Much to my surprise, liking rock and classical music predicts the same things about your personality: having greater “openness to experience” (a personality trait from the Big Five framework) and being more intellectual.

Makes sense for classical, but who would have guessed that’s true of rock?

Another surprise to me was that enjoying dance/electronic music, country music, and jazz music predicted similar traits: being more group-oriented (e.g., gravitating toward group rather than 1-1 interactions), being more extroverted, and being more spontaneous.

But each of these 3 groups also stood out uniquely. Enjoying country was associated with being more emotional, enjoying dance/electronic was associated with higher openness to experience, and enjoying jazz was associated with being less attention-seeking than the other two groups.

Enjoyment of both pop music and hip-hop was associated with being more emotional, but pop music enjoyers were more group-oriented, whereas hip-hop music enjoyers were more spontaneous.

All the correlations discussed here are between r=0.3 and r=0.45 in size, so they are moderately large. It would be neat to see whether this generalizes to non-U.S. samples.

You can explore all of these music genre correlations, plus over a million more correlations about humans, for free using PersonalityMap: https://personalitymap.io

This piece was first written on May 23, 2025, and first appeared on my website on May 29, 2025.

To find out, at Clearer Thinking, we ran a massive study.

We tested thousands of people performing random subsets of 62 diverse cognitive tasks (vocab, math, logic, pattern recognition, reaction time, games, memorization, mental rotation, language learning, etc.)

We successfully replicated a classic finding: performance on nearly all cognitive tasks correlates positively with performance on the other tasks—a phenomenon known as the “positive manifold,” foundational to IQ.

IQ scores explained ~45% of variation across our diverse cognitive tasks, aligning with previous research. That’s very substantial for a single number (IQ score), but also far from capturing everything.

Some of the remaining 55% variance is pure noise; the rest likely comes from task skill (developed through practice) and task-specific aptitudes (likely influenced by both genetics and childhood experiences).

It’s also worth noting that while IQ is predictive of a diverse range of intelligence tasks, it doesn’t necessarily capture ALL that’s meant by intelligence. It’s unclear if it includes “street smarts,” social skills, or deep nature skills (like hunter-gatherers have).

We confirmed IQ predicts interesting outcomes:

• Actively open-minded thinking (r=0.43)

• Household income (weakly, r=0.15)

• Self-reported job performance (for lower IQ ranges only, r=0.48)

• Celebrity worship (substantially negatively correlated with IQ, r=-0.42)

• No link to happiness or life satisfaction.

IQ captures something—but WHAT? There’s no consensus. Theories include that IQ is…

• A single cognitive resource

• Working memory + executive control

• A measure of brain integration

• The result of overlapping cognitive processes

• The top of a hierarchy of abilities

Guess what’s a BETTER predictor of major life outcomes than IQ?

The Big Five personality traits.

In our data, openness, conscientiousness, extraversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism (when all 5 are used together) outperformed IQ at predicting most outcomes.

IQ clearly matters—it unavoidably jumps out from the data when testing people on a diverse range of cognitive tasks.

And yet…

IQ is far from being all that matters and is definitely not destiny.

We used the data from our study to create a new cognitive assessment, which analyzes ability across 7 dimensions and aims to provide you with useful insights about your mind.

If you’d like to take it, you can do so here:

https://programs.clearerthinking.org/cognitive-test-intro.html

(Proceeds support our mission.)

This piece was first written on March 25, 2025, and first appeared on my website on May 15, 2025.

This bell-curve-like shape is a problem for MBTI-style tests because they want to classify each person as either Extraverted or Introverted, either Sensing or Intuitive and so on (usually represented as a four-letter code, like ENTJ or ISFP). But, for each such trait, most people are near the middle. This is why MBTI-style results often change when retested.

What about the Enneagram? While some treat it as more of a spiritual system, it is also often used as a personality typing system. When we use the theory to produce a score measuring how much each person is like each of the 9 Enneagram types, here is what we find:

As we can see, just like with the MBTI-style results, the distribution of scores on each Enneagram type is also pretty close to a bell curve (though the distributions are a bit right-leaning in some cases).

Your Enneagram “type” is simply whichever of these bell curves you’re the most extreme (positive) outlier on. If you’re an outlier on just one, you have a clear Enneagram type.

Depending on the specific Enneagram test I take, I typically get high scores on each of three or four different types, making the concept of an Enneagram type difficult to apply in my case. If you’re like me, you may not have a single coherent Enneagram type.

The gold standard personality framework in academia in the Big Five system. A big advantage it has over other systems is that it assigns you a score on each trait. Like the other systems, we see the traits are close to normally distributed, which for the Big Five is expected:

Regardless of which of these popular systems we use, personality traits are roughly normally distributed, with lots of people near the average and few far from it. MBTI-style tests force you onto one side or the other of each trait (which works best when not near the middle).

The Enneagram, on the other hand, focuses on the one trait in which you’re the greatest (positive) outlier. Finally, the Big Five simply assigns you a score for all five traits – without trying to categorize you.

This piece was first written on September 12, 2024, and first appeared on my website on September 16, 2024.

Before you read this, however, I recommend you read our piece on the Missing Heritability Problem, which provides important context for interpreting this information. Newer, genome-wide association studies tend to get substantially lower estimates for heritability than the twin study figures listed below, and it is still a debate in the field which approach to measuring heritability is more accurate.

Focusing on twin studies, let’s examine estimated heritabilities across five categories: body, mental health, physical health, cognitive/mind-related traits, and personality (including the Big Five personality traits).

You can find high-resolution versions of these charts here:

• Heritability of body-related traits
• Heritability of mental health-related traits
• Heritability of physical health-related traits
• Heritability of cognitive/mind-related traits
• Heritability of personality-related traits
• Heritability of all traits in one chart

Note that here, we are looking at h^2, which represents the “narrow sense heritability”. It measures the proportion of phenotypic variance in a population that is attributable to additive genetic variance. This measure focuses specifically on the additive effects of alleles, excluding other genetic effects like dominance or epistasis. In particular,

h^2 = (additive genetic variance) / (total phenotypic variance).

All of the h^2 numbers in this article come from (or are derived from) papers (or from combining papers). In most cases, these h^2 numbers were calculated by comparing the similarity of traits between monozygotic / MZ (identical) and dizygotic / DZ (fraternal) twins to isolate the additive genetic component. The intuition for how such studies estimate heritability is that the more similar identical twins are in that trait relative to fraternal twins, the more heritable the trait generally is.

Note that h^2 is different than H^2 (broad sense heritability, sometimes written h_b^2 or h_{b}^2), which measures the proportion of phenotypic variance attributable to all genetic factors, including additive, dominance, and epistatic (gene-gene interaction). In particular,

H^2 = (total genetic variance including additive, dominance, and epistatic variances) / (total phenotypic variance).

H^2 will always be greater than or equal to h^2. The two numbers will be similar in cases where the additive genetic variance constitutes the majority of the total genetic variance.

For traits heavily influenced by dominance or gene-gene interactions, H^2 will be significantly larger than h^2. Examples include traits influenced by a few genes with strong dominance effects or complex traits with significant gene-gene interactions.

Note that h^2 values should be considered rough approximations only. Calculating them can be complex and estimates can vary for a variety of reasons, including:

• Differing populations: sometimes h^2 will differ in different human populations due to differences in genetics or differences in environmental influences
• Equivalent environment assumption: if identical twins and fraternal twins don’t “share their environment” to the same extent, that can lead to issues in calculation. If identical twins share more similar environments than fraternal twins, heritability may be overestimated.
• Gene-environment correlations: if there is a correlation between genetics and the environment experienced by individuals, this can bias estimates.
• Differences in the environment: heritability estimates are merely estimates of the percent of phenotypic variation that is accounted for by genetics in a particular environment. If the environment changes, this number can be expected to change. For instance, if everyone’s environment became more identical, heritability would go up because the environment then can’t account for as much variation.
• Simplifying assumptions: additionally, sometimes additional assumptions are made when estimating heritabilities. For example, Falconer’s formula says that h^2 = 2 (r_MZ – r_DZ) where r_MZ is the correlation coefficient for monozygotic (identical) twins and r_DZ is the correlation coefficient for dizygotic (fraternal) twins. But Falconer’s formula makes some assumptions, for instance, that the correlation in traits between twins is not significantly influenced by shared environmental factors, that the effect of genes on the trait is independent of environmental factors, and that assortative mating doesn’t occur (i.e., parents of the twins are not more similar to each other in terms of the trait than would be expected by chance).

Heritability figures will sometimes change as the environment changes. For instance, in an extreme situation where every person has an identical environment, the only variation is genetic. Hence, the more constrained an environment is the greater the heritability.

A common misconception is that zero heritability would imply that genes are not involved. Suppose, though, that in a specific population, everyone has a gene causing trait X (which the environment then modifies). The heritability of X for that population will be found to be 0, even though the trait is caused by a gene!

Now, let’s look at the heritability of all traits in one bar chart:

And here is a list of heritabilities in table form:

Sources:

We recently conducted qualitative research by crowd-sourcing over 100 open-ended responses to the question:

“What signs do you look for that help you identify people who are likely to be untrustworthy or who are likely to hurt you if they become your close friend or partner?”

We thought the answers contained some insights that may help you to identify people with whom it would be risky to get too close. 

Here is a summary of the common themes that our respondents suggested as potential red flags or warning signs for an untrustworthy or harmful person:

1. Manipulation: This takes many forms, including guilt trips, gaslighting, peer pressure, negging, emotional blackmail, and a variety of more subtle behaviors, such as when someone is excessively nice early in a relationship in a way that is not congruent with their underlying personality. These are attempts to control or influence others without being straightforwardly coercive and without appealing to rational persuasion.

2. Inconsistency and Dishonesty: This includes inconsistencies in narratives they tell and dishonesty, but also more subtle forms of deception (such as repeated small untruths and inconsistencies between words and actions) or a lack of continuity in self-presentation over time. This can also include describing projects, connections, or behaviors in grandiose ways that are detached from reality. 

3. Self-Centeredness: This includes a lack of awareness or care regarding the impact of their actions on others, with a focus just on how situations impact themselves. This self-centeredness can also appear as an over-concern with outward appearances (or how situations make them look), frequent bragging, an excessive focus on seeking attention, and the tendency to only talk about themselves without inquiring about others.

4. Anger: Everyone experiences anger sometimes, but frequent, uncontrolled, or unexpected anger tends to be seen as a red flag. Similarly, approval of vengeful or vindictive behavior (or engagement in these behaviors) can be problematic.

5. Lack of Empathy: A lack of empathy for the suffering of others or an absence of kindness in words or actions can signal that someone is more likely to harm you if you become close friends with them or enter into a relationship with them. 

6. Extreme Emotionality: This refers to emotional instability or extreme mood swings. It is even more problematic when accompanied by blaming others for their emotional reactions, especially when those reactions are highly inappropriate (given the circumstances). Extreme emotional reasoning can cause people to become detached from reality (e.g., “Since I feel angry, you must have seriously wronged me!” or “Since I feel anxious, you must be threatening me!”).

7. Avoidance and Poor Communication: It can be difficult to be close to someone who is extremely avoidant of conflict, who hides intense negative feelings that they experience (e.g., pretending not to be angry when they are furious), or who has poor communication skills, especially when resolving issues or conflicts.

8. Lack of Responsibility and Accountability: This includes impulsivity, recklessness, a lack of consideration for others’ safety, an inability to take responsibility after making mistakes, failing to follow through on commitments, or blaming others for their own shortcomings. This can also include serious addiction issues that they are not seeking treatment for, constantly identifying as a victim of their circumstances while not taking responsibility for their role, and projecting personal issues onto others (or lacking self-awareness of their serious faults).

9. Poor Handling of Their Other Relationships: It can be offputting if someone seems unable to healthily handle other relationships in their life or if they treat people poorly if they disagree with or dislike them. Other behaviors, such as asking to borrow money from someone early in a relationship with them, may reflect a lack of common sense or a general inability to navigate relationships in a healthy way.

10. Negative Talk and Gossip: It does not bode well when someone often speaks negatively of others, especially as a source of entertainment or habitual gossiping. This can include talking badly about past associates or partners, such as saying that all their exes were “crazy.”

11. Judgmentalness: Signs of judgmentalness could include passing harsh negative judgments of others based on little information or being very critical or judgmental of other people’s minor faults.

Please note that these traits and behaviors are a summary of over 100 people’s views, not our personal opinions and not professional advice. If you’re concerned that you might be in an abusive relationship, we strongly encourage you to seek support. Seeking help is a brave and important step toward ensuring your safety and well-being. Remember, you’re not alone, and there are resources and people ready to assist you. 

If you are in a relationship that you want to improve, we have a few free tools that might help:

1. Kind And Effective Communication (15 Minutes): Learn and practice principles of non-violent communication to build stronger relationships, resolve conflicts, and improve your self-understanding and awareness.
2. The Relationship Review (15 Minutes): Examine different aspects of your relationship with a partner, close friend, or family member using an open, non-judgmental approach
3. Managing Arguments In A Relationship (20 Minutes): Learn how to navigate arguments effectively and kindly using a situation of your choosing.

Having social interactions and spending time with a variety of kind people is an essential part of our general well-being, but this can become counterproductive when your interactions are with people who are untrustworthy or who aim to harm you.

We hope this “wisdom of the crowds” summary helps you to identify some of the warning signs of unsafe people!

This first appeared on Clearer Thinking on November 3, 2023, and first appeared on this site on November 8, 2023.

We conducted a study of 999 people in the United States; recruited through our study platform at Positly.com. We looked for a correlation between 18 different personality traits (each trait being assessed with two questions) and life satisfaction. We examined the association each trait had with scores on the Satisfaction With Life Scale (a 5 question scale by Diener, Emmons, Larsen, Griffin). There are, of course, many personality traits beyond the 18 we measured!

We found that 8 of the 18 personality traits were strongly associated with life satisfaction, in the sense that the relationship held in the same direction whether measured:

(1) as simple correlations between each individual trait and life satisfaction

(2) controlling for all the other personality traits as well as income, age, gender and education (using linear regression), or

(3) controlling only for the other personality traits most strongly associated with life satisfaction (again using linear regression).

We also found a 9th personality trait with a slightly weaker association to life satisfaction; it was statistically significant, at p=0.05, using two of the three methods mentioned above.

The personality traits we found to be most closely associated with life satisfaction are listed below (ordered roughly by strength of association).

While reviewing the results, please keep a few things in mind:

A. The personality traits were reworded (to have the reverse meaning) in cases where there was a negative correlation to life satisfaction, so that all associations are positive.

B. Also, the exact cause of association is somewhat ambiguous so, for each trait, I cited three different speculative theories on why the relationship to life satisfaction may exist. For example, an association between X (e.g. a personality trait) and Y (e.g. life satisfaction) doesn’t necessarily mean that X causes Y (see this for all the meanings a correlation can have).

In the case of any particular association, it could be that:

• (a) the trait CAUSED greater life satisfaction (i.e. X->Y)
• (b) the trait is CAUSED BY greater life satisfaction (i.e. Y->X)
• (c) some other variable or variables increase the value of the trait and SEPARATELY cause greater life satisfaction. In other words, mutual exclusivity (i.e. Z->X and Z->Y).

The 9 personality traits together (in a linear regression without any other variables) explain about 23% of the variance in life satisfaction (i.e. adjusted R^2 = 0.23). Of course, we only studied 18 personality traits in this study, there are many others that exist that we did not investigate in this work.

Personality Traits Most Positively Associated with Life Satisfaction

1. At Ease – Seldom experiencing fear / Seldom worrying

Perhaps because…

• (a) High levels of anxiety cause people to feel unsatisfied with life.
• (b) People become anxious about the fact that they are unsatisfied with life (for instance, worrying because they feel like they “should” feel satisfied and that something must be wrong with them because they don’t)
• (c) Tough life situations (e.g. divorce or job loss) cause both lower life satisfaction and higher anxiety (separately).

Note: Many people learn to reduce their fear and worry. For instance, they may use Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (including Exposure Therapy for specific fears) or Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction. I think it’s likely this really does improve life satisfaction for people who don’t naturally feel “At Ease”. If you feel a lot of anxiety, fear, stress, or worry in your life, I recommend trying out our app Mind Ease.

2. Self-Valuing – Feeling of superiority / Feeling equal to others

Perhaps because…

• (a) Feeling inferior to others makes people feel bad about themselves which makes them feel unsatisfied with their lives.
• (b) Being unsatisfied with life causes people to feel inferior to others (e.g. due to blaming themselves for their unsatisfying situation).
• (c) Some commonly occurring bad life events (e.g. being harshly rejected or being put down a lot by family members) cause people both to become unsatisfied with life and to feel inferior to others.

Note: Some people learn not to view themselves as inferior to others by challenging their feelings of inferiority (e.g. using Cognitive Therapy techniques) or learning self-compassion (some have benefited from related literature like “Self-compassion” by Kristin Neff). I expect that for someone low on the trait of Self Valuing, learning to view yourself as equal to others may improve life satisfaction.

3. Warm – Laughing aloud / Expressing happy feelings

Perhaps because…

• (a) Being warm causes others to be drawn to us, this closeness improves life satisfaction.
• (b) Being satisfied with life causes people to feel more relaxed around others, which causes them to openly share positive emotions.
• (c) Having emotionally supportive caregivers growing up causes people to be both more comfortable showing their positive feelings, and more satisfied with life.

Note: People can get better at expressing their positive feelings (e.g. I have!), for instance by consciously channeling positivity when greeting people, consciously smiling when feeling happy (if it doesn’t happen automatically, which it doesn’t for some people), verbally expressing that something has made you feel good, etc. I suspect that for those low on the Warm trait these efforts might cause at least a minor boost to life satisfaction.

Personality Traits A Bit Positively Associated with Life Satisfaction

4. Unselfish – Putting others before oneself

Perhaps because…

• Being unselfish leads to better interpersonal relationships which makes people more satisfied with life.
• Being more satisfied with your life means you have less need to focus on yourself, hence, increased focus on others.
• When bad interpersonal experiences teach people that they shouldn’t trust others, they become less satisfied with life (due to worse social relationships) and become more selfish (because they don’t expect others to be unselfish toward them).

5. Forgiving – Not wanting or seeking revenge

Perhaps because…

• Harboring anger and dwelling on wrongs makes you feel bad about your life.
• Being more satisfied with your life makes it easier to minimize or forget about ways you were wronged by others.
• Growing up around forgiving people makes you both more satisfied with life as an adult and more forgiving of others.

6. Improvisational – Being adaptable or quick on your feet

Perhaps because…

• Being adaptable is often useful in the workplace, leading to increased effectiveness and work satisfaction; this leads to increased life satisfaction.
• When you are unsatisfied with life, that unhappiness causes a cognitive burden that makes it harder to be improvisational
• Negative thinking makes them less satisfied with life, and it also separately makes it harder for them to be think quickly on their feet because it’s distracting.

7. Self-Defending – Not being overly self-critical when things go wrong

Perhaps because…

• Blaming yourself for a lot of things may cause you to become unhappy about your life.
• Having a life that makes you feel satisfied may give you greater self-esteem (if you attribute that good life to your own character), which could prevent you from blaming yourself for problems.
• Being the sort of person that very rarely upsets other people could cause you to be both more satisfied with life (due to better social relationships) and less likely to attribute negative incidents to your own character.

8. Normal – Acting in a socially acceptable way

Perhaps because…

• Behaving normally may allow people to fit in better with their social groups; making them more satisfied with life.
• Being increasingly unsatisfied with life may cause people to engage in increasingly abnormal seeming behavior.
• Being a social outcast may cause people to be both less satisfied with life and less likely to care about their behaviors conforming to what others view as normal.

Personality Trait Possibly Associated with Life Satisfaction

(this final trait was not as consistently associated with life satisfaction as those above)

1. Unfeeling – being indifferent to the feelings of others

Perhaps because…

• Feeling too intensely when others suffer causes one to suffer; leading to lower life satisfaction.
• Being more satisfied with life makes people feel less need for maintaining existing social relationships causing indifference to the feelings of others
• People with a more positive disposition feel less negative emotions (causing more satisfaction with life) and less negative emotion in response to other people’s feelings (hence greater indifference).This fairly weak association could easily be a statistical fluke.

Note that there is some subjectivity in the rank order above because the strength order varied somewhat based on which method was used to measure the associations, and because there is a limit to the precision with which the associations can be measured using our data (which, naturally, depends on the sample size).

Also, since each personality trait was measured using only two questions (and, as a result, each trait was measured only superficially for each person), one might assume that these results fail to capture the true extent of the correlations. On the other hand, since we tested 18 traits and selected the strongest, a regression to the mean effect will be working in the opposite direction to some extent.

Note: each of these examples is supposed to illustrate a somewhat extreme form of each trait for clarity purposes. Most people who have or lack each trait don’t have a form that is as extreme as is shown in these examples.

1. Extraversion vs. Introversion

“Are you coming out? It’s going to be a huge night! First we’re meeting up with Bill, Harry and Jennifer for drinks. Then stopping by the party to see the whole crew, and after, if we’re feeling it, we’ll hit up Sing Song karaoke. Then we’re hitting the clubs for the rest of the night!”

“Thanks. I appreciate the invite. I’m just going to stay in tonight. I’ve really been loving this book I’m reading. I’ve been looking forward to having the time to finish it.”

2. Conscientious vs. Nonchalant

“I can’t believe how much material this exam is going to cover! I still need to make an outline of all the material, and flashcards. Last time I color coded my outline which worked really well, though it took a long time to make. I might borrow outlines from a couple other people to see how they organize the material. I’m going to be up until 2am tonight at least.”

“Me too…but more like 4am. I have a date with World of Warcraft. You do realize this test only counts for 5% of our grade, right? I might just skip the exam actually.”

3. Social awareness vs. Social unawareness

“Let’s go talk to Sally over there, she clearly wants to get out of that conversation with Bill. Plus, I should introduce her to Ethan.”

“Wait, who’s Sally again…is she one of the new engineers? How do you know she doesn’t like Bill, did she tell you that? And is Ethan even here tonight? Why do you want to introduce them to each other anyway?”

4. Irrationality vs. Stability

“Sometimes life is so intense that I almost can’t take it. I’ll just burst out in tears in the middle of the day and have to hide in the bathroom at work. I wouldn’t have it any other way though, it’s what makes life so meaningful.”

“Crying at work you mean? I’ve done that too actually. I was at work when I found out my sister had died. It was really tough. Actually though, now that I think about it, I finished out my shift since I only had 5 minutes of it left anyway. And I don’t think I cried until later that night when I was at home alone.”

5. Aesthetic sensitivity vs. Aesthetic indifference

“Did you see the colors he painted his walls!? They made my skin crawl.”

“Wait, what color were they? And how is it even possible for colors to make your skin crawl?”

6. Sensitivity vs. Insensitivity

“Please, please don’t use glue traps. Once the mouse is stuck it will slowly starve to death. What if I help you trap it and then we can find a good place to release it outside?”

“Are you kidding me? We’re talking about a mouse! If the stupid thing weren’t so damn fast I’d stamp right on its head with my boots, that would take so much less time.”

7. Anxiety vs. Calmness

“I’ve been worried all day because I’ve been waiting for the doctor to call me with my test results. I mean, I know I probably will test negative, but what if I don’t? I wouldn’t be able to stay in school anymore, and I’m not sure I could afford the medical bills. Even if there is a 1% that I test positive, the consequences would just be so serious that it’s still a big deal. And my chances might even be worse than 1%! I really don’t need this right now, I was already really worried about the presentation I have to give to the CEO at the end of the month. What is life going to throw at me next?”

“Honestly, you just need to relax. What’s the point of worrying about all this? Worrying doesn’t change anything and you’re just stressing yourself out. Like you said, you’re really unlikely to test positive. Everything is going to be totally fine in the end.”

8. Open Mind vs. Closed Mind

“That was the coolest lecture ever, I’m so inspired right now. I can only begin to imagine what it’s like to be Prism, as a visually impaired Chinese Italian non gender binary person who spent fifteen years fighting for the medical establishment to finally recognize the alternative medical treatments that cured his own cancer! Prism has so many interesting ideas about relationships and child rearing too. I’m also really excited now to buy a few books on the diversity of social practices among First Nations people.”

“Seriously, you enjoyed that? That was literally the weirded thing I’ve ever experienced. I wanted to puke when he made us all put our arms around each other in a circle and try to open our ‘inner eye’. What does that even mean? Not to mention that half the people there were out of it on drugs of some kind. And why on earth was that woman practically naked?”

9. Authoritarianism vs. Libertarianism

“If your father wants you to move in with him and your mom, then that’s your duty as their child. Maybe your pastor can give you advice for how to make it a smooth transition.”

“It was my parents choice to have me. Just because they made that choice doesn’t mean they have control over my life. Are you serious that if you were me you would talk to a pastor for advice? Sure, I’m spiritual. But I don’t belong to a church or follow one particular set of teachings, I prefer to figure out myself what religion and spirituality mean.”

10. Optimism vs. Pessimism

“I can’t wait until vacation! We’re going to have such an incredible time together. And it’s going to be such a well deserved break after all this hard work. Plus, they’re going to announce bonuses right before we leave. Business has been great, I bet they’ll be the biggest bonuses yet. When we’re lying on the beach we can discuss the fun things we’re going to buy with all that money!”

“Vacation will be pretty fun I guess. But I’ve been thinking…the beaches get so crowded during the vacation season, maybe it would make more sense to just stay home this year. It’s pretty pointless just lying on the beach all day anyway. I know you’re excited about bonuses, but I don’t want you to get your hopes up. Business looked good this year, but our industry is about to get squeezed with all the new technology coming to market. I wouldn’t be surprised if they don’t even give us bonuses. After all, we work at a company that tries to convince consumers to buy meaningless shit they don’t need, so why would the company care about making its employees happy?”

11. Hypersexuality vs. Asexuality

“This club is amazing…it has the hottest people I’ve ever seen! I would literally sleep with anyone here. It’s hard to even focus on this conversation!”

“Oh…hmm, I guess you’re right, there are a lot of good looking people here. All the skin tight clothing and showing off of skin seems a bit gratuitous though, don’t you think?”

12. Analytical vs. Intuitive

“I’ve been thinking about social interaction a lot lately, and currently my best framework for how to start a conversation with a stranger is to make a comment about something in the surrounding context that you know the other person is already aware of. For instance, about the weather, but only if the weather is well above or below average for that season. Then, once the other person responds to your comment, you should ask them a question related to their response to get them talking further. If the person gives a really short response to your question then it probably means…”

“Can I stop you right there? Honestly, if you’re analyzing how to have social interaction you’re already doing it wrong. Just get a feel for what the other person is like. Then just say whatever feels most natural to say. Don’t overthink everything!”

13. Self-esteem vs. Self depreciation

“There are very few incredible people in the world. What are the chances that two truly unique and awesome people would find each other? I think that as a team we could achieve just about anything.”

“You keep calling me special, but honestly, I’m embarrassed to admit it, but there’s nothing special about me. Nearly everything I’ve achieved was just a result of good luck, or having unfair opportunities that other people don’t get, and I’m probably one of the least talented people to achieve what I’ve achieved. Eventually people will figure that out about me and it will all come crashing down. And when I get good opportunities I usually just mess them up or undermine myself. If there’s anything special about me, it’s that there’s something wrong with me. I screw things up. Fundamentally, not only am I ordinary, but I’m not even an especially good person, and I don’t deserve much of anything.”