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In this episode Joel and Antonia dive deep into the needs and desires of the INFJ personality type.
In this podcast on the INFJ Personality Type you’ll find:
- This podcast episode talks about the INFJ personality type
- We have an unusually high number of INFJs represented in Personality Hacker
- INFJs have the tendency to feel very misunderstood.
- 2 important components to understand INFJs:
- Their mental process is called ‘Perspectives’. They’re actually watching their own mind work and form patterns. Because this isn’t something verifiable, other people just don’t believe them or reject what they radiate.
- INFJs pair Perspectives with Harmony. When a person with the INFJ personality type tries to figure out what to do, the first thing that pops in their mind is, “how do we make sure everybody’s needs are met?” This process is in tuned with unspoken social contracts that we accept.
- INFJs are very sensitive to the emotions of other people that they end up absorbing them.
- The more sensitive they are, the more they have the tendency hiding. The less expressive they get, the more pain they experience.
- It’s difficult for the INFJ personality type to build intimacy with another person.
- INFJs who are developed and growth oriented don’t retreat to coldness. They’ve taken the harmony process in order to understand and create healthy boundaries.
- INFJs are also able to see how things will play out in the future and this is one of the reasons why they are hesitant to build intimacy with other people.
- Because they are so aware of what’s going on with the other person, they end up having one-sided relationships.
- Jesus of Nazareth, Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr were probably INFJs.
- INFJs are not in the receiving end in victimization. They have extraordinary capabilities within them.
- If you are an INFJ personality type or know someone who is, here are a few things you need to note:
- You don’t have to absorb other people’s emotions and have it stay there. You need to develop techniques to let it go.
- Words have power and the way you describe yourself will become your reality. Change the way you talk about yourself and think of ways of being a co-creator. Create a reality that’s positive to you. If you change the word use, you can change reality.
- When getting everybody’s needs met, you’re basically part of everybody. Getting your needs met means you take care of yourself. Get sensitive to what those needs are in real time.
- Honor what you need in the moment and be willing to take care of it. This will help you get other’s needs met.
- Continue to look for people who understand you. Allow yourself to be understood and form the relationships you’ve been desiring.
- You can’t change that you’re going to absorb people’s emotions. Manage and learn strategies that will help you figure out a way to let the energy come in and go out.
- Do what you can to see yourself as a person who has positive things to contribute to the world. Focus what you got as gift and not as a burden to others.
Helpful resources for the INFJ personality type:
Developing Your INFJ Personality Type (by Donna Dunning)
The INFJ Personality Type (by Dr. A.J. Drenth)
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304 comments
As a retired mental health professional and an INFJ, I agree with your comments. Well said. What I noticed in the podcast was an assumption that with mothers who are INFJs, they know their pain. Well, unless their mothers have very poor personal boundaries, I doubt that they truly understand their mothers’ pain. I certainly never divulged that kind of thing to my daughter.
And I also do not agree that we feel victimized as a rule. But with respect to that, I would rather see some empowerment about how to take care of boundaries and needs as an INFJ and to pull back on how much we sacrifice to the outside world. A big problem with us is giving too much and suffering from burnout. So I especially disagree with the idea that what we should do is give more to the world….and to remember that we could contribute like these three people, two of whom were assassinated. The third, Gandhi, gave up everything, including his marriage and sexuality, to do what he did. In my experience, this is the last thing an INFJ needs to hear, and it is something only an extrovert would give as advice! Like everyone else, we deserve to be on this planet without having to be extraordinary or putting ourselves out there in the line of fire. And that’s my piece. Yep, we INFJs can learn not to silence ourselves for the sake of others’ feelings. And as someone who has taken on the big causes and is paying the price in burnout, I don’t need a cheerleader saying rah rah rah, get back out there.
Learning that I’m an infj in itself has given me a framework for actually understanding myself and observing my life through a lense that resonates deeply within. I want to thank you for this episode and for framing it insofar that I now feel I have PERMISSION to be myself. Every episode I listen to reminds me to be myself, and by extension accept and see the beauty in those around me for who THEY are.
Until I tapped into this model and really dived in I really struggled with figuring out exactly what my gifts were – even though it’s been in front of me the whole time. I was, as you put it, habitually stuck in the pain. This is a RELIEF, and I have since finally figured out how I am going to impact and contribute to the world.
Thank you.
I’m replying to Lisa’s thread, though my response is also just a general reply…
My primary reason for writing is to sincerely thank you for the work you are doing to put this information out there. You are clearly compassionate, skillful, intelligent, insightful people and are doing a good service for the public.
Because I just witnessed your great support for INFJ’s, I feel much more comfortable expressing some of those INFJ traits (that I often try to hide) as I write this. This is very refreshing.
I must say that the one place where you kind of lost me during the podcast (where feelings of being misunderstood for the millionth time by an extrovert crept in) was when, as Lisa mentioned above, you got on to a bit of a rant about victim think and self-cloistering, etc. When Antonia began talking about her mother becoming “worthless” for 3 days following a conference, all my own alarm bells started going off. Of course it must be extremely frustrating for those who aren’t INFJ’s to witness loved ones getting strung out and stressed out yet again (and again). And as INFJs it really is our responsibility to learn to set boundaries and limits if we want to decrease our own suffering and the suffering we cause others. At the same time, I would go so far as to suggest that one reason we never get around to doing that very well is because we get extremely mixed messages from others. On the one hand people say things like, “well just set some boundaries for god’s sake already.” Yet when we do set them, the very same people actually tell us we’re too “cloistered” (to borrow your term) and sometimes have very strong emotions of anger and hurt towards us.
When Joel mentioned the scenario where the parent gets in the bath and sits there with candles and a book for a few hours it made me a little prickly! It seemed a window into the characature that the INJF is seen as. But of course I understand his point that you can’t really go in your room for a week if you have kids to tend to (or you can, but then they will need decades of psychotherapy).
But parenting notwithstanding, while there’s intense social pressure in this day and age to not ever come across as TOO much of a hermit, I actually think it is a great disservice to people who truly can spend practically endless amounts of time alone and not only not be self-cloistering or hiding out, but flourish in a way that is pretty rare. For example, I personally spent 7 years in a solitary retreat (in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition) and it was one of the most wonderful times of my life. And yet even within that stable and longstanding lineage, there are still people who will subtly (or not so) hint that people who engage long solitary retreat practice are somehow running away from “real life” and it’s complications. (These same people must have never themselves spent much time alone with their own minds or they would realize that it’s not always a blissful getaway). (Side note: It would be interesting to know how many of the yogis living in the Himalayas are INFJs).
Anyway, since you are public figures and have the opportunity and potential to influence others, might I make a sincere request that you are careful about how you either reinforce present narrow perspectives on what are socially acceptable amounts of solitude or offer a wider view, even if it doesn’t appeal to you?
Other than that, I look forward to reading more of your work and hope you will continue to inspire others toward growth.
Yes, I echo and affirm both of your comments. On the one hand, I yearn for friendship, but on the other, human interaction is exhausting! It’s always a push-pull dynamic. When I force myself to interact, I find myself waiting expectantly for when I can be alone again.
I’ve listened to this particular podcast episode multiple times. Love the entire podcast, but it’s amazing to hear yourself reflected back so accurately. I’ve kinda sorta known I am INFJ for a little while, but only really started diving deep within the last year or so. I couldn’t figure out why I was so stressed all the time, no matter what I did, so I decided to approach it from a different viewpoint. Instead of looking at what “everyone” does to de-stress, I started looking more into stress responses and what causes them. Everything I came across about INFJ hit the nail on the head. It gave me a new way of looking at what I had going on. While knowing my personality type and working on personal development have helped a ton, I’ve currently hit what I think is burnout, and desperately struggling to find my way out again. I needed to go back to basics, so I turned here. Thank you for quality content and everything you put out into the world. This is a little more rambling than I would like, but it’s all I have at the moment. :)