Here’s How Each Personality Type Can Change The World

1 July, 201930 June, 2019Marissa

Every personality type has something incredibly valuable to offer the world. Each comes with a slightly different way of learning new information, seeing the world, making decisions, and interacting with others. And that means that we each have the potential to positively impact the world in different ways.

A person’s Myers-Briggs® type doesn’t explain everything about them. But it does describe how our minds work, and that can give us an idea of how each type can use their strengths to make the world a better place.

For this list, I’ve paired the types that use the same primary and co-pilot functions together. For example, both ESFJ and ISFJ use Extroverted Feeling and Introverted Sensing as their preferred functions, just in a different order. If you’re new to Myers-Briggs® theory or want a quick refresher, you can click here for a quick intro to how functions work.

ESFJ and ISFJ

ESFJs and ISFJs change the world by connecting with and supporting other people, as well as preserving and passing on valuable lessons of the past.

Having Extroverted Feeling as either their primary or co-pilot function gives SFJ types a strong desire to help and support other people. They tend to personalize everything they do and care so deeply about others that they may forget their own needs while selflessly serving those around them. They’re also really good at picking up on what other people are feeling.

With Introverted Sensing as either their primary or co-pilot function, SFJs have a strong desire to learn from the past. It’s the function that helps us make sure we remember what was learned in our personal and collective histories so we don’t keep repeating failures as we go forward.

ENFJ and INFJ

ENFJs and INFJs change the world by bridging gaps between people who have different perspectives and offering a vision for what the future could look like on both personal and societal levels. Read more →

ENFJs, the Dead Poet Society, and Ways To Change the World

24 June, 201924 June, 2019Marissa

When I wrote my list of 7 Fictional Characters That You’ll Relate To If You’re An ENFJ, I rewatched the movie Dead Poet Society. I think both John Keating and Neil Perry are ENFJs, but they’re often typed as ENFPs and that got me thinking about some of the main differences between these types. And that led me to pondering the ways that NF types, and ENFJs in particular, work to change the world.

Most people don’t think of ENFJs as a type that would buck the status quo. We see them as harmony creators, best friends, and mentors but not necessarily as someone who swims against the flow of culture. I think that’s the main reason people type Mr. Keating and Neil as ENFPs, who we more often think of as the outspoken champions of causes. But ENFJs do have a rebellious streak. In fact, all NF types are idealists who typically find some way to seek a better world. Though the ways they work toward this change (and what a better world means to them) differ depending on their individual personalities, interests, and experiences most of them do want to change the world in some way.

Just to be clear, NF types aren’t the only ones who care about social change or want to see improvements in the world. Every one of the 16 types does that in their own way, and I’ll be working on a post that covers all of them in the near future. But just for today, I want to focus on ENFJs, ENFPs, and Dead Poet Society.

The Teacher

I’m not a huge fan of giving the Myers-Briggs types nicknames because there’s so much more to each type than can be neatly packaged into a single description. But we can look at the different nicknames as roles that each type fills often enough for it to stick as a label. Teacher, Mentor, Giver, and Charismatic Leader are all descriptions that are used to try and sum-up the key traits of ENFJs. Interestingly, all those labels could be applied to John Keating from Dead Poet Society. Read more →

Personality Type Myth-Busting: Is Intuition The Same As A Gut Feeling?

8 May, 20197 May, 2019Marissa

I often see Intuitive types describe their experience of intuition as a “gut feeling.” It’s not something we can explain — it’s just something we know. And that is a valid way to describe a lot of what we experience from using Intuition. But if that was all there was to intuition, then we’d be able to describe a lot more than 30% of the population as Intuitive types.

When people talk about intuition, they usually mean something different than what type theorists mean when they refer to Intuition as a psychological function. Google defines intuition as “the ability to understand something immediately, without the need for conscious reasoning.” We might also use the word intuitive to mean “suited by nature for a particular purpose in life,” as when we speak of intuitive athletes or creative types who “just know” how to do something.

In her book Personality Type, Lenore Thomson points out, “Most of the people to whom we apply the word intuitive in this causal way aren’t Intuitives — at least not typologically. They’re usually Sensates and Introverted P types, whose right-brain abilities the left brain can’t explain to itself” (p. 199). I’ve also noticed that some of the things that Intuitives describe as part of their intuition are actually connected with other mental processes. For example, an INFJ might say they intuitively know how to blend in with different social groups when in reality that ability is tied to their harmony-seeking Extroverted Feeling process more than to their Introverted Intuition.

So if Intuition, in the typological sense, isn’t want people usually think of when they think of intuition, what is it? Read more →

Personality Type Myth-Busting: Are Extroverts Incapable of Understanding Introverts?

29 April, 201928 April, 2019Marissa

One of the things that really irritates me when I see certain introverts talking online is how much they seem to hate extroverts. They’ll even use that word — “I hate this thing that extroverts do” or “I hate it when extroverts are like this.” Some even have lists of all the things they hate about extroverts.

We introverts have been pushing for a while now to get recognized as “normal.” Introversion is how about 50% of the population’s brains are hardwired. It’s an inborn preference for the inner world of thoughts and ideas, which is also shaped by our unique individual experiences. So stop judging us for it, okay?

What far too many of us forget is that the exact same things are true of extroversion. For about 50% of the population, being an extrovert is perfectly normal. It’s an inborn preference for the outer world of things and people. Extroverted and introverted mental “wiring” are both perfectly normal. Both are needed, and both personality types deserve respect.

So with that clarification out of the way, let’s talk about whether or not extroverts are incapable of understanding introverts. Read more →

7 Fictional Characters That You’ll Relate to If You’re An ENFP

4 March, 201920 September, 2019Marissa

What fictional characters do you relate to as an ENFP?

Just as we can describe real people using the Myers-Briggs® typology system, we can also use the system to type well-written fictional characters. Some of fiction’s most iconic and intriguing characters are ENFPs, and today we’re going to talk about seven of them that I think real-life ENFPs will find relatable.

Another great thing about looking at character personality types is that it helps us to better understand people who have different types than we do. Fictional ENFPs can serve as examples for what real-life ENFPs might be like, and also show how much variation can exist between individuals with the same type.

Ahsoka Tano

Ahsoka is one of my favorite Star Wars characters, and she’s one of three who I type as an ENFP (Qui-Gon Jin and Ezra Bridger are the other). Like others of this type, Ahsoka leads with Extroverted Intuition, which Personality Hacker nicknames “Exploration” because for NPs “the best pattern recognition system for the outer world is to mess with everything that can be messed with, and to explore.” Read more →

What Does Each Myers-Briggs® Type Look Like If They Get Stuck In A “Loop”?

20 November, 201819 November, 2018Marissa

When someone interested in Myers-Briggs®talks about loops, they’re referring to what happens when a person bypasses their co-pilot function and starts relying on their dominant and tertiary process instead. This can be a temporary situation, or it can last for quite a long time depending on the individual and their circumstances.

Some people teach that the Dominant-Tertiary Loop leads to personality disorders, but I have not found any good research to back up this claim. We can slip into a loop pattern without developing a disorder, and specific mental illnesses aren’t tied to any one personality type. It seems more likely to me that, as a general rule, loops are part of a reaction to stress or an attempt to avoid discomfort.

If you need a refresher on how cognitive functions work, click here to read “The Simplest Guide to Myers-Briggs® Functions Ever.”

We all need a balance between inner and outer world feedback, a way to learn new information, and a way to process information and make decisions. We’re got all that covered in our dominant and co-pilot functions because one is introverted and one is extroverted, and one’s a perceiving/learning function (Sending or Intuition) and one’s a judging/decision-making function (Feeling or Thinking).

When we skip our co-pilot function and go for the tertiary instead, we’re replacing the co-pilot with a function that fills a similar role because the tertiary and co-pilot are both either Perceiving or Judging functions. However, the tertiary has the same orientation (Introverted or Extroverted) as the dominant function. Going into a “loop” means we’re ignoring the world that is most uncomfortable for us and we’re opting to use a function that’s less mature than our co-pilot. This “loop” is going to look different for each type, but in all cases it means we’re not balanced. It also usually means that we’re avoiding personal growth. Read more →