We Took the Strengths Test. His Tops Are Her Bottoms.

Welcome to We Should Probably Edit This, but we won't.

This is about our life's messy journey.

It's unscripted, talks about growth, real laughs, sometimes real laughs, sometimes just the chaos, and, and we think there's a little bit of comedy here.

Everything.

It's about our 37 years of marriage and our experience. I'm Matthew Greger.

And I'm Nancy Greger. And we're your hosts of We Should Probably Edit This.

But we won't. Maybe. And we probably should have edited that. So here's our next episode.

Yes.

Hi. Hello. Welcome to our next episode.

Wow, 2 in a row. We're on a roll.

Well, it's not 2 in a row. We had a week. So anyways, um, today's topic is going to be on our strengths. We're not going to focus on our weaknesses too much, just our strengths.

No, the objective is don't worry about your weaknesses because the idea of this examples, if you will, is that I think weaknesses fall in line with people trying to change. Right. So there's abilities that we each come with. If we focus on our weaknesses so much, we're trying to change that.

Or if we— if the partner focuses on the weaknesses of the other, that's just room for problems.

Room.

Yes.

It's epic.

But it's also really important that we understand.

You know.

That we understand the strengths of each other. And I think actually, until we just took this lead class at church—

at the Gallup Poll is what we ended up taking at church.

Right. But until we took that course, we knew of each other's strengths, but we didn't really hone in on it. And I think this, the StrengthsFinder, really just shed light to where we work good together, what defines us and what quadrant we're good at and where the other one excels versus the other. And we've just played— we haven't really focused in on that too much of letting the other person drive their strength in our relationship. We always expected, or I have— I expected that you should understand what I'm talking about.

Sure. Okay. And I do allow you to express your strengths to some extent.

You mean express my desire for you to understand something that you really don't want?

That you really don't want to? Let's pull it back.

Okay.

What were your top 5 strengths?

Okay.

Start there. I'll start there. Because that will lead people to understand.

Understand the two of us a little more? Correct.

So what were your top 5?

All right, so let's do— I'll do my top 5, then you do your top 5, and then we'll talk about where they fit into it.

Hey, go ahead, top 5.

That must be one of your strengths right there that you're trying to push me into. Okay, so the first one I have is learner, and this is about being curious, inquisitive, and studious. Second is Achiever: driven, diligent, ambitious. Third is Futuristic: imaginative, forward-thinking, visionary. I love to think about the future. Belief: certain, passionate, committed. And the fifth one is Responsibility: dependable, committed, and responsive.

I like them. Those are good. Those are good.

Okay, so what are your— what are your top 5?

My first one was communication.

See, she's trying to get me to communicate always.

Communication. Uh, good at storytelling, not, uh, afraid of speaking in front of a crowd or speaking on a stage. Never been my issue.

Or continuing to talk. Period.

Consistency. Um, I'm a creature of habit and I tend to stick with certain things, uh, until I— something falls me off. But then I always remember how good it is to remain on a consistent level. Uh, and that's routines. That could be, um, just routines and rules of how you follow. Significance. So, um, for me, there's, there's, there has to be some underlying passion that I feel when, um, I'm talking about something or I'm trying to express something. There has to be some significance to it that I think is going to be helpful. Harmony. This was funny because one of the, one of the key descriptions to harmony is people that are straightforward as well as what we would call spicy. And I—

did it actually describe?

It does in the description. Yeah. In the further around in the description, it talks about people who are straightforward. Um, and describes them as being spicy, spicy, which I thought was, was very funny when I, when I heard it, because years ago, um, I asked my older child, my son, how he would describe me to, you know, people he wanted to introduce me to or whatever. And he would say, my mom's spicy, which at first I was like, I'm not sure what that actually means, but okay. And then the last part for me was responsibility.

Before you do—

No, I'm finishing off mine. Don't interrupt me.

I want to talk about the spiciness a little bit.

So the last part was responsibility.

Okay, so we both—

I am the type of person who is, uh, very loyal and very responsible. Um, I'm— those for me, honesty and loyalty, are very, very critical parts to a relationship that I have with anyone, whether it's my husband or whether it's friends. It's the aspect that those are two values and qualities that I have inside. And so that's what I'd like other people in my relationships to have. So those are my top 5.

I mean, we both have that responsibility as number 5 on it. So I think we're definitely in tune there. But, you know, going back to the spiciness for a minute, I mean, I will have to say that, you know, the best way to describe that is when you get a really good spice, it lingers.

It could go either way.

Well, I mean, it could either have— it could be bad or it could be good. But, but it, but it does, um, it does linger and it does, there's that punch that a good spice gives you. And I think, I think you definitely give a good punch.

Well, what I, what I realized in doing this is that some of that has, when I said I was straightforward, I don't, I don't mince words. If I'm—

No, you come right to the point. I'm afraid of saying things at times. I mean, I don't want to— I take someone else's feelings in place, basically, on how—

No, no, no. Don't make it seem as though I don't take your feelings into account.

No, but you don't worry about them.

I don't worry about it.

Okay. You know, I will overthink about— I will overthink. I will overthink how somebody is going to feel about it. So I take way too long to get it out.

Right.

You know, even years ago, Throughout, as long as I can remember, I hated confrontation, and I would do everything I could not to have to confront something.

And you're still that way.

Correct. And I don't know where that fits in.

No, that just tells you that there are things about each other in a relationship that my strengths and his strengths, when we meld them together, probably make us an altogether better human. and abilities to do things and move forward. I think in every relationship, if you are both exactly the same in everything, then you're going to be butting heads. Yeah. I think you're, you're going to find that you're not really doing what's feeling, um, adequate enough, if you will. But I do think that there's a good blend. One of the things we're really good about together though, is in, in, in the areas of—

Yeah, so let's talk about that for a minute, then we'll talk about what we're really good. So there's 4 quadrants that these fit into.

Yes.

One is executing, the other is influencing, then relationship building and strategic thinking. So guess what quadrant we are in? So I'll have to say that of my top 10 strengths, 4 are in executing, 5 are in strategic thinking.

Right.

And one is in relationship building.

Yes. And in mine, I have 4 in executing. Uh, I have 3 in influencing and 3 in relationship building and 0 in strategic thinking.

So that, that just explains a lot.

It really does for me because I mean, tell them what, what's in some of the categories, which is here.

Let me, let me list you. I'll list you my, my 5 that are in strategic thinking. Then I'll list the other 3 that are in there. Futuristic, Ideation, Input, Learner, and Strategic. And the other 3 are Analytical, Context, and Intellection. Now, this just explains a whole lot when she has none of those. You know, and I'm always looking into the future. I'm always planning. I'm always coming up with ideas. I'm very strategic about how I do things. And I don't, I never really understood Well, why aren't you? You know, just what, what is it? Why don't you, why don't you understand what I'm talking about?

It just doesn't interest me. It doesn't. I don't see that as being one of the necessities in my particular life or who I am. But let's rephrase that. This helps you identify features about yourself.

So why don't you tell me what's in influencing and relationship building?

So in influencing for me is activator, communicator, and significance. Um, 1 and 3, 1 is communication. Significance was number 3. Activator was number 10 because I looked at the top 10. Um, but if I look at the top 5, 2 of my top 5 was in influencing and, um, 1 was in relationship building, which is harmony, but the other ones were adaptability. And Relator. And I found that that Relator is probably very true about me because I'm not necessarily the person that needs a lot of friends, or I don't really have a lot of friends, but the people that I feel are my friends is fine.

So you're good with a small amount?

I'm good with a small crowd. Like, I couldn't— I don't think I could handle a large number of of friends, right? Because I think that it gets diluted and I can't focus my attention because remember, I'm a loyalist.

It's like a networking event.

And so for me, it's— I, I can be loyal to 1 or 2, maybe 4 people, but I'm not going to be loyal to 20. It's very hard for me to do that because I give so much of myself. I'm the person who who, if there was a need for you to present yourself right away and be right there, I'm there. I don't even think twice about it. You know, my kid calls me up and says, hey, Mom, I need you to help me with Baba Baba. Can you do it? I'm there.

I have to think about it.

Where he does, he thinks about it.

Because I have to get strategic with my response. Yeah.

And what we're doing, you know, so for me, just going with it. I just go. I just, I just go to the point because I've built up a relationship with that individual, that person that I feel a lot of loyalty to and responsible for that I don't think twice. If they were to call me up and say to me, hey, I need you to do this, I'm going to do it. I'm not even going to hesitate. I'm not even going to think about it.

I'm just like, mom, I need your help.

I'm there. Let's go. What do you want? What is it that I could do? To help you. Whereas if they ask me and, and else, and they'll say to me, well, I don't know about Danny. He says, don't worry about Danny. We got to tell Daddy things 3 weeks ahead in advance so he can wrap himself around the idea and the concept. But I'm not reliant upon whether or not he agrees with it, whether or not he sees it, whether or not he wants to go along with it.

But the one, the one strength I have in in the relationship side is individualization. And I think you have it in here. What's the discussion of what an individual is? Individualization is, okay. So, okay. It's people exceptionally talented in the individualization theme are intrigued with the unique qualities of each person. They have a gift for figuring out how different people can work together productively, how different people can work together productively. So I, I, um, I think that's, that's true about what I do with my relationships. I look to see what is it about you as an individual person. That's why I do better with my kids one-on-one, correct, than all three together, than all three, then, then the whole mix. Yeah. Yeah.

But I will say that one of the things that we are almost kooky aligned with.

Yeah. We both have 4 in that.

We both have 4 in this category and that is execution.

And I think nothing proved it more than that, than our recent sale of the house and us getting where we want to be and what we wanted to do and just, just all in on it. I mean, that's the thing is if we can come up and we can agree on what we're doing, there's nothing that can stop us because we're going all in on it. And so I looked at that today. And so both of us have Arranger and Responsibility. And then I have Achiever and Belief, and you have Consistency and Deliberation. So, I mean, that only leaves Discipline, Focus as the two that are outside, and Restorative.

Right.

Yeah. I mean, I think that's true that neither one of us have the focus or the discipline, and that's probably the part that we struggle with the most, staying on focus on what that is and then having the discipline to actually move forward and do it.

But we got most of them in that category. And I think the ones we don't really shine on and maybe not even in the top 10 of what we are doesn't really play an issue for us when it's about us doing something. And I think That's not just a sign of, of what it was like when we were getting ready to sell the house, but I've— I've had close friends say, say to us that they've never met a couple who works at doing certain things together, like with a tremendous amount of, of discipline and wanting to get it done. So for instance, And it wasn't a time when we owned our own home that we didn't do things to work on that home.

Right. Even our kids say, you guys are always doing something with the house.

Always doing something. And, and, and I think to some extent, um, you know, maybe I, I wished we would have spent a little bit more time focused on doing other things, uh, with the kids, uh, and getting that done. But we, we were very, very like attuned. And that probably comes down to—

what do you mean? You mean spending more time doing fun things with the kids?

Yeah, I mean, we spent a lot of time fixing things and improving things and upgrading things. Now I want you to know that some of those things weren't just because aesthetically we wanted to.

Well, I mean, I mean, look, look at what we did with it. Um, 25 Wooster Heights when we built a whole play gym, right?

That's what I'm saying. But that was not only built a whole play gym, that was for the kids, but we also put an outdoor fountain, water fountain.

So they could— they— so they would stay outside instead of tracking the dirt and mud inside to get a drink. But, but in order to get prepped for that, we had to build a stone wall.

Yes.

Which I had to go and I picked up every single stone by hand and moved them from one, from one person's house to this. And that was like several months of rocks in the back of my truck.

But we—

and then we did the fence. And I got my hernia from, from that one.

Yeah, we did.

Remember, remember us putting the fence, digging the fence with the—

what I'm saying is, is though, even though if I, when I look back now, there were things that we were very committed to, but it wasn't always about necessarily fixing of the house as much as is what could we do to improve upon the house that would make the rest of the family more comfortable in the house and to be able to enjoy it more and enjoy it more. Right. So like we did that when we bought our first house, 25 Wooster Heights. We had our kids in mind with the backyard, and we built a fantastical, you know, play gym for them in the back. And then when we moved to the second house, which was 17 West Pine, we had a pool.

We put in a pool, and the pool was again so that— and a big swing, which lasted until the tree got hit by lightning.

But we put in that pool because we felt that every— the kids and us, we were going to get enjoyment from the pool during the summer months, especially their teenage years.

I mean, it was a lot of work to put it in. Yeah. But it's rewarding afterwards, after you accomplish and you're done executing, to actually sit back and—

And I would hope that the kids enjoyed it while they were there. I think they did. They all went in it. They all enjoyed, you know, the pool. And when we had the boat, they enjoyed going out on the boat with you on the lake. Those were like—

Yeah, that was my first boat.

Your first book. Yeah, we got 25.

But as far as executing, yes. Now it's time to execute different things and maybe be able to spend more time with our children than, than what we had in the past. And this time it's doing something more specific and more fun or something like that.

So from your perspective, it has to be planned, it has to be dedicated, it has to be timed out, it has to be written on the calendar. It has to be scheduled. If it's not, it won't happen.

Are you talking to me?

I'm talking to you. Yes.

So what, you'll just go?

I— you know what? The best part about moving and moving into a condo and renting, by the way, not owning it, but renting it, is that it was supposed to give us the freedom to do whatever we wanted to do when we wanted to do it.

So what's the difference then now between me and you on that?

You're still having to plan. You're still having to schedule. You're still— it's very hard for you to not have a list. I don't do good with lists. It's not my thing.

Yes. I mean, part of it that's still holding me back right now is my job. Um, it's that commitment to that. But I would agree with you. Yeah. Yes.

I may not have as strong responsibilities as you do with your job, but I still do have a job.

No, I know that. But you're willing to just go.

No, I'm willing to say, let's do this and let's plan. Let's go. We're going here. You're still thinking, well, I don't know if that's really going to be the good time.

Well, no, I mean, I will have to say that there's still an adjustment that I'm going through. With this change that we have, you know, being, you know, debt-free. I'm still— it still hasn't hit me. Having a little more freedom, like every weekend there was something else we had to do, you know, around the house or something like that. We had to go get firewood. We had to go take the garbage out. We had to go— we had a routine every Saturday morning that we did. And periodically throughout the week. And then we planned what's the spring projects, what's the next thing that we're going to do? Now that doesn't exist anymore. And I'm still okay. I'm still in that mind shift right now that I'm going through. And that's going to take me, as you know, it takes a while. As you know, it takes a while longer for me to adjust.

Next year we'll do the same topic. But I will say one of the things that I learned during this class that we took at church on leadership was whatever your— was it 34 items? It was listed. Whatever your bottom weaknesses are, it's not about fixing them. It's simply about acknowledging them. They're there. That's not your area, right? And moving on and just focusing on your top 5 that, or even your top 10, because that's where you're, that's what you're really good at. So why are you worrying about trying to increase your weaknesses?

Yeah, you can do so much.

Your weaknesses a little bit up that scale.

You can do so much more by focusing on what you're really great at versus what you're not, what you're not good at. And it's just like for me, one of them I don't remember what the name of it is, but it's, um, it talks about the past and about relating to the past. And I just don't like doing that at all. That's like my bottom. But what's unique about our bottom is that's in our top of the other person. So my bottom are, are in your, or in your top.

His, his, his tops and what he had in his tops was learner. Achiever. Um, you didn't have this one.

No, I didn't have this one. I didn't have Intellection, but 3 of your bottom, 2 of your bottom 3 were my top 2.

His top 2, which I, when I, when I saw that, I, I think we both laughed at it. We both looked at each other with such like, oh my God, because you know, his is Learner and Achiever.

Let me see that.

And I'm always the type of person that, you know, he'll be after me and he'll say to me. You know, well, do you, let's put our vision board together or let's put your vision board together. Let's, let's figure out, let's plan. Let's do this the first, the next 6 months. And I'd be like, well, you know, you're not, no, it wasn't something I wanted to do.

Futuristic's not that far off here. That's number 12 for you.

Yeah, but it's not the top 10. And here's the thing about in this time in our lives, this is what we ranked. Right. Um, maybe 10 years from now when we, we take it again. And I, and I think people should, should do this again. I, I want to make, I want to have this so that I can send it to my kids.

Yeah, I did, I did mine 10.

I did. And I want to send it to the children and say to them, I want you to do this. I want you to figure out a little bit about yourself.

Right.

You may already know some of these, some of these things.

No, I think, I think it's important. I think it'd be really good, especially since you're working with your, your youngest son. You know, helping with him with his books and things.

He's got to figure out his top 10.

I think, I think, I think it would be really good to find out.

We're probably exactly alike. That's why.

Maybe, maybe not. Or maybe he can see where he can focus on instead of trying to focus on those. Maybe it would be really helpful for him to know who he needs to hire to help him with his weaknesses. I think it's just, yes, that, and that, that's a good, and I think that's a good way, whether you're running a group, whether you're whether you're managing people, whether you have your own business, whatever. What you need to do is you need to make sure that you hire people that can help complement you and can, if you're, if you're not doing, and that's, and that's, but that's the case for a marriage, right?

There were certain characteristics about him that I recognized that I was like, those are areas that he's really good in and I'm not. And I'm okay with that.

Like, I didn't know why.

I didn't know why, but I also didn't have a desire to have to change that. I think the problem with you is sometimes is you push and push and push until I finally have to put the hand up and say, if you don't stop, I think I'm gonna have to kill you.

And, you know, but I didn't really realize that really until we took this test together. I think that— I think what I'm looking forward to is this next next phase, this next stage, is that now that I understand where you're good, your strengths are, and, um, and they're not mine at all, that I, I will stop bothering you about it and I'll just share it with you. No, I'll just tell you strategically, this is what we're doing, and you're either on board or you're not.

Correct. And if I'm not on board, I'll tell you I'm not on board. I don't know why I'm not on board or what I need more.

I will adjust it.

But that, that for, that for, I think the two of us was, was very enlightening that his top or my bottom. And, but that was okay because there were still areas what we, we really blended really, really strong in. And then realizing, you know what, you're really good at that. And it was funny because I had a conversation, I think it was back in Scott's We were with another couple for breakfast. And I remember that at that breakfast, I had said to her, I go, you know, I don't think that it's a bad thing that whatever your spouse is doing, for you to be able to support them and not necessarily have to be competing with them. I think he has areas that he wants to go in. And if it meant that I was simply a supportive mechanism to that, That's what I was, a supportive mechanism to it. And there's no shame in that in a relationship. I think nowadays people tend to want to have like that same level of competition and drive. And I'm like, yo, you know what? It's okay if he has the drive. It's okay if he's got that ambition. And it's okay if he wants to achieve.

I struggled with that of why don't you have that? Why don't you want to do that too? Why can't we do that together?

Because I turned around and said, I married the guy who has those aspects that I'm not really good at. So I'm not going to force myself or try to change because nobody—

even, even doing something like coaching, I don't understand. Well, why wouldn't you want to do that too? You know, and it's just like, it's okay. But for a while, I really— we even tried it. We had coachgreger.com, you know, and even though we were going to coach different things, you know, we thought we could do that.

And so here we are doing, doing one thing that we kind of figure we could do well together. And that's this podcast, right? Are there things that I might venture into separately? Potentially. Are there things that he's going to venture onto? Absolutely. Right. Because his DNA is about achieving. His DNA is about, about learning different things, learning it and achieving and accomplishing things. where I'm kind of sitting back saying, eh, it's okay.

Well, as long as you can help influence and communicate and relate and build relationships around it with me, that would be great. Because I struggle at that. I struggle at that.

That's the yin and the yang part of it. But, you know, I think, like I said, the good thing about it is that we recognized— I don't think we did this test.

Well, I did, I did the test in 2014. I took it myself. I don't know why I did it anymore, but I know that before, like, Learner and Achiever are now my 1 and 2. Before it was Achiever and Learner. That flip-flopped. I had Futuristic as number 3. I have to go back and see what the other 2— I'm pretty sure Responsibility was there, but I don't think Belief was. Something else was in its place. But yeah, so my top 2 just flip-flopped in 10 years.

Yeah, unfortunately. I don't think I ever took this test before. So for me, these were not— they were a highlight as to, to some extent, certain things I already knew, but not so much what I already knew. It's what I realized weren't my strengths at all. And, you know, learner is one of those.

Well, having it now for me, having it now in black and white, it's really helped me understand. I mean, I don't think we need to take— these strengths don't mean everything, but they're a good part.

They're a good guide.

They're a good part to help you understand the other person.

Yeah.

And now that, you know, that it comes out and it's actually okay, she really doesn't want to achieve those type of things. She doesn't care about necessarily— it's not that I don't want to achieve.

No, I mean, I'm leaving that up to you.

Yeah. Yeah. Strategically, thinking and putting things in a strategic way, you're going to leave that up to me. And I'm going to say, okay, then I'll just bounce off when I'm all done strategizing.

I'm good with your list. If you write the list and I look at the list, I'm good with the list. And I tend to like see the list and say, knock it off.

Then what's— yeah, I was going to say, then what we're good at, we'll take that list and we'll both execute on it.

But if you're going to ask me for the list, I'm going to say, I know, I asked you recently for a list. I was so like, I really don't want to.

But how did you get the list done?

Because I was driving and I had Claude Mobile on my phone, and it was a 45-minute drive, so I just hit— I hit the button and I kept talking to Claude. And as I talked to Claude, I gave him— I just spewed onto Claude, and then I made him some I made him do all the work. And then I said, and then I said, okay, Claude, put it in like an email version or a text version, bullet points. And then I copied, pasted onto an email and sent it to him and said, here you go. Here's your freaking list.

Now I got the list. I know it was a lot of effort. So on that note, we should probably edit this.

But we won't.

So, um, We would really like it if you could help us get the message out.

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Bye.

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