Individual Development, EQ, Jung, Pearman Personality Integrator

“Won’t this be confusing to people who have learned about their type as a four letter code?,” was the question put to me as I was talking about the Pearman Personality Integrator.   Of course, there are loads of assumptions and questions behind this question which are worth considering if you want to approach psychological type from a different frame. Let’s celebrate the use of well developed and substantial self-awareness strategies that invite an individual to consider how he or she behaves and affects the world around them.  And, most importantly, let’s celebrate any self-awareness strategy that enhances how an individual perceives and judges events in everyday life. The four letter code produced by the MBTI ® and similar tools approach psychological type from a very specific perspective.  Keep in mind that the assessment tools are NOT the same thing as Jung’s theory of psychological types. The four letter code tools seek to provide a fundamental sort between...

A Growthful Conversation One of the many splendid outcomes of Carol Dweck’s work on Fixed and Growth mindsets is that she provided guidance as to what these are all about and how to shift the perspective.  She points out that a “fixed” mindset is one where intelligence is perceived as fixed and so are other traits or qualities.  The view is you have a certain amount of an attribute and that’s what you have—-there isn’t any good reason to try to grow.  Challenges are avoided in that these may expose a ‘lack of the intelligence’ required. Effort is seen as fruitless. Getting things wrong and receiving feedback reveals limitations or problems that must be avoided.  A “growth” mindset seeks feedback because learning is assumed to be possible and achieved with effort; is patient with discomfort while learning; is more interested in learning than “checking the box”; enjoys complexity, and asks more questions than declares answers.  For sure, as Dweck notes, there...

Thinking—Logical, Analytical, and Outcome Oriented (or so the rumor goes) Ever wonder what all the fuss was about when it comes to being analytical?  Some folks are very basic in their use of thinking—-meaning they are quick to see gaps or problems and they think their job is done.  A more complex use of thinking is to begin with a perspective of multi-variate factors and exploring the underlying and intersecting systems in a situation.  It isn’t so much about finding the gaps as understanding the logic of factors, or as Jung put it, “following its own law s, [Thinking] brings the contents of ideation into conceptual connection with one another” (pp:830, page 481).  You have these ideas that you connect in a way that seems logical. Judging functions serve to provide a way to evaluate information and experiences so there is a basis for action or conclusion.  While the completeness and quality of all decisions begin with the kind of information that is u...

                                            What does empathy have to do with judgment?                                         A look at the engine of judgment: Thinking and Feeling. For many years I’ve had participants in psychological type workshops say to me, “How can Feeling be a rational judgment?”  “What does Feeling have to do with making decisions?”  “How is empathy related to making a choice or in judging something?”  When I’ve been with experienced long time consultant or facilitator users of psychological type assessments, I’ve asked the following and usually get silence in response:  “If Thinking is a rational judging process, how is Feeling rational?”  I’m willing to bet there are a number of readers of this blog who have had the ...

Patterns, Possibilities, Connected Dots, and Imagined Scenarios I suggested to a group recently that if we think about the four “portals” of perceiving as outlined by psychological type, we have four unique ways of “seeing experience.”  In one blog entry on the Sensing functions, I suggested that Extraverted and Introverted Sensing are by design “portals” on the tangible, concrete, and consensually verifiable in very different ways.  I want to explore the other “portals” related to the role of Intuiting in Extraverted and Introverted modalities.   As Jung noted, our type pattern has a way of being one-sided and prompting us to pay attention in one particular way.  Further, he pointed out that our challenge is to learn more about the other modes of perceiving and to learn to access them more consciously—which is what I hope the Pearman Integrator invites individuals to consider.  Jung called perceiving mental functions “irrational” by which he meant thes...

Reality is Here and Now, Proven There and Then It seems to me that Jung indicates that the mental functions of type operate in conscious, adaptive, and unconscious ways.  For example, we might force our mind’s eye to pay attention in a particular way (conscious) or might might find that we are naturally using a mental function to address a situation that has just emerged (adaptive).  At times we project meaning or perspectives on to a situation and only later on reflection realize the unconscious operation of a function was at work. Jung gave us a fabulous way to think about our personality intelligence by outlining ways of perceiving and judging our experience.  In the next four blogs, I want to simply explore the eight functions and their value to us through a variety of frames of reference.  Perceiving functions serve to provide information that is both actual and possible.  By their very definition, perceiving means receiving, taking in, and se...

“The measure of intelligence is the ability to change.”  ― Albert Einstein Using the Pearman FlexIndex Throughout my career as a coach and consultant, clients have shown me just how important flexibility is in dealing with challenges and in personal growth.  The research I completed using multiple variables with the database at the Center for Creative Leadership provided ample evidence that the more flexible individuals were consistently rated more effective by others and demonstrated both more resilience and use of capabilities. As a result of experiences with clients and research, I wanted to make sure that a new exploration of psychological type measured flexibility as related to the use of mental resources.  This insight is embedded in the Pearman Personality Integrator. Flexing in the use of your mental resources is essential to adapting to challenges appropriately and coping with the complex demands of modern life.  To flex you need to read what is...