Myers-Briggs Revisited

In college I used to speak in Myers-Briggsese a lot. This is the personality test which spits out four letters: introversion/extraversion, intuitive/sensory, thinking/feeling, judging/perceiving. I am an INFP, the veritable space cadet of the Myers-Briggs pantheon. When I first took the test, I think I liked it so much because I had always thought myself weird, especially growing up around very practical, earthy people. When I read the description of my type, I at least didn't feel alone in my weirdness, even if statistically there aren't many INFP's (that is probably a good thing for the world overall). I'm a pretty functional and organized INFP, I think, but I've worked on it.

I don't do Myer-Briggsese as much anymore, but every once in a while I re-take the test out of curiosity to see whether I test differently or change. Apparently I either know these tests so well, or my personality is stable, because this one I took still comes out INFP.



The site is informative because it has links to forums and discussions of type. I read a discussion here on INFP-INTJ romances. Pavel is an INTJ, so it was a fun read. I think the two attract each other because they recognize mutual quirkiness and are intrigued, they probably both have nerdy interests that draw them together, and they can feel safe with the other person. What is interesting about an INFP-INTJ match-up is that both can be quite romantic, but we approach it so differently. The INTJ is strategic about it, whereas the INFP wants to be spontaneous, is sentimental about little things. I've learned to appreciate the thought Pavel puts into pleasing me, and I think he ends up often being sweeter and more romantic in a practical sense than I am.

The extreme case of the two approaches is like in the movie A Beautiful Mind, where the guy (who's probably an INTP, I'd guess) lays out his anally logical thought process for evaluating whether to marry his girlfriend, probably something that he should have kept to himself. His girlfriend says "give me a moment while I re-adjust my girlish expectations of romance," but she sees the sweetness in his approach, too. A less mature person might have said "what an unfeeling jerk," missing the fact that the guy actually was on his knees, with a ring, etc. The man might have then said, "what an unreasonable shrew YOU are!" They would both have missed the other's inherent quality. This is the best use of Myers-Briggs, in my opinion- being able to appreciate others' different ways of doing things.

Now, my hubby being an INTJ, he did not have such an agonized process, at least that I could see. Once he decided he was going to marry me, that was it- it was just a matter of working out the details. Probably this is where a key strength of an INFP-INTJ romance lies. We don't do much good for each other in the areas of social life or practical things. Both Pavel and I are hermits, and we tend to reinforce each other's hermitages, and we are both fairly useless with fix-it and practical type things. However, we do balance each other out in terms of decision-making. I would agonize forever about something, but Pavel is pretty decisive once he's got the facts, and he doesn't second-guess. I appreciate this a great deal. Heaven save us from the P's being in charge.