Oh hey nice to meet you, I’m an INFJ.
Not a clue what I’m talking about?
You need to look into the Myers Briggs personality type indicator. Essentially, it’s a personality test – but a really important, well known and well respected one.
I grew up in a household where Myers Briggs ‘types’ were the topic of daily conversation, and throughout my education in business and marketing it has come up time and time again. There are several reasons why it’s important to know about it:
- Understand why you have those habits
- Understand how you work best
- Understand what makes you tick and what turns you off
- Understand your relationships more deeply
- Understand how to be more efficient at work
- Understand others and how to deal with polar opposite personalities
There are loads of sites online where you can take long or short versions of the test for free, so have a look around.
ANYWAY, I won’t linger too long on the structure and combination of the types, but below is a helpful guide to my type – INFJ:
Introverted – Gains energy through quiet time and being alone, loses energy in social situations (Opposite is an ‘Extravert’ who gains energy when socialising)
Intuitive – Sees patterns and possibilities and makes decisions based on an abstract intuition (Opposite is a ‘Sensing’ person, who is more logical and practical, making decisions using concrete evidence)
Feeling – Prioritise people and emotions (Opposite is a ‘Thinking’ person, again making logical decisions through analysis and rationality)
Judging – Prefers structure, order and routine, and likes to plan before acting (Opposite is a ‘Perceiving’ person, tends to be more spontaneous, flexible, and possibly disorganised)
So now that you have a little background understanding – here’s some more about what it’s like to be me!
The Not so Good:
- Working in groups is just the worst
Being introverted means I lose energy by being in social situations. It exhausts me after a short while and I just want to go somewhere by myself to recharge. Trying to do work in social situations is therefore particularly hard, and I know a lot of Introverts struggle with it. I personally need silence to work, and simply can’t concentrate if anyone else is talking or even playing music, and I also find it hard to share ideas freely for fear of being judged by others. On the whole, not a great way to get stuff done. - I may make decisions based on emotions sometimes
It’s easy for me to get swept up in the emotion of something and make decision based on my (very active!) imagination. I’m lucky that my partner, N, is a more rational personality, so he brings me down to Earth when I need it! - I want people to like me…so much!
Being sensitive to the emotions and feelings of others means it can feel extremely uncomfortable when I know someone doesn’t particularly like me. Therefore I’ll do everything I can to make people like me, which isn’t always a good thing. I’m definitely at risk of being a pushover due to that – I’m getting better though, and slowly learning to care less what others think of me. - Did I mention I’m kind of emotional?
Watching sad films, TV shows or adverts, hearing sad stories or seeing someone get hurt or upset just turns me into an emotional mess. There is such a thing as too much empathy, and sometimes I hate having all the feels. - I feel like s**t if my routine is messed up
I have lists of lists of to do lists (yes, list inception is a real thing), and sometimes I actually write out a plan of my day. As in, ‘at 9am I will do this’ and ‘at 11am I will do this’. This means if something comes up or I need to be more flexible, it can make me feel a little stressed…if only because it ruins the neatness of my to do list. - Networking is also the worst
Similarly to working in groups, talking to strange people with the purpose to gain something from them is hideously awkward for me. I could NEVER work in sales – ever.
The Positive:
- My time and project management skills are fairly epic
Did I mention my lists of to do lists? I’m obsessive about time management, productivity and efficiency, and I will always maintain that this is my biggest strength. - Making decisions based on intuition isn’t a bad thing
As far as my experience goes, I’ve found that intuitive decision making nearly always works out best. The ability to intuitively find patterns and extrapolate from them has thus far been very useful. #BelieveinyourBiology - I’m very well-suited to Marketing due to empathy
When I quit uni and started searching for a new career path, I looked very deeply into Myers Briggs for suggestions and ideas. Being a counsellor always comes out top for INFJs, but one of the top choices is also a ‘Marketer’. Thus, I have become one, and have found it to be very successful so far! - I’m great at working on my own
I could honestly be a hermit quite easily, and my extreme Introverted-ness means I suit remote working very well, if not better than an office/group environment. - Creativity comes naturally
INFJs are known for being creative – particularly with their writing communication skills. Hence why I’m positive that many bloggers are INFJs/INTJs also! - My friendships are deep and important
Apparently INFJs find it easy to make friends but hard to keep them, and therefore usually have a small handful of really close friends. This is definitely true for me. I deliberately seek out people with very similar personalities to my own because I know I will find it easier to build more meaningful relationships with them. In the past I’ve found I’m not very compatible with Extraverts at all, mainly because of their tendency to have large amounts of shallower friendships instead.
I would love for everyone I know to write something like this and share it, because I honestly find it so interesting to know what’s going on inside other peoples’ heads, and I love seeing how different we all are.
I am apparently an Extrovert Intuitive Feeling Perceiving :D What does that mean?? Very interesting, I love personality tests! Alice xx
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I don’t know each one that well, but just from the basics I’d say that means:
– Social personality (enjoys being in groups of people)
– Very imaginative and emotional
– Care about people and emotions; have lots of empathy
– You’re quite spontaneous and perhaps sometimes disorganised; tendency to procrastinate
:)
xx
I realised there was an explanation underneath too! :) Very much sounds like me – I constantly procrastinate ;) Hence why I ended up doing a personality test at work! haha xxx
Is there a way to take the test for free? I went to the site and kept getting asked to pay $49?
If you just Google Myers Briggs test there are loads of sites that do shorter versions for free! I just wanted to link to the official site here :) x
We’ve done this at work too – I’m an INTJ which (despite all their seemingly bad traits) does actually quite please me, I think it’s very accurate! xx
INTJs are great! Haha You’ll be similar to me then, but just a bit more logical x
This is SO interesting, Anna! I’m going to take this test now! :) I can feel myself relating to a lot of what you’re saying, but also suspect there’ll be a few differences there too so I might pop back and comment to tell you what results I got!
Reading your response was very interesting too.Thank you for sharing :) You sound like someone I’d genuinely like to be friends with..haha! In fact, everything you’ve written about yourself is what I’d imagine Lee’s (my boyfriend) results to be. And funnily enough, he’s a marketer too! So, when he’s home tonight I’ll ask him to take this test and see what he thinks. You’re right though – knowledge is power, so knowing your personality well makes it easier to deal with the negatives (like the end-of-the-world feeling if someone genuinely dislikes you), and to make the most of the positives (like your friendships being deeply important and working well alone). Fascinating, and fun!
Flora x
http://www.hardyandhay.com
Awesome! I look forward to hearing your results :) You guys could write a blog about each other’s personalities haha.
Doing this has made me a more understanding person, for sure. Before, I really struggled to get on with very different personalities, but now I understand the reasons behind their traits it’s much easier for me to think “it’s nothing personal, that’s just how an extravert deals with things” etc. x
It’s interesting that you say that Marketing is one of the top careers suggested for/chosen by INFJs. A lot of websites I see discourage INFJs from choosing Marketing as a career because it doesn’t fit with their morals. I am very interested in a Marketing career but I can’t help feeling it’s a bit evil. I would hate myself if I chose I job where I was actively doing harm. I’m interested: do you ever feel this way or not? Do you enjoy Marketing as a career?
Hey Lauren – I wouldn’t pay attention to that at all! Marketing doesn’t have to be sleezy and salesy at all, so there’s no moral issues to contend with unless you’re using bad tactics. I worked in Marketing for a couple of years and now I have my own business that is all about branding and marketing and I LOVE it! I am an INFJ and I don’t have any issue with it at all :) I love being able to empathise with customers and really understand their needs.