Overthinking About Personality

Magical Overthinkers

Amanda Montell & Studio71

Education, Science, Society & Culture

4.3 • 636 Ratings

🗓️ 11 June 2025

⏱️ 51 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

How much of who you are is really you—and how much is habit, circumstance, or a story you started telling yourself a long time ago? This week, host Amanda Montell (@amanda_montell) is joined by journalist and author Olga Khazan (@olganator) to explore the strange, sticky concept of personality: where it comes from, why it feels so permanent, and whether we can actually change it. We touch on the appeal of personality frameworks like Myers-Briggs and the Enneagram, but zoom out to ask deeper questions: Do people ever really change, or do we just learn how to act differently? What happens when we no longer feel like the person we’re known to be? A quiet spiral about identity, adaptability, and the mysterious choreography of who we become.Further Reading: Me, But Better: The Science and Promise of Personality Change by Olga Khazan - Join the "Magical Overthinkers Club" by following the pod on Instagram @magicaloverthinkers.- To access early, ad-free episodes and more, subscribe to the Magical Overthinkers Substack.- Pick up a hard copy of Amanda's book The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, or listen to the audiobook. Head to https://Greenchef.com/50MAGICAL and use code 50MAGICAL to get fifty percent off your first month, then twenty percent off for two months with free shipping. Sign up for your one-dollar-per-month trial period at⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠https://SHOPIFY.COM/magical⁠⁠⁠ Check out the Fits Everybody Collection at ⁠⁠https://www.skims.com/magical⁠⁠ #skimspartner Stop putting off those doctors appointments and go to⁠⁠⁠ https://Zocdoc.com/MAGICAL⁠⁠⁠ to find and instantly book a top-rated doctor today Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hey listeners, it's Amanda. I want to tell you about another podcast that I think you'll enjoy.
0:05.5	It's called Deep Cover, The Truth About Sarah. In this season of Deep Cover, you'll hear the story of Sarah Kavanaugh.
0:13.1	Sarah was many things to the people she met, a decorated veteran, a Marine who saved her comrades, a young woman fighting cancer.
0:20.3	Sarah was everything people wanted her to be,
0:22.9	until she wasn't. Turns out, no one knew the real Sarah. Not her comrades, not her wife, no one.
0:30.4	On this season of Deep Cover, Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Jake Halpern, and acclaimed investigative
0:36.0	journalist Jess McHugh unravel an epic six-year
0:39.7	deception that upended lives of countless people. Listen to deep cover The Truth About Sarah
0:45.6	wherever you get your podcasts.
0:53.3	Welcome to The Magical Overthinkers Podcast, a show for thought spirulers, exploring the subjects
1:00.0	we can't stop overthinking about, from burnout to celebrity worship. If you identify as a thought
1:08.3	spiraller, an overthinker, a dreamer, someone who lives in their head,
1:14.0	then you're in the right place. This podcast is here to soften the clash between the innately
1:21.1	irrational ways we humans make decisions and the overwhelm of this time. It's here to take the temperature down on our thoughts
1:29.6	a little bit, to help us think less about the things that don't matter and more about the things
1:35.0	that do. I'm your host, Amanda Montel, and today we're overthinking about personality.
1:46.0	Personality has been a lifelong fixation for me.
1:51.0	Since I was a little kid, I've always been obsessed with taking little personality
1:56.0	quizzes in magazines.
1:58.0	Everything from spending two hours on an exhaustive Myers-Briggs personality assessment
2:03.8	to taking 30 seconds to take a which Gilmore Girls' love interest is right for you, quiz in the
2:09.9	back of 17 magazine. I have always been fascinated by personality taxonomy and categorization
	...

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