how much can people change?
When I was a kid, I stumbled through the door of my house one afternoon, distraught. Something had happened at school. Maybe one kid had punched another on the bus or the classmate everyone knew was cheating had finally been caught. I don’t remember the inciting incident from that day, but my mother will be pleased to hear that I very much remember what she told me.
As mothers are wont to do, mine gave me encouragement in the form of a warning. “Be careful how you act,” she said, “because people don’t change that much as they get older.”
My mom has lived in the same town most of her life. When she goes to work or church or the grocery store, she’s likely to run into adults she babysat when she was twelve or sat behind in math class when she was sixteen. She still gets together with college friends every month. In her experience, most people remain remarkably consistent over the years. The financial advertisements warn us that past performance isn’t any indicator of future results, but that student who cheated on a fourth-grade math test isn’t someone my mom wants doing her taxes decades later.
And yet.
A few years ago, I bumped into a woman at the farmers’ market I went to high school with. I hadn’t seen her in more than ten years. She was with her husband and new baby, enjoying a leisurely weekend away from her bustling pediatrics practice, though she spent a good deal of her time volunteering at the free medical clinic downtown. My high school yearbook wasn’t big on handing out superlatives, but I never would have expected that she would have had the discipline to become a pediatrician, or any kind of professional. Or that she would have turned into the sort of person who wakes up before dawn on a Saturday to go to the farmers’ market. I couldn’t tell you exactly what sort of person that is, but I was sure she wasn’t it. In high school, she hadn’t been in college-track classes. She was almost kicked out of school after an especially, um, exciting spring break trip. And the last time I’d really thought about her was during our junior year, after she spent an evening pretending to be me and prank calling boys. (Thankfully, her cover was blown because one of these boys’ homes had a nifty new service called “caller ID.”) No one had expected her to go to college, let alone become a pillar of the community.
My mom was right: in many ways, people don’t change much over time. But my high school acquaintance’s transformation is not an isolated event, either. What’s going on here?
In this chapter, we’ll explore what about us can’t be changed much and what can be changed a lot—and how to make that change happen if we want to.
Personality Change versus Behavioral Change
We’ve looked at several personality frameworks in this book, which all capture a different aspect of our more-or-less hardwired traits, the ones that are extremely difficult to change even if we want to. Over time, our MBTI and Enneagram types are expected to remain stable. Our love language and our strengths on the StrengthsFinder assessment are too. Highly sensitive children become highly sensitive adults. Over time, these things change a little, but they don’t change much. They’re part of us, like our height or our shoe size. These are fitting comparisons, because even these things change under the right circumstances, like aging or pregnancy, but they still don’t change much.
While our personality markers don’t change dramatically, they aren’t static, either. Research predicts how we’ll change over time. With more maturity and life experience, most of us become more conscientious and empathetic—without any conscious effort. Many studies have demonstrated that most adults become more agreeable and emotionally resilient as they age.1 People also generally become slightly more introverted as they get older. These personality changes are incremental—and gradual.
However, that doesn’t mean we can’t change much; after all, our personalities are only one part of what makes us who we are. Our personalities may be resistant to change, but our behaviors are significantly more pliable. Understanding our personalities makes it significantly easier to change the things within our grasp. This is the whole point of studying the various frameworks! Some people resist personality frameworks because they say such frameworks put them in a box. I’ve found that understanding my personality helps me step out of the box I’m trapped in. When I understand myself, I can get out of my own way.
The Foundations to Change
How We See Ourselves
“I’m the kind of person who _____” is a powerful phrase, no matter what goes in that blank. Our identities evolve as we move through life. Sometimes this happens without our even noticing. Sometimes we consciously choose to see ourselves in a new way. Consider the new Christian who describes their conversion as taking on a new identity in Christ. Or the new mother whose identity profoundly shifts with the birth of her baby.
How do you see yourself? Who are you at your core? Our answers to these questions profoundly change our thoughts and our actions.
Psychologist Scott Barry Kaufman points out that when our identities shift, even our scoring on key personality traits is affected. Not radically, but it does impact the scoring. He writes, “As someone becomes more invested in a job, they often become more conscientious; likewise, when someone becomes more invested in a long-term relationship, they tend to become more emotionally stable and have higher self-esteem.”2 If we want to implement successful changes in our lives, how we think about ourselves matters. “I’m the kind of person who ______.” What goes in that blank for you?
Our potential to change depends a great deal on whether we believe we can change. In other words, if we want to grow and change as individuals, we have to be the kind of people who believe we can. For decades, psychologist Carol Dweck has been studying what she calls “mindset,” a simple belief that guides a large part of our lives.3
As she sees it, people approach life in one of two ways. Some people believe our characteristics are carved in stone: we have to play the hand we’re dealt. These people believe everyone was born with a certain amount of skill, or quality, or intelligence, and these things can’t be changed. The die has already been cast; our abilities are static. Dweck calls this a “fixed mindset.” If this is you, the cards in your hand determine your destiny.
Others believe that the hand we’re dealt is just a starting point. They believe people can change over time, improving their natural skills, talents, and abilities through deliberate effort and purposeful engagement. Dweck calls this a “growth mindset.” If this is you, your cards are a starting point.
Our mindsets profoundly affect the way we live our lives, and—unlike the frameworks in this book—when it comes to mindset, one option is better than the other. In fact, my friend Paige recently broke up with her boyfriend—who she had once thought was “the one”—because of their differing mindsets. Although Paige had never heard of Carol Dweck, her account of the breakup could have been lifted from the pages of Dweck’s excellent book Mindset.4
If you have a fixed mindset, you see yourself as either smart or not. You’re either funny or you’re not. You don’t see yourself as the kind of person who can change. And when you meet someone and fall in love, that relationship is either good or it’s not. You believe that if something doesn’t come easily—a job, a skill, a romantic relationship—you should let it go.
Paige’s boyfriend had a fixed mindset, while she had a growth mindset and couldn’t see a future with a person who didn’t believe he could change. (Or perhaps she could envision it just fine and found the idea distasteful.) The research backs Paige up on this. Any relationship expert will admit that a committed long-term relationship is a whole lot of work, and even the best relationships don’t come easily. A growth mindset frees us to make an honest assessment and then do something about it.
Marriage expert John Gottman says emotionally intelligent couples understand that the negative stuff is a fact of life in any relationship. In fact, he believes most marital arguments aren’t solvable, because “most . . . disagreements are rooted in fundamental differences of lifestyle, personality, or values.”5 Gottman believes we grow in our relationships by reconciling our differences, not fixing them. Only a growth mindset makes this possible.
Remember “goodness of fit” in parenting from chapter 5? A fixed mindset says we get what we get. We hope for the best and play the hand we’re dealt. But a growth mindset says that goodness of fit isn’t something we’re assigned; it’s something we create. Which mindset would you rather see in your parents, partner, or sibling?
To a large extent, our mindsets determine the quality of our friendships. When we don’t feel we need to prove that we’re worth something—whether to ourselves or to others—we’re free to appreciate other people for who they are. We don’t need to belittle them or compete with them to make ourselves feel better. We can encourage one another to grow—in the way that’s right for us, and for them.
In 1943, Winston Churchill famously said that “we shape our buildings and afterwards our buildings shape us.”6 He was speaking of the British parliamentary Commons Chamber. The shape of the building represented—and thereafter influenced—the shape of the country’s government. The same can be said of our lives. We structure our lives how we will; we plot our schedules and fall into rhythm, choose friends and spouses and careers, move into homes, cities, neighborhoods. We shape our lives—and then they shape us.
Gretchen Rubin devoted her book Better Than Before to an in-depth study of habits, which she calls “the invisible architecture of everyday life.”7 In the book, Rubin pinpoints four habits as “foundation habits.” These are sleep, move, eat and drink right, and unclutter. These four habits disproportionately affect our well-being and directly strengthen our self-control, so changing them makes it much easier to implement any change we want to make.8
Motivational speaker Jim Rohn made headlines when he asserted that we become like the five people we spend the most time with. We choose our friends and companions, and then they shape us.9 When we seek out people who are kind, conscientious, and empathetic—which, incidentally, are key predictors of success in life and marriage—we become more kind, conscientious, and empathetic ourselves.
The reverse is also true. This is elegantly observed by Emma Woodhouse in Jane Austen’s Emma. Mr. Elton is a handsome and ambitious young vicar who is quite charming when he wants to be. After marrying a wealthy but vain woman, Mr. Elton changes—and not for the better. Emma cuttingly observes, “He always was a small man, made smaller by his wife!”10 The line draws knowing laughs from readers—it’s funny because it’s true.
In her fascinating book Rapt, Winifred Gallagher tells the story of how her cancer diagnosis led to a powerful lesson in mindset. Gallagher decided she could spend the months—and possibly years—of her cancer treatment focusing on the grim diagnosis, or she could purposefully shift her attention to the happier things in her life. She was surprised to discover that when she deliberately focused on the good stuff, she was actually very happy most of the time. She’s convinced this was possible only because of her mental vigilance. She writes, “It’s about treating your mind as you would a private garden and being as careful as possible about what you introduce and allow to grow there.”11
We are constantly evolving products of the influences we take into our brains. What we look at, what we long for—to a large extent, this is exactly who we become. The foundational habits we adopt, the people we hang out with, the thoughts we dwell on—these all greatly impact the kinds of people we are and the kinds of people we become, as well as how we change and how much.
Insights that Can Lead to Change
The words of Reinhold Niebuhr’s now-famous serenity prayer spring to mind:
God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,
the courage to change the things I can,
and the wisdom to know the difference.
I’ve found that personality insights help me see what changes need to be made, why those changes are necessary, and how to carry them out. Learning more about personality has helped me make peace with the way I was made (even though some days I’d rather trade myself in for a different model). It has helped me understand the people I love, live with, and work with, and it has helped me accept the way they were made, which is to say, differently from me.
It’s given me the courage to change the things I can (often, the most important thing I’m changing is my own mind) while accepting the things I cannot (my immutable personality traits). I’m still learning how to discern the difference, but I do know that thanks to my decade-plus study of personality rubrics, I am now much better at this than I was when I started.
When I first began learning about personality as a teenager, I didn’t know how to approach or use this information. I barely had enough self-awareness to determine my type—no matter the framework—let alone put it to work in my life. I might as well have been asking BuzzFeed which Jane Austen leading man I should marry, for all the good it did me.
I’ve learned a lot since then. I know now that, no matter how much I wish it to be otherwise, parts of me are resistant to change. I’ll always be tall, with blue eyes and big feet. Just as surely, I will always be introverted and right-brained, and I’ll always need to be a tiny bit more mindful of my personal boundaries than the average woman. I’ll struggle with decisions when I get overwhelmed. I’ll never love loud music or large crowds. But these things don’t define me; they don’t determine much of what I can and can’t do. My personality traits don’t determine my destiny, but they inform it, and I’ve accepted that.
I’ve never made a decision based strictly on my personality type. I’ve never felt that my personality determined my calling. But I’ve gained a great deal of self-awareness over the years—aided in large part by the personality frameworks in this book—and this self-awareness has empowered me to make better decisions about my life, my relationships, and my work. My personality isn’t a limiting label; instead, understanding my personality has blown my possibilities wide open.
Because I understand myself better, I can navigate the world a little better. I’ve learned how to get out of my own way. My old blind spots don’t trip me up nearly as often as they used to. Because I know how I’m likely to go off the rails, it’s easier for me to stay on the tracks. This knowledge has vastly improved my self-management and done wonders for my relationships with my friends and family. I don’t feel boxed in by my personality; instead, understanding myself has taught me how to open the box and step out of it.
My personality doesn’t prescribe my actions, but it does help me thoughtfully consider them in a way I couldn’t before. If my personality is the lens through which I see the world, then I’ve learned to look at it instead of just through it. I’ve learned to notice where it’s serving me well and where it’s stirring up trouble. I’ve become better at noticing how my lens differs from other people’s lenses and what kinds of communication breakdowns are likely to result. And then I’ve learned how to deal with them.
Far from taking away my agency, understanding personality has helped me make smart, informed decisions about my life.
Ready to Climb out of Your Box?
Self-discovery and self-formation are lifelong processes. No one is ever going to have all the answers. We’re not going to complete the task of reaching emotional or spiritual maturity, but if we can make substantial progress on the journey, we’re doing pretty well.
As I told you in the introduction, I’m not a scholar. I’m a fellow traveler who’s found some useful maps and is happy to pass them along to her companions on the road. They can’t take you where you need to go—that’s still up to you—but they can make the journey much easier. It’s not exactly an easy road we’re on. I know I’ll take all the help I can get.
Truly knowing yourself is one of the hardest things you can do, but it’s also one of the most valuable. The sooner you begin, the sooner you’ll begin to see the payoff.
Today’s a great day to start the journey. If you haven’t already, pick a framework—any framework—from this book and dig in. Take the assessment. Make a plan to follow up. Check out one of the resources for further reading at the back of this book. And get ready to climb out of your box.