Does this wiring make my butt look fat?

Today’s Wisdom Bite about temperament types helps you consider your natural wiring and how it affects your weight. Traits and skills tend to cluster, creating a temperament type. While you’ll recognize aspects of yourself in all four of the temperament types above, which word cloud seems the most familiar to you? This is likely your dominant (or highest) type. Which word cloud is more foreign to you? This is likely your growth (or lowest) type. What’s intriguing is your inner saboteur and weight loss struggle are intimately connected to an overdependence on your dominant type and resistance of your growth type. Balance these two types, and you balance your life and your body.

Excess weight means you’re hiding out in your comfort zone and playing small…

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Here’s what you need to know

Excess weight means you’re hiding out in your comfort zone and playing small. Without understanding your temperament types, you might not even realize you’re doing this. I say types (plural) because most temperament assessment tools slot you into a single type. It’s more useful to see yourself as a spectrum of types, so that you can appreciate your dominant and growth types.

Your dominant type is where your innate strengths are found. Depend on this too much though and it becomes a weakness: your comfort zone. You might perceive your growth type as a weakness but it’s just a cluster of underdeveloped skills. Nonetheless, developing these skills can be awkward so you resist them to avoid the discomfort. Hiding out and playing small this way might be frustrating for you but it’s just your saboteur doing its job of keeping you safe from harm, small in scope and protected from any unknowns.

  • Have your temperament types led to excess weight? If your dominant and growth types are out of balance, then yes. Refer to the word clouds and consider someone who has too much Empathy but is shying away from being Bold. This person will likely lose themselves to taking care of others and not have the nerve to say no when they need to take care of themselves. How about someone who’s all about Visioning but cringes at the thought of Accountability? This person may have great ideas for a healthy lifestyle but they keep moving the goal posts so they never seem to get started. You get the idea?
  • How are your temperament types affecting your weight loss journey? The key takeaway from understanding your types is there is no one type better at permanent weight loss than another. Everybody has to learn to balance their types. I emphasize permanent because some people are more Plan-oriented or Physically-oriented and can get weight off their body quickly – the ‘outer work’. But those same people will often struggle to do the ‘inner work’ that comes easily to those who are more Emotionally-oriented or Learning-oriented. Without the inner work, the weight will always be at risk of coming back. Everybody has to do the inner work and outer work.
  • How can your temperament types work for you instead of against you? Beyond being able to balance your types, knowing your wiring also helps you to satisfy your needs and do so without apology. For example, someone who is more Social does better with the support and compassion of others. The person who is more Intellectual often needs independent time to absorb and process the knowledge they gather. Someone who is more Organized might need reliability and punctuality for themselves and from others. And the person who is more Creative can benefit when they satisfy their needs for spontaneity and adventure.

When you’re depending too much on your dominant type you feel stuck. If this is what your weight loss efforts feel like, your breakthroughs are not going to come by doubling down on these efforts. Those breakthroughs will happen by exploring your growth type.

Dialing down your dominant type will make your efforts more fun and enjoyable as you get some momentum going again. Dialing up your growth type brings feelings of aliveness and fulfillment – what I affectionately call fearlessness. You’ll come to realize the best way to experience weight loss is with a sense of fun AND fearlessness.

Here’s what you can practice

Refer to the word clouds and the guesstimate you made at the beginning of this Wisdom Bite. Or, if you want something more definitive, try Googling True Colors, MBTI, DISC, Enneagram, Big Five…the assessment tools and their labels are less important than the spectrum of traits and skills they reveal about you. Complete more than one and remember, you’re looking for your highest and lowest scoring types.

Once you have some consensus on your dominant and growth types, ask a trusted friend which specific strength of yours would be helpful to relax and which underdeveloped skill needs a boost right now (keep your focus narrow to start; you can work on other skills later). Yes, you can do this on your own but your friend will have more objectivity about the Ego preferences that keep you doing what you already know vs. the Soul stretches that open you up to new possibilities.

Finally, watch for the first inklings of stress in your life – before those inklings are too big to overwhelm you – and practice balancing your skills. The balance needed for weight loss comes from balancing your skills, especially under stress, when you’re most likely to retreat to your comfort zone. As you practice, be prepared for awkward first tries. That messiness just means you’re evolving. Before long, you’ll begin to feel more peace and inner strength in areas that were once problematic for you.

Remember to get your free wallpaper of this Wisdom Bite to help you keep it top of mind.

How did it go for you?

Your natural wiring is the way you came into this world. You may feel like you’ve come far and accomplished much, yet somehow those same strengths are not working for you with your weight loss. The beauty is, your wiring doesn’t have to limit how you choose to experience things going forward. With some work, it can become the very thing that expands your world and creates the success you’re after.

Select a simple moment where you stepped out of your comfort zone and share it in the Members-Only Comments section below.

Did you discover that small steps like this, in the service of your growth, can feel like huge victories?

Be sure to check back in too, to let us know how it’s going!




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12 Comments

  1. Tracy Windsor

    I can relate to this part: “How about someone who’s all about Visioning but cringes at the thought of Accountability? This person may have great ideas for a healthy lifestyle but they keep moving the goal posts so they never seem to get started.”

    I balk at the word “discipline” — I do what I want, when I want, and I don’t force myself to do something I don’t want to do! Definitely has its downsides!

    Reply
    • Coach Kath

      Ha! I wrote that line as a reminder to myself but I’m glad to see it’s resonating with you as well. Trust that the part of you that’s balking at “discipline” is holding out for a more natural style & rhythm of your own making – which you’ll discover in this process.

      Reply
  2. Elle

    The Personality Lingo and True Colours assessments both identified Gold (Planner) as my dominant style. My growth style is Green (Thinker). This surprised me as I tend to be quite organized, very neat, like tradition and have been referred to as reliable/dependable. The Myers Briggs assessment I did (albeit 20 years ago) assessed me as INTJ. Odd how my style has changed over the years. Just proof that i can balance my styles.

    Reply
    • Coach Kath

      Have you noticed how as you develop the skills of your growth type, it takes nothing away from your existing strengths? In fact, your new skills will help balance the strengths you need & relax the strengths you don’t need in a given situation.

      Reply
  3. Ana Perez

    My top trait in both tests was blue. I am a giver and people pleaser to a fault. I am rarely bold or accountable but those would be qualities I would like to grow.
    I recently set a major boundary at work and am taking time off for my mental health. I rarely ask for help but it was offered and I accepted, so this is quite outside of my comfort zone.

    Reply
    • Coach Kath

      Boldness, integrity & boundaries are a great trio to develop, as you learn to pull your energies back from over-giving & people-pleasing. You were in fact bold by saying Yes to taking time off work & using that to be integrous with your mental health/self-care.

      Reply
  4. Graham

    On the Personality Lingo test, green was my dominant type and orange was growth. On the True Colours test, gold was my dominant type and orange was growth again.

    I have recently taken some part-time work where I am speaking in front of a crowd and having to be charismatic and somewhat the center of attention, dealing with unpredictability and thinking on my feet. This is taking me outside my comfort zone!

    Reply
    • Coach Kath

      The part-time work & what it’s requiring of you are definitely you stepping into your growth type of orange. This also suggests your dominant type is more likely gold – especially given how much I know you like your rules & plans!

      Reply
  5. Bonnie H

    My Dominant style is Blue. My Growth style is Gold. I would LOVE to have some of those Gold qualities – to be more naturally organized, prepared, and punctual, for example. Another part of me rebels HARD at the thought of those qualities. Some of my Growth style qualities feel downright life-squelching when I read them.

    Reply
    • Coach Kath

      Haha! Wonderful observation of your rebel & what it’s trying to protect for you. The key is determining what LEVEL of these Gold qualities make a notable contribution to your quality-of-life without tipping into a rigid, “life-squelching” interpretation of them.

      Reply
  6. Kim M.

    My dominant types are to be both emotional and a planner. Thinking outside the box and being spontaneous/adventurous are both difficult for me. Both make me anxious and, while I am pretty quick to be adaptable, it’s hard for me to shift my mindset once plans are in place.

    In the last few years I have worked hard to build flexibility and to step out of my comfort zone. I changed jobs, moved homes, went back to school, and am now looking into this program. I have thought a lot about balance, and while I have all the skills to be a massive overachiever at work, I am learning to say “no” and engage meditation, rest, spirituality, and self-compassion into each day.

    This is still a major work in progress, because as a people pleaser I want to say yes whenever asked. But that has cost me my own balance.

    Reply
    • Coach Kath

      Great recognition of & proactivity with your patterns. And nice to see you’re defining what balance really means for YOU.

      Reply

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