identity

Which trait do you most dislike in yourself?

Originally asked

The Guardian, to a different person each week, The Q&A

The Guardian's The Q&A has retained this Proust-derived prompt from at least 2007 through 2026, and ABC independently put it to the Obamas in 2011.

You answer as yourself. Nobody on FLAPSS answers as anybody else.

One of 24 questions in The Q&A here.

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On the record

Public figures who have answered a question like this elsewhere. Quoted from the source shown, not written for FLAPSS.

Read by field Everyone Science and medicine 1 Arts and letters 77 Politics and public life 6 Business and finance 1 Sport 1
Read by age Any age In their thirties 15 In their forties 13 In their fifties 22 In their sixties 20 Seventy and beyond 15
Barack Obama 44th President of the United States, 2009–2017; United States Senator from Illinois 2005–2008
Sometimes I wrote off my own failings as just another example of the world trying to keep a black man down. I had a tendency sometimes to make excuses for me not doing the right thing.

Recorded Morehouse College, Atlanta, Georgia, The White House (Obama administration archive), 19 May 2013 source ↗

Róisín Murphy
My problem with clothes. I’ve got an issue, haven’t I? I’m not a fella in a band who can turn up in his T-shirt and jeans. I’ve got the whole drama of what I’m going to wear: the hair, the makeup. All that preening and pruning that adds to the stress. I have begun to hate that perfectionist in me.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 16 September 2023 source ↗

Lemn Sissay
Believing in, even admiring, people who refuse to believe in me, and not believing people who do.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 14 October 2023 source ↗

Michelle Visage
My health anxiety. I am a bit of a hypochondriac. I hate that about myself and I’ve worked extensively in therapy on changing it.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 20 January 2024 source ↗

Walton Goggins
Insecurity around money. I have this profound insecurity about not having enough to provide for my family.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 10 May 2025 source ↗

Bear Grylls
Too controlling about silly things like timings or not having toxic cleaning products in the house.

Recorded The Q&A, The Guardian, 24 January 2026 source ↗

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