Here I wish to make some remarks on the correct interpretation and usage of psychological classification methodologies, as the general application of them seems widely misused in their accepted revelations. The main examples which I have in mind to use for the purpose of interpretation are those of psychological personality tests, such as; the Meyers Briggs; the Big 5 personality tests as used by modern psychology; the archetypal constructions as proposed by Jung; the tripartite separate of personality as divided to their corresponding physical disposition as proposed by William Sheldon; and in general the medical diagnoses of someone’s “mental illness” or abnormal psychic state. While these I specifically have in mind, any classification system that seeks to delineate areas of emotional or experiential phenomena, or even modes of being, are all under scrutiny to be used in their respective proper formats, and here criticism and explanation of the method we should use to interpret them is discussed.

What frequently occurs after an individual receives a classification of their character is that they become identified with it and develop a belief structure that is modified and in alignment with said classification, at the exclusion of other diagnoses, and at the exclusion of being identified as lying upon a mutable spectrum in every regard of character trait. The individual receives, discovers, or intuits themselves as fitting into different categories, and through the identification, both consciously and unconsciously, doubles down on the path prescribed. The unconscious search for content in alignment with the description given to them promotes confirmation bias in the individual, strengthening the resolve upon a limiting description of their character. This methodology is reinforced by the intellectual belief that the defining of such a diagnosis is directly relatable and descriptive of their character. Due to the belief in such a self-grouping, the individual spreads the meme of the classification, in thought and speech, further reinforcing their belief and modifying their behavior in alignment with the diagnosis. People tend to not want to contradict themselves, and to remain consistent in their interactions with others, and through the statement of their description to other people, they seek to confirm their words through the manifestation of their actions, further solidifying the modified belief structure. I believe this to be a perversion of the data presented, and altogether promotes an suboptimal mode of self-description, that is, if the goal is towards not only a comprehensive understanding of one’s self, the “truth”, but additionally towards the individuals personal character growth, or “Ultimate Wisdom” (as described in previous content).

This acceptance of a diagnosis and further memetic reinforcement necessarily implies the transition from the always beneficial fallibilistic mode of being towards that “mode of Certainty” which is characterized by dogmatism and stagnation. Obviously this is an impediment we wish to remove, while on the other hand, we must accurately understand the usefulness of such classifications, and the way to interpret the findings in a way which we can use to foster a proper psychological development.

The mode of being fallible, and of the fact of irreducibility of our character to simplistic terms, is of paramount importance for the individual to integrate the totality of their psyche. While there is beauty and wit in the simple, the human psyche is merely too vast to be cut down by Occam’s Razor in a way which does justice to the variability and extensive complexity which makes it up. While words themselves cannot ever do infallible justice toward an accurate representation of the actuality of the psychological whole, they can more or less be used to conceptualize the reality in a way which is beneficial. The dogmatic adherence to a single diagnosis, mode of being, or applied psychological classification, must be henceforth disregarded.

To start from the fundamentals, the range of human experience, of human psychological makeup , and its displayed character traits, lies upon a spectrum of potentiality for every individual. Every individual lies upon a spectrum of anxiety manifestation, strength of will, sociability, intellect, virtue, extraversion, introversion, agreeableness, as well as in the proportion of the psyche which is dominated or affected by archetypal structures in the unconscious (to greater or less degree). Every metric which is regarded as being all-encompassing towards an individual’s character, as described by psychologists, is inherent in every individual to a varying degree. While this is more or less intellectually grasped when pointed out, it is rarely expounded as being universally valid, and is only referenced when it suits the individual to so do. Those who are towards the “extreme ends” of a certain psychological trait, in relation to the totality of individuals, are slapped with a diagnosis which is generally accepted, and in reference to areas of which little or no description is given, the actual trait goes unrealized and if consciously considered is disregarded as not applicable to the individual’s psychic makeup. A patient who is categorized as being low in trait openness may seek to respond to such a description through overcorrecting or by doubling down in the self-identification, but may simultaneously unconsciously ignore other areas of their character which may have a greater bearing on their psychological wellbeing, such as disagreeableness or self-conceit. We must be on guard against isolating the psyche to a unitary description lest we fail to optimize the totality.

Upon every area of human analysis, we lie upon a spectrum, in every regard. This complexity of intertwined variability across every psychological classification, and our potential for change within it, and our response to the current state we find ourselves in, is paramount to the optimization of the individuals wellbeing. The application of wisdom derived from experiential as well as acquired knowledge are the mitigating factors towards the management and optimization of one’s psychological state in response to the manifestation of underlying psychological traits. How well one receives the results, and under what individual belief structure and interpretation method one uses to analyze the results, will determine the individual’s response. This is obviously a more complex topic, but the gist of it can be deduced from what follows.

The usage of psychological classifications should be interpreted in the manner of disclosing information solely in relation to the framework one is analyzing, as being applicable only within that structure and not without or in an all-encompassing nature towards the totality of ones Being. For example, the classic introverted and extroverted distinction made by Jung seeks to delimit individuals into two clearly opposing groups. The problem is, every individual lies upon a spectrum of their past, current, and future relation to the description of the two terms, and can bounce between them as well as inhabit both on a regular basis. The classification of oneself as being an extrovert doesn’t mean one doesn’t have any inclination towards introversion, it merely means that the description of the word extrovert, as decided by the conductors of the psychological examination, and as the individual responds to what he believes to be an accurate representation of himself in the questionnaire, is what the test produces to be a good explanation in light of its collected datum, in relation to the average test participant. In addition, we must take into account that the system used to discern psychological traits are based on samples, so, we must take the information it gives in its correct context. If we are confronted with the result of being high in trait extroversion, it is referring to the fact that we are more extroverted than the average person who was included in the sample. Everyone has a degree of extroversion, and to state that we are “high in trait extroversion” necessarily entails that what we believe to be true responses about ourselves (answered in the questionnaire) points to the fact that we have higher than the average person’s trait extroversion, as it is defined by the psychological system, in relation to the sample size of people tested for the trait, based on the questions and their answers.

The necessary correlation of this to the truth of the matter is tempered in relation to the individuals understanding of the description, as well as his understanding of himself, which we know is unconsciously modified by inherent biases and preconceived notions, stemming from socio-cultural, environmental, and genetic pre determinations. The accurate analysis of oneself is an impossibly tricky thing to differentiate from what one would like to be an accurate description of themselves. This is the first logical issue one gets into in psychological examination and classification. Secondly, the subject is limited by the spectrums associated by the two terms, and in their overarching applications and general descriptions. The truth is we all could be extroverts in certain situations in life, introverts in others, dependent upon the situation we find ourselves in. We must recognize that the classification is only to be used in the sense of, for example: “I currently am operating under Jung’s conceptualization of introversion in his division between introversion and extroversion right now, because I believe my current situation is describable by his description of the term” (maybe you are abstractly thinking in the absence of social interaction, and enjoying it, and don’t want the company of others). Because you find yourself frequently in such a situation, doesn’t mean that the classification can be blanketed across your character, or that it is exhaustive in defining you, it strictly means exactly what it means – meaning –  within the moment you see a likeliness to your own character in the description of whatever the questionnaire is asking (holds across all self-narratives), and the result is more or less pointing to high or low in the trait in relation to the average person tested. This holds true for any classification one may become interested in or be diagnosed by, whether it be a personality test or other divisions of the psyche into conceptual groups.

An honest examination of every descriptive conceptualization can be applied to any individual at some point in his life, or at least be recognized as a potentiality for him who is analyzing, if he is to be sincere and work towards the connection. One can spin any description to fit one’s conduct, and can see any human conceptualization in a way that is in alignment with one’s character, if one has the intellectual relational reasoning necessary to do so. Even if one can’t clearly see every personality description as being contained in their character, and claims boldly that this description truly represents them and these don’t, I believe upon further investigation he will discover that certain descriptions within the framework are merely more or less applicable to his character in the manifestations of his thought, speech and actions (which truly represent what we believe), and that this “more or less” implies that they all are descriptive of human nature which he himself contains, just certain ones become manifest to his conscious awareness more than others. Statistical probability and percentage of conscious occurrence play a role in the acceptance of descriptions, as that which more consciously enters into awareness becomes a more viable description than the altogether more accurate claim of ignorance.

This is the use of such classifications, the phenomenological examination of conceptualizations which are used as representations describing different modes of ones being, and using such concepts to denote specific changes and attributes of one’s mode of being. The optimal use is to not generalize a specific description as being applicable across all moments of time, but using them to comprehend and describe his present state as it so appears to him, within the framework of whatever system he is using. The description is only applicable within the system he is using to analyze his psyche. If one seeks to couple multiple systems, one creates a metasystem and that becomes the arena within which he is playing.

Groupings done by William Sheldon pose a serious problem to a truthful understanding of one’s physical state and its connection to stated “correlative” personality. His differentiation of three body types, endomorph, ectomorph, and mesomorph must be used under the interpretative framework I have described above, or the data would be misconstrued. There are no strict restrictions which define these terms in their actuality, but if we are to analyze ourselves using his method, it is possible for us to state that one description fits us currently more than the others, while simultaneously holding the view that it is a classification which isn’t stable and clear cut, it is merely a conceptual defining of our current state as being in alignment with one classification more so than another, in comparison to others, as he defines it, within that system. It doesn’t point to a truly scientific description in a way that is meaningful in an objective sense, it is merely useful in the game played within the rules he describes, not truthful other than in idealized form. The same holds for his corresponding psychological compositions which he says is in alignment with different body types. His description, in a nutshell, is between the skinny, large, and muscular, body types and their corresponding traits of cerebrotonia (predominance of intellectual over social and physical factors), viscerotonia (predominance of social), somatotonia (predominance of physical). The naturally skinny person is defined as being more intrinsically introverted and inclined towards intellectual dominance, abstract reasoning, social distancing and isolation, and have a high interest in privacy. The naturally larger person being defined by being desirous of sensual pleasures, love of people and sociability, enjoyment of family life, craving for affection and need of people when in trouble. The naturally muscular person is defined as having a more aggressive nature and desire for power over others, indifference towards pain, high desire for youth and a need for activity. Of course his descriptions are more exhaustive, but generally we can see how the underlying traits which may lead to the development of each body shape or of each personality traits, themselves, can be causally related to its correlate term. In other words, an underlying desire for power may make an individual to become more likely to become muscular, the underlying desire for sensual pleasure may lead the individual to eat more and become larger, in relation to others who lack the similar desire, the underlying desire for intellectual comprehension of the world may predispose the individual to be more likely than others to neglect of physicality and thus skinniness. Also, vice versa in conversant cases. Thus we can see the causal connection in underlying traits of the classifications, but in all cases every single correlation can be applied to any individual regardless of their current body shape or of their most domineering mental pattern. We cannot tell whether the correlation between interest and body type will manifest itself in an individual, here it is implied as merely a probable effect, but in all reality, it is entirely possible for such interests to produce the opposite corresponding manifestations in actions than he described. The desire for power can produce introversion, and all other combinations are possible. The ability to change or to be defined by any of these drives / physical appearances is necessarily contained in every individual, albeit to differing degrees and likelihood of present manifestation. While these descriptions one may automatically intuit as applying to them, in their desire to mentally connect the two descriptions to their own disposition, it is absolutely a hindrance, and impediment, and an illusion or trick of the mind to exclude oneself from the ulterior psychological descriptions and personalities. It is useful to see how the groove created by a psychological state can be a beneficial pathway towards the higher probability of development of a body type, and the exploration of the causal effectiveness in psychological states and their relation to the ability to manifest actions in accordance with those states is surely something interesting, but as far as denoting the essential characteristics of our psyche, every one of these different modes of being lies within every one of us as potentialities. The degree to which the groove produces the correlated action is merely predicated upon intuitional and potentially statistical variance, it is not universally valid or immutable, it is actually quite limiting and can be easily memetically reiterated as a thought pattern which melds the psyche to its description. This is the error we must be on guard against proliferating, we must be careful which content we choose to believe, spread, and act in accordance with, lest unconscious deceptive forces become prevalent.

In the same way we should view the psyche as a whole. It isn’t beneficial to be defined by one description within one form of classification, when we can bracket our personality and psychic makeup in a million different ways. It is beneficial to see the causal relation between modes of being and their effects upon our lives, and what is more probable to produce certain content, so that we can direct our beings into the grooves which we consciously believe would be beneficial to us. In receiving information about our psychological makeup, as compared to the average person, we can utilize the information to better understand ourselves, but we must be framing the results and our place in relation to them in the proper brackets. Certain occupations, relationships, ways of spending time, and interests, can be gleamed through the results of psychological testing, proving applicable to many areas of our lives, but the necessary caveats must be conceded. What presupposes any test, and the data from which it draws, is the belief of a general understanding of ourselves in the first place. Thus, through understanding ourselves, in accurately representing ourselves when being tested, we learn how our psychological makeup compares to others, thus enabling us to better understand our self in relation to the society from which the data is taken. This context, and the accuracy of our representation, will determine the accuracy of the results. So in a way, how we understand ourselves, in the first place, is the crucial factor towards how we understand the results, and thus how we understand ourselves. This seems paradoxical, and potential deceptive, but, if we are to authentically represent ourselves, the results can be utilized in the aforementioned ways.

 We want to get the clearest view of ourselves, and to do so we must remain in a state of fallibility and openness to variability in our self-narrating, as the trickle-down effect is vast and its implications will affect our wellbeing and further development. If we are to make a simple approximation of classifications than we should maintain the defining of ourselves as a complex system of overlapping and intertwined modes of being and character traits, without further specification, which would only muddy the clear waters from which we ought to remain content in. Others can deduce what they will in their judgment of us in our speech and actions, and we may choose the narration for which to follow, but we must maintain a diligent striving for such descriptions to be in accordance with the objective truth. We must be honest towards our potentialities, and we must be wise in the discerning of beneficial modes of being in which to inhabit, as they truly define our conscious experience of life and thus our wellbeing.

On a side note – there’s room for extrapolation into overlying modes of being in reference to merging layers of classifications and how they manifest cooperatively. For example, an extroverted or introverted Hero archetype dominating the psyche, or a high in trait openness individual with a dominating trickster archetype. There’s much room for psychological extrapolation upon the emergence of novel classifications between each other and between older groupings. This would be beneficial to the whole psychological community in denoting how to navigate or aide a patient that can be characterized in these ways, as well as individually if you find yourself manifesting actions which are in line with a specific formulation, and also in describing the optimal integration of the psyche from these very different starting points which we may find ourselves in. While certain actions, patterns, habits, predispose us to certain modes of being, and certain classifications, certain combinations within different systems of analysis, in conjuncture with each other, if carried out authentically, can provide novel insights into the phenomenology of our Beings. Are these tests more accurate than psychotherapy? From introspective analysis? From a phenomenological analysis of our own Being? From the description of our personality from a close friend or loved one? The answer doesn’t necessary matter. But all this content, all these pathways of inquiry, can provide a more holistic view of ourselves, and what we need to work on to become who we wish to be, in relation to who we are, and also, to provide into formation to be utilized in the pursuit of best navigating our experience on the road to that highest ideal potentiality which we are striving for.