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As a Melancholy-Phlegmatic in Inclusion you appear to others as an introvert and a loner when in fact you actually prefer at least a moderate amount of social interaction. This is to say, that you won’t initiate socialization but you will respond if invited.

You like to keep a constant pace of productivity. You aren’t comfortable with “rush” work or with nothing to do. A moderate pace is most effective and most efficient.

You are extremely independent and do not like to be told how to do what you need to do. You a capable of making decisions and don’t need to know everyone’s opinion to see the best course of action. In fact, if others seek to involve themselves in your operations they need to understand the work must be done your way.

If interference runs high, you are not unwilling to lash out with harsh temper to put things back in their proper order.

You don’t openly express affection and prefer what you receive to be a private affair. You have very few deep relationships but those you do have are extremely founded, grounded and long lasting.

What other need to know about you:

• you must have your quiet time

• too much socialization drains your energies

• you won’t tolerate being controlled

• you want every thing done right the first time, and the way you want it done is the right way

• you have a temper

What you need to know about yourself:

• other people have good ideas too

• choices are not ultimatums

The image above is a photo provided by the family of an extremely talented young swimmer Megan Romano as part of a story about her excellent chances for the upcoming Olympics. I mean this girl can swim and swim fast!

But, I think this picture completely derails the story.  The display of Michael Phelps pubic area really puts me off the story.

I have studied and counseled the elements of human behavior for many years and I just can’t for the life of me, think why this picture would be run in a publication like Rivals High, a publication which so emphasizes student sports.

What do you think the message is here?

As a Melancholy in inclusion you may find that you prefer to your own thoughts and reflections to more frivolous interactions. You often take comfort in your private and serious nature when those you know are caught up in the  ”drama” of life. In fact, when you don’t purposefully take private time to regenerate you find yourself becoming impatient with others.

You typically approach very few with the aim of association and socialization and, truth be told, would truly prefer like consideration. A well performed task brings you as much satisfaction as many social encounters. And so, you approach people as you would approach the completion of a task. Which is to say, you seek the most efficient way of working with them.

Because of you hands on mentality your mind will rarely let you rest. When a difficulty arises you play it over in your mind in a continuous loop in an effort to find your error or divine a solution.

Your intense drive for perfection in others as well as yourself can be very off putting and can get out of hand if you don’t stay cautious.

What others need to know about you:

• you don’t like your possesions borrowed without your permission
• you don’t appreciate having contrived socialization foisted upon you
• you must have quiet time to recharge
• you take everything people say very personally
• you will use dry, cutting humor to keep those away who come too close

What you must know about yourself:

• you must learn to trust others
• you must learn to express your desires directly

Your phlegmatic/supine tendencies in control make you appear very independent even though you don’t always feel as such. You don’t seek control over others and won’t accept their control over you.

You have a love for “the rules” and can become quite rigid if challenged.

As a melancholy in affection you neither show nor desire public displays of attention. As a result, you don’t often have the opportunity to develop deep relationships. Those you do invest your trust in are invested for life. Even if their behavior doesn’t warrant your continued acceptance you find it difficult to sever long held ties. You are loyal and faithful to a fault, even knowingly allowing yourself to be taken advantage of by those whom you trust.

I hope you will be always able to conduct business and life in such a manner that you will never be called on to use intervention techniques designed for de-escalating volatile persons, but occasionally such techniques become necessary.

Here are 7 tips that will serve you well. If you maintain a cognizance of these elements you will be well served in an escalating verbal conflict.

1. Paraverbals
Paraverbal communication (tone, cadence, volume, and rate of speech) can cause your meaning to be just the opposite of the actual words you speak. Avoid double messages by monitoring your paraverbals.

2. Reflexive Questioning
Rephrase the volatile persons statements in your own words. This will assure you have an understanding of their meaning which may have become garbled due to heightened emotion.

3. Silent Treatment
One of the most effective verbal intervention techniques is silence. This allows the volatile person additional think time and removes you as a possible opponent for their argument.

4. Calm as a Lake
Even thought you may be churning beneath the surface it is important to communicate a sense of calm to the upset person. This makes them much more receptive to communication which may lead to acceptable resolution.

5. Keep it Simple
Be clear, calm and direct with your communication. This leaves no chance you will be misunderstood and decreases the stress of complex communications.

6. Body Language
Like paraverbals, body language can communicate mixed messages. Make sure your body language is sending the same message as the words you are speaking. Be aware of you proximity and the speed of your movements. Standing too close or moving too rapidly can be perceived as threatening.

7. Divide and Conquer
Often escorting the upset person to a quiet place without an audience will do wonders for calming a person. The lack of audience eliminates the potential for a public loss of face for all parties involved.

One of the few temperaments that is doesn’t nearly always represented itself with heavy blending of other temperaments is the melancholy. It is not uncommon to encounter those who are high melancholies in control, inclusion and affection. In fact, this is true to such an extent that many are compulsive melancholies in at least two of the three areas of need.

So, it is not unlikely that if you are a melancholy you may be a compulsive melancholy in control, a compulsive melancholy in inclusion and a high melancholy in affection.

As a compulsive melancholy you may find that you prefer your own thoughts and reflections to frivolous conversations. Small talk and chit-chat are not pursuits that you choose to engage in. If you have something to say, you say it. Contrived socialization is a drain on your energy and patience. You prefer a good book.

You don’t typically approach others to engage in idle chatter and, truth be told, you would actually prefer they left you out of such things. You find yourself puzzled by those who are ever seeking to “include you in the fun.” It isn’t fun. You don’t want to be offensive or stand offish, you’d simply prefer not to bother with it.

What others think of you isn’t an issue you overly concern yourself with. You are self-motivated. If you feel something is worthwhile to pursue, you will take it up, if not, you won’t.

You have a tendency to under value yourself. In fact, when you bring something to fruition you seek out the imperfections in it so that you can confirm your undervalued self assessment. But, if someone else points out a flaw, you are easily insulted and offended and are not above putting them in their proper place. You drive for perfection from yourself and others can make things very difficult for you.

Your mind is constantly engaged. It simply will not shut off. This is especially true when you reflect upon your imperfections. Your mind is so adept at reliving negative experiences that those experiences become magnified and cause you distress long after they have ceased to be a factor in your life.

You have the ability to direct your mood via the thought path you choose to follow. If you think about the positives your mood becomes positive. If you think about the negatives, your mood becomes negative. This makes you an excellent listener as it makes you extremely empathetic with the speaker.

Those you fully trust are a very select few who have proven themselves to you time and again. Those who spontaneously try to engage you are viewed with a suspicious lens until you decide whether they are genuine.

You are rebellious and independent and hold no truck with those who attempt to foist responsibilities on you that you do not want. You firmly believe that as you have no desire to control the lives of others they have no basis to expect any control over your life.

You don’t seek out leadership, but if others choose to follow your lead because you take decisive and direct action they are welcome to come along for the ride. They are welcome, that is, as long as they adhere to your code for order, truth, reliability and dependability.

You prefer to keep your personal life personal. You don’t give yourself over to dramatic displays of affection and public displays by others tend to make you uncomfortable and even embarrassed. Deep relationships are reserved for a very select few in your life. But, for those you do allow into your sanctum sanctorum you would likely sacrifice your life to protect them.

What others need to know about you:

• you require time for quiet reflection
• you will not be pushed into frivolous social engagements
• you prefer tasks to chatter
• you want any criticism in private, if at all
• you don’t appreciate public displays of affection

What you need to know about yourself:

• Everyone must answer to some higher power, including you.
• It is imperative that you find a way to calm your mind, consider a hobby such as puzzles, fishing, hiking, etcetera.

Take a few minutes to reflect and share you observations and reactions in the comments section. I am interested in the perspective of all, but I specifically invite you to comment.

Other articles in this series:

What if I’m a Melancholy Compulsive Choleric?

What if I’m a Phlegmatic Supine?

What if I’m a Phlegmatic Melancholy?

What is a Blended Temperament?

I received this message when I opened my site management page today

“Akismet has caught 1,041 spam for you since you first installed it.”

This is February and I installed Akismet in December.

I know many of those who read my work are vastly more knowledgeable in this area than I. So, here is my question. How do comment spammers make money?

I really don’t understand it. Even I my screener didn’t catch the spam, most of the messages don’t make any sense anyway. They are usually just a string of unrelated links. I can’t see what would entice anyone to select any of them. They don’t even relate to the content of my posts.

Here is an example I’ve copied and pasted here. I’ve replaced the actual links with strike throughs.

Jspwirwd | diwisahc@danywilde.net | danywilde.net/map.html | IP: 206.53.55.74

East are of ccluding pharyngitis modified by keflex
xanax pictures expectancy leads approx. Understanding cultural by video singulair munchies patients they medroxyprogesterone acetate indirectly. Citizen believes patients they buy clomiphene drug at variouslosartan interchange absorption. As malpractice also scattered capsule histex orange white laugh at zyloprim manufacturerrestoril for agitationpdr entries for the drug baycol meet minimum attorney baycol wisconsin needs. Two major insurance industry coreg affects on blood sugar will require toprol xl 25 mg side effectsmarezine versus meclizine congested. Association between midnight on course of tussionex ingredience the next prozac divorce gain. Following oral attitudes toward erwoid ecstasy vault neurotoxicity death rate of ruralbuy malco flextra in sidney ducks. Most but controlled deliveries metrogel topical antibiotic and management buy zebutal from the online drugstore expectancy. Plan when to subsidize losartan trial for duchenne to escape tricor thyroidism good start natural estrogen compared to premarinpolicy. Singapore used reflects lyavandia drug description rosiglitazone maleate healthscout duty of finasteride salesduty teracted ecstasy. recognized as potential. Glycine and laws in

It looks like gibberish to me.

Another type that puzzles me is the…

“I don’t understand all of the post you wrote on (insert post title here). But, it looks interesting. I guess I just need to do more research.”

Now, the first time I admit, this got past me. But, I still don’t see how this kind of bait could generate much traffic either.

On the other hand, I realize that as a student of human behavior I may be a bit myopic on this one. Somehow, a desired result must be achievable or it wouldn’t continue to happen.

 I passed the question along to my friend Ted Demopoulos who is quite well versed in this area. The following is Ted’s reply.

Hi Reg,A lot of things spammers do make no sense. Sometimes they are just trying things, experimenting, to see if something works.
For example, if they leave 100,000,000 gibberish comments will 1000  people click to their site? From their perspective, maybe it makes sense?I have friends who spend pretty much full time (as in obsessive) looking at malicious traffic on the Internet as low as the bits and bytes levels, and often they are mystified as well.

I’ve been getting more spam comments lately too. A few make it through the filters but not many

Ted

–
Ted Demopoulos, Demopoulos Associates, I consult, I write, I speak, 603-659-0500
Safely and Securely Profiting from the Information Overload Age
SANS Institute Certified Instructor
Effective Internet Presence (now required for success in business and life)

I also got a very insightful response from MT That MindTweaks Chick (aka Tori Deaux which is also a pseudonym I suspect), that I wanted to share. Bye the way, is reposting a comment to the body of a text plagiarism? Ah well, it will be worth the sacrifice.

Here’s my eddycated guess…

Most spam comments aren’t about directly increasing traffic, but in the hope of the links improving their search engine rankings. Most modern blog/journal software makes comment links “nofollow” by default, so they don’t count towards ranking anyway, but spammers work off the high volume approach. I’m just tossing out numbers here, but…. Spam a billion blogs, and a million of the comments might get through spam protections. Of those million, 100,000 of those blogs might not have “no follow” turned on in their comments. Not a high percentage results wise, but 100,000 links, will shoot search engine rank way up.

There are probably a few companies out there paying spammers for traffic per click, too… in which case the spammers don’t care if the click was from a visitor to your site, or from you, checking to see if it was spam. It still counts towards their numbers - and again, it’s all about volume, both for the spammers, and the companies that pay them. 

mindtweaks.com

So, my friends, what do you think? Are Ted and Tori spot-on on this one? How is this type of spam a profitable venture?

As a phlegmatic choleric in inclusion you tend to socialize with those who you feel can be beneficial to your purposes. But, you expect others to put a lot more into the interaction than you do. Because of this you may find that you are particularly adept at tasks which require precision and accuracy. Your drive for perfection makes you quite stubborn and willful. Although, you can be friendly and cordial you don’t typically share your own thoughts and feelings with others.

You prefer to interact with those who recognize and accept your leadership abilities. Those with weak wills annoy you and you believe they get what they deserve for not standing up for themselves.

Your extreme independence helps you to make quick decisions, and take on a task with little input, or interference, from others. In fact, if others choose to interact with you when things need to get done, you make it known in no uncertain terms that you are in control and they can get behind and help push or get off the road.

You demand recognition for your efforts and have no problems displaying your displeasure when you don’t recieve what you view as your just desserts.

You neither display nor require overt displays of affection. In fact, you share your true feelings with a very select few who have earned your trust.

What you want others to know:

• you are drained after a tough job and would rather rest than socialize.
• anyone who chooses to be around you needs to be able to stand up for themselves.
• you won’t tolerate emotional weaklings.
• you are determined to maintain control of yourself and your environment.
• you are perfectly capable of making your own choices and accepting the consequences.
• you have a temper.

What you need to know about yourself:

• Everyone, including you, has to answer to someone. To behavior as though you can operate outside the “laws of life” will not get you where you want to go.

Take a few minutes to reflect and share you observations and reactions in the comments section. I am interested in the perspective of all, but I specifically invite you to comment.

What If I’m a Melancholy with Phlegmatic Tendencies? 

 What if I’m a Melancholy Compulsive Choleric?

What if I’m a Phlegmatic Supine?

What if I’m a Phlegmatic Melancholy?

What is a Blended Temperament?

I live in Greensboro, North Carolina. These folks live and breath stock car races. So, in order to make nice with my neighbors and share a little information with everyone, I’m posting the “Speed Weeks” agenda for Daytona that I’ve managed to get ahold of.

Here goes:

Wed Feb 13

• 11:00 am NASCAR Live! Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 12:00 pm Sprint Cup Practice Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 1:00 pm NASCAR Live! Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 2:00 pm Sprint Cup Practice Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 3:00 pm NASCAR Live! Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 4:00 pm 2008 Sprint Cup Series Preview Show ESPN2
• 4:30 pm Craftsman Truck Series Practice Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 5:30 pm NASCAR Live! Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 6:00 pm NASCAR Now ESPN2
• 8:00 pm The SPEED Report (Special Edition) Daytona Preview SPEED

Thurs Feb 14

• 11:00 am Craftsman Truck Series Practice Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 1:00 pm NASCAR RaceDay Gatorade Duel at Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 2:00 pm Gatorade Duel 150 Qualifying Races SPEED
• 5:30 pm NASCAR Victory Lane Duel Wrapup (LIVE) SPEED
• 7:00 pm Craftsman Truck Series Qualifying Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 9:00 pm Gatorade Duel 150 Qualifying Races [Re-air] SPEED

Fri Feb 15

• 1:00 pm NASCAR Live! Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 1:30 pm Sprint Cup Practice Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 3:00 pm Nationwide Series Qualifying ESPN2
• 6:00 pm NASCAR Now ESPN2
• 6:30 pm NASCAR Live! Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 7:30 pm NCTS Setup Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 8:00 pm Craftsman Truck Series Race Dayton (LIVE) SPEED
• 8:00 pm For Race Fans Only - Dale Earnhardt Jr. QVC
• 11:30 pm Trackside The Daytona 500 SPEED

Sat Feb 16

• 9:00 am NASCAR Live! (LIVE) SPEED
• 10:30 am Sprint Cup Final Practice Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 12:00 pm NASCAR Countdown - Daytona ESPN2
• 1:15 pm Nationwide Series Race at Daytona ESPN2
• 4:30 pm Dale Jr. - Shifting Gears presented by National Guard ESPN2
• 5:00 pm NASCAR Live! Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 6:00 pm Tradin’ Paint Daytona SPEED
• 6:30 pm NASCAR Performance SPEED
• 7:00 pm The SPEED Report (Special Edition) Daytona Preview SPEED
• 8:00 pm Dave Despain on Assignment Building the Daytona 500 SPEED
• 9:00 pm Daytona 500 Memories SPEED

Sun Feb 17

• 9:00 am NASCAR Live! Daytona (LIVE) SPEED
• 9:28 am NASCAR Now Update (Studio Update) ESPN2
• 9:58 am NASCAR Now ESPN2
• 10:00 am Dave Despain on Assignment Building the Daytona 500 SPEED
• 11:00 am NASCAR RaceDay The Daytona 500 (LIVE) SPEED
• 2:00 pm Daytona 500 FOX
• 8:00 pm NASCAR Victory Lane The Daytona 500 (LIVE) SPEED

Enjoy!

Anyone who expects you to have confidence in their ability to provide any insight into your life needs to meet your expectations for competence. They must be more knowledgeable than you, otherwise you would be able to take care of things from your own position. They need to be legitimate and a display of their diplomas and certificates would be a good start to establishing their bona fides with you. They need not attempt to pacify you with insincere hugs, pats on the back or shoulder touching. You prefer the professional approach.

You are by and large a private person and you require some quiet time each day to regenerate your energies. This does not mean you do not enjoy socializing. In fact, you do enjoy social situations, you are simply selective in who you trust will enough to socialize with. If pressed into contrived social situations you have a tendency to approach interacting with unfamiliar people as you would approach a task. You look for the most efficient way to interact with them and move on.

You don’t like ill used time. You much prefer to work at a steady pace to stay ahead of demand rather than waiting for the impending deadline and working through the pressure. In fact, the threat of pressure holds no motivating factor for you at all. Instead you resent the poor planning of those who now require work to be conducted in a pressure situation.

You would gladly adopt the mantra, “Poor planning on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part,” if you felt the poor planners would have any concept of what you meant by it.

Those who choose, by action, deed or word, to insult or offend you should do so at their own peril. You have no problem what-so-ever with finding a way to meet out retaliatory justice for past crimes. This is true even if you must be somewhat passive-aggressive to accomplish it. In your mind pay back is not a female dog; pay back is a logical consequence.

Moody people bring you down and you would rather not deal with them. Nothing so annoys you as someone who constantly goes about bemoaning their lot in life. Your philosophy, “Life is a do-it-yourself-er, get over it.”

No one, not even you, meets your standard of perfection. This causes you no small amount of distress. You must learn to accept that though we all must strive for perfection, falling short is not failure.

You are compulsively independent and self motivated. You don’t push yourself onto others and you would appreciate the same courtesy, thank you very much.

You are a true proponent of “Truth, Justice, and the American Way!” By this token, you demand truth, order, reliability and dependability from those you trust. In fact, you can be somewhat rigid and uncompromising at times.

You don’t overtly show much affection. That is not to say you don’t care, it simply means you believe the proof should be in the pudding. If you care about someone you prefer to demonstrating it through action, or doing things for them. In fact, if you believe someone is being overly affectionate you feel crowded or put upon.

What you wish people knew about you:

• you need your “space.”
• too many people about stress you.
• you prefer clearly defined tasks.
• you have a temper.
• you prefer to work in your areas of competency.
• others should take responsibility for themselves.
• you prefer to receive your criticism and feedback in private.
• truth, reliability and dependability are paramount values.

What you need to know about yourself.

• people don’t know you care about them if you don’t tell them.
• if you share your agenda and schedules with others they won’t see you as so cold.

If you are a melancholy with phlegmatic tendencies you can make a positive choice right here. Others with your temperament have left comments and received feedback that was helpful to them. If you comment here you may also find you receive useful feedback.

What if I’m a Melancholy Compulsive Choleric?

What if I’m a Phlegmatic Supine?

What if I’m a Phlegmatic Melancholy?

What is a Blended Temperament?

As a melancholy, compulsive choleric you are an extremely unique mixture of temperament. You may find yourself frequently torn between your limited desire to interact with others and your drive to influence, lead and control those around you.

On the one hand you are basically a private and serious person. Situations with limited structure tend to annoy you or cause you stress. To compensate for this you may find yourself retreating into more private and isolated surroundings than provide the order and purposefulness you crave.

You don’t approach very many people for social interaction and, if the truth be known, would really rather they didn’t approach you either. In fact, you are much more task oriented and don’t really understand the world’s obsession with feelings and emotions. Frankly, you find it all a bit tedious and dull.

On the other hand, you are compulsively independent. You do not need a committee to come to a decision. When you understand the task at hand you are ready to take immediate action. In fact, you may view unsolicited input from others as intolerable interference and you have no qualms about making that known.

Oddly, even though you will tolerate no control over your life from others, you demand control over the behaviors of those who seek to invade your world. This feeds into your need for perfection. Your highly critical nature makes it unlikely that you will be completely satisfied with the work of anyone, including yourself.

You have been known to demonstrate explosive outbursts of temper. In fact, others may consider you cruel or abusive.

You have very little tolerance for touchy, feely interactions. Your self defence mechanisms cause you to appear emotionally guarded and distant. You have very few people whom you truly trust. And if you choose to express your feelings for them you demonstrate it by a gesture or doing something special for them rather than verbalizing. This trait is so pronounced that you may even feel insulted or offended if someone displays overt affection toward you. You believe affection is after all, a private affair and should be kept that way.

You know you work hard to produce and you believe, no demand, that your efforts be acknowledged and appreciated.

Some things you need others to respect about you:

• your home must be an orderly sanctuary.
• you will not respond well to forced socialization.
• you prefer tasks to people
• you need to be in control of your own finances.
• upbeat music lightens your mood.
• people need to be strong so that you don’t have to control them.
• you have a temper.
• overt displays of affection make you uncomfortable.
• you need to make your own decisions

One thing you MUST learn about yourself:

• EVERYONE answers to a higher authority. Me, you, everybody. Some of us answer to a higher spiritual authority. Some of us answer to a flesh and blood boss. Some of us must answer to both. You must learn to acknowledge and accept that authority and comply with the structure it provides.

I’m always interested in feed back. I am particularly interested in your views as a choleric or someone who interacts regularly with a choleric. Please share your thoughts in the comment section.

What if I’m a Melancholy Compulsive Choleric?

What if I’m a Phlegmatic Supine?

What if I’m a Phlegmatic Melancholy?

What is a Blended Temperament?