Hello Radiant Souls!
In past blogs I’ve talked about our personality, specifically in terms of the Enneagram, and I regularly blog about Neuro-Linguistic Programming (NLP) techniques. Today we are going to combine the two so you can facilitate integrating some of your own personality characteristics.
As a quick refresher, NLP recognizes we have different parts of ourselves working toward differing goals. I’m sure you’ve experienced some point in your life when a part of you wanted to do one thing and a part of you wanted to do something entirely different. Each part of us holds a positive intention for us, but often we are too caught up in the internal division and struggle to get ourselves on the same page we fail to get curious and inquire about what positive things these parts can possibly be trying to provide us.
The same is true with different aspects of our personality. These parts really do have something positive they are trying to offer us. Even those darker parts we don’t appreciate, like, or desire to recognize. The key to appreciating and integrating those parts is in discovering what gift(s) it has for you.
Identifying Your Parts
In order to integrate these different aspects of yourself to refine your personality characteristics, they must first be identified. Most people are able to think of a few things others might find abrasive about themselves right off the top of their head. Most common in my own persona is impatience, nit-picking, and being sassy. Once you move from the easy to identify ones to the ones you truly try to deny and bury, think about what things people could say or have said about you which really struck a nerve and triggered you. Those parts creating an internal cringe or sting are the ones most deeply seeking acceptance!
There is a fun way to identify these parts of yourself: give the traits their own identity. Give each part a name, observe what the part looks like, what age the part is, what the part smells like, and anything else noteworthy about this part. For instance, the parts I mentioned above I’ve named Impatient Irene, Nit-picky Nancy, and Sassy Sally.
If you are stuck you can ask someone close to you what they observe being challenging to deal with when it comes to your personality or what they observe is working against yourself. For instance, my impatience would work against me because I would so badly want to be done with a task or move on to the next thing at hand, I would rush through life and not enjoy any of the experience. Sometimes I would even conclude a project or assignment when it was not thoroughly assessed or processed, much to my chagrin once my supervisor would review all the things I had overlooked.
Naming your parts’ is especially fun with a friend or significant other who is also participating in the exercise. The names can be extremely entertaining and lots of laughs can ensue! For the purposes of the exercise of integration I will be referring to these parts as “characters”.
Integrating Exercise
Once you have your cast of characters identified, you can move forward to integrate them one at a time.
- Pick one character.
- If you didn’t previously observe it, it’s age, what it’s wearing, it’s gender, it’s mood, how it smells, etc do so now.
- See this character in your mind. Ask it what positive intention it has for you.
- Take time to appreciate this positive intention and identify how you can perform this task/intention for yourself with the resources and knowledge you now have available to you.
- Integrate this character into your being so you are now one with it, no longer viewing it as something negative or disowned from you.
Here’s an example of the work I did with Sassy Sally. Sassy Sally was a young teenage punk rocker with a zero-cares-given attitude. She was super spunky and spicy with her hair in tall spikes and her clothes “fashionably” ripped to pieces. Sassy Sally held a very positive intention of being able to voice every single thing I didn’t feel would be appeasing for others to hear. This positive intention was truly the paramount to empowering myself. I realized I had plenty of resources and the courage to express my needs, desires, wants, and beliefs in a tactful, articulate, and assertive manner. I no longer need Sassy Sally to step in for me. This allowed Sassy Sally to fully integrate. As a result I found myself speaking my truth more often and even begun having people seek out my thoughts.
This is a wonderful exercise to process through with a significant other and close friend. From time to time when I get a little sassy, instead of responding to my shortness or tone my significant other will comment about the fact Sassy Sally could really use a chill pill. The shift in talking to this character alleviates all defensiveness I would have otherwise experienced. This exercise creates a much more harmonious world both internally and externally.
If this exercise resonates with you and you’d like to explore meditations for refining yourself, Debbie Ford offers some masterful meditations, both similar and in addition to this process, in her book “The Dark Side of the Light Chasers.” Thanks for stopping by!
Peace & Love,
Janessa