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Can You Change Your Personality?
That depends on your definition of personality and what it looks like to change it
One of the questions I get asked the most as an MBTI specialist is whether personality can change over time. I always give the same answer: both yes and no. Allow me to elaborate.
The Big Five vs. Myers-Briggs
There are two main theories I’ve contended with over the years:
- The Big Five
- The MBTI (Myers-Briggs)
People often argue over which theory is more “accurate”. But I don’t think this is the right question to be asking. I think it depends on the context. Both these theories are useful in their own settings, as I will talk about in this post.
People also tend to write the MBTI off as being too rigid, as “putting people in a box”, and as not accounting for the change in individuals over time. This is an issue with the way the MBTI is usually shown by popular sites such as 16 personalities. In this post, I will address why the MBTI is more open to the changing traits of the individual than you might initially think (but also, not in the way you would think).
