Locate your behaviour in marriage

By The Standard and Newsday | Jul. 27, 2014

IN marriage there are different characteristics that individuals flaunt. These have either a positive or negative implication on the marriage.

Some behaviour has to be worked on as it contributes to some skirmishes in relationships or marriages.

Have you wondered why some people are just hard to deal with? They are just unfriendly, and unwelcoming. On the other hand there are some people that you wish to spend the rest of your life with because of their sweet presence and benevolence. Some people are just composed and they can spend countless hours silent even though you stay with them in the same house.

Basically there are four psychological classifications which give rise to four major temperaments or personality types. The word “temperament” has its origins in the Latin word temperamentun which means “right blending”. These four temperaments have been with us for some centuries and help us to mirrow how we behave,

These where popularised by Hippocrates and other early Greek scholars and today they still help us classify people’s personalities: Choleric This type of a person is power-driven or wants to be in control. She/he is a leader, strong willed, goal oriented and wants things done. Such a person is positive, practical, independent, confident and welcomes challenges. The unpleasant side is that they can be very self-sufficient, harsh and hot tempered, which can contribute negatively especially in handing emotional matters. You could be married to such a person and you need, to exercise great patience when dealing with them. In marriage, you need to note that these people lack something that you could give. For example, you need to show them love, kindness, be gentle and help them do tasks without use of force.

Sanguine The second personality is sanguine. As the term implies, this kind of a person is always cheerful, upbeat and optimistic. They are outgoing, energetic, friendly, forgiving and very bold. These are good at networking. Generally, it’s fun to hang out with a sanguine.

Unlike the choleric that is mainly goal-oriented, the sanguine is relationship-oriented and that’s why they are very popular.

The sanguine has weaknesses too. Since they are relationally oriented, they are very emotional and are people pleasers and as a result they are time wasters. It’s great to have a sanguine in a company they bring a dose of fun, but you could end up partying all day, loose focus and get defocused from the real goal. If you are a sanguine you need extra self-control, faithfulness and patience.

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Phlegmatic This is the group that I am in – and I am also half – sanguine. I hope you are also identifying with your class. The phlegmatic, desires peace and is a team player. Such people are dependable, calm, easygoing, witty and very attentive. These people are efficient and purpose driven. The problem here is that this group can be so apathetic and compromising.

Since they are easygoing they could carry the “I don’t care attitude”. Calm people like the phlegmatic are needed, but for some situations we need people that are very responsive and quick to act.

Melancholy As the name implies people on this group are introverted. These people are thoughtful, creative, deep, and are perfectionists. These are the people that always want a high standard in anything they do; they are organised and are task oriented. At times it’s hard to deal with such people because they are impractical, over analytical, moody and insecure.

With this snap shot into people’s personalities, I hope you have seen where you fit in and you can also classify where your spouse or where your love mate fits into. These help us in connecting and handling people that we are married to. These helps us to capitalise on our strengths as we polish our protruding traits.

As a married person or in a relationship, you need to continue to learn these traits in people and acknowledge that disparities are part of the human factor. These differences are to be used to our advantage. Some marital strives are not necessary at all it’s only that we are different and we don’t know!

Parting point: You can work on your behaviour for the benefit of your marriage. Do not burden your spouse with your negative attributes that you could tune. We need to appreciate that people are different and that makes life so much spiced up.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe once said: “Behaviour is the mirror in which everyone shows their image”