You’re a Cheerleader! This means that you have high positive affect and low negative affect, or, put another way, you tend to feel positive emotions more than negative emotions. This leads to a cascade of good qualities: Cheerleaders tend to be optimistic about the future, good motivators, and a reliable source of happiness for friends and family. People enjoy your presence. This is the affect profile that most people want to have—but this profile does come with costs.
Cheerleaders, buoyed up by their positivity, are often highly averse to bad news. The Cheerleader CEO tends to explain away (or ignore) bad quarterly reports; the Cheerleader friend tends to give rosy advice to friends in need, rather than deliver hard truths; the Cheerleader partner is less sensitive to their partner’s distress, driven by the idea that better days are on the horizon. All these scenarios lead to blind spots during life’s gloomier times.
As a Cheerleader, your complementary profile is a Poet—people with low positive and high negative affect. Poets can help you address your blind spots as a co-worker, friend, and partner, since they are more comfortable with seeing and explaining negative experiences. At the same time, your buoyant Cheerleader qualities can help poets see the brighter side of life. Surrounding yourself with a Poet or two could be beneficial for your professional and personal life.
Remember, no affect profile is better than another. You are not rigidly bound to the best and worst qualities of a Cheerleader. The point is to know yourself. Now that you know your strengths, act on them with purpose. And now that you know your weaknesses, keep an eye out for your pitfalls.