The Identity Question: Who Am I?

"The Great Escape"--Illustration by the author

Who am I? Where did I come from? Where am I going? Why am I here?

These are questions often found on the short list of philosophy's big questions. From earliest times people have wrestled with these questions, debating--throughout the centuries--the ideas of previous thinkers.

Every aspect of what it means to be human has been debated. Do we have a soul? Some insist yes while others deny. Do we have free will? Most say yes, but again there are naysayers like Sam Harris who insist not.

My main point, which I will present in a minute, is that there is no fixed self, that who we are varies depending on circumstances, especially in our relation to others.

When you meet me in one setting, I may come across as an extrovert, confident and outgoing. In another setting you may find me quiet, self-conscious and even anxious. Am I one and not the other? Is one form of myself "me" and the other "not me"?

This is not to suggest that there is no real "I" or that I do not exist. I wouldn't be typing this if I didn't exist. But who are we precisely?

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25 years ago a company I worked for conducted a two-day workshop to help us understand our Myers-Briggs personality profiles, to help us better understand ourselves and our company co-workers. I found it personally helpful with many takeaways. One of these I discovered through the following experience.

Preceding the two day off-campus workshop we were each required to answer a bunch of questions which would be analyzed and used to help us understand our personality types. If you're unfamiliar with the 16 Myers-Briggs types, you can learn more at the Myers-Briggs Foundation website and even take the indicator test.

On the first day of the workshop they pulled ten of us out of the group and had us wait in the hall. Unbeknownst to us, we were the five most extroverted and five most introverted people in the company. The facilitator came and called five of the ten into the room. I was not in this first group.

After a few minutes, the facilitator retrieved myself and the other four from the hallway. We had no idea what this was going to be about, nor had we guessed that it was related to our being the extroverts.

We were seated at a table in the middle of the room, where the introverts had been seated before us, It was like a theater in the round, with everyone watching us as we faced one another. We were then given a problem to solve along with a two minute time limit (or some arbitrary amount of time.)

As we bandied about the problem--which may have been to come up with as many ways to cover a floor or fill a room, a problem with a variety of solutions--our co-workers watching us began laughing. Whatever we were doing was funny to them, but we stayed on task and grappled with the problem, throwing out ideas.

Afterwards, the facilitator stopped us, explained what was going on and why it was funny. We then discussed our own feelings about it.

Here's why it was so amusing to everyone. As extroverts we were all talking at once, in complete contrast to the introverts who had gone before. First off, the introverts were somewhat self-conscious being seated in the middle of the room with everyone watching them. They took turns talking, with thoughtful pauses between their offered up solutions. Nor were they loud.

The extroverts on the other hand were talking over one another, probably finishing one another's sentences. There was probably not a second of silence.

Quilt detail, Kathy McTavish design at JNG.

HOWEVER, there was another lesson from this experience, besides the comic contrast. Of the five most extroverted I was not the most or second most outgoing of the group. My score was either fourth or fifth, and here's what happened.

In the presence of these louder, more extroverted people than I, I ended up becoming quiet, behaving more like an introvert. I became uncomfortable. It felt unnatural.

And here's my point: Who I am is, to some degree, altered by the people I am with.

In a hundred different ways our behavior can be crimped or nurtured. We can be made to feel small and powerless or confident and strong, depending on the situations we are in, so that if someone makes a judgment about us based on a single encounter, they really don't know us at all.

All this to say that before we put other people in boxes and label them, let's remember that people are more complicated than that. I dislike being labeled as something I'm not. You probably do, too.

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PostScript: For the record, my MBTI was ENTP. What's yours?

The Power of Introverts

Years ago I saw an article in Sports Illustrated about a group of NFL football players who instead of partying or running around used to sit around or lie on the floor reading books. They were quiet. They were a little different from the blabbermouths. They were nicknamed "The Zeroes."

Interestingly enough, there's a popular new book (Jan 2012) that has quietly gathered a lot of attention for itself, aptly titled, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking. More than 1,100 people have reviewed the book, which I consider a good indicator of its popularity.

In an interview posted on Amazon.com author Susan Cain is asked why she wrote this book.

For the same reason that Betty Friedan published The Feminine Mystique in 1963. Introverts are to extroverts what women were to men at that time--second-class citizens with gigantic amounts of untapped talent. Our schools, workplaces, and religious institutions are designed for extroverts, and many introverts believe that there is something wrong with them and that they should try to “pass” as extroverts. The bias against introversion leads to a colossal waste of talent, energy, and, ultimately, happiness.

According to the reviews the book details example after example of introverts who profoundly changed history. Too often we think that only extroverts can be leaders and make a difference.

Cain observes that the qualities that used to rule have been subverted in our new media culture. It used to be that character was important. Qualities like industriousness, discipline and the like were held in high esteem. Today, these have taken a back seat to outgoingness and "a winning personality."

Here's a paragraph from the book's description:

Passionately argued, impressively researched, and filled with indelible stories of real people, Quiet shows how dramatically we undervalue introverts, and how much we lose in doing so. Taking the reader on a journey from Dale Carnegie’s birthplace to Harvard Business School, from a Tony Robbins seminar to an evangelical megachurch, Susan Cain charts the rise of the Extrovert Ideal in the twentieth century and explores its far-reaching effects. She talks to Asian-American students who feel alienated from the brash, backslapping atmosphere of American schools. She questions the dominant values of American business culture, where forced collaboration can stand in the way of innovation, and where the leadership potential of introverts is often overlooked. And she draws on cutting-edge research in psychology and neuroscience to reveal the surprising differences between extroverts and introverts.

I once participated in a business retreat in which we all went through Meyers-Briggs personality testing. I myself found it an invaluable experience as you encounter the varieties of human personality and discover why some people react differently in different situations. One exercise showed vividly how not only are people introverts and extroverts, but that in different situations even extroverts can become introverted when placed in the presence of people more extroverted than themselves.

To some extent personality is fluid. But for the most part, "At least one-third of the people we know are introverts. They are the ones who prefer listening to speaking, reading to partying; who innovate and create but dislike self-promotion; who favor working on their own over brainstorming in teams. Although they are often labeled 'quiet,' it is to introverts that we owe many of the great contributions to society--from van Gogh’s sunflowers to the invention of the personal computer."

If you're an introvert, my guess is that you will value the affirmation this book supplies. And if you're an extrovert, I'm certain that you will find this volume of insights helpful in navigating a world that has a full range of personality types, plenty of them the quieter type.

I do like the title. Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking. I think I'll shut up now. Have a thought-full day.