Rebel Without Cause

Somehow this week, through the random clicking of links, I ended up taking a personality quiz based on Gretchen Rubin's theory of the "Four Tendencies."  According to Rubin, there are four different personality tendencies that we might have: Obliger, Questioner, Upholder, and Rebel.  I haven't read the book, so I can't give any specifics about each type, but the general idea is this:

• Obliger-- Someone who gets things done when there are external expectations (i.e. you make it to the gym every day because your best friend expects to meet you there to work out together).
• Questioner-- Someone who takes the time to exhaustively investigate or research before acting.
• Upholder-- Someone who can take initiative on their own and carry through even when nobody else knows about it.
• Rebel-- Someone who resists any kind of expectations.

(I may well have this completely off, but this was my takeaway from the article I read.  If you want to know more she has an entire book about it.)

Anyway, according to the quiz I am an Upholder personality type.  The thing is, I can see strong traits that fit into the other categories too.  I tend to research forever before being willing to commit to anything.  (Years and years before I was willing to make the jump to publishing ebooks, for example.  And don't even get me started on the hours I spent before we bought our latest van.)  I also tend to be an obliger who can get stuff done for other people when I can't do it for myself.  

But the trait that has smacked me upside the head the most the week has been "Rebel."

There is a strong part of me that resists other people telling me what to do.  Call it pride, call it rebelliousness, call it contrariness, whichever you want.  It's the part of me that doesn't want to go with the crowd.  Spend hours trying to convince me that I need to do something a certain way, and I will silently-- but insistently-- dig in my feet.  Post a facebook parenting rant and even if I agree with your point, I will suddenly find myself coming up with arguments about why you are wrong.  Now, I'm not generally confrontational (unless you happen to be in my close friends/family circle) so I probably won't say anything to your face-- or post it, rather.  But in my mind I will make a 180 degree turn-- or at least a 90 degree turn.

It's the reason I'm not a Yankees fan.  In fact, the longer I lived in New York, the more anti-Yankees I grew! (Shouldn't it work the other way around?)

What provokes the strongest rebellion on my part is when I feel I am being manipulated.  It's the exact reason I despise most interactions with salespeople.  Many successful salespeople use manipulation as a matter of course-- either using your desires or your fears against you.

Why do I bring this up?  This week the rebel in me has been getting angrier and angrier.  So angry that on some mornings I've woken up angry, before I even have a chance to get out of bed.  I'm not going to tell you why (yes, I'm a tease) because I loathe confrontation.  But I've been surrounded on all sides by a movement that has been trying to manipulate me for political purposes.  (Even when my participating friends are not politically savvy enough to understand what they are actually doing to people like me.)  And nothing brings out the passive-aggressive rebel like manipulation.

But at this point I'm exhausted.

I'm tired of being angry.  I don't want to think about it any more.  I don't want to care anymore.

Apathy.  It's what follows rebellion when my strength wears out.  What it doesn't do is convert me to anyone's cause. Counterproductive? Possibly.  Immature? Sure.

But realistic.  People hate to be coerced.  Even if it's for a good cause.  It backfires more often than not.

Applying it to my own life, I've come away with the conclusion that manipulation should not be in my toolkit.  Not for selling my books, not for converting people to causes I care about, and most of all, not for my relationships with my loved ones.

Now to do a little soul searching and see where it might have crept into my life.