Thinking Outside the Box in Birth Order

To understand Birth Order it is important to think outside the box. All of us originally were taught to think inside the box. It started when we were about five or six years old. A playmate lied to us, we were devastated, and mother or father told us “you just can’t believe everything you hear.” That gave us the problem of how to figure out what is true. To solve the problem we watched to see what our parents or other adults believed and decided that’s what we were going to believe. Thus we learned to believe on the basis of authority and that defines our box. Our box is made up of what we believe. We can think outside the box by choosing to question authority on the basis of evidence.

Psychiatrist Alfred Adler created the box that defines Birth Order almost a century ago. He stated that Birth Order consisted of oldest, middle and youngest child. Ever since then researchers have struggled trying to prove him right. Even today, research projects that look into Birth Order always assume that it consists of three personalities. They are still thinking inside the box.

Thinking inside the box relies on authority. Thinking outside the box relies on evidence. Almost forty years ago I found some evidence that Birth Order consisted of five rather than three personalities. It was the discovery outside the box that opened up a new understanding of Birth Order personality. I began to see how things actually are. Since then I have been able to add a large amount of information to the understanding of Birth Order, information I am glad to share with you.

How can you develop the ability to think outside the box? You can do it by welcoming challenges to what you believe. I made the decision many years ago that if people could destroy my faith I wanted them to do it. I wanted to believe the truth. From that point I stopped defending what I believe. Defending my faith had kept me inside the box. Accepting challenges to my faith gets me out of the box. It allows me to consider new evidence.

A motto that can help says, “Never get so interested in believing that you forget to think.” Repeat that motto to your self. It allows you to focus on evidence.