A “Deep Review” of Florence Littauer’s Your Personality Tree
This month I will continue my series of “deep reviews” of books on personality and temperament theory. My method is to discuss not only what each book contains, but my personal reaction to the principles it covers and the examples used to illustrate the main points. Previous reviews in this series include Florence Littauer’s Personality Plus and Marita Littauer’s Wired That Way. You can find them at http://newbeginningsmarriage.org/Articles.html, http://lawrencejclark.blogspot.com/, and http://www.amazon.com.
Since I had read and reviewed Personality Plus and Wired That Way, Part I of Your Personality Tree was mostly review material. After that, the most useful sections for me were chapters 5, “What Gets You Depressed?” and 6, “Are You Wearing a Mask?”
I wish I had read Chapter 5 eighteen years ago when I was in the midst of divorce. If you haven’t read my previous reviews, my personality blend is Powerful Choleric/Popular Sanguine. As a Choleric, I was depressed because my life was out of control. My wife was divorcing me, and I could not understand why she would do such a thing. I had done everything I could to be a good husband and father, I was absolutely faithful, and I was neither verbally nor physically abusive. She said she simply didn’t want to be married to me anymore, and that she felt she could have a better life on her own. As a Sanguine, I was depressed because my wife no longer gave me the attention I craved, my jokes were no longer funny to her, and life with her constant criticism and negative attitude was not much fun at all.
It took me over a year after the divorce to finally seek therapy, but by that time I was in such bad shape that I was considered clinically depressed and was put on medication. If I had understood more about my own and my ex-wife’s temperaments, I might not have spent so much time blaming myself for her choice to initiate the divorce.
Chapter 6 helped me to more fully understand the concept of masking. I could see how I had spent several years wearing a Melancholy mask of perfectionism in an attempt to first please my stepfather when I was a child, then my ex-wife when I was an adult. I could really identify with Florence’s example of living for fifteen years masking as a Melancholy/Phlegmatic at home while living out her true Sanguine/Choleric in the public eye. Even after my divorce I continued to exhibit this pattern in other relationships. I am thankful to say that I have now overcome this issue, which was the root cause of much of my depression, and have not taken any anti-depressant medication for the past twelve years.
Part II of Your Personality Tree was very enlightening. It showed me how my personality has been shaped by the traits I have inherited. In my case, doing the family tree exercise was a little tricky, since I grew up with a stepfather and did not meet my biological father until I was twenty years old. It has been interesting, though, to see how many traits I inherited from his side of the family, even though I wasn’t around to experience them during my formative years. Since I was “grafted” into the Clark family at only 18 months of age, though, I can see many personality traits that I have inherited from that side of the family.
This section also helped me to understand each of my parents and their parents better, and looking around at assorted aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces and nephews, etc., I can see how these personality traits are passed down from generation to generation.
Another interesting thing I learned from this section was how the different personalities interact with and react to each other. For example, one of my uncles is a Powerful Choleric, as was his father. When I was a child, I was intimidated and often bullied by this particular family member. Although I am a Choleric/Sanguine, I now intentionally mask a Phlegmatic personality when I am around him so that we can get along better. I understand that there is no way he is going to change his personality, so if I want to have fun (Sanguine need), I am willing to give up control (Choleric need) for a short time whenever we visit.
An excellent line that I read in Chapter 7 was, “You will then find the reasons for reactions your mate has that have nothing to do with your behavior.” Florence was giving advice to someone trying to understand the spouse’s family personality tree. Later in the chapter she discusses two main benefits from exploring the personality tree: 1) to see where we’ve come from and why we are the way we are, and 2) we’ll be aware of what we are passing on to our children. These are extremely important concepts that I plan to emphasize when doing seminars for married couples.
The two chapters on parenting and discovering the personalities of our children were also helpful. My two older children are now grown, but I can see how they each have their own personality traits. My oldest daughter is a Popular Sanguine/Powerful Choleric; she is a social butterfly but is also internally driven to achieve goals, but often masks Melancholy traits due to the influence of her mother. My son, who is a junior in college, is a Popular Sanguine/Peaceful Phlegmatic who manages to charm his way into getting what he wants and is more than happy to sit back and let others do most of the work. My youngest daughter, who is not quite a teenager, is also a Popular Sanguine/Peaceful Phlegmatic.
Part III of this book was the most difficult section for me to read. After I accepted Christ and began attending a Christian college at age twenty, I thought all my problems were solved. I felt that since I was a new creature in Christ, all of the physical and emotional difficulties I faced as a child would disappear. I tried to live my life modeled after the Beatle’s lyrics, “All you need is love.” What I didn’t understand until a dozen years later was that my in-born Sanguine/Choleric temperament had been constantly squashed down by those I was close to.
Reading this section brought up a lot of difficult memories and people from my past, but it also helped me to understand who these people were and, by exploring their family’s personality trees, figure out why they acted the way they did. They were not born with a mission to abuse and destroy Lawrence J. Clark; they just were the way they were (and are). This realization helped me to forgive them for their past actions, and also to understand how I masked my true personality while around them; now, though, thanks to Florence Littauer and her book, Your Personality Tree, I have the knowledge and the freedom to let my true personality shine through!
