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In this episode, Joel and Antonia compare how feelers and thinkers experience feelings and talk about which type is more emotional.
In this podcast you’ll find:
- Are feelers more emotional than thinkers? The online buzz surrounding this question.
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What’s the difference between experiencing emotions and using a feeling function to make decisions?
- Carl Jung’s definitions around feeling emotions in the body
- The degree of separation between feeling the emotion and making the decision for feelers.
- Thinkers – what’s the difference between thought and a thinking function?
- Is there a greater gap between our thoughts and thinking function than there is between our emotions and our feeling function?
- Joel’s experience as a feeler – does he feel more emotional than thinkers?
- Antonia’s experience with thoughts and feelings as a Accuracy (Ti) user.
- The pendulum swing – how the world has shifted from over-valuing thinking to over-valuing feeling.
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The myth that all feelings should be acted upon – why it’s important to develop a mature relationship with your feelings.
- How feeling types can be cavalier with emotional data
- Some differences between Authenticy (Fi) and Harmony (Fe)
- How emotions motivate thinkers.
- How we’re wired to be intrinsically rewarded for using our preferred functions.
- What does it look like when a feeler has well-developed emotional intelligence?
- What are emotional “triggers”?
- Looking at SpongeBob SquarePants as an example of personal agency.
- Why feelers make their best decisions based on emotional criteria – and how, ironically, they can appear less emotional when they do this.
- Some thoughts on the intellectualization of emotions.
- Why we need to process feelings of guilt and shame.
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22 comments
In the middle of the podcast, paused, I decided I would jump in here first to throw out the idea that perhaps one big way we thinkers are cavalier with thoughts is misinformation. Especially now with social media and how much easier misinformation spreads and is accepted. We have to be more careful about the quality of information we allow to throw out there because we are ok with being wrong and perhaps updating or fine tuning the data as needed. Especially true for myself as I find I like to crowd source thoughts and ideas. In this day and age people can run with it and make a religion or movement out of it. It’s a trolls’ paradise!
Hello Deana,
Here’s my best attempt to answer your question.
I could actually be described in a very similar way as what you said. I do not have particular sensitivity to the nuances of my own emotions, nor do I express them strongly. I also tend to make decisions based primarily on what makes logical sense to me.
This is all true, even though I am positive I am a feeling type (ISFJ).
xxFJs in the Myers Briggs system use a feeling process called Fe or “Harmony,” as you may know already. They also use a thinking process called Ti or “Accuracy.” Now one thing about this function polarity is that the feelings that the person is more likely to rely on for decision-making are others’ feelings. I would say that process, in isolation, puts less focus on your own individual, personal emotions than the Fi or “Authenticity” process does.
Before going into more deep dives of Myers-Briggs, I considered myself a more “thinking” person than an “emotional” person, because I was referring to my internal processes. If your type is INFJ, which I think is totally possible, then your internal decision-making function is that Ti or “Accuracy” process. Of course, maybe you are a xxTP in this personality system and use these process in another order. Or maybe you don’t use these functions at all. Maybe you’re an xxTJ or an xxFP. I really can’t know.
To sum it all up, xxFJs and xxTPs will tend to make decisions based on:
1) What makes logical sense to them (Ti)
2) How the decision will affect the emotions of other people (Fe)
On the other hand, xxFPs and xxTJs will tend to make decisions based on
1) What works and gets stuff done in the outer world (Te)
2) How they personally feel about the decision (Fi)
If you’re still trying to figure out your type, I personally would recommend starting out by figuring out which judging (decision-making) function polarity you use. From there, I’d try to figure out which perceiving (learning) function polarity you use, if you haven’t already.
I really hope I was helpful, although maybe I gave a much longer reply than what you were hoping for. I’m still here checking the comments regularly if you have any more questions, although please recognize that I’m not a professional with this system. I’m just a personality psychology enthusiast hoping to learn more and help other people learn.
Hope you have a great day,
William
Thanks for your reply, Antonia
I’m thinking about Antonia’s example of a feeler who intellectualizes their emotions to make an argument that seems irrational to others. What if your experience is invalidated by people around you? perhaps it is not completely your responsibility if you change in reaction to them.
I am thinking about when people of color explain racism to white people, or women try to express feeling like they are not equal. Often as soon as a marginalized person expresses broad negative emotions they are expected to prove it—not only to prove their own experience is valid, but that it can be explained 100% by racism or sexism and that all women or POC have the same experience. This makes it difficult to articulate one’s emotions. We can self censor and throttle valid intuitions based on countless small experiences because we hear those voices argue with us in our heads. Society has ready made explanations to invalidate oppressed subjectivities (assumed inferiority, reasons why the system is fair etc). Often demands for social change begin with people sharing vague discontents and discovering they are not alone.
There is a negative feedback loop when a person tries to articulate feelings of marginalization in the face of hostile and skeptical reactions. You might double down and simplify your experience so it is acceptable to the others. Emotional experiences might be translated to rigid rules like “don’t ask me questions about my identity because that’s emotional labor” or when mansplaining or white fragility is applied too broadly. When I see mistakes like that, it seems to be out of frustration at not being believed. Thinkers might fall into the trap of not exploring ideas that could be used against their perspective. There are serious consequences to “losing” the argument here. If people don’t believe you it perpetuates your oppression and can even result in your bodily harm. If you are not the marginalized one, it’s on you to be open minded and admit what you don’t know. Don’t ask someone to prove their experience is real when they are attempting to share painful emotions, which they could have been carrying for a long time. Keeping quiet and listening can show you that these are common experiences and spare the speaker from your interrogation.
I am less “feeling” or in touch with my own feelings than seems typical here. I have been called “cold and calculating” a time or two, but tend to think they really meant “cool and collected”.
I’ve always thought of myself as a thinking person but have tested INFJ numerous times. Is this possible or a mistype?