Personality Type

I recently took the Myers Briggs Personality Test and learned that my personality type is "The Caregiver". When I had first read through all of the sixteen personality types, I was not able to choose one that I thought described me. There were several that I thought might relate to my personality, so I was very curious. Before taking the test, I was very uncertain as to whether I was an introvert or extrovert. While we were discussing both of these personality types in class, I was thinking to myself that I possessed traits in both categories. While I enjoy being by myself at times and enjoying quiet and peaceful relaxation, I also enjoy being around people and I feel comfortable in crowds and talking in front of people. The test revealed that I most often lean toward an extrovert personality, but my preference for it was only one percent! So I think my observation was correct; I seem to have attributes to both personalities.

My personality type is ESFJ: extroverted, sensing, feeling, judging, or as the description points out, extroverted feeling with introverted sensing.The personality description definitely fits my character traits, especially the part about being good at reading other people's thoughts and emotions without them saying anything to me. Another interesting part of the description was that ESFJ's prefer order and structure to their environment rather than abstract and theoretical ideas. This is very true of me, as evidenced by the fact that I do not enjoy or understand poetry that is not to be taken in the literal sense.

The word "judging" in my personality trait seems quite harsh, especially since I have a 78% preference for it, but as we discussed in class, judging does not have to be a bad thing. Judging may be along the lines of being able to look at a problem and judge the ways in which the best decision can be made. The character description explains it as being able to judge others to get information about them, but then turn it into supportive judgments.

My favorite phrase in the character description was that ESFJ's "have a strong focus on the details of life." This is extremely descriptive of me. I have heard countless times how surprised people are when I remember tiny details of an instance that happened months ago. I am very in tune with my surroundings. This test gave me a greater understanding of why my personality is the way it is, and what my strengths and weaknesses are.