PERSONALITY and CHARACTER

The word 'personality' derives from the Latin word 'persona' which means 'mask'.

The study of personality can be understood as the study of 'masks' that people wear. These are the persons that people project and display, but also include the inner parts of psychological experience which we collectively call our 'self'.

What is personality?

"Your personality is the type of person you are, which is shown by the way you behave, feel and think".

How a person behaves, feels, and thinks, how he conducts himself in a given set of circumstances is largely determined by the state of his mind. The mere external appearance or a person's speech or mannerisms are only fringes of one's personality. They do not reflect the real personality. Personality development in the real sense refers to deeper levels of a person.

What is character?

Every action and thought of ours leaves an impression in our minds. These impressions determine how we behave at a given moment, how we respond to a given situation. The sum total of all our impressions is what determines our character. The past has determined the present. Even so the present - our present thoughts and actions - will shape our future. This is the key principle governing personality development.

What activates the body-mind system?

This question will help us to have better knowledge of ourselves. This question engaged the attention of ancient Indian seers and sages. They experimented with themselves with their sensory and mental apparatus and after a disciplined quest they found out that there is a divine element in human beings, which is the mind of the mind, eyes of the eyes, ears of the ears, and speech of the speech.

It is this divinity which constitutes the real 'I' and the eternal element in our personality. This divinity survives the physical dissolution of the body. This divinity remains latent in us as long as we identify ourselves with our body-mind and the sensory systems. The goal of life, according to the scriptures and the great ones, is to manifest this hidden divinity.

Some essential qualities for personality development:

Faith in oneself:

Faith in god came next only to faith in oneself. If one believes that one's real nature is the spirit-not the body or the mind- one would be a better individual with strong character.

Think positive thoughts:

Positive, wholesome thoughts based on our inherent divinity are essential for a strong character. 'Go on doing good, thinking holy thoughts continuously, which is the only way to suppress base impressions.

Character is repeated habits and repeated habits alone can reform character.' Further, the only sin is to think of oneself and others as weak.

Attitude towards failures and Mistakes: Man advocated uploading the ideal once again even if a person failed a thousand times. He appreciated committing mistakes and learning from them rather than leading an inert existence like a wall, which cannot even tell a lie.

Self-reliance:

Man is the maker of his own destiny. 'We are responsible for what we are, and whatever we wish ourselves to be, we have the power to make ourselves.'

Renunciation and service:

Man held selfless service as a paramount means to character development. This, coupled with renunciation of selfishness and desire for the fruits of action, It can be considered as the twin ideal of our nation. 'Intensify her in those channels, and the rest will take care of itself.'

The personality of a man is two-thirds, and his intellect, his words, are but one-third. It is the real man, the personality of the man, that runs through us. Our actions are but effects. Actions must come when the man is there; the effect is bound to follow the cause.

Pleasure Is Not the Goal

Pleasure is not the goal of man, but knowledge. Pleasure and happiness comes to an end. It is a mistake to suppose that pleasure is the goal. The cause of all the miseries we have in the world is that men foolishly think pleasure to be the ideal to strive for. After a time man finds that it is not happiness, but knowledge, towards which he is going, and that both pleasure and pain are great teachers, and that he learns as much from evil as from good.

Good and evil have an equal share in molding character, and in some instances, misery is a greater teacher than happiness. In studying the great characters the world has produced, also in the vast majority of cases, it would be found that it was misery that taught more than happiness, it was poverty that taught more than wealth, it was blowing that brought out their inner fire more than praise.

Sense-happiness is not the goal of humanity. Wisdom is the goal of all life. We find that man enjoys his intellect more than an animal enjoys its senses, and we see that man enjoys his spiritual nature even more than this rational nature. So the highest wisdom must be this spiritual knowledge. With this knowledge will become Bliss. All these things of this world are but the shadows, the manifestations in the third or fourth degree of the real knowledge and Bliss.

Only the fools rush after sense-enjoyments. It is easy to live in the senses. It is easier to run in the old groove, eating and drinking.

Life on the plane of the spirit is the only life, life on any other plane is mere death; the whole of this life can be only described as a gymnasium. We must go beyond it to enjoy real life.

How to change our Character?

Every work that we do, every movement of the body, every thought that we think, leaves such an impression on the mind-stuff, and even when such impressions are not obvious on the surface, they are sufficiently strong to work beneath the surface, subconsciously.

What we are every moment is determined by the sum total of these impressions on the mind. What I am just at this moment is the effect of the sum total of all the impressions of my past life. This is really what is meant by character; each man's character is determined by the sum total of these impressions. If good impressions prevail, the character becomes good; if bad, it becomes bad.

If a man continuously hears bad words, thinks bad thoughts, does bad actions, his mind will be full of bad impressions; and they will influence his thought and work without his being conscious of the fact.

In fact, these bad impressions are always working, and their resultant must be evil, and that man will be a bad man; he cannot help it. The sum total of these impressions in him will create the strong motive power for doing bad actions. He will be like a machine in the hands of his impressions, and they will force him to do evil.

Similarly, if a man thinks good thoughts and does good works, the sum total of these impressions will be good; and they, in a similar manner, will force him to do good even in spite of himself.

When a man has done so much good work and thought so many good thoughts that there is an irresistible tendency in him to do good, in spite of himself and even if he wishes to do evil, his mind as the sum total of his tendencies, will not allow him to do so; the tendencies will turn him back; he is completely under the influence of the good tendencies. When such is the case, a man's good character is said to be established.

If you really want to judge the character of a man, look not at his great performances. Every fool may become a hero at one time or another. Watch a man do his most common actions; those are indeed the things which will tell you the real character of a great man. Great occasions rouse even the lowest of human beings to some kind of greatness, but he alone is the really great man whose character is great always, the same whatever he be.

All the actions that we see in the world, all the movements in human society, all the works that we have around us, are simply the display of thoughts, the manifestation of the will of man. Machines or instruments, cities, ships, or men-of-war, all these are simply the manifestations of the will of man; and this is caused by character, and character is manufactured by Karma. As is karma, so is the manifestation of the will.

In short

Personality

• Personality refers to the range of distinctive personal qualities and traits of an individual.
• It Represents, Who we seem to be?
• Traits are Personal and physical
• What is it? It is the identity
• It is Subjective Nature
• Expressions are the Outer appearance and behavior of a person.
• May change over time.
• Validation of Society not required

Character

• A character refers to a set of morals and beliefs that defines how we treat or behave with others and ourselves.
• It Represents, Who we actually are?
• Traits are Mental and moral
• What is it? It is a learned behavior
• It is Objective Nature
• Expressions are Traits of a person that are abstract.
• Remains same, no change.
• Validation of Society Required