What is Identity
Do you know who you really are and what makes you think, behave and operate the way you do?
“Who am I? What is my identity?”
It is a simple question with complex answers. It is common for people to equate their personal identity to the work that they do or the positional title in an organisation. They may simply say “I am a director at ABC Company” or “I am an engineer”, but a person’s identity goes much deeper than physical attributes, wealth or achievements. The challenge of personal identity becomes more obvious when there are career changes, retrenchment or permanent retirement from the workforce. Would the answers to the questions about their identity change?
There is both an external and internal identity that every person possesses. The external identity can be observed by a person’s physical attributes such as the way they dress, relationships with other people and how they spend their time. Internal identity can be linked to strong personal values, beliefs and attitudes in life.
While some elements of a person’s identity are publicly transparent, there are other elements which can remain private, personal and not shared. We are constantly surprised to find out in the news about the secret scandals of public figures, the quiet charitable work of the wealthy and the unbelievable lives and achievements of normal everyday people.
A person’s identity is mostly consistent throughout their life and define who they really are on the inside, regardless of their role in society. People who have discovered and embraced their unique identities have lived authentic and fulfilling lives when they weave it with their passion, unique inborn talents and hard work.
Wouldn’t you like to learn more about who you really are today?
Power of Self-Awareness
Discovering your identity can be truly a liberating experience with many benefits. There are different elements to your identity, and it is important to invest your time to study them well. When you start uncovering the details of who you are, you become aware that you are uniquely gifted and positioned to accomplish incredible things. Being self-aware and having the discipline for self-management is a critical starting point for a successful life.
To begin your journey, explore your childhood formation years and understand how it affects your behaviour, resiliency and decision making today. Learn about your personality, your valuable strengths and perilous weaknesses; and how to leverage them in your life, relationship and community. Define values that resonates deeply and make them foundational anchors of your life.
Once you have gained a deeper insight of yourself, you will have the ability to recognise, understand and become cognizant of your personal idiosyncrasies, passions and motivations. You will appreciate your talents, competence and capacity. You will know how to leverage your personality’s strengths, minimise the impact of weaknesses and exercise mastery over your emotions. Build up mental fortitude, willpower and courage to relentlessly pursue your passions and achieve the success you deserve.
Catherine Beard (The Blissful Minds) shared 10 reasons why self-awareness is your greatest asset:
- You know your strengths and weaknesses.
- You are conscious of your emotions and how you react to them.
- You know what motivates you.
- You are aware of how you come across to others.
- You know what your values are.
- You trust your intuitions.
- You notice when you have unkind thoughts.
- You understand that your perspective frames your beliefs.
- You know what you need to change.
- You are mindful of your actions.
Uncover Your Past
A well to do gentleman was once asked why he would deliberately buy and eat stale food well past its expiry date. He explained that he had suffered greatly from hungry and a lack of food as a child during the second world war. Those memories and fear drive his current behaviour now, even in his eighties. Although he does not lack money or resources in the present, he felt as a duty that he must never waste food.
While some behaviours from our childhood can be good and necessary, some behaviours can also be undesirable and unhealthy.
The CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, USA) conducted a study into Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) and found links of childhood trauma that resulted in social and emotional problems as well as chronic diseases people develop as adults. To create awareness into this issue, the ACE Test was created to provide a guide for people to understand why their childhood experiences can impact their future.
To complement this study and to offer more context, health advocates, psychologist and paediatricians developed a questionnaire to measure resiliency with the scoring system modelled after the ACE Test. The resiliency test is designed to prompt reflections and conversations on experiences that may protect people from developing negative behaviours.
What you may have experienced in your childhood can affect your thinking, decisions and outlook in life.
To find out more, you can take these free tests to uncover buried events in your past that may be playing a pivoting role in your life right now.
Take the ACE/ RESILIENCY Test now (Link to ACE/Resiliency Test Page.)
Discover Your Personality
Why do you relate and work very well with some people while you have constant conflicts with others? Why do you feel that some people are so engaging and fun whiles others are so irritating and insensitive? How do you think other people view you? What is their opinion of you?
If you find all this confusing and perplexing, you are not alone. You are simply dealing with different personality types and their associated behaviours.
Every person has a distinctive and unique personality. There is usually a prominent personality and a secondary personality in everyone. Some personality types work well together while others may be fraught with conflicts and disagreements. You may find that your personality type makes it easy for you to get along and work with one colleague but difficult and hard to work with another. Because we are all so different, it will not be possible to get along perfectly and work with everyone well all the time.
The great news is, knowing about the different types of personality can be enlightening and highly rewarding. Once you understand yourself better, you will begin to observe and understand others as well. You can find ways to adapt your personality type and working style to others, communicate more clearly and handle conflicts more effectively. You can learn to make better decisions.
There are different psychometric profiling tests to measure personalities and behaviour, but you do not need an in-depth study of yourself in order to make a change or create positive impact. Simply become more self-aware and be respectful to those people who are different from you.
We are all born with a personality type and this will develop and evolve slightly over time. Celebrate and appreciate our human diversity. There is so much to learn and appreciate from each other. Different personality types can bring strength, new ideas and excitement into your life or team.
We would love to help you discover your personality today!
Click on the link to take a personality test and discover more about the most important person, you. (Link to Personality with Test Page.)
Start Your Journey Here
We have free resources on this website that can help you get started on your journey of identity discovery today. As you discover more about yourself, you will gain a better understanding of who you are, your passion and giftings, and what you were meant to achieve in your life.
We look forward to hearing about your success stories soon!