We talk creating characters by using the 16 Myers-Briggs personalities.
We have discussed the Myers-Briggs personalities in the past. In our series of very popular blogs we did a survey of 500+ people regarding their personality type and playing habits with D&D. The results were pretty interesting! We’ve taken the test ourselves and agreed with the outcome. We’ve also taken the test in-character as characters from our Thread of Souls book series and found perfect alignment, as well! So that got us thinking about how writers and creators could use the personality types on Myers-Briggs to help them develop new characters.
When you visit the 16 personalities website, you’ll find an overview of each type. You’ll find the Inventor who has a thirst for knowledge, the Campaigner who is a free spirit, the Executive who excels in managing things, and more. By clicking on each personality type, you get an extremely comprehensive breakdown.
The Breakdown
When we click on the Logician, we get a highly detailed breakdown of this personality type. It starts with a page-long Introduction, which is very useful in getting a feel for this character. It also provides real-world examples of Logicians to put things into context, such as Albert Einstein, Kristin Stewart, and Lord Varys from Game of Thrones.
We have series of pages after that. The Strengths and Weaknesses page is great for developing a well-rounded character. We get pages on how they deal with Romance and Friendships, which is great for inter-character relations. There is one for how they would act as parents for characters that have children. Career Paths and Workplace Habits are excellent references for choosing a profession for them. And finally, Conclusion gives more thoughts for this character.
Using a Personality Profile to Create a Character
Let’s use the Executive one, and say we are going to create a character that would exist in our high fantasy Thread of Souls world.
Introduction: We learn that Executives are “model citizens” in a sense they uphold the law, follow rules, and focus on a democratic community. We will design a character that lives in Sunspire and is actively involved in the community. They take the laws of the city very seriously.
Strengths & Weakness: We flesh out our character with their strengths being highly organized, very patient, and extremely dedicated to the tasks they take on. For their weaknesses, we choose from the provided list that they are stubborn in their viewpoints, not comfortable with new and untested ideas, and never relax.
Romance & Friendships: Learning from the personality website, we put our character into a stable and long marriage, where they are committed, honest, and reliable, but not very romantic or spontaneous. For their friendships, our character has a very wide net of friendships and connections, however, there isn’t much diversity in people or viewpoints. We will have our character socialize in one part of Sunspire and not interact much with different people.
Parenthood: Reading that Executives tend to be strict parents, we think it will be fun to give them a rebellious adolescent child that challenges their way of thinking.
Careers & Workplace Habits: By reading we learn that Executives tend to stay with one employer for their entire career, and like a culture of hard work and discipline. Suggested careers are the military, law enforcement, hospitals, legal firms, and politics. We will put our character as a leader within Sunspire’s military establishment, the Solchens.
Conclusion: Going through the conclusion, we will add the last details to our character. Their story will revolve around having to learn to accept different views and unorthodox approaches in order to overcome a seemingly insurmountable challenge. The solution will be brought to them by their rebellious adolescent, giving them an opportunity to heal a strained relationship.
We hope this helps you learn new ways to create characters and generate ideas for your stories!
