Friday, May 11, 2018

My MBTI Instrument

INFP.  That's what I get most of the time when I take those personality tests.  The first one I took was at work.  My employer offered it as a type of personal improvement benefit.  Or something.

INTJ.  That's what I get some of the time.  The numbers are apparently pretty close.  The IN part stays the same.

Introverted Intuitive... Yup, I can't say I disagree.  The FP part surprises me a bit. I see myself as more logical than 'feeling'.

The numbers swing when I've been around someone who is either F or P, though.  I become more TJ.  There must be some kind of subconscious compensation.  Or maybe the Myers-Briggs tests are just scored a little differently and a single answer pushes back over the line.

The tests are always followed by some self-improvement advice.  "If you're an INFP you should blah blah blah..."  Sounds like a horoscope.

Jungian anecdotal observations.  That's what they say is behind it.  Wikipedia'd it.

There may be something to it, though.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/INFP if you wanna read more about my type for some reason.  I won't judge.


EDIT:
After reading a good bit more about the origins of the MBTI, it appears it is based on pseudo-science. No doubt people exhibit these personality traits, but to categorize them as if there is some sort of foreordained, unchanging personality sequence in everyone is bonkers. Anyone can bring out good or bad traits in themselves.

People aren't born introverts or extraverts; they're created. If a person is allowed to believe they have no bad ideas, or is raised to bully people in order to get their way, they become an extravert. Most people feel too sorry for them to call them out on their nonsense. The only reason extraverts are still extraverts is because they haven't met someone tired enough of listening to their crap to humiliate the paratrophic energy-vampire into shutting up so the grown-ups can talk. Unless they're simpletons, or sociopaths, a little dose of Biblical humility will eventually turn extraverts into introverts. It's why you see loudmouth, bossy youngsters usually growing into humble adults.

Saying that, there are kids who are naturally shy or gregarious when they're little. That doesn't mean they have some combination of traits that can't be changed, though. Even more important is recognizing that being outgoing doesn't make you a lifelong extravert, and being shy doesn't equal a life of introversion.