Linked: Maximizing Life Connections One Link at a Time
CVB: You have co-written with our friend Linda Gilden a series of books to help people understand the different personalities and how they work together in practical ways. Tell me how that all transpired and what is the goal of this series?
Linda Goldfarb: Linda and I were part of a group of professional writers called CLASS, Christian Leaders, Authors, and Speakers Services. During that time we sat under the teaching of the Littauer legacy and it changed our lives. Knowing the personalities, learning about ourselves absolutely changed us. And I became passionate about it. Linda, of course, was also passionate about it. I had incorporated the personalities into my coaching and into my life. This understanding also changed the dynamic with my husband and with my kids.
I had been working with busy parents and I needed something quick and simple to help them. So I contacted Linda and I said, “Would you be interested in co-writing an easy, but truth-filled assessment for busy people? People have got to get linked. And so it was like, “Oh … Linked!” So it is a trademark and it is supported by the brain science.
For example, the mobilizer does not naturally snap with the stabilizer portion of the brain. It does not happen. But you can have people that are mobilizers and they’re walking as a stabilizer. That was me as a child. I had parents that wanted the house quiet and I was a socializer. As a kid, I didn’t know anything about the personalities. My parents didn’t know. So I’m morphed into something I was not. I shut off everything that would have been a natural way for me to walk. I didn’t realize until I was in high school that I was much happier on the stage. I didn’t realize that in my quiet state I wasn’t who I needed to be.
CVB: So when did that change for you?
Linda: When I was in high school. But I didn’t have a name for it. I didn’t know what it was. I realized that I was fun. I can help people move on to the next thing. I became a change maker at a very young age, but I didn’t want to push people. But people would come to me and say, what do I do now? And I’d say, “Well, you do this, and this, and this.” It just came naturally to me.
I was very competitive. In my nature, things like exercise and competition, all of that is how I rest. But I was being told, “take a nap.” And answered, “I don’t want to take a nap.” I wondered what was wrong with me?
Then I discovered the personalities when Florence Littauer and CLASS came to San Antonio. At first I was put off because I was afraid they were going to try to label me. But then I saw how the personalities impacted my relationships and family. I started discovering my husband, who is a stabilizer and an organizer in my real life
When I found out that I am a choleric personality I said, “No, I’m not. I’m not a bossy person.” But then I discovered that when I walk in a room, people assume I own it because that’s my posture. That’s my nature. So then I looked at my husband and I was like, “Oh, that’s why he slept. He needs to sleep. He’s not lazy. He’s living life.”
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