Happy Friday! I hope you had a good week and you are prepared for the weekend! It has been a crazy long week and I am thankful the week is finally over. How was your week? Today, I am not doing my normal Friday post because I wanted to write about something that I found interesting and hope you do as well. Sometimes I just enjoying writing about things I think are fascinating and different than the normal.

We are living in a world that has eight billion people, all of which have different and unique personality traits. I find most of these personality traits intriguing and want to learn and understand them better. With the various types of traits, there are, I find it challenging to comprehend several of these traits because they are the exact opposite of who I am. Before I explain the personality traits I cannot understand, I want to discuss how we develop our personalities. Are they something that is ingrained in us since we were young or do are personalities continue to develop throughout our lives? Do our personalities have anything to do with how we were raised? Do past experiences alter who we are in life and therefore affect our personality?

Before I continue to write and you take the time to read, there is something important I need you to understand. Please be advised that I am not a medical professional or psychologist, so all the information I am providing is from research I have done to further my understanding. The information in the rest of this post is not meant to be professional or expert advice, but just some amateur knowledge I have obtained. I have always found psychology interesting and exciting to learn. Personalities can be fascinating and the development of them is beneficial to understand why people behave the way they do.

According to social cognitive theory, our personality development occurs by observing the behaviors of others. Psychologists believe our personalities get better over time and refer to this as “the maturity principle”. As time passes, we become more extroverted, emotionally stable, agreeable, and conscientious as we age. We are not born with a personality, but our experiences in life, education, and environment help to mold aspects of our personality. Our genes and parents do play a role in our personality as well, but not entirely.

Psychologists have determined that those that display positive personality traits, such as kindness, honesty, caring, reliability, responsible, loyal, strong, and resilience have developed habitual responses that have remained permanent. The good news is, habits can be learned, so simply altering your habitual responses over time is an amazing way to create a change in your personality.

The personality traits that I will never understand are those that are considered negative. People can be pessimistic at times because of bad events that occurred in their life, but most can snap out of this when life gets better for them. I think it is exhausting to be around someone who is constantly pessimistic throughout their entire life and always sees the glass as half empty. Unfortunately, you can try helping these individuals view things differently, but many times you cannot fix their perception of issues in life. Personally, I do not judge anyone based on anything besides how they treat others. I would like to think we are all just human beings trying our best to survive in this crazy world and should be thought of as equals.

I try to avoid dishonest people, which seems to be a trait of all politicians possess. I would guess this is the main reason I do not like politics. You never can be sure when politicians are being truthful. Once someone lies and loses our trust, it is extremely difficult and sometimes impossible to regain. Another trait many people seem to have nowadays is manipulative qualities. I would almost put these traits in a similar category. Manipulative people are being dishonest. Manipulative people try to play on another person’s emotions, get frustrated and impatient easily, tend to be the ones that will make plans, and they do not listen without interrupting.

Lastly, one of the main personality traits I do not understand is narcissism. Narcissistic people tend to have an inflated sense of self-importance, have a sense of entitlement, require constant and excessive admiration, expect to be recognized as superior even without achievements that would warrant it, and exaggerate their achievements and or talents. This type of person lacks empathy for others when they are struggling.

After reading this, are there any personality traits you find difficult to understand and may try avoiding those with the traits? Do you have ways to tolerate people with personality traits you do not understand or care for? Do you know what type of personality traits you have and are proud of?

Thank you for visiting my site today. I hope you enjoyed what I shared, and it helped you understand the development of personality traits. I hope you have had a good week and you are looking forward to the weekend. This week has been much cooler, so my body is learning to adjust. The cooler weather has definitely created a lot more pain. Thankfully, the space heater I have under my desk and the heating pad helps a lot! I am looking forward to reading your comments and promise to respond as quickly as possible. Please never forget that I am always sending y’all LOTS of love, comfort, support, and MANY positive vibes!

Always, Alyssa