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In this episode, Joel and Antonia talk about developing intuition as an INFP, INTP, ENFJ, or ENTJ.
In this podcast you’ll find:
- Car Model article
- Car Model Podcast
- Why We Resist Developing The Co-Pilot In Our Personality
- We gravitate toward our driver and marginalize our copilot
- If we are introverts, our copilot is extraverted
- If we are extraverts, our copilot is introverted
- INPs copilot is Extraverted Intuition (Ne) – “Exploration”
- ENJs copilot is Introverted Intuition (Ni) – “Perspectives”
- Intuition is a perceiving process, which means you use this function to take in info
- What could be happening behind the curtain?
- What is the pattern of the things I am observing?
- Ni vs. Ne podcast
- These types lead with a judging function, so they are going to have a proclivity to be more decisive or understand how they feel or think about things
- Perceiving processes force us to open up our perception and take in more info
- INPs and ENJs should use their intuitive processes to round out the decision-making functions they lead with
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INTP & INFP
- INPs struggle with their copilot because it forces them to take in more territory.
- If you are leading with Introverted Feeling (INFP), it can take a long time to determine the right decision.
- It relates to identity
- For INTPs, it also takes a long time to determine the good data vs. the bad data, because the bad data may be related to info that we absorbed from childhood.
- INPs can use Extraverted Intuition (Ne) when they are having to problem solve.
- The real gifts of Ne come from exploring.
- Getting outside your comfort zone.
- Always looking for the new experience.
- This type of exploration takes a metric ton of energy and can seem intimidating to the INP.
- INPs know how they think or feel about things, but they have to generate a lot of energy to use Exploration.
- Exploration burns the most resource.
- It takes awhile to get into it, but once you are using it you consume energy because you are breaking new ground.
- Ne is not a rational function.
- Sometimes it doesn’t make sense.
- And it has lots of false starts.
- Exploration does not allow you to manage your image as much as you may want.
- The things you do may look unstable to others.
- Your credibility may even take a hit or two.
- Extraverted Intuition is probably the most optimistic function of all eight cognitive functions.
- Joie de vivre
- You will burn out the self-consciousness and discover extraordinary freedom.
- INTX Unleashed – INTP gained “Bouncy” energy.
- INTPs who crave connection can find it through their Copilot.
- Online research can give you a tiny hit of Ne, but it is only a snack – not a meal.
- Online research allows you censor the info that comes in, but if you are in a real situation with info coming in that you can’t deny it is much harder to ignore the data.
- Resonance vs calibration
- Because INPs lead with a judging function, they tend to pre-calibrate the info they absorb.
- Extraverted Intuition post calibrates though.
- INPs need to speed up to keep pace with Ne.
- Turn off the calibration and act rapidly.
- Real-time adjustment & absorption of data.
- This will require immense amounts of energy, but it prevents you from pre-calibrating and keeps you open to new data.
- Post-calibration can happen in tertiary – Introverted Sensing (Si) “Memory”
- When you are doing online research, you are collecting data in your Si process and doing enough post-processing with the info to involve Intuition more passively.
- This is the opposite frame you want to come from because it uses Memory as the data gathering mechanism and lets Exploration help out.
- Lead with Exploration and get real-world experiences, then use Memory as a tool to support Ne.
- Ne is an extraverted process, so you have to get out in the real world.
- What is uncomfortable to one INP may be easy for another.
- Every INP is going to be different.
- They need to head towards discomfort.
- Discomfort should be your guiding light.
- Then the discomfort becomes comfortable.
- Being out of your comfort zone becomes your new comfort zone.
- Throw yourself in and post calibrate.
- Sometimes you may overdo it. Other times you may under do it.
- Calibrate after – always.
- Image management is your enemy as you develop your Copilot.
- Is the life you built providing you the opportunity to grow?
- You may need to go somewhere else to exercise your Intuitive Copilot.
- One of the things you need when practicing Exploration is Joy. It is a big piece for providing the stamina you need to exercise Ne.
- Exercise:
- Set an alarm for one minute.
- Lay down in bed like you are going to sleep.
- When the one minute alarm sounds, jump out of bed with enthusiasm and put a big beaming smile on your face.
- Throw your shoulders back. Open your arms and take a big prayer of gratitude out to the universe (or your divinity of choice).
- Repeat this exercise again and again (7-10x), until you create the muscle memory that ritualizes how you get out of bed every morning.
- This will help you generate energy to make getting into your copilot easier.
- Work on strategies to ritualize your morning routine: drink a glass of water, journal, meditate, exercise, etc.
- The ritual will set you on the right trajectory for the day
- This exercise will calm down your 10 yr old Memory process and open you to opportunities for using your Exploration process.
- Take a different route to work
- Eat a different kind of food
- Pick a new part of your city or country and get lost
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ENJs – ENTJ & ENFJ
- Copilot is Introverted Intuition (Ni) – “Perspectives”
- Perspectives has spent so much time watching its mind form patterns that it sees the patterns in its own mind and the patterns in other people’s minds.
- We call it Perspectives because it is excellent for understanding other people’s perspective.
- ENJs rely on this for problem-solving, but not as much as they should.
- Ni encroaches on ENJs by forcing them to slow down.
- This can be uncomfortable for action-oriented ENJs.
- ENJs love to impose order on a chaotic world. Ni is very free and chaotic. We cannot impose order on the inner world of Ni.
- ENJs love to close loops.
- Ni gets in the way of closing loops because it injects a massive amount of data which complicates things.
- Introverted Intuition helps the ENJ to close better loops.
- Otherwise, how do you know you are closing loops in the right way?
- ENJs driver function looks for weaknesses in systems – organic and inorganic.
- Stress points
- Needs going unmet
- Ni forces the ENJ to go inside their mind and determine stress points and unmet needs within the ENJ.
- Sit with yourself and look at how your mind is set up.
- Extraverted Thinking (ENTJ Driver) – once it makes a decision it creates a neurological superhighway. Set it and forget it.
- Ni adds long game data.
- Extraverted Feeling (ENFJ Driver) believes their agenda is the best agenda. If they question themselves, they may find that they don’t have everyone’s best interest at heart.
- If you have ideas that are deemed dangerous, Perspectives does its own censoring.
- Our minds may want to go to places we have blocked out.
- The conclusions that your mind may reach when you explore the scary bits may turn your life upside down.
- ENJs will have more energy than INPs.
- ENJs are good at getting things done and getting into action.
- ENJs may struggle with monkey mind in an attempt to get everything accomplished.
- Harness that energy. Keep it centered instead of dispersed.
- Exercising Introverted Intuition requires you to sit still, get quiet, and go inside your mind.
- Perspectives gives the ENJ the ability to see the eventuality, or long term results, for the things they are doing.
- Longer timelines.
- Ask questions like “To what end?”
- Broaden categories you apply to people.
- Some of the ENJs perspectiving may be serving their own agendas or end games.
- You may have specific definitions of what an A player is.
- Or what makes up a healthy man or woman.
- You may have narrow definitions you have culled from jumping into other people’s perspective for a short time then coming back to your mind with assumptions based on limited data.
- When you can the thoughts in and see others in 3D, you will improve your compassion and skill level for talent scouting.
- Exercise:
- Take an hour a day and choose a quote you can explore profoundly, like Carl Sagan’s, “We are a way for the universe to know itself.”
- Go to a quiet place. Maybe even dark. Close your eyes, reduce sensory input.
- Ruminate on that quote for an hour.
- When your to-do list pops up, bring your mind back to the quote.
- After an hour, take out a piece of paper and write down some of the insights you had.
- This exercise will start training your mind to develop that Ni process.
- Wander the garden of your mind.
- Let go of self-censorship.
- Stop yourself from censoring your mind and let it go where it wants to go.
- It will likely be uncomfortable.
- You may have outsourced a part of your life to others.
- You may not be in control like you think you are.
- Once you can explore the parts of your mind you keep hidden you take real control of your life.
- Stop making big leaps/assumptions with limited info.
- ENJs tertiary Extraverted Sensing (Se) needs to be a servant to Introverted Intuition (Ni).
- If you make Ni a servant to Se, you will shorten the timelines of your speculations.
- Exercising Ni on a daily basis will make it more available to you throughout the day, so your observations are more profound.
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INTP & INFP:
- Copilot Ne
- Generate lots of energy
- Speed up
- Seek out Freedom of experience
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ENTJ & ENFJ
- Copilot Ni
- Slow down
- Harness energy
- Sit with it.
- Wander the garden of your mind and sit with uncomfortable thoughts
- INPs might like what ENJs have to do and vice versa
- But it won’t be developing their Copilot
- Developing the Copilot in the right way changes your life – and it may be painful to make the changes that are necessary.
- The way out is through
- When you get to the other side, the changes you make are more authentically you.
- The fruit at the end of all of this is well worth it.
- The application of these principles is unique and individualized.
- How are you using some of these principles to move the needle in your life?
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Podcast - Episode 0226 - Why We Resist Developing The Co-Pilot In Our Personality
Podcast - Episode 0228 - Developing Sensing As A Co-Pilot (ISxP & ESxJ Types)
39 comments
Hey guys. I’m an ENFJ and, as you requested, I thought I’d share what works for me. In the podcast, you talk about Sensations needing to serve Perspectives and I assumed that meant approaching them in that order. However, I found that the opposite is true but in a healthy and mindful way!
In order to be still, quiet and alone enough to access my Intuition I first need to move my body and burn off or channel some of the excess energy. If I don’t move my body before I ask it to be still, the mind that I’m trying to delve for intuition is too busy and frenetic. It’s basically the yogi principle of doing the asana before the meditation.
One last piece I thought I’d share is around the concept of ‘dangerous’ thoughts as this came up in the podcast a couple of times. As someone who’s suffered with OCD, there aren’t really dangerous thoughts per se, they’re all just thoughts. Perhaps a better word might be ‘disturbing’ or ‘intrusive’.
Fantastic content. Thank you for the wonderful work you’re doing. :)
I don’t usually read the comments, especially when there are so many, but I found the suggestion to ruminate on something you read (or listened to) especially something with a philosophical/theological/abstract bent to be a great suggestion. I try to read books by and listen to podcasts by those I suspect lead with Ni. I’ve found when you “feed” Ni with information it “percolates” for a while and when you are supposed to be sleeping at night and everything is quiet and you are laying awake in bed, things pop up. I keep a notepad next to my bed for just such occasions. That way, when I am angry that I am not sleeping, I can at least console myself with the fact that I am having good ideas.
My other best suggestion for developing Ni is to marry someone who leads with it. Or just spend a lot of time talking to such a person. I am an ENTJ married to an INTJ (sorry, kids, on all those doubled up blind spots). I just observe him using Ni all the time and try to copy him. For example, he often runs through future possibilities or conversations “ad nauseum.” It can be hard on me when he just does that and doesn’t act, I can get quite bored, but I have come to appreciate it more knowing it is an example of using Ni. I used to see it as “worry” now I play along like it’s a game. A specific example of this might be how I run through conversations with him that I might have with someone in the future saying “If she says this, then I could just say this.” And round and round we go. My husband loves to play this game (although I am the only one who knows we are playing anything; it probably just feels like a normal conversation to him). :).
I still have a long way to go, but I know that being married to/having a best friend that is an Ni driver has shaped me in SO SO many ways. My husband has helped me become MUCH less black and white in my thinking. He models many other Ni things for me as well, such as keying in on details that strike me as out of place or odd in my environment or in an interaction with someone and following up on it with questions. I call it “following the clues.” (I have to ask questions to see what’s going on, he just knows. It’s like living with Sherlock Holmes.")
Finally, I’m working on an extensive mind map to try to really get a grip on Ni. I’ve being combing through the PH resources to find information to fill out the map. Over time it is helping me understand what Ni is and how to better use it for growth. (I know that is very nerdy, but maybe it is a helpful idea for another nerd out there. ;)
Uh, never mind, apparently I’m an ENFJ, after all. O_o See episode 194, and my comment there. An ENFJ who grew up in a big family with a VERY high intuitive cultural preference, and, less strongly but still there, an INT preference. Add in some trauma and ADHD, and voila, I’m not good at looking like a J, but great at looking like an ambivert. And blending in.
I already journaled and wrote throughout my life to figure out what I thought about things, but when you can’t “turn off” the Fe and you become a stay-at-home mom to three littles and can’t hear yourself think, well. Quiet time, whether journaling or taking a walk around the block or occasionally NOT listening to the podcasts you love when you’re alone in the car, it’s absolutely crucial. Otherwise I go into sensory overwhelm and either explode or numb in time-wasting, unsustainable ways.
I think I loop by getting so caught up in present feelings and needs that I push aside the 100% predictable future feelings and needs. So I don’t close the loops I want to close, I don’t look like a J, and I don’t think of myself as meeting needs because I’m not an Enneagram 2, and I’m bad at meeting the tangible needs, much better at only trying to “fix” by listening and holding space, meeting those emotional needs. Tend to be pretty genius at validating other people’s experiences, I think. (Yeah, it’s the water I swim in, but I’m 39, and that seems to be what the feedback points to!)
Hi, 39yo INFP here.
Given the joyful and positive nature of Ne, do you think one can be forced into this Exploration through circumstances that are not inherently joyful and positive? (Sort of like a hobbit being made to go on an adventure?)
For example, when my mom was dying of Alzheimer’s and later on when I was grieving the deaths of both of my parents, I often felt like I didn’t know how to “do” this, and like I wanted a predictable path forward but there was none to be found. Others, and especially my therapist, reminded me that of COURSE I didn’t know how to do this, I had never done it before, it would be kind of scary if I did know. The Orphaned Adult by Alexander Levy talks about (often subconscious) identity and behavior shifts in this new territory, and suggests this parent loss might be the real root of the “midlife crisis.” He also talks about that image management piece, and the clumsiness of the newness of it all, saying something like, “no one has ever told me they regretted their grieving process was not captured on film for posterity.”
Between that, various bouts of postpartum depression, discovering I have ADHD, and all the extroversion that comes of having small children in the house (especially during quarantine!), I think my Ne may be pretty well developed? I don’t know, quietly doing my research sounds pretty appealing still, but again: living with small children. And my life is fairly social right now. That energy piece, man…
So… how can you tell when your Ne is developed, uh, “enough?” I can tell I grew a TON in the last ten years, with all the different hard things that happened. So… now what?? :)
Co-Pilot PROCRASTINATION!*
As a hard-nosed, ex-military, Chiropractic business-owning ENTJ, I recently bought the Personality Hacker ENTJ Starter Kit….Happy to report it’s already showing real-world results…If you’re on the fence, JUST DO IT! I especially love the video on ENTJ’s relationships with the other 16 types. Believe me, I need this!
**Here’s my experience which you may find Helpful…
I kept putting off working on my Co-Pilot of Introverted Intuition (Ni) because I couldn’t wrap my brain around it, or come with up with a logical reason for why I should, although I innately KNEW it would help. I get in “the zone” while running, so to kill 2 birds / 1 stone, I found music on YouTube called “852 Hz > AWAKEN INTUITION” (Meditative Mind Channel) and did a 5-miler with my dog. I simultaneously repeated a presumptive question-style affirmation (à la Noah St John’s book “The Secret Code of Success”…he calls them “afformations”). I ran, listened, let go of conscious thought, and just mindlessly repeated the question, “How am I always so incredibly intuitive?” On this run, my Co‐pilot automatically reformulated a more personally usable definition of what the heck Introverted Intuition actually was (which totally satisfied my logical Te), why I should use it, along with other business insights about my next practice location. These things amazingly surfaced fully-formed without any logical deductive reasoning or conscious brain effort. This event has inspired me to do daily mindfulness meditation or a guided intuitive meditation with YouTube.
Since getting the ENTJ Starter Kit and working on my co-pilot, this past month I’ve earned more money and had way more new patients calling our office out of the blue without any advertising! I’m also becoming less abrasive and more calm and poised. So thank you so much, Personality Hacker! Joel, your dynamic & vivid illustrative examples and smooth topic transitions really keep the podcasts rolling. Antonia, I absolutely love your voice tone, inflection, and powerfully clever and concise use of the English language…I often press “pause” and repeat your statements aloud because they are so filled with nuanced layers of meaning. I could listen to you talk all day. You two make a forceful podcast team, & you clearly know your subject down cold, which enthralls my ENTJ sensibilities.
I’m curious if your “Intuitive Awakening” program would help grow my copilot?
Thank You & Keep Up the Great Work!
~Dr. Jason T Baker, owner Family First Chiropractic, Ultra Health Chiropractic