Prior to our recovery it was hard to tell or distinguish the type of person we were and the personality type that drives us. As we pursue recovery and gain clarity a personal direction from our personality type comes through. From a psychology standpoint, a personality is defined as who we are on a physical, mental, emotional, and social level. When we further understand our predominant personality trait we can strengthen the positive aspects and even negate or turn the negative aspects of that personality trait. It is very important for me to understand how those four aspects on the physical, mental, emotional and social aspects of who I am work together to define me as a person. Most of us have a dominant personality type with characteristics of the others. There are many studies on this that you can find online. I will provide the link where I found much of today’s content at the end of this blog. To simplify things, we will look at personality types A, B, C and D.
Type A is defined as the go-getter, Type B is relaxed and social Type C is the rule abiding perfectionist and D is considered distressed and sensitive to others. Each one of these has both positive and negative to it even though a couple of them appear to be negative. Finding which one you are can be as simple as taking one of the numerous evaluations online. They may not be 100% accurate but they may give you an indication as to where you are predominant in your personality.
- Type A people are very prone to be high achievers. They can be very competitive and are usually well organized. They seem to be very aware of their surroundings and because of that they love to set goals as they even push outside of their comfort zones. On the surface that sounds great and it often is. The same people can be workaholics and tend to unreasonably push themselves with deadlines. A positive note is they want others to achieve as well and so they are often eager to help others. One of the downsides is that they often overextend themselves and can become anxious and even more stressed
- Type B personality is the opposite of Type A. This group of people tend to be more relaxed they are more consistent across the board and basically more steady or even keeled. They seem to enjoy what they do and because they approach their personal life in a more relaxed fashion they tend to have a calming influence on other people. They are also well grounded in their life and they tend to be more tolerant. Mostly they are overall happywith their life and emotionally stable. Unlike their counterpart, Type A people they will not always achieve their full potential because they tend to be less ambitious and often procrastinate and leave things up to the last minute.
- Type C’s are very like Type A, but what separates them is their personal perfectionism. They tend to spend more time on details, and instead of trusting their work they will check it several times for accuracy. They are not as organized as Type A people, so they will not be as aware of time and therefore what they need to do takes more time than necessary. They willi not be as efficient. Type C people are very consistent, reliable and it would bother them to bend or break the rules. They are happy to follow the rules and the work that they perform will be within those rules/guidelines. Type C people are best when they study and learn one subject, rather than being good in lots of areas. They preferred to be an expert in one or two areas.
- Type D personalities are considered distressed and sensitive to others. This personality type tends to lean toward negativity. Even though the D stands for distressed, Type D people have many positive aspects. This class a person tends to be peaceful on the outside and sensitive to the emotions of others. They are also considered to be very warm. They tend to be more realistic and seem to be resilient to things going on around them. They are helpers and enjoy the opportunity to give advice. Type D personalities are people who can be a great source of wisdom to other people. The distressed and negative side comes from there worrying and tendency to be pessimistic and gloomy about various occasions in life. These are people who would benefit from learning how to visualize the right way. It would help bring them balance.
Regardless of what personality type you are there is a positive and negative side. I suggest you continue to do your own personal research and find where you tend to be. It is often interesting to enlist others and ask them their view of what personality type you lean toward. Once you have done that, apply those positive traits to your personal recovery.
Robert Pardon
Robert is the Recovery Guy. Getting clean and sober on April 25, 1986 has given me the insight and practical skill set to not only stay sober, but to also re-invent myself to the person I always wanted to become. Showing others how to do this is my life goal.
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