Question of the day.

What personality traits do you share with your relatives/children?

My answer:

I have a tendency to be very suspicious of people just like my Dad, well, actually for him at this point it looks more like paranoia and I can clearly see that he’s getting worse with age so hope that I will not end up like that because it quite bites both for such person as well as perhaps even more so for everyone around. I am also a pessimist like him and generally our worldview is pretty similar, although my pessimism is more defensive than just plain grumpy. I think my sense of humour is also similar to his. We are both introverts and get overwhelmed with things quickly though each of us manifests it in vastly different ways. If the four temperaments theory makes sense, and I think it may, I seem to be something like a rather even mix of melancholic and phlegmatic, and I’ve got the phlegmatic part definitely after my Dad. I think I’ve also got my rational brain after him, like that despite I am generally rather dreamy and imaginative, I can be very down to Earth and sensible when need be, so that my imaginativeness can’t turn into insipid sentimentality and I always keep some distance to things. Although our types of intelligence are rather very different despite that. Ah yeah and I hate changes just like him and neither of us is particularly spontaneous, and we tend to have rather very consistent views on everything that we have views on. We both have some sort of anger issues but each of us of a completely different nature, because while I turn it mostly inwards unless there’s no room, he gets it all out on other people and has meltdowns like a baby, which also get worse with age and due to other factors as well.

Me and my Mum are both deep thinkers, are sensitive and emotional and very empathetic and caring, think way too much, like things that most people either don’t know or don’t like or don’t/can’t appreciate, are individualists, overly self-critical, good listeners, like our own company, though my Mum is generally an extrovert, she likes to share her emotions with other people and is very chatty and exuberant, but still at the same time she feels the need for being just with herself sometimes, is not dependent on others and calls herself wild, used to be very shy and doesn’t have many friends outside of family. We both have our passions that we are enthusiastic about, we are very intuitive and introspective, and I’ve got the melancholic part of my brain after her, as she’s sanguine-melancholic.

And I can be quite a catastrophist after my grandma, though she is much worse and her catastrophism is much more contagious I think.

My Mum also says I have a lot of traits after my grandad, and while we get along very well and he’s the only person who has always stood by me no matter what and he often seems to get me better than other people in my family, I don’t personally feel that we have much more in common in terms of personality than that we are both veeery introverted and nerdy loners, as my grandad has very high ego, and despite he’s always been amazing to me, throughout his life it’s been clear that he doesn’t have high empathy levels and has to be the best at everything and even when he is not, he still is. Oh yeah and I’ve got sleep paralysis after him which is not a personality trait but because of its severity and that it’s stuck to my brain since forever until now it has had some influence on who I am. 😀

Oh yeah, and my Dad says that I am as smart as my Godmother, which is not necessarily a compliment, not because my Godmother isn’t smart, she is very much, but because I am smarter than him and authoritarian folks don’t like that. I think we do think a bit similarly with my Godmother, because we both tend to overanalyse a lot of things and sometimes take them a bit too literally, but overall I don’t get along with her that well and find her slightly intimidating.

What does that look for you and your family? 🙂