What does your personality type mean about you?

Your personality type, what does it mean about you?

Some people really hate personality-type systems. They don’t like to feel like they can be explained or predicted or boxed.

Neither do we.

Our idea of personality types is different. Because the way we see personality, is that it is nothing to do with you.

The Enneagram personality-type system boxes people into only 9 types.

But wait, didn’t God create us all to be unique and special?

Absolutely! So what went wrong?

God did not create you with a personality type. Your “type” is a result of sin.

Now, yes, there’s an unresolvable debate about whether nature or nurture plays more of a role in personality, but according to the Bible, either works. We were sinful at birth, even in the womb (Psalm 51:5).

And while YOU are a uniquely created, unboxable being, SIN manifests in a finite series of options. Each ‘personality type’ is simply a manifestation of sin in a particular way that leads to a predictable series of responses from you.

Much less than a description of who you are, it is a description of the coping strategy you have chosen to deal with the pain that has resulted from sin. What’s more, it is a (pitiful) defence against the lie of Satan. People will not love you unless… God will not love you unless… That’s what he’s whispering. And in an effort to deserve that love, as a child you chose a coping strategy. One that seemed at the time to work. and so you’ve practiced it over and over again, until it seems like it’s a part of you.

1. People will not love me unless I do things the right way.
2. People will not love me unless I help them.
3. People will not love me, unless I impress them.
4. People will not love me, unless I stand out from them.
5. People will not love me, unless I am intelligent enough.
6. People will not love me, unless I support them.
7. People will not love me, unless I am fun to be around.
8. People will not love me, unless I make them.
9. People will not love me, unless I let them have their way.

This strategy does not define you. All it does is lead to a series of predictable responses and repetitive interactions.

You know those fights you’ve been having for years? They always go the same way. You can almost predict exactly what your partner is going to do or say in those moments. And no matter how much you hate it, you know that you’re going to do what you always do.

The good news is, that freedom is possible. All that strategy is, is a response to a lie. God will not love me, unless…”

It starts with acceptance. God loves you, regardless.

“I have loved you, my people, with an everlasting love.
With unfailing love I have drawn you to myself.
I will rebuild you, my virgin Israel.
You will again be happy
and dance merrily with your tambourines.

Jeremiah 31:3-4

There is nothing you can do to earn or deserve that love. With total acceptance of this, comes freedom to respond. Freedom of choice is one of our most defining features of humanity. It’s what Jesus came to die for. To set you free from the box you created for yourself, and to return to you – total freedom of choice.

Think of the risk God took in doing this. The box you chose tied you to him. You were stuck in an infinite loop of trying to please him. But now, you are set free. Free to choose him. Or not to. Total freedom. Freedom that no personality type system can predict with it’s 9 Enneagram, 16 Myer-Briggs, or Big 5 types.

If you want to be set free from those cyclical fights you’ve been having with your partner, this is where it starts too. Choose to accept that your partner loves you for who you really are, not because you “make” them by running your coping patterns. Choose to accept that you are loved regardless, and respond with freedom. See beyond their coping strategies to the broken heart beneath that is looking for unconditional love. Respond with freedom.

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