Hey friends,

So apparently, my personality is like… a shape-shifter.
Middle school friends told me I “changed” when I hit high school.
High school friends said the same thing when I started college.
And my boyfriend from last year? Yup—he told me this year that I’ve changed again.

Honestly, he’s not wrong. I feel it too.

But here’s the thing—there’s a difference between personality and temperament.

• Personality = the part of you that can change with time, experiences, and life stages.
• Temperament = the stuff you’re born with. The unshakable, “this is just how my brain is wired” part.

I first learned about this back in freshman year of college when I took this psychology test called TCI at the campus counseling center. That’s when I realized—most personality tests we do for fun, like MBTI or Enneagram, are actually measuring the changeable parts of us.

No wonder those results can shift depending on the season of life you’re in.

Temperament? Way harder to change. And honestly, way more useful to know.

The Problem: Those Tests Are $$$

The TCI test isn’t free—it’s like $40–$50 plus extra for the full breakdown.
If you’re in school, you might get it free through your counseling center, but I was on summer break.

Also… I didn’t just want to check boxes on a form.
I wanted an actual conversation with someone who could ask me questions and help me reflect.
Only problem? I don’t personally know any psychologists.

So I decided to let ChatGPT play the role.

And guess what? It worked better than I expected.

The Prompt I Used

I literally typed this into ChatGPT:

I want to know my inborn temperament, not just my current personality type.
Please ask me a series of key questions to figure out my temperament.
Once I answer them, write me a personalized temperament report based on my responses.

And then I just answered whatever questions it threw at me.
It was like having a free-flowing conversation, except it remembered everything and connected the dots for me.

Pro tip: Since temperament is about the unchanging stuff, try to think about both your current self and your younger self (like elementary school age) when answering. That way it’s more accurate.

By the end, I had a full-on “temperament report” that was like… two or three pages long.

Why I Loved Doing This

1. It Made Me Stop and Reflect
   I didn’t just tick boxes like in a normal test. I had to write out my thoughts, compare my past self to my present self, and notice which traits stayed constant and which ones evolved.
2. It Gave Me Life Direction
   Living in sync with your natural temperament feels like swimming with the current instead of against it.
   I realized there were times in my life I was basically denying my core temperament—and, surprise surprise, those were the times I felt the most burnt out or depressed.

Knowing your temperament doesn’t mean your whole future is suddenly clear. But it does give you a better compass.

---

So yeah, if you’ve got ChatGPT (or honestly any decent AI chatbot), try this.
You might end up understanding yourself way better than you expect.

---

If you want, I can even give you the exact ChatGPT prompt I used so you can copy-paste and get started. Trust me—super worth the 15 minutes.