Redefining Who You Are Via Personality Change

This week, I’m at a professional conference dedicated to understanding and treating personality disorders. Attending talks and clinical workshops in this space got me thinking about how tricky it is to draw the line between personality and personality disorder.

After all, we all have personalities, our enduring patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving. And those patterns can get a lot of us into trouble, not just people living with personality disorders.

Who decides when a trait crosses the line from “This isn’t serving me” to “This is maladaptive”?

The Problem With Categories

For the most part, mental health conditions are treated like categories. You either have a disorder or you don’t. We talk about personality like this too: You’re an introvert or an extravert.

But that’s not really how personality works. Research shows that traits exist on a continuum. For example, the introvert/extravert “dichotomy” is actually a range:

• Detached or avoidant
• Shy and less interested in big, stimulating social events
• Right in the middle—quieter in some situations, more outgoing in others (this is most of us)
• Energized, sociable
• Attention-seeking, always talking

You can fall anywhere along this spectrum. And there is no absolute optimal level of this trait (or any trait). Instead, there are levels that may be more aligned with your goals. For instance, commanding attention may be less desirable at someone else’s birthday dinner, but it may serve you well as an actor or comedian.

When “Just How I Am” Isn’t Working

Source: Vitaly Gariev / Unsplash

Disliking aspects of your personality doesn’t automatically mean you have a personality disorder. Feeling frustrated that you overthink, avoid conflict, or always wait until the last minute doesn’t make you “disordered.”

So, instead of asking yourself “Do I have a personality disorder?” or “Am I neurotic?” ask yourself “Do my traits help or hurt me when I’m pursuing goals and relationships?"

If you find that your emotional reactions, interpersonal habits, or self-limiting beliefs are getting in the way of your goals, then it’s worth exploring what can shift.

From Fixed to Flexible

For decades, personality and personality disorders were considered set in stone. When you take personality tests online or in your company’s HR office, you’re assigned a “type” and given the advice to choose roles and relationships that work well for who you are at that moment.

But what if you’ve got great ideas you want to put into action at your office, but you’re not the leadership type? Or what if you want to open your own business, but you’re afraid you’re too disorganized to follow through? Or what if you’ve been diagnosed with borderline personality disorder?

Then, I have good news for you. Modern personality science tells us that traits change across the lifespan. We evolve and shift as we accumulate life experiences.

And the emerging field of volitional personality change shows that this process doesn’t have to be left to chance. When we deliberately practice new ways of thinking, feeling, and behaving, we can accelerate personality changes that used to be considered impossible (Haehner et al., 2024)

In my own research, testing strategies for changing traits, we’ve seen people make decades’ worth of natural personality change in just a few months by using targeted, cognitive-behavioral strategies (Sauer-Zavala et al., 2023).

Moreover, people do recover from personality disorders (Zanarini et al., 2024). With the right support, their emotional lives, relationships, and behaviors can become more adaptive over time.

Personality as a Work in Progress

The more time I spend at conferences like this, the more I see a shift in how we think about personality. Psychologists are beginning to view personality as a starting point for growth, instead of a box.

Personality Essential Reads

The One-Two Personality Punch to Get Ahead

Genetics, Environment, and Personality

Your personality doesn’t have to be a fixed identity, nor does a diagnosis encapsulate who you are. Instead, these labels are just a way of describing patterns you can understand, refine, and evolve.