):
goal that they have. And they almost like very
vividly see these like tasks paying off in this huge
important goal that they have intheir minds and that they always
keep in their minds. So they think about like, how am
I going to spend that tax refund?
How is it going to feel when I win the like swimming
championship? And Angela when I interviewed
her was like, sorry if this is weird as to her former student,
(27:58):
but she said she didn't really like making the like PowerPoint
slides for her class I. Was like, I literally, I raised
mine. I said, why don't you have
someone else make these PowerPoint slides?
Because we're talking about likehow you can like be the best
version of yourself, lean into your strengths.
And I was like, you got to have someone else make your slides.
So she doesn't like doing these PowerPoint.
Yeah, I know. I'm like get an intern but she
(28:20):
doesn't. I did.
Make some for her recently because I was like, I promise I
can help you out here. Like I promise it will be
easier. But she's so funny.
She's like, I got to take a class like so it's amazing.
So she, yeah, so she hates thesePowerPoints and but she's like,
in her mind, she's like, but as I'm doing this, I'm like
becoming a better teacher. And that's more important to me.
That's my big goal that I'm working toward.
(28:42):
And that helps me be conscientious.
So the people who I I interviewed who were able to
become conscientious had like starting a business or like one
guy really wanted to become a, aprofessor, but he had, he was
like the worst student ever. And he had never written a paper
and like never studied and didn't know how to study.
And so he had to like put two and two together.
(29:04):
That's like, OK, I am going to have to learn how to do this in
order to meet my goal. So that's really what
conscientiousness comes down to,so.
You mentioned you were able to see like a large amount of
change with improv. You were enjoying it more,
looking forward to it. What are these other areas of
change look like? Is it more the behavior?
Is it how people are thinking about things?
With neuroticism, they're less stressed, they're more calm.
(29:26):
Like, what is that change in personality look like versus at
like going back to your high school reunion and people being
like, wow, this is so different.Yeah, so some of them might be
kind of subtle. So I would say for neuroticism,
I feel like day-to-day I didn't like notice a big difference in
my attitude or anything, but I kind of just noticed that
(29:46):
honestly, I was like a lot kinder to myself when things
would go wrong. Yeah, like I kind of was less.
I had a lot less self blame, youknow, when like small things
that like you get stuck in traffic and you run late to
something like that kind of thing would make me like, oh,
like I'm an idiot. I should have looked early, you
know? Yeah.
And I was just a lot more like, oh, that sucks, you know.
(30:07):
Yeah, OK, I didn't expect this. Like I kind of let things like
that roll off me a little bit more.
So that one might be more like, in just your thoughts and how
compassionate you are to yourself.
Yeah. For extroversion, I just saw
this, like, a big reduction in my level of, like, wanting to be
reclusive all the time. And like, whenever I was having
(30:30):
a bad day, like, basically my whole life, I was like, oh, I
had a bad day. I really want to be by myself
and, like, watch TV and have a glass of wine.
And I still like to do that sometimes.
But now I sort of feel like I had a bad week.
I should meet up with my mom's group this weekend or like, I
should meet up with this person who always cheers me up or like,
I should see a movie with someone else.
(30:51):
I kind of have a more, I don't know, more adaptive.
Yeah. Like a better like kind of a
view of like connecting with others will also make me feel
good, not just being by myself, if that makes sense.
It does for sure. It could be it could be like
subtle shifts in just your perspective or the kinds of
things you're drawn toward or, or even like how much you are
afraid of things. Like some people talked about
(31:12):
being less afraid of like publicspeaking or being looked at
weirdly. Like one guy really was didn't
like it when people looked at him like, and so he kind of was
able to push past that and become like a kind of this like
gregarious guy who was kind of aleader at work.
Yeah. So it can be.
It can be various things. So I'm curious in hearing like
these changes being described, I'm thinking of like the no
(31:36):
openness, neurotic introverted person who's really resistant to
change. And is hearing like change my
personality? Like I think not, I'd rather not
do that. And I'm curious what your
thoughts are there? Like is there always benefit to
shifting these things? Did you come across people who
are so resistant to the change itself that even if there would
be benefits that were aligned with their goals, it was too
(31:59):
scary of a process? Like how do you navigate that in
between of like they're bought into the outcome.
They see that like these areas maybe are preventing growth in
their relationships or their career or their goals, But also
the idea of change and like yoursense of self and your identity
and things that are so personal,like how you think about things
and what you want to do that changing so quickly.
(32:21):
How do? How did you navigate that if
that came up? Yeah, so, so the study, like the
main study that I looked at for the book is called You Have to
Follow Through. And he called it that because
you have to follow through. You can't just be like, I wish I
was different and like, not do anything about it.
Yeah. Yeah, it's it can be scary to
change anything, right. Especially like patterns of
behavior that you've been following for a really long
(32:45):
time. OK, here comes theory #4 which
is this idea called free trade theory.
So for people for whom like permanent change or like
changing yourself or like being different is too overwhelming or
scary. This psychologist named Brian
Little has this theory that you can almost like try on different
(33:07):
personality traits to kind of rise to the occasion or to like
fit a certain situation even without changing yourself
permanently. So to give an example, he is
very, very introverted, but he, it's like with Angela Duckworth,
it's very important to him to bea good teacher and to be
gregarious when he teaches. So he almost like almost like an
(33:29):
invisibility cloak or something.Like, he puts on an extroverted
personality when he's teaching and kind of gives it all he has.
And like, that's his extroversion time.
And then he has to go like be byhimself in his office for a
little while and like, kind of restore back to normal.
But it's something that you can do because we all are going to
(33:50):
have moments in our lives when we have to do something that's
not totally natural. Like, like even if you're very
introverted in college, you haveto, you know, give presentations
and go on internship interviews and job interviews and things.
And there's no escaping that. Like there's no introvert way
(34:11):
out in some of those situations.Your driver's license.
You've got to get real ID like these things have to happen.
Yeah, like you have to register for class, like you, you're
gonna have to like do some of these things.
And so it's, it's a way to thinkabout like, OK, can I like focus
all my energy on this task that's not totally natural for
me, but that I'm going to experiment with because I think
(34:33):
there might be something good onthe other side.
So that's that's another way to think about it.
So I imagine people that don't have like a super strong sense
of identity or sense of self or who aren't feeling super secure
in their personality traits and do want to change, I imagine
that also overlaps with like their social relationships as
well. And kind of the work that you
(34:54):
did with your first book, which is talking about how people are
drawn to fit in with social norms, why we have them and the
experience of people that are labeled as outsiders or outcasts
are weird. And so I'm curious your thoughts
on people that are driven to make personality changes with
that goal fitting in or being more like these other people,
(35:14):
especially because you followed these paths.
I'm not fitting in with your first book and the benefits
there being unique and an outsider and having those
varying traits. And so kind of how that fits
into the personality change piece, especially when that
driver of change is not necessarily like I have the
school where I want to show better in this context or how
I'm showing up is preventing me from doing this thing and I
(35:36):
really wanna do or this person that I wanna be, if that makes
sense. Yeah.
So a lot of people have asked methat, like, why should I change
for other people? And I really think the answer is
like, you shouldn't. I don't think you should change
to fit in with other people or to be less weird.
I guess to, to use my first books title like I, I think it's
(35:58):
really more for you, like for the person who's changing.
So all of these things that I did were in service of making me
happier and improving my own life.
And like, yeah, I did especiallyfor like agreeableness.
I like volunteered and, you know, tried to like be more
thoughtful toward my friends, but and like, they maybe
appreciated that, but it wasn't mostly for them.
It was like mostly for me. It was a byproduct.
(36:21):
Yeah. So I would, I would say like,
don't don't think about where you're going to fit in or like
how other people are going to like you more.
Think about what you, you know, stand to gain and and how you
can boost your own mood and get more out of life, honestly,
because like, our social connections are a big part of
what makes us happy. And people who do have bigger
(36:44):
communities, you know, they tendto tend to feel better.
They tend to feel more like seenas people.
So yeah, I, I would just focus on on what's in it for, for you
as opposed to whether other people will will like the new
you. 100% as we wrap up, I'm curious if there's any big
misconceptions about personalityor changing your personality or
(37:08):
any of these like adjacent areasof personality psychology that
you want to debunk or that you hear and you're like, that is
just so off base. I don't understand why people
don't get this things of those kind of perspective.
Good question. Well, sometimes I hear like, oh,
is it because you don't like yourself?
But I actually think it's because you do like yourself
(37:29):
that you seek out new ways of living.
You know, when someone learns tocook delicious meals for
themselves, it's not because they're like, oh, I hate you
like, you know what I mean? Like it's, you want to like
nourish your body and eat something delicious.
It's and then similarly, learning these new skills can
help you live better. And so it's like a sign of self
(37:50):
love to me to want to to try some of these things out.
Yeah, I did an episode a while back and we talked about how
when someone's really strugglingand you're their only source of
support, yes, you are like theirfriend and you're giving them a
positive in their life and you're doing them a disservice
if they're not also getting likeprofessional evidence based
(38:13):
support. And I think it's the same thing
for yourself. Like yes, you can be happy with
who you are and want better for yourself.
Like you might be doing yourselfa disservice if you're
complacent with these different things that aren't necessarily
aligned with your long term goals or the life you want for
yourself. I definitely think that's also
something that I think we struggle with because there is
(38:34):
so much conversation about like self improvement and self help
and working towards a better version of yourself.
And this like shows up in so many different contexts, whether
it's like how we speak to ourselves or like the body
positivity movement. And it's like, do we celebrate
the best parts of ourselves? Are we just completely content
and happy and accepting ourselves as aids?
Do we want better for for ourselves?
(38:55):
And it's like all of those things can be true.
And I think they're not mutuallyexclusive.
Like you can want better for yourself.
And like you mentioned as you worked on neuroticism, give
yourself grace for where you're at now.
And also celebrate these things that you really do appreciate
and are doing well and want to continue to do in your life,
which I think it's really cool that it doesn't have to be
(39:16):
mutually exclusive or changing something.
Does it mean that you hate the current version?
Absolutely, yeah. We're not about all or nothing
thinking because that would be anti and anti psychology, as you
know, yes. Yes, last question, if you were
thinking about like Gen. Z as a whole and you wish they
knew something about personalitychange or personality in
general, what advice would you give?
(39:37):
Because we're going into many, many, many years ahead of us
where we'll change our personalities, intentionally or
not. I feel like this is now a
stereotype, and I don't even know if this is true of Gen.
Z anymore, but I feel like, OK, the stereotype that people of my
age have about Gen. Z is that they're like too
digitally, They're very digitally savvy, but they're
like too digitally savvy. Like they rely too much on.
(40:00):
Digital technology and like phones and.
AI, the MIT study that came out a couple of days ago.
No, I did. What did it say?
It's saying that like it's getting totally skewed out of
proportion. And it's saying that, like using
AI for everything is like showing in brain scans that
you're stunting growth. And like, that's not actually
what the study says, but it's like very allied with that
(40:21):
misconception, but being too digital and not putting in the
work or doing the hard thing. Sure, I, I'm not like as
concerned about your brains or whatever, but like, I just
think, you know, to the extent possible, like as much as you
can get out and build real community with real people.
And like, yeah, not even for your brain or your career or
(40:42):
whatever, but just like, you know, touch grass and like you'd
have a basis in reality. It's important.
That would be my my only advice though I'm sure Gen.
Z is doing that. Please don't yell at me, I'm
just. We could be doing it more.
Giving my best advice. That I have.
No, I love it. It's, it's very funny how we do
all these studies and we like operationalize all these things
and we look at all the contributors and it's like
(41:03):
always relationships, it's always community that we're
surrounding ourselves with. And it's so, so, so important.
And it does get lost a lot of the times.
And so I think that reminder is,is really important for people
to internalize and use their personality to get that outcome
in their lives and and be surrounded by a good group of
people. Yeah, yeah, that's that's all I
got. I love it.
(41:24):
Well, if people want to read both your books, continue to to
consume your work. Follow along with articles
you're putting out. Where can they do?
That yeah. So my book is me, but better.
And then it's available whereverbooks are sold.
My previous book is called A Weird, and it's also available.
And you can follow my writing onpersonality@olgahazan.substack.com.
(41:45):
And I'm also a writer at The Atlantic Magazine.
And our URL is theatlantic.com. Amazing.
Well all of that will be in the show notes.
Thank you so much for taking thetime.
I'm so excited for everyone to listen to this and implement it
in their lives and experience the change themselves.
Yeah, thank you so much for having me on.
If you enjoyed this episode, if she persisted, make sure to
leave a review, subscribe and share with a friend or family
(42:07):
member. Follow along and at She Persist,
a podcast on TikTok, Instagram, YouTube and more for bonus
content. Thanks for listening and keep
persisting.
Welcome to Sheep Assisted, the Gen.
Z mental health podcast. I'm your host, Sadie Sutton.
Let's get into it. So a lot of people have asked me
that like, why should I change for other people?
And I really think the answer islike, you shouldn't.
I don't think you should change to fit in with other people.
I think it's really more for youdon't think about where you're
going to fit in or like how other people are going to like
(00:21):
you more. Think about what you stand to
gain and how you can boost your own mood and get more out of
life. Hello, you guys, and welcome
back to another episode. She persisted.
I'm so excited you guys are here.
If you follow on Instagram, you saw a little teaser.
I walked around a little independent bookstore in Boston
this weekend. And whenever I go to a
(00:42):
bookstore, I love to visit my podcast guests via seeing their
books. It is like the coolest pinching
moment to big. Oh my God, I know that person.
I interviewed, that person we talked about that book that's
now like on the shelf in this random location in this random
city or in this airport. It's like the coolest, most
surreal thing. Like one day I want to have in
my office as a psychologist or as a researcher, whatever it is,
(01:04):
a bookshelf and would be in my podcast studio.
One day when I have a podcast studio, a bookshelf with every
single book from every single podcast guest I've had.
And it's like the sheep resistedcollection.
Anyways, if you saw that little walk down memory lane.
And I was talking about episodeswith guess whose books I found
in the bookstore. I also teased 2 upcoming
episodes, one of which is today's episode.
(01:26):
We have Olga Kazan on the podcast.
She is the author of the new book Me But Better, which is a
fascinating book about how to change your personality and the
science of personality change. So if you're like, OK, that
sounds super interesting. I don't know where to start.
This is the episode for you because we go over the basics of
like how do we define personality like there's all
(01:46):
these things out here and we talk about the Enneagram, we
talk about personality types. We talk about the scales that
are typically used in psychology.
When we talk about personality, we talk about what we know about
it, like is it changeable What influences personality and then
we talk about different ways that you can effectively change
your personality. Real activities, you can go out
into the world and do people to surround yourself with to shift
(02:09):
certain traits and traits that alot of people want to shift.
Why you might want to change these things, how it relates to
your mental health, because there is one personality trait
in particular that is really correlated with a lot of mental
health challenges. Like if you wanted to shift that
and make yourself like less prone to thinking in certain
ways and behaving in certain ways, it's not necessarily super
(02:30):
great for mental health and sometimes worth thinking about
in the context of this episode. Olga is a journalist and author
known for her work on Health Science and social science
topics. She is currently a staff writer
at The Atlantic and has previously written for The New
York Times, the Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post,
Forbes and many other publications.
And so in this episode, we are talking about her new book,
which you guys can find whereverbooks were sold, like I did this
(02:52):
weekend in Boston, which was so fun.
Like I said, it's called me but better LinkedIn the show notes,
but we breakdown the five personality traits that make up
your personality, the ones that we know the most about according
to psychology, the ones that aremost predictive of things in
life. And we talked about exactly how
you can change your personality for the better.
And if you're listening to this and you're like, OK, what about
(03:12):
self acceptance? Like what about this idea of
just like accepting ourselves aswe are?
Like, I don't know if I want to change who I am.
We talked about that because Olga's previous book, which
you've probably seen on a shelf somewhere, is called weird.
And it's about the power of being an outsider in an insider
world. And so we talked about the
importance of like embracing whoyou are and it's more or like
(03:33):
when you're kind of having a conflict or you feel like this
isn't serving me right or this is really keeping me from like
this goal I have or being this best version of myself.
And not in a like, I'm not good enough.
So I'm going to change this, butlike to be the best version of
myself. It might be effective to look at
shifting this trade if that makes sense.
So we come at this from a lot ofperspectives.
(03:53):
I adore this conversation with Olga.
I know you guys will learn so much from listening to this.
And I loved all the anecdotes and research that Olga wove into
this conversation. You guys have to check out both
for books if you like this conversation and I'm talking so
much in this intro, but I just cannot wait for you guys to
listen because it's such a greatepisode.
And if you guys like the episode, make sure to subscribe,
(04:13):
turn on automatic downloads, andshare on social media.
If you tag me, I'll repost. You'll be entered into our
monthly giveaway to and win a Starbucks gift card on me and
thank you guys for supporting the podcast.
It means the world. I love when you comment and send
me messages about the episode. Like nothing makes me happier.
And you guys really loved last week's episode.
I got some really sweet messagesand comments about it and that
(04:34):
just like made my whole life. It was the best.
I shared them with so many people.
I was like, Oh my God, they likethe episode.
You might have seen them on Instagram.
Also also, I want to mention before we dive in again getting
sidetracked. If you ever send me anything, I
will never like post it without blurring a name or if it seems
like something that's like specific to you or like not
related to, I would never share that.
So I just wanted you guys to know if you're ever like, I
(04:55):
liked an episode, I wanted to like share, but I don't want
that to be shared with everyone or like I just want to send a
message or I just have a question to talk about in a
future episode. You can either anonymously send
through the Google Sheet on my website.
It's like a form. It doesn't require a name or an
e-mail and you can just send in questions and suggestions and
submissions and all the things. Or you can send me a message and
be like, don't want to share this but just want to pass this
(05:15):
along or like feel free to shareabout the episode, but I always
remove any identifying information or any other things
that are not related to like people that are enjoying the
episode. So with that, let's dive into
the science of personality change.
Well, thank you so much for joining me today, Olga.
I'm so excited to have you on Sheep Persisted.
I have been following your work for a while, and I'm really
excited to sit down with you today and just dive in and get
(05:38):
your perspective on a number of things that are really relevant
to Gen. Z.
Yeah, I'm excited too. Thanks for having me.
So I would love to give a littlebit of background to listeners
who are completely coming in blind.
Maybe they've seen a book at thebookstore, they're headed
through the airport, they've seen the cover before, but they
don't know your background. They don't know your story.
(05:59):
Tell me how you ended up writingyour background as a journalist
and also having this special team, this interest in
personality and that kind of part of identity and sense of
self. Yeah, So I've been a journalist
at The Atlantic since 2013, and I've covered different things.
I don't only write about psychology, but I've written a
lot about psychology. And I want to say it was like
(06:23):
several years ago, I came acrossthis research that was like, you
can change your personality. And I was like, that's weird
because first of all, like, isn't personality stable?
And also, why would you want to change your personality?
That sounds like not something most people want to do.
And so I started kind of like reading more and more about it
(06:45):
and interviewing the researcherswho study personality.
And what I kind of came to realize is that, like, your
personality traits are almost like tools that help you achieve
your goals in life. So personality, it encompasses a
lot more than like what we like and dislike.
It's sort of like the way you approach the world and the way
you approach different situations and how you react to
(07:07):
adversity or challenges. And a lot of times the way that
we react to things is maybe likenot the best way.
Like maybe, you know, maladaptive, as we say in
science, Like you might be kind of like overreacting to a
situation, or you might be like writing off an opportunity just
because you think it's not like a natural fit for you.
(07:28):
And a lot of those kind of instances are dictated by
personality traits is like, how do you approach situations like
that? And I, and I noticed that in my
own life, there were a lot of things that were kind of going
wrong that were pretty clearly influenced by my, my own
personality traits. So I wanted to kind of tackle
those and honestly just kind of like experiment with this
(07:52):
research protocol that I was reading about to see if it would
work on me. Yeah, I am so excited to dive
into the protocol itself and howwe test and understand
personality and these parts of personality that were maybe not
so effective because I have a lot of thoughts there because as
you know, like mental health outcomes and also some other
(08:13):
maybe more positive areas of life can overlap with
personality a lot. But I would love to start for
people that haven't taken intro to psych or they're just
listening to this on their morning commute, this idea of
personality. Again, we get into the weeds
with how we define these things,but it can get confusing because
colloquially we'll talk about personality and it can be really
(08:33):
different from what it mean froma research standpoint or from a
psychology concept. So how can we understand
personality? Like, is it how we talk?
Is it the relationships we show up in?
Is it how we think about things?Is it how much we're feeling?
How can we understand personality as a concept before
we work to change it or understand it in other people?
(08:56):
Yeah. So it's kind of all of those
Brent Roberts, who's like the big personality researcher and
sort of defines it as thoughts, feelings and behaviors, right?
So it's, you know, someone comesat you with an idea.
Let's go to Bali, Indonesia thisweekend on a last minute
getaway. But I think absolutely not are.
You, yeah. Are you like wait, no, I have
plans already. Or like, are you like, yeah, I
(09:18):
totally would love that. I'll like throw.
Everything I have no plans and the no plans can't be changed.
Exactly. Yeah.
Or like, yeah. So everyone is going to have a
different reaction to that. And that's part of your
personality is like how like what's like sort of the first
thing that comes to your mind when something like that
happens. You know, what are your values?
What are you interested in? What do you pursue?
(09:38):
What do you think about? And the way that this is
measured is through 5 traits, openness to experiences,
conscientiousness, extroversion versus introversion,
agreeableness and neuroticism versus emotional stability.
And so those are like two sides of one coin.
And so I can go deeper into eachof those, but those are kind of
(10:00):
like the five traits that researchers think this is your
personality, like where you rankon each of these is sort of the
kind of person you are. And if we have a good sense of
where you are on each of these, we can paint a pretty good
picture of who you are as a person.
Yeah. So I'm curious before we dive
into what all of those things can correlate to how they
(10:22):
generally change as we age and as we go through life, and if we
can intentionally change them. I'd first love to kind of hear
your thoughts on personality tests because the different
traits you just described are what we see in a lot of
research. It's like very common in a lot
of psychology studies and outcomes.
And we have a really good understanding of like what
neuroticism is correlated with and what extroverts are more
(10:45):
likely to do. But there's also like a lot of
other personality tests that float around like some people
love their Zodiac signs. There is like the I'm totally
going to butcher the name of this, but it's like letters and
numbers together and. Abraham Yes, people love that
one. People feel strongly about their
enneagrams, like they identify in a big way.
(11:06):
And so I'd love your thoughts onthese other ways that people are
describing personalities. Is it kind of like building on
this initial foundation that's been established completely
different? Why is this the way that so much
research looks at personality tocompare to these other metrics
and measures? Yeah, so I always like hate this
(11:27):
part because people are like, you'll probably my enneagram
from Michael Damian, like people.
Won't really. It's for.
You yeah yeah, exactly for you, yes yes.
So like I totally think that like for fun or just interest or
like even to like know more about yourself, you can totally
take these tests Enneagram MBTI Myers Briggs is another one.
You can even do a horoscope, youknow, if you want and they can
(11:51):
be interesting and fun. Some of them are like sort of
valid, like Myers Briggs has some elements of validity to it.
I would say. Like where those go wrong is
that they put people in categories.
So it's like if you've ever taken a Myers Briggs, it's like
introverted, you know, judging thinker, you know, something
like that. And it's like really, none of us
(12:11):
are like totally introverted or totally extroverted or, you
know, a total like Judger. Like if you think about it, like
sometimes you make judgments, but sometimes you're more
emotional. I forget what the other one is,
but like, you know, sometimes you're kind of introverted, but
like right now you and I are being kind of extroverted.
So, you know, it's like it's, it's where those go wrong,
(12:33):
according to researchers, is that they put people in
categories. And So what they like about the
big 5, which is that what I described earlier, those five
traits is that they're all in a spectrum.
So you could be, you know, 30% introverted or, you know, 80%
extroverted, but you're not necessarily all the way one way
or the other because we all like, at the end of the day,
need a little bit of that opposite side.
(12:56):
Like we're never going to be 100%.
That would not be a good thing to be all the way over to one
side. Yes, 100%.
And I think understanding where you fall on that spectrum,
especially because we know so much about personality with that
structure, can be really helpful.
I took Angela Duckworth's Grit Lab class this last year and one
(13:17):
of the big units was personalityand understanding where you fit
on the Big 5. And then where that maps on to
like different career interests and values and how you can show
up in a way that's really aligned with how you are as a
person. And not like just forcing
yourself into these different boxes.
We'll talk about can do that. Can you shift yourself to fit in
these different contexts? But not even in like a what is
(13:39):
my personality like compared to others, but like what is my
personality like? So how can I put myself in
context that allow me to thrive can be so helpful when you
understand where you fit on those spectrums and where you
feel your best and how you show up your best and how you can set
yourself up for success without like, fighting against yourself.
Totally, Yeah. So I would love to talk about
(14:02):
the different traits, the Big 5,and what we know about these
different traits because like you mentioned, there's so much
research that's been done using the structure of personality.
And my mind instantly goes to neuroticism because there's so
much research on how that correlates with mental health.
But could you kind of explain tous how those different
personality traits actually showup in areas that we think of on
(14:26):
a day-to-day basis? Maybe it's relationships, maybe
it's career, maybe it's school setting, like thought processes.
How do those actually come to play in our day-to-day lives?
OK, I'm going to go a little outof order because it starts, the
acronym starts with openness, but that's the most challenging
one to explain. So all sort of
conscientiousness, which is likethe trait that your boss loves,
(14:50):
the trait where you're always making your bed, you're always
on time, you never forget where you.
Left. The bed is out of the frame on
purpose right now. These are people who are neat
freaks. There are morning people, they
are organized, They are very like meticulous in pursuing
their goals. You don't have to like keep them
on task. They sort of keep themselves on
task. Yeah.
(15:11):
So this is something that peoplereally love to like, first of
all, cultivate in themselves. And then again, bosses and and
other like internships and things are all like kind of
sorting for conscientiousness basically.
Yeah. Extroversion and introversion
are pretty self explanation. One thing I will say about
extroversion is people think it's like, are you the life of
(15:31):
the party? But it's really like how much
you seek out other people and activity in general.
It's not so much like like, so for people who are like wary of
experimenting with extroversion,it can be something like joining
a book club and sort of listening kind of more than you
talk. But just like that, that feeling
(15:52):
of being around, being around people, being in a community is
sort of what extroversion is allabout.
Agreeableness is sort of the cuddly like warm trait.
So more so than extroversion, it's like you're just always
thinking about other people. You have this like really kind
heart. You're just putting others needs
in in front of yours, Empatheticand warm.
(16:15):
You know, it's kind of how people describe you.
And neuroticism, you alluded to,is another one that people
really like to change or try to change.
And because it is correlated with anxiety and depression, it
has a lot of like negative thinking kind of component.
Like it's sort of like you get into those negative thought
(16:37):
spirals with neuroticism and youkind of have a hard time getting
out. Like so everything is sort of
goes from bad to worse when whenbad things happen to a neurotic
person. And that was one that I really
struggled with and that I workedon for the book.
And so openness is a little bit funny because it is sort of a
catch all for a bunch of different things.
(16:57):
But the best way to describe openness is sort of that example
that I gave you earlier of like,hey, you want to go to Bali this
weekend and, like, an open person would be like, yeah,
totally. Or like, yeah, you'd be in
tickets. Yeah.
Like an open person with, like, an unlimited budget and no job.
Yeah. But, you know, even just smaller
things like, hey, you want to goto this restaurant you've never
tried, eat this dish you've never heard of, like, go to this
(17:21):
foreign movie in this abstract art exhibit.
They're just like up for whatever and new experiences and
new things make them really excited and they they are not
the people who will like rewatchthe office for the millionth
time while eating like. Doing that right now, not.
That there's anything wrong withthat?
Yeah, I love the Office rewatch,but yeah, they're kind of on the
(17:45):
opposite side of that. Yes.
And you alluded to this earlier where like right now in this
conversation, we're being more extroverted, we're open and that
we'd never met before doing thisinterview.
Are these traits that are constant in all these different
silos of our lives? Or are these personality traits
kind of dependent on who we're around or the context that we're
(18:07):
in? Like how much do these change on
a day-to-day basis depending on what environment we're in?
I will tell you several different theories.
Yeah, I love that. Theory one, this is like more
like, I would say proven at thispoint is we basically all change
throughout our lives. So most of us will change on at
(18:28):
least one trait over the course of our lives.
If you think about, I mean, I, Iguess most of your listeners are
young, but if you, if you look at like your parents, like
they're not like what they were,were like in high school, right?
Like they're, they're pretty different.
Like we all kind of mature as weget older because we're in these
roles, Like we get jobs and we have families and we end up
having to adapt to these roles and our personalities kind of
(18:51):
change along with that. And just like life throws things
at you and you kind of you kind of change a little bit to to
adjust to that. OK theory #2 is that we all kind
of reflect the people that were around.
So if you think about it like when I went to college, so I
grew up in an area where nobody swore or used cuss words.
(19:11):
Yeah. And then I went to college at a
college where everyone's swore and use cuss words.
And so I came home from my firstlike, fall break or winter break
or something, and I was like, F this, F that.
Like, just like every other wordwas an F bomb.
And my friends were like, whoa, what happened to you?
You crossed over to the dark side.
(19:32):
So that wasn't like a personality change.
But that's an example of how thepeople that you're around to
influence the way you behave andthe way you think and what you
think about and, and what you want.
Sometimes even, you know, And then theory #3 which is what I
really like focus the book on isthat if you have things about
yourself that you would like to change, whether it's just some
(19:53):
habit that you don't really likeor some element of your life
that you're maybe not enjoying as much or isn't serving you
that well, people actually have the ability to change.
On those traits in a shorter period of time than they would
naturally. OK, we're going to dive into
when people intentionally changehow they do that, but I'm really
curious the reasons why people are drawn to change their
(20:17):
personality. And we'll also touch on like,
your first book is so fascinating about being seen as
like weird or being ostracized and also a driver of change
depending on the person. And so I'm curious from the
interviews that you've done and the research that you've done in
this area, what are the reasons that people want to change their
personality rather than a behavior or a context or a
(20:39):
relationship? Yeah.
So it's definitely like behaviors and contexts and
relationships can also be thingsthat that you can change and
like that that might be necessary instead of a
personality change. But I will say that a lot of
things that we kind of want to improve about our lives are
often related to personality change.
(21:01):
So like, I often hear from people like, but I don't want to
change my personality. I just want to make more friends
and be more organized and, like,be less anxious.
And I'm like, those are three personality traits.
Yeah. Yeah.
So a lot of these things that we're kind of like, this isn't
working for me are actually related to personality.
And so I for the book, I interviewed a lot of people who
had something like they wanted to stop drinking or one person,
(21:23):
like, really wanted to start a business, but she just was like,
very disorganized. Like, I had trouble, like,
following through on things. And so she wanted to work on
organization, you know, lots andlots of, I met lots of people
working on anxiety cuz I, I did a big meditation class.
So like, it's basically when they realize that there's some
goal that they have or somethingthat they would like to do that
(21:45):
like whatever they're currently doing isn't helping them meet
that goal. Or it's like whatever habits or
like thought patterns they're having is like derailing them.
And so that's usually when people are kind of prompted to
do some sort of personality change.
And are there certain ones that people are really drawn to
changing? Like everyone wants to be more
(22:06):
open or people are really tryingto be more extroverted?
Or it is just so context dependent on that lived
experience and what isn't feeling aligned?
So a lot of people in the studies, the most common traits
that people try to change are conscientiousness, neuroticism
and extroversion. And I think that they're trying
to do extroversion because they want more friends, because a lot
(22:28):
of them are done on college students the the studies.
And so, yeah, so it's, I think, yeah, I think probably in that
order is like, but if you think about college, it's like trying
to get your work done and tryingto make friends and like trying
to be less anxious and stressed out.
So that kind of naturally fits. But across most studies, those
are the like the three most common ones.
(22:49):
So you mentioned. Earlier that our personality
kind of generally. Shifts across our lifetime.
And like if you are in a new role or in a new relationship,
that can also shift your personality.
Can you give us kind of a baseline of how much your
personality changes without likean intentional intervention
It's. Hard to say because like all of
these are like it'll be like half of a standard deviation or?
(23:12):
Whatever. Yeah.
So it's like, it's hard to quantify in that way.
But like, so definitely like thenatural lifelong change is more
gradual. Like you're not gonna notice
day-to-day and like week to weekthat you're changing.
Like you're just gonna graduallykind of shift.
And then, you know, maybe you goto your high school reunion, you
know, in 20 years and people arelike, whoa, like you were super
(23:36):
shy in high school, but now you're really outgoing.
So it'll be something like that,right?
So the, what I'm talking it out is more like people doing
activities and behaviors every single day so that the changes
happen almost like week to week and month to month.
And an example of this is like, so for extroversion, one of the
things that I did is I signed upfor an improv class, which is
(23:58):
very against the grain of like what I'm naturally like.
Like, I'm not a performer and I actually like don't even really
like improv that much as an art form, but I just, I kind of just
jumped into it. And honestly, I could see the
change in probably like a few weeks where I was going from
being like very scared and terrified and having like almost
like panic levels of stage rightto like this is fun.
(24:21):
I'm looking forward to it. It was within probably like a
few like a couple months or like8 weeks ish, you know, and I
don't know, I, I, so that kind of gives you a sense of like a
more compressed period of time because you're actively working
on it versus like it just sort of naturally unfolding.
Can you give us some other examples of like interventions
(24:43):
and ways that people are workingto shift to these trades if they
want to be less neurotic or moreconscientious, or you mentioned
like openness, extroversion withimprov.
What are some of these other protocols that people are
following things they're trying to shift these traits more
rapidly? So I would say for neuroticism,
the one that I kept coming across and people like hate that
(25:06):
this is the case. But honestly, it's like various
forms of mindfulness and like just like Buddhist adjacent
thoughts. And I think it's really because
when you're anxious, you keep kind of jumping forward into the
future or you're jumping into the past.
Like you're like, what went wrong yesterday and like what's
(25:26):
going to go wrong tomorrow? And you're like kind of never
just in the present moment. And a lot of like enjoying life
is about being in the present moment.
Like there was 1 Buddhist quote I came across that was like,
life exists only in the present moment.
And it, it basically is just saying that like our lives are
made-up of every single minute that we live.
(25:48):
Like that is what makes up how happy we are.
It doesn't really matter what happened yesterday and what's
going to happen tomorrow. Like learning to kind of
appreciate the present moment will inevitably make you happier
because the present moment is kind of all you have.
So anything that kind of focusesyour mind on the here and now
and on the life you're actually living is gonna help you become
(26:11):
less neurotic. And that ultimately,
unfortunately, it comes down to like mindfulness and meditation.
Yes, yes. It really is one of those things
where it's like the people who like hate the mindfulness the
most or the most neurotic people.
Like the person. There was like one other woman
in my meditation class who hatedit.
And she was like, we were both super anxious, like high
(26:33):
achievers. Like she was a doctor and she
was all stressed out. And I was like a journalist.
And then everyone else who like,really enjoyed it was like, I'm
a part time yoga teacher. And you're like, yeah.
Checks out. Yeah, So, yeah.
So that's neuroticism, extroversion.
I would just sign up for activities with other people.
It's like pretty straightforwardfor conscientiousness.
(26:53):
That's an interesting one because the problem there is
like, so Angela Duckworth, actually I interviewed her for
the book, and she is like a conscientiousness guru.
Like she, she knows all about this, but one of the things that
she kind of pointed out is that all the things that you do to be
a conscientious person are really, really boring.
(27:14):
So you're like practicing your instrument, or you're doing like
laps in a swimming pool, or you're filling out your taxes,
or you're like sending a bunch of emails, or you're doing stuff
that is like kind of tedious. But what conscientious people
are able to do is to connect those tedious tasks to a bigger
(27:35):
goal that they have. And they almost like very
vividly see these like tasks paying off in this huge
important goal that they have intheir minds and that they always
keep in their minds. So they think about like, how am
I going to spend that tax refund?
How is it going to feel when I win the like swimming
championship? And Angela when I interviewed
her was like, sorry if this is weird as to her former student,
(27:58):
but she said she didn't really like making the like PowerPoint
slides for her class I. Was like, I literally, I raised
mine. I said, why don't you have
someone else make these PowerPoint slides?
Because we're talking about likehow you can like be the best
version of yourself, lean into your strengths.
And I was like, you got to have someone else make your slides.
So she doesn't like doing these PowerPoint.
Yeah, I know. I'm like get an intern but she
(28:20):
doesn't. I did.
Make some for her recently because I was like, I promise I
can help you out here. Like I promise it will be
easier. But she's so funny.
She's like, I got to take a class like so it's amazing.
So she, yeah, so she hates thesePowerPoints and but she's like,
in her mind, she's like, but as I'm doing this, I'm like
becoming a better teacher. And that's more important to me.
That's my big goal that I'm working toward.
(28:42):
And that helps me be conscientious.
So the people who I I interviewed who were able to
become conscientious had like starting a business or like one
guy really wanted to become a, aprofessor, but he had, he was
like the worst student ever. And he had never written a paper
and like never studied and didn't know how to study.
And so he had to like put two and two together.
(29:04):
That's like, OK, I am going to have to learn how to do this in
order to meet my goal. So that's really what
conscientiousness comes down to,so.
You mentioned you were able to see like a large amount of
change with improv. You were enjoying it more,
looking forward to it. What are these other areas of
change look like? Is it more the behavior?
Is it how people are thinking about things?
With neuroticism, they're less stressed, they're more calm.
(29:26):
Like, what is that change in personality look like versus at
like going back to your high school reunion and people being
like, wow, this is so different.Yeah, so some of them might be
kind of subtle. So I would say for neuroticism,
I feel like day-to-day I didn't like notice a big difference in
my attitude or anything, but I kind of just noticed that
(29:46):
honestly, I was like a lot kinder to myself when things
would go wrong. Yeah, like I kind of was less.
I had a lot less self blame, youknow, when like small things
that like you get stuck in traffic and you run late to
something like that kind of thing would make me like, oh,
like I'm an idiot. I should have looked early, you
know? Yeah.
And I was just a lot more like, oh, that sucks, you know.
(30:07):
Yeah, OK, I didn't expect this. Like I kind of let things like
that roll off me a little bit more.
So that one might be more like, in just your thoughts and how
compassionate you are to yourself.
Yeah. For extroversion, I just saw
this, like, a big reduction in my level of, like, wanting to be
reclusive all the time. And like, whenever I was having
(30:30):
a bad day, like, basically my whole life, I was like, oh, I
had a bad day. I really want to be by myself
and, like, watch TV and have a glass of wine.
And I still like to do that sometimes.
But now I sort of feel like I had a bad week.
I should meet up with my mom's group this weekend or like, I
should meet up with this person who always cheers me up or like,
I should see a movie with someone else.
(30:51):
I kind of have a more, I don't know, more adaptive.
Yeah. Like a better like kind of a
view of like connecting with others will also make me feel
good, not just being by myself, if that makes sense.
It does for sure. It could be it could be like
subtle shifts in just your perspective or the kinds of
things you're drawn toward or, or even like how much you are
afraid of things. Like some people talked about
(31:12):
being less afraid of like publicspeaking or being looked at
weirdly. Like one guy really was didn't
like it when people looked at him like, and so he kind of was
able to push past that and become like a kind of this like
gregarious guy who was kind of aleader at work.
Yeah. So it can be.
It can be various things. So I'm curious in hearing like
these changes being described, I'm thinking of like the no
(31:36):
openness, neurotic introverted person who's really resistant to
change. And is hearing like change my
personality? Like I think not, I'd rather not
do that. And I'm curious what your
thoughts are there? Like is there always benefit to
shifting these things? Did you come across people who
are so resistant to the change itself that even if there would
be benefits that were aligned with their goals, it was too
(31:59):
scary of a process? Like how do you navigate that in
between of like they're bought into the outcome.
They see that like these areas maybe are preventing growth in
their relationships or their career or their goals, But also
the idea of change and like yoursense of self and your identity
and things that are so personal,like how you think about things
and what you want to do that changing so quickly.
(32:21):
How do? How did you navigate that if
that came up? Yeah, so, so the study, like the
main study that I looked at for the book is called You Have to
Follow Through. And he called it that because
you have to follow through. You can't just be like, I wish I
was different and like, not do anything about it.
Yeah. Yeah, it's it can be scary to
change anything, right. Especially like patterns of
behavior that you've been following for a really long
(32:45):
time. OK, here comes theory #4 which
is this idea called free trade theory.
So for people for whom like permanent change or like
changing yourself or like being different is too overwhelming or
scary. This psychologist named Brian
Little has this theory that you can almost like try on different
(33:07):
personality traits to kind of rise to the occasion or to like
fit a certain situation even without changing yourself
permanently. So to give an example, he is
very, very introverted, but he, it's like with Angela Duckworth,
it's very important to him to bea good teacher and to be
gregarious when he teaches. So he almost like almost like an
(33:29):
invisibility cloak or something.Like, he puts on an extroverted
personality when he's teaching and kind of gives it all he has.
And like, that's his extroversion time.
And then he has to go like be byhimself in his office for a
little while and like, kind of restore back to normal.
But it's something that you can do because we all are going to
(33:50):
have moments in our lives when we have to do something that's
not totally natural. Like, like even if you're very
introverted in college, you haveto, you know, give presentations
and go on internship interviews and job interviews and things.
And there's no escaping that. Like there's no introvert way
(34:11):
out in some of those situations.Your driver's license.
You've got to get real ID like these things have to happen.
Yeah, like you have to register for class, like you, you're
gonna have to like do some of these things.
And so it's, it's a way to thinkabout like, OK, can I like focus
all my energy on this task that's not totally natural for
me, but that I'm going to experiment with because I think
(34:33):
there might be something good onthe other side.
So that's that's another way to think about it.
So I imagine people that don't have like a super strong sense
of identity or sense of self or who aren't feeling super secure
in their personality traits and do want to change, I imagine
that also overlaps with like their social relationships as
well. And kind of the work that you
(34:54):
did with your first book, which is talking about how people are
drawn to fit in with social norms, why we have them and the
experience of people that are labeled as outsiders or outcasts
are weird. And so I'm curious your thoughts
on people that are driven to make personality changes with
that goal fitting in or being more like these other people,
(35:14):
especially because you followed these paths.
I'm not fitting in with your first book and the benefits
there being unique and an outsider and having those
varying traits. And so kind of how that fits
into the personality change piece, especially when that
driver of change is not necessarily like I have the
school where I want to show better in this context or how
I'm showing up is preventing me from doing this thing and I
(35:36):
really wanna do or this person that I wanna be, if that makes
sense. Yeah.
So a lot of people have asked methat, like, why should I change
for other people? And I really think the answer is
like, you shouldn't. I don't think you should change
to fit in with other people or to be less weird.
I guess to, to use my first books title like I, I think it's
(35:58):
really more for you, like for the person who's changing.
So all of these things that I did were in service of making me
happier and improving my own life.
And like, yeah, I did especiallyfor like agreeableness.
I like volunteered and, you know, tried to like be more
thoughtful toward my friends, but and like, they maybe
appreciated that, but it wasn't mostly for them.
It was like mostly for me. It was a byproduct.
(36:21):
Yeah. So I would, I would say like,
don't don't think about where you're going to fit in or like
how other people are going to like you more.
Think about what you, you know, stand to gain and and how you
can boost your own mood and get more out of life, honestly,
because like, our social connections are a big part of
what makes us happy. And people who do have bigger
(36:44):
communities, you know, they tendto tend to feel better.
They tend to feel more like seenas people.
So yeah, I, I would just focus on on what's in it for, for you
as opposed to whether other people will will like the new
you. 100% as we wrap up, I'm curious if there's any big
misconceptions about personalityor changing your personality or
(37:08):
any of these like adjacent areasof personality psychology that
you want to debunk or that you hear and you're like, that is
just so off base. I don't understand why people
don't get this things of those kind of perspective.
Good question. Well, sometimes I hear like, oh,
is it because you don't like yourself?
But I actually think it's because you do like yourself
(37:29):
that you seek out new ways of living.
You know, when someone learns tocook delicious meals for
themselves, it's not because they're like, oh, I hate you
like, you know what I mean? Like it's, you want to like
nourish your body and eat something delicious.
It's and then similarly, learning these new skills can
help you live better. And so it's like a sign of self
(37:50):
love to me to want to to try some of these things out.
Yeah, I did an episode a while back and we talked about how
when someone's really strugglingand you're their only source of
support, yes, you are like theirfriend and you're giving them a
positive in their life and you're doing them a disservice
if they're not also getting likeprofessional evidence based
(38:13):
support. And I think it's the same thing
for yourself. Like yes, you can be happy with
who you are and want better for yourself.
Like you might be doing yourselfa disservice if you're
complacent with these different things that aren't necessarily
aligned with your long term goals or the life you want for
yourself. I definitely think that's also
something that I think we struggle with because there is
(38:34):
so much conversation about like self improvement and self help
and working towards a better version of yourself.
And this like shows up in so many different contexts, whether
it's like how we speak to ourselves or like the body
positivity movement. And it's like, do we celebrate
the best parts of ourselves? Are we just completely content
and happy and accepting ourselves as aids?
Do we want better for for ourselves?
(38:55):
And it's like all of those things can be true.
And I think they're not mutuallyexclusive.
Like you can want better for yourself.
And like you mentioned as you worked on neuroticism, give
yourself grace for where you're at now.
And also celebrate these things that you really do appreciate
and are doing well and want to continue to do in your life,
which I think it's really cool that it doesn't have to be
(39:16):
mutually exclusive or changing something.
Does it mean that you hate the current version?
Absolutely, yeah. We're not about all or nothing
thinking because that would be anti and anti psychology, as you
know, yes. Yes, last question, if you were
thinking about like Gen. Z as a whole and you wish they
knew something about personalitychange or personality in
general, what advice would you give?
(39:37):
Because we're going into many, many, many years ahead of us
where we'll change our personalities, intentionally or
not. I feel like this is now a
stereotype, and I don't even know if this is true of Gen.
Z anymore, but I feel like, OK, the stereotype that people of my
age have about Gen. Z is that they're like too
digitally, They're very digitally savvy, but they're
like too digitally savvy. Like they rely too much on.
(40:00):
Digital technology and like phones and.
AI, the MIT study that came out a couple of days ago.
No, I did. What did it say?
It's saying that like it's getting totally skewed out of
proportion. And it's saying that, like using
AI for everything is like showing in brain scans that
you're stunting growth. And like, that's not actually
what the study says, but it's like very allied with that
(40:21):
misconception, but being too digital and not putting in the
work or doing the hard thing. Sure, I, I'm not like as
concerned about your brains or whatever, but like, I just
think, you know, to the extent possible, like as much as you
can get out and build real community with real people.
And like, yeah, not even for your brain or your career or
(40:42):
whatever, but just like, you know, touch grass and like you'd
have a basis in reality. It's important.
That would be my my only advice though I'm sure Gen.
Z is doing that. Please don't yell at me, I'm
just. We could be doing it more.
Giving my best advice. That I have.
No, I love it. It's, it's very funny how we do
all these studies and we like operationalize all these things
and we look at all the contributors and it's like
(41:03):
always relationships, it's always community that we're
surrounding ourselves with. And it's so, so, so important.
And it does get lost a lot of the times.
And so I think that reminder is,is really important for people
to internalize and use their personality to get that outcome
in their lives and and be surrounded by a good group of
people. Yeah, yeah, that's that's all I
got. I love it.
(41:24):
Well, if people want to read both your books, continue to to
consume your work. Follow along with articles
you're putting out. Where can they do?
That yeah. So my book is me, but better.
And then it's available whereverbooks are sold.
My previous book is called A Weird, and it's also available.
And you can follow my writing onpersonality@olgahazan.substack.com.
(41:45):
And I'm also a writer at The Atlantic Magazine.
And our URL is theatlantic.com. Amazing.
Well all of that will be in the show notes.
Thank you so much for taking thetime.
I'm so excited for everyone to listen to this and implement it
in their lives and experience the change themselves.
Yeah, thank you so much for having me on.
If you enjoyed this episode, if she persisted, make sure to
leave a review, subscribe and share with a friend or family
(42:07):
member. Follow along and at She Persist,
a podcast on TikTok, Instagram, YouTube and more for bonus
content. Thanks for listening and keep
persisting.
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