4 Basic Mechanisms That Can Change Personality; Effortlessly reconnecting with an old friend shows how little our personalities change over time. However, we may still have a desire for change and betterment of ourselves. We can also make an effort to get rid of some of the wounds our personality has received. According to a new study, there are factors that bring about or prevent personality changes. Therefore, it provides a kind of road map for such changes to occur, and also provides information about the obstacles that make permanent changes challenging and helps to overcome them.
Our personalities can set limits on our access to the things we want in life. We may want to be less lonely, less anxious, more successful, or simply happier. Our current personality may be insufficient to achieve these. One of the most important points of the analysis is that although personality remains relatively stable over the long term, it never freezes and can therefore be changed throughout life. Therefore, we may not be able to completely change the person we are, but we still have the opportunity to make some modifications.
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4 Basic Mechanisms That Can Change Personality
According to the authors of the study, there are four mechanisms in personality change, and if they are not understood, they lead to frustration.
These are as follows:
- Prerequisites – preparing yourself for change
- Triggers – preparing your environment for change
- Reinforcers – organizing your environment to reinforce change
- Integrators – implement change in as many places as possible
Basically, the goal of these four is for the person to acquire new personality habits and make them automatic. However, before starting, the aspects of the personality should be defined, which ones should be changed should be reviewed, and the things that will trigger, strengthen and integrate this change should be determined. This is not an easy task either.
People who can take an in-depth look at your current behavior and have something to offer can also motivate you to make change and serve as triggers and reinforcers. In this process, the mechanisms that keep the personality in balance must be reduced. In other words, the regular environment and lack of insight must be eliminated, and preconditions, triggers, enhancers and complements related to the personality you want must be put into action.
1. Pretend it until you actually do it
According to the research, the most important part of this process is to act the way we want, at least even if it is fake, until we think about the way we really act. So, for example, if you are a person who feels anxiety, you can help your mind and body adjust to this new response by pretending that you are not anxious. Over time, this behavior, even if it is fake, will begin to feel more natural. In this way, you can apply your new personality without hesitation, strengthen it, and integrate it into your entire life, and it is certain that you will adopt it over time.
2. Criticizing yourself won’t help.
This practice is basically not much different from mindfulness practice. In mindfulness, it is said that if people pay attention to what they feel and think, they do not act unconsciously and thus focus on acting consciously. The same goes for personality change. The more we focus on where we want to go, and avoid criticizing ourselves when we fall short, we can create the desired change. This process is like walking. The baby first tries to walk and falls, but over time, he/she completes the process by getting up and walking again.
3. Internally motivated change is important
It is important that personality change comes from within and not due to external pressures. If you are trying to become an extrovert because it is socially valuable, that is, if the reason for this effort has no personal meaning for you, it will be very difficult to sustain this change. In addition, internal motivation is an important point for setting personal goals and psychological health.
4. Capturing positive improvisational changes
An inspiring experience in life can suddenly spark an unexpected positive response. These include, for example, the birth of your child or overcoming a personal challenge. Unfortunately, the impact of these life-changing events diminishes over time because there is nothing to support them.
Therefore, it is important to recognize when such a change occurs, examine what caused this change, and incorporate it into your own identity. In addition, the protective mechanism on the personality should be loosened after this life-affecting event. Therefore, for change to continue, it is necessary to put in place preconditions, triggers, enhancers and complements.
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The most important point here is reinforcement, that is, arranging your environment according to the change you expect in your personality. Therefore, you must remember to fill your life with things that encourage change.
