Tactician’s Pact

The summer of the movie nerd sadly is long gone my friends and so Cloud Atlas, Skyfall, Lincoln and The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey will have to suffice for the holiday season.  Skyfall specifically is lookin pretty bossy though especially in this new trailer:

After 50 years of the franchise, Skyfall is already being called the ‘best Bond yet’.  Daniel Craig is said to have truly stepped into his role as a more nitty-gritty James Bond, and Academy Award Winner Javier Bardem is said to shine in his role as unhinged arch-criminal Silva.

Something tells me he loses though.  And Bond wins.  Just a hunch.  Why does Bond win all the time?  Well I guess some people are just born that way.  Bond seems to find out though, as we all do: that life’s greatest gift, can sometimes be a curse.  Let’s take a look.

Artisans spend a good deal of their time seeking stimulation because they need it.  As much as possible, they live in their five senses, and they seem to like their music a little louder than the other types, their clothes a little more colorful, and their food and drink a little stronger.”  — Please Understand Me II, p. 58

Artisans so covet skill in technique that they often aspire to become some sort of virtuoso of performance.  The ultimate technician, capable at times of perfect artistic execution.  Showing skill so great as to be unimaginable.”  — Please Understand Me II, p. 59

An orphan with a “chip on his shoulder”, Bond fought his way to the top of the British Secret Service.  A compound of all the ‘secret agents’ and ‘commando types’ Ian Fleming encountered during the war, Bond is the man that Fleming always wanted to be.  ‘Socially sophisticatedsuave and polished’; Bond lives with a ‘theatrical flourish’, and has ‘a knack for knowing where the action is’.  But there is something ‘cold’ and ‘ruthless’ about him, says Fleming, like he would do whatever it takes to get the job done.  Bolddaringcharismatic and action-oriented with a thick skinJames Bond is the quintessential Promoter Artisan.  Indeed Bond, like all Promoters, at some point in his life made a sacrifice:

“these smooth Operators are usually something of a mystery to others.  While they live in the moment and lend excitement–and unpredictability–to all their relationships, they rarely let anyone get really close to them.  They have a low tolerance for anxiety and are apt to leave relationships that are filled with interpersonal tensions.  Promoters understand well the maxim “he who travels fast, travels alone,” although they are not likely to be alone for long, since their boldness and sense of adventure tends to make ESTPs highly attractive to many other people.”  — Please Understand Me II, p. 66

Skyfall opens this friday November 9, 2012.

3 thoughts on “Tactician’s Pact”

  1. I love your website and have taken an interest in Temperament Theory for many years. My comment isn’t about Bond, who is undoubtedly a Promoter Artisan, but your designation of Bilbo Baggins as a Guardian there in the “Name Your Favorite Fictional Icon” section. Though he is an apparent Gaurdian by all appearances, and resides in a decidely Guardian culture — Hobbiton and The Shire, the height of genteel country conformity — Tolkien went to some pains to offer a more nuanced portrait of Bilbo in Chapter One of THE HOBBIT where he made a clear distinction between the very “respectable” (and very “Guardian”) Baggins side of the family and his Mother’s far more adventurous and unpredictable “Took” side, where it was rumored that somewhere along the line a Took ancestor had taken a fairy wife. Bilbo is a very interesting case in literature of a Guardian holding in check an “inner Artisan,” as put forward by Tolkien himself in this excerpt from Chapter One: “Still it is probable that Bilbo, her only son, although he looked and behaved exactly like a second edition of his solid and comfortable father, got something a bit queer in his makeup from the Took side, something that only waited for a chance to come out. The chance never arrived, until Bilbo Baggins was grown up, being about fifty years old or so, and living in the beautiful hobbit-hole built by his father, which I have just described for you, until he had in fact apparently settled down immovably.” To me, the book charts the evolution of the Guardian Baggins getting in touch with his inner Artisan Took, and by doing so allows Bilbo to triumph against all odds in this key story in the history of Middle Earth. Of course, The Ring helped, but being a Took helped, too — and perhaps more significantly. So, I pose a question: is this concept of a character wavering between Guardian and Artisan qualities consistent with Temperament Theory? I would like to think that Tolkien, who seemed to have Godlike omniscience over his Universe, had similar omniscience over his characterizations and their psychological consistency and correctness. I would love to hear your thoughts.

    1. Yes absolutely people display traits and characteristics from all four of the types, but the theory goes that we are predisposed to one of the four and that one’s temperament ultimately eclipses most of the “environmental factors”. Bilbo being half “Took” and having that influence on him undoubtedly guided a lot of his behavior. As a matter of fact, and I have seen this personally, when a Guardian is heavily influenced by an Artisan or Artisans from a position of authority like parent or family elder, they tend to emulate those behaviors with astounding accuracy. While they engage in these behaviors and thoroughly enjoy letting loose every once in a while they still approach their lives in the way of a Guardian. One thing we must learn about Guardians, and I’m a huge proponent of this, is the fact that they are can be very difficult to identify as Guardians. After all, Guardians are the best at doing what their told, and “falling in line” with society. This means that Guardians are often very hard to identify as Guardians, even though statistically speaking they are probably over half the population. Bilbo specifically, engaged in this whole adventure only with intense pessimism, essentially providing comic relief by complaining the whole time. But the answer to your question is yes, many people display behaviors that are characteristic of the other types, but ultimately you have to look at their core behaviors to determine their type. Sorry it took so long to respond. ; )

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