Evaluating Character

Our relationships make us. Thus, judging character is a crucial life skill when evaluating potential friendships, business partners, or romantic relationships.

Ted Goia, the author of the Honest Broker, wrote about 8 techniques for evaluating character. I found his first tip the most interesting:

Forget what they say—instead look at who they marry.

This is a sure-fire technique, and it tells you important things about people you can’t learn any other way. A person’s choice of a spouse—or if they aren’t married, their closest lifelong partner—is much more revealing than anything they say or do in public.

This choice tells you about their own innermost longings, expectations, and needs. It tells you what they think of themselves, and what they think they deserve in life (or will settle for). It is, I believe, the clearest indicator of priorities and values you will ever find.

So the next time you’re introduced to strangers at the party, and they start talking business, spend at least a little time sizing up their partners. If you don’t pay attention to this, you will have lost an important source of insights, and may pay a high price as a result.

While I’m not at the age where most of my friends are married, I do agree, that you can tell a lot about a person by who they are dating.