“That’s Just How I’ve Always Been” - or Something More?

Introduction

Have you ever found yourself uttering those familiar words – “That’s just how I’ve always been” – when someone points out a particular quirk or habit? Like a well-worn pair of slippers, this response slides easily onto our tongues without much thought. It’s comfortable, familiar, and requires no explanation. But beneath this verbal shrug of acceptance lies a universe of complexity, rather like a seemingly simple pond that, upon closer inspection, reveals entire ecosystems teeming with life.

In this journey through the landscape of your inner self, we’ll explore the nuances of understanding personality traits, venturing beyond the surface-level acceptance of “that’s just me” into something far more illuminating. Whether you’re embarking on a personality self-assessment or simply curious about why you react to certain situations in particular ways, this guide will walk alongside you, holding space for discoveries without judgment.

The path to self-understanding isn’t always straightforward – it meanders like a country lane through rolling hills, sometimes obscured by fog, other times bathed in clarity. But each step brings its own reward, and I promise you’ll find value in pausing to consider what makes you uniquely you.

What if those traits you’ve always taken for granted – your tendency to plan meticulously, your ability to see connections others miss, your discomfort in certain social situations – aren’t just random quirks but meaningful pieces of your personal puzzle? Let’s explore together, shall we?

What Are Personality Traits?

Personality traits are rather like the individual instruments in an orchestra – each playing its own distinct notes, yet together creating the symphony that is you. They’re the enduring patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving that differentiate you from the person sitting next to you on the bus, or even from your closest sibling who shared your childhood home.

Psychologists often categorise these traits into five broad dimensions, commonly referred to as the Big Five: openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism. Think of these as the primary colours on an artist’s palette – infinite variations and combinations exist, creating the unique portrait that is your personality.

Openness reflects your curiosity about the world and willingness to embrace nwe experiences. Perhaps you find yourself constantly drawn to learning new skills or exploring unfamiliar ideas. Or maybe you prefer the comfort of established routines and familiar concepts – both are equally valid expressions of this trait.

Conscientiousness speaks to your approach to tasks and responsibilities. Are you the sort who makes lists for your lists, planning each detail with precision? Or do you thrive in spontaneity, finding creative solutions as challenges arise? Your natural tendencies here influence everything from how you approach work projects to how you organise your sock drawer (or don’t).

Extraversion isn’t simply about being the life of the party or shrinking into the corner. It’s about where you draw your energy – from social connections or from quiet reflection. Some of us feel recharged after a lively gathering, while others need solitude to restore their inner batteries after social interaction.

Understanding these dimensions isn’t about boxing yourself in or applying limiting labels. Rather, it’s about recognising the beautiful complexity that makes you who you are – the particular blend of traits that influences how you experience and respond to the world around you.

The Importance of Identifying Personal Traits

Identifying personal traits might seem like an academic exercise, but it’s rather like learning to read the unique instruction manual for your own mind and heart. Far from being merely an intellectual pursuit, this process offers practical benefits that ripple through every aspect of your life.

When you understand your natural tendencies, previously puzzling aspects of your behaviour begin to make sense. That moment of clarity can feel like finally finding the right prescription for glasses you didn’t even know you needed – suddenly, the world comes into focus. Why do certain situations drain you while others energise you? Why do you process information differently from your colleagues? The answers often fib in your personality traits.

By recognising your traits, you can:

• Harness your natural strengths with greater intention, rather like a sailor learning to work with the wind instead of against it
• Develop compassion for yourself in areas that don’t come naturally, understanding that we all have different gifts
• Improve your communication with others by recognising how your processing style might differ from theirs
• Navigate conflicts with greater awareness, seeing how personality differences might be at the root of misunderstandings
• Make career and lifestyle choices that align with your authentic self, rather than fighting against your nature

There’s a particular freedom that comes with this understanding. When you recognise that your need for detailed planning isn’t “being uptight” but a manifestation of conscientiousness, or that your desire for deep conversation isn’t “being intense” but an aspect of openness, you can embrace these qualities without shame.

Perhaps most importantly, identifying your traits allows you to distinguish between aspects of yourself that are relatively stable (your personality) and those that might be situational responses or learned behaviours you’ve adopted to fit in. This distinction is crucial becasue it helps you discern which aspects of yourself to embrace and which might be masking patterns you’ve developed as coping mechanisms.

The journey of identifying personal traits isn’t about placing yourself in a rigid category or using traits as excuses for behaviour. Rather, it’s about developing a compassionate understanding of your natural tendencies so you can work with them mindfully, making choices that honour who you truly are while continuing to grow.

How to Conduct a Personality Self-Assessment

Embarking on a personality self-assessment is rather like becoming an archaeologist of your own mind – carefully brushing away layers of assumptions to discover the treasures beneath. It requires patience, curiosity, and a willingness to look at yourself with fresh eyes. Here’s how to begin this illuminating journey:

1. Reflect on Your Behaviours

Start by observing yourself as you might observe a dear chum – with kindness and genuine curiosity. Notice how you respond in different situations. What energises you? What drains you? When do you feel most like yourself?

Keep a journal for a week or two, noting your reactions to various circumstances. You might discover patterns you’ve never noticed before – perhaps you consistently need time alone after social gatherings, or maybe you thrive when tackling complex problems but feel restless with routine tasks.

Ask yourself questions like:

• When do I feel most alive and engaged?
• What situations make me feel uncomfortable or drained?
• How do I typically approach new challenges?
• What’s my first reaction when plans change unexpectedly?

Your answers will begin to paint a picture of your natural tendencies. Remember, there are no right or wrong answers here – only insights into your unique way of being.

2. Seek Feedback

Sometimes we have blind spots about ourselves that others can see clearly – rather like being unable to spot a smudge on your own nose without a mirror. Approaching trusted friends or family members can provide valuable external perspectives.

When seeking feedback, be specific with your questions:

• “How would you describe my approach to problem-solving?”
• “What do you notice about how I interact in group settings?”
• “When have you seen me at my best?”

Listen openly, without becoming defensive. Remember that others’ perceptions aren’t definitive truths but additional data points that can help complete your self-portrait. Sometimes the most valuable insights come from the gaps between how you see yourself and how others experience you.

3. Use Formal Tools

Standardised assessments can provide structured frameworks for understanding personality traits. Consider taking established tests like:

• The Big Five Personality Test, which measures openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism
• The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, which identifies preferences across four dimensions
• The VIA Character Strengths Survey, which highlights your core positive traits

These tools aren’t meant to place you in a box but rather to give you language and concepts for understanding your natural tendencies. Approach the results with curiosity rather than treating them as definitive labels.

4. Look for Patterns Across Time and Contexts

True personality traits tend to be relatively consistent across different situations and throughout your life, though they may express themselves differently as you mature. Consider whether certain tendencies have been present since childhood or emerged in response to specific life experiences.

For example, if you’ve always preferred deep conversations with one or two people rather than large group interactions, that might reflect an intrinsic aspect of your personality. If, however, you became more reserved after a particularly difficult social experience, that might represent an adaptive response rather than your natural inclination.

Remember that conducting a personality self-assessment isn’t a one-time event but an ongoing process of discovery. Approach it with gentle curiosity and compassion, allowing yourself to be surprised by what you find. The goal isn’t to categorise yourself rigidly but to develop a richer, more nuanced understanding of who you are and how you move through the world.

Interpreting Personal behaviours Without Judgement

Learning to interpret your behaviours without criticism is perhaps the most challenging yet rewarding aspect of self-discovery. Most of us have an inner critic that runs a constant commentary on our actions, comparing us unfavourably to others or to some imagined ideal version of ourselves. Silencing this critic – or at least turning down its volume – requires practice and intention.

Imagine observing yourself as you might observe clouds passing across the sky – with curiosity and acceptance rather than evaluation. “Oh, there I go getting anxious before a presentation again” instead of “I’m such a nervous wreck, I should be better at this by now.”

This non-judgmental stance involves several key principles:

Acknowledging that all traits have both gifts and challenges

Every personality trait carries both strengths and limitations, rather like a coin with two inseparable sides. Your attention to detail might make you excellent at spotting errors but might also lead to perfectionism that slows you down. Your spontaneity might bring joy and creativity into your life but might sometimes result in disorganisation.

The goal isn’t to eliminate the challenging aspects of your traits but to recognise the complete package and work with it mindfully. Your sensitivity might make criticism particularly painful, but it likely also gives you exceptional empathy for others. Would you really want to lose that empathy just to avoid the sting of criticism?

Understanding the context of your behaviours

Behaviours never exist in isolation – they’re always responses to particular situations, influenced by your history, current circumstances, and the environment around you. When interpreting your actions, consider the context:

• Were you under unusual stress?
• Were you responding to subtle social pressures?
• Were you trying to meet someone else’s expectations?
• Were physical factors like hunger or fatigue affecting you?

Sometimes what appears to be a personality trait might actually be a situational response. You might conclude “I’m terrible at public speaking” after a presentation goes poorly, when in fact you were sleep-deprived and underprepared – circumstances that would challenge even the most confident speaker.

Recognising that personal growth is a continuous journey

Self-understanding isn’t a destination you reach once and then stop. It’s more like tending a garden – requiring ongoing attention, adaptation to changing seasons, and acceptance that there will always be new challenges and discoveries.

Sometimes we resist looking at certain aspects of ourselves because we fear finding something broken that needs fixing. But what if instead of approaching self-discovery as repair work, we saw it as cultivation? Just as a gardener works with the soil they have – adding compost here, providing support there – you can work with your natural tendencies, nurturing strengths and gently addressing limitations.

When you notice a behaviour pattern that doesn’t serve you well, approach it with curiosity rather than condemnation. “I wonder why I always procrastinate on these types of tasks?” opens the door to insight in a way that “I’m so lazy, what’s wrong with me?” never could.

Remember that the very act of observing yourself with compassion is transformative. As you practice interpreting your behaviours without judgment, you’ll likely find that this gentler approach actually facilitates change more effectively than harsh self-criticism ever could. Like a plant turning naturally toward sunlight, we tend to grow best in an atmosphere of acceptance and understanding.

Common Misconceptions in Self-Discovery

The path of self-discovery without judgement is often strewn with misconceptions that can lead us astray or unnecessarily complicate our journey. Like misleading signposts on a woodland trail, these false beliefs can have us trudging in circles rather than making meaningful progress. Let’s clear away some of these common misunderstandings.

The Myth of the Fixed Personality

Perhaps the most persistent misconception is that personality is entirely fixed and unchangeable – set in stone from early childhood. This belief can lead either to fatalism (“I’m just wired this way, so why try to change?”) or to denial of fundamental aspects of yourself (“I shouldn’t be this way, so I’ll force myself to be different”).

The reality is far more nuanced, like a river that maintains its essential character while constantly flowing and changing. Research suggests that while core personality traits do show remarkable stability, they also evolve throughout our lives. We typically become more emotionally stable, conscientious, and agreeable as we mature, particularly during our 20s and 30s.

More importantly, even if your basic tendencies remain relatively constant, how you express and channel them can change dramatically. An introvert will likely always recharge through solitude, but can develop social skills and confidence that make interactions more rewarding. Someone naturally high in neuroticism might always experience emotions intensely but can learn to respond to those feelings with greater equanimity.

Understanding your personality isn’t about resigning yourself to limitations but about working wisely with your natural tendencies – rather like a sailor who can’t change the wind but can adjust the sails.

Confusing Temporary States with Enduring Traits

Another common pitfall is mistaking temporary states – moods, reactions to circumstances, or learned behaviours – for fundamental personality traits. This confusion can lead to unnecessarily restrictive self-definitions.

For instance, you might conclude “I’m just a nervous person” when in fact your anxiety stems from a specific situation or life phase. Or you might think “I’m not creative” because you were once criticized for your artistic efforts, when creativity is actually a capacity you could develop with encouragement and practice.

To distinguish between states and traits, look for consistency across time and situations. A trait tends to show up repeatedly in different contexts throughout your life, though its expression might vary. A state is more temporary and often tied to specific circumstances.

Remember too that behaviours can become habitual without reflecting your essential nature. You might have learned to be highly controlling because you grew up in chaos, even if your natural tendency is more flexible. These adaptive patterns can be so familiar that they feel like “just how I am,” when they’re actually strategies you developed to cope with particular circumstances.

The Label Trap

In our quest for self-understanding, it’s easy to become overly attached to labels and categories, allowing them to define and limit us. While frameworks like the Myers-Briggs or Enneagram can provide useful insights, they become problematic when we treat them as comprehensive definitions of who we are.

I’ve seen people proudly declare “I’m an INTJ” or “I’m a Type Eight” as if these designations explained everything about them. But humans are gloriously complex creatures who can never be fully captured by any typology system, no matter how sophisticated. These frameworks are maps, not territories – useful guides that necessarily simplify the minted landscape of human personality.

The danger comes when we start filtering our experiences through these labels, potentially rejecting aspects of ourselves that don’t fit our chosen category or limiting our growth because “that’s not my type.” You might think “As an introvert, I couldn’t possibly enjoy public speaking” or “As a feeling type, I shouldn’t pursue a career in analytics,” unnecessarily constraining your possibilities.

Hold labels lightly, seeing them as descriptive rather than prescriptive. They should expand your self-understanding, not contract it. Use them as starting points for exploration rather than endpoints that define you completely.

The Perfection Expectation

Perhaps the most insidious misconception in self-discovery is the hidden belief that the process should lead to some ideal, perfected version of yourself. This expectation turns what could be a joyful exploration into a problem-solving exercise where you’re constantly looking for what needs “fixing.”

True self-discovery isn’t about becoming perfect – it’s about becoming more fully yourself, embracing both your gifts and your limitations with compassion. It’s about recognising that the aspects of yourself you might have been trying to change or hide might actually be integral to who you are, worthy of acceptance rather than correction.

This doesn’t mean abandoning growth or improvement. Rather, it means approaching growth from a foundation of self-acceptance instead of self-rejection. The paradox is that we often change more profoundly when we first accept ourselves as we are, rather than starting from a position of criticism and dissatisfaction.

Remember that the goal of understanding your personality isn’t to achieve some ideal psychological profile but to live more authentically and effectively with the unique constellation of traits that make you who you are.

Conclusion

The journey of understanding your personality traits is rather like exploring an ancient forest – there will always be new clearings to discover, unexpected paths to follow, and deeper mysteries to contemplate. It’s a dynamic and enlightening process that asks of you curiosity, openness, and most importantly, a willingness to set aside judgment and embrace what you find with compassion.

As you’ve seen throughout this exploration, engaging in personality self-assessment and interpreting personal behaviours without harsh criticism opens doors to insights that might otherwise remain hidden behind the defensive walls we build to protect ourselves from our own scrutiny. When we approach ourselves with the same kindness we might offer a dear friend, remarkable discoveries become possible.

Perhaps you’ve recognised patterns you never noticed before – how certain situations consistently energise you while others deplete your resources, or how your approach to challenges differs fundamentally from others around you. Maybe you’ve begun to distinguish between the core traits that have been with you since childhood and the adaptive behaviours you’ve developed in response to life experiences.

Whatever you’ve discovered, remember that the value lies not in labelling yourself or fitting neatly into categories, but in the understanding that emerges from this gentle self-exploration. The goal isn’t to box yourself in with limiting definitions but to expand your self-awareness in ways that create more choice, more authenticity, and more compassion in how you move through the world.

When you next find yourself saying, “That’s just how I’ve always been,” perhaps you’ll pause and look a little deeper. Is this truly a fundamental aspect of your personality, or is it a pattern you’ve fallen into without questioning? Is it serving you well, or might there be other ways of expressing your authentic self that would bring more fulfillment?

Remember that understanding yourself isn’t the end of the journey but rather the beginning of a more conscious way of living – one where you make choices aligned with your true nature rather than struggling against it or following paths simply because they’re expected.

Ready to Deepen Your Self-Discovery Journey?

If you’re curious to explore your unique wiring further, I invite you to join our community of compassionate self-discoverers. Our guided assessments and personalised insights can help illuminate patterns you may have never noticed before – not to fix what isn’t broken, but to understand and work with your authentic self more effectively.

Visit MyNeuroDiscovery.com to begin your journey with our free personality patterns assessment. You’ll receive thoughtful suggestions tailored to your unique profile, all delivered with the understanding that you’re not a puzzle to be solved, but a fascinating individual worthy of compassionate exploration.

Remember, this journey isn’t about becoming someone different – it’s about becoming more fully yourself, with all the beautiful complexity that entails. Take the first step toward deeper self-understanding today.