What Strengthsfinder 2.0 has done for me

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How’s that for a descriptive title?  I am something of a self-knowledge junkie.  I like to find new ways to understand myself, as well as others.  I’ve been having a problem these last couple of months, and I’m starting to understand that it’s been a problem of identity.  As I entered into Chinese medicine, I really had to set aside everything I had learned up until that point.  It was a brave new world.  In that situation, I find that drawing close to avowed experts tends to lead me in the right direction.  Thus, I end up around pretty strong personalities.

This is usually a good thing.  It was a good thing in this case.  But, I think because the health and well-being of other human beings has hung in the balance, I may have given up too much too early.  Or, maybe, it’s just part of the learning process.  Whatever.

I forgot to bring ME into the medicine and went through a period of lack of identity.  I was searching endlessly.  This permeated every part of my existence, but particularly my intellectual and spiritual life.  I have investigated every major world religion and sunk deeply into a very different way of looking at the Universe.  It’s been wonderful and will continue to be.  I want to make it very clear that I have no regrets, nor am I saying that any of this has been a “bad” thing.

I find, now, that a period of synthesis is upon me.  It’s time to dip back into some of my former realities and update them, meld them with what’s happening now - and move forward.  A period of relative inactivity forced by recent crazy, crazy weather in Portland has caused me to see the wisdom and importance of this.

What does this have to do with Strengthsfinder 2.0?  Well, it really helped solidify something in my mind, and reminded me of something I learned long ago.  For those who don’t know, Strengthsfinder 2.0 is a method and philosophy that helps people discover their true strengths.  On the face of it, it’s just one more book with one more “personality” scale.  But, if you take the test, you may have the surprising experience that I had - insight.

My “Top 5 Themes” are:

1. Learner
2. Achiever
3. Relator
4. Connectedness
5. Strategic

Ok, so those are words.  They don’t mean much on the surface and surely many “personal assessments” could come up with something similar.  They key is what Gallup asks you to do with this information.  You’re asked not to judge yourself in a negative way concerning any of the information and to focus on these as your strengths, instead of seeing the other 29 traits that you didn’t rank highly for and focus on augmenting those “weaknesses.”  The philosophy behind this, backed by Gallup’s extensive research, indicates that people thrive (and are most happy) when they continually improve on their strengths instead of focusing on their weaknesses.

This makes a lot of sense to me.  I read through the basic descriptions as well as the individualized trait descriptions that are created by my unique answers to the various questions.  I found myself amazed by how much most of it resonated with me.

I may talk about all of this more in the future.  But, it reminded me of something.  I have always been a person who brings apparently disparate things together.  I thrive when I’m learning things that seem to contradict one another, or that add unusual layers to whatever I’m currently learning.  Above all, I just love to learn.  I don’t feel right if I’m not stimulating myself with something new and interesting, or revisiting something I already know and going deeper.  I don’t thrive when I’m forced to stay in a static state, nor when I’m asked to remain mono-dimensional in my learning.

Thus, I have begun to dive back into my training in Western philosophy.  I’ve been reading some of my old books, contacting colleagues and professors and I’m currently leafing through the awesome MIT Opencourseware.  There are some fantastic courses available for free there.  I do want to be careful not to devote so much time to this that I neglect my Chinese medicine studies.  However, I don’t want to see it as irrelevant.  Because it isn’t.  There’s a lot more I could say on this point, but won’t now.  Why?  Because it’s Christmas Eve and it’s time to hang out with my family.

Thanks for reading,

Eric