More than a bird

A personality test gone wrong... then, so right

Hello! I’ve found doing things to be challenging recently. I’ve also been busy with work, meaning writing briefs, which sometimes makes it harder to have energy to write the newsletter, too.

Apparently mercury is no longer in retrograde, and apparently that’s good news. It also happens to be somewhat relevant to the discussion below… so drop in with a comment, a like, anything to show there’s signs of life on the other side of this 2013 Macbook Air! That’s just the kind of month it’s been, folks. Happy to be here now.

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The other week some coworkers and I took the Cornell Lab Publishing Group’s “What bird are you most like?” quiz. After answering 15 questions relating to sociability, eating habits, boldness, and other character traits, you get assigned one of 22 North American birds as your personality match.

Two of my coworkers got red-tailed hawks, and another got a raven. Two others got something called the American kestrel, who apparently enjoys eating insects at baseball games. My result? “You are a Canada Goose!”

Some of my bird brethren flying outside my window.

…Really? A goose?! Everyone else is getting raptors, ravens, birds that are cunning and wise and brave. And I'm sitting here feeling a weird kind of shame for somehow being exposed as a fraud, as not good enough. Feeling like… wait for it… a silly goose. 

I dutifully plopped my result into the group chat alongside a frown face and a volunteer to trade bird personalities.

You can’t trade your identity! One (very helpful, and clearly empathetic) coworker said.

Geese are great parents! Another coworker said, in an actual attempt at empathy. Plus, their babies are so cute. 

I looked at the “personality” description for Canada Goose: “Family ties and friendships are important to you. You’re chatty and sociable, hardy and adaptable, but very traditional. You do things the way your parents did rather than trying new approaches. A natural leader, you’re not bossy and let others take the lead, too.”

Okay, some of this resonates. Chatty and sociable? Sure. Hardy and adaptable? Definitely. A natural leader who is good at sharing power? Yes! That’s my ideal form of leadership! But “very traditional” and doing things the way my parents did instead of trying new approaches? That’s basically the opposite of how I’ve constructed my adult life. Does the quiz somehow know something I don’t? Is my sense of self completely wrong? Am I truly more like a Canada Goose than any of the 21 other anthropomorphized bird stereotypes…!?

Finally, a newsletter in which I can display Steph and Danny’s chickens. Minolta in Seattle, WA, Feb. 2021.

It’s deeply satisfying to be told something about our own lives. Personality tests like this are fun because of the dopamine hit you get when you’re “sorted” into the right group. I’m a Ravenclaw, I knew I was smart! I’m a total introvert and use my feelings to make decisions—that’s why my life is so hard. The right result affirms a sense of self; a mirror reflecting back what we want to see. It’s validating, to get a personality test result that feels “like you.”

Later that week, I was at dinner with a friend and some of her friends who I’d just met. We started discussing horoscopes and were delighted to discover that out of the four of us, two were Geminis and two Sagittarius, the uber-compatible sister signs of the zodiac. Well of course we were hitting it off! #notallGeminis, baby!¹

This one woman mentioned an app called the Pattern, which I’d heard of but never used. She convinced the rest of us to download it and watched as we all were shocked by the seeming accuracy of our personality descriptors. “You have a lot of fire, courage, and determination - you’re not someone people should try to control.” Damn, yeah, it’s true I’m defiant! “You’re meant to inspire others with your creativity and humor.” Thank you for articulating my life purpose, yes! I love this app! Tell me more about how great I am and all the obstacles I face—understand me, validate me, know me.

There’s plenty of research about the fallacies of personality tests, including the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, which some of us had to take in law school before being paired with our clinic partners. From what I’ve read, it’s hard to eliminate confirmation bias from any such tests. Once you’ve been assigned a particular personality type, you start noticing those traits about yourself more than the traits that run counter to that type. It’s the same with horoscopes—I notice my “chaotic Gemini nature” because I’ve chosen to identify with my sun sign and downplay the many attributes I share with other signs. This is by no means an invalidation of having a full star chart reading with an astrologist—I believe a lot of discovery can happen through examining our roots, our past, the constellations of our lives. Ultimately, I care less about the psychology of personality tests than I do about reflecting on why and how I use these “tools” as part of my own self-discovery.

Acquiring self-knowledge is hard. It requires honesty, questioning what you’ve been raised to believe. It requires taking a good look in the mirror, and then assessing the quality of mirrors you’re grown up thinking were clear. It can also requires giving up the image you have of who you are and how you want to be perceived.

As I was writing this essay, I decided to take the bird quiz again. Despite answering the questions pretty much the same, I got a different result: “You are a Raven!” Wow. Okay… A raven’s personality description is: “Extremely intelligent and sociable, you love practical jokes and figuring out tricky situations. You’re devoted to family and friends, playful, acrobatic, and hardy. Even those who don’t like you can’t help but respect your many talents.”

Overall, the raven’s description is more in line with how I think of myself. It came as a bit of relief, to be placed in a new category this time; maybe my last result was a fluke.

But over the past few days, as I’ve reflected on this topic, I’ve come to miss the goose. I feel attached to it now, the more time I spend examining my initial shameful reaction. I’ve started seeing geese everywhere—calling to each other as they fly above my house, stopping traffic in the street as they waddle with their babies to the pond on the other side of the road. Maybe I am indeed a goose; maybe I’ve decided that’s what I want to be.

It wasn’t until yesterday that I remembered one of my favorite poems (yes, it’s a popular one) happens to be about geese. How funny it was to forget, and then to come back to it again. Of course I’m a goose! And how lucky, how stubbornly lucky, to get to be included in this wild mess.

I read this poem and feel it within. May we all get to be there, high up in the clean blue, heading home.

From this goose to her gaggle,²

-Julia

1. I hope some of you are rolling your eyes by now—it’s warranted.

2. Sorry but I had to.