Family Culture

I found the MotherStyles book at our tiny local library and was skimming through it yesterday evening while outside keeping an eye on the little ones. The basic idea is to find your Briggs “type” and apply it to the way you mother: “MotherStyles helps you break through the myth of the perfect mother and equips you with the self-knowledge you need to become a more effective …” The quiz was making the mommy-blog rounds a couple of weeks ago (I came out as an INTP though in the more complicated Meyer/Briggs tests I come out almost even between Thinking and Feeling) and the book basically expands on that, listing the strengths and struggles of various temperamental types in the Mother role (and also in the Dad and Child roles as well).

Personally, I find the personality typing concept very interesting. I understand our homeschool and family life much better now that I see that my kids are largely introverts, for instance. It helps me read various advice books in better perspective — for example, I read so many homeschooling books when I first started out that seemed to indicate that the perfect way to parent is to be an ESTJ — IE extroverted, focused on sensory and practical details, very routine-inclined and seeing things in plain black and white (ie behavior and character issues). There is nothing wrong with this personality type and it is actually one of the more common ones in the population, but it’s not the only one and it often made me feel like a “bad homeschooler” because I didn’t have the kids building our house, doing lots of chores and projects and unit studies, and keep behavior charts on the walls. Then I moved to classical where being an NT is rewarded and valued, but used some Charlotte Mason ideas to affirm my F and P traits.
One thing I found of value in the book was the idea of Family Culture being influenced by the composite types of all the members. For example, we are largely introverts rather than extroverts in our family. Both my husband and I seem to fall on the NT “intuitive/thinker” side of the continuum though the book suggests that most “T” women have strong “F” (feeling) traits as well because they have been enculturated in this.

I’m a “P” (perception) rather than “J” (judement) oriented person which means that my J family members are sometimes frustrated by my hesitancy to make snap judgements and decisions. I would tentatively put our Family Culture as an INTJ which makes our family focus on “Individual Integrity” — doing our own thing our own way and preserving carefully our own sense of honor. This does seem accurate. Knowing this and knowing my own temperament, I can be more thoughtful about balancing our family traits and my own traits so that what the book calls the “odd man out” doesn’t get misunderstood. (For example, Aidan seems to be an ESFP which makes him activity-oriented, wanting to be around people, influenced by his moods — I find that he wanders around and seems at loose ends unless there is a certain amount of activity and plans in the air).