INTJ transforms into INFJ in relationship.

OK here we go. I’ve been trying to figure out myself for a very long time. MBTI helped a lot. Everything I could find written about how INTJs think, behave and view the world matched up well except for one area. In relationships, the written descriptions were off. Way off. The descriptions were of someone I didn’t recognize. The more detailed the description the more wrong it seemed. Then I found this You Tube video. It describes me perfectly.




I was laughing so hard watching this video. I had to watch it several times. For me the funniest things said were:

“We are just so in sink that we feel like doing the same things like at the same time. We wake up at the same time. We both are craving the same food at the same time. We both feel like watching the same show at the same time. We both feel like canceling and staying in at the same time. We both feel like going out at the same time.” -- For me this Vulcan mind-meld thing freaked out an old girl friend and me too. LMAO! I mean what the hell is that! Hahaha.

And this one had me laughing for literally 10 minutes:

“My girl friend said she was like if I didn’t have tasks. I would be fu****g all the time I would just be in a love bubble and that was it. And like she’s like: I HATE TASKS. And she was like: I HATE HOW TASK INTERUPT MY LOVE BUBBLE.” -- OMG that is so funny!

So my questions for everyone here are:

1) To INFJs, does all this ring true for your type?

2) To INTJs, is all this way off base for your type?

3) Has anyone read or heard of such a thing as an INTJ having an INFJ alter ego?

4) What do you think I should identify as? Just INTJ or INFJ doesn’t work. INxJ doesn’t seem right to me either because I know when I’m use T and F. It’s not random.

All this has caused a lot of internal conflict with me over my life. The INFJ (all I want in life is to live in a Love Bubble) conflicts with the INTJ (I must change the world through logic and to hell with everything else). Often times I really do feel like Mr. Spock from Star Trek. Outwardly logical but emotional and vulnerable on the inside. What I've found is that if you have one then the other suffers. I've never been able to balance these two extremes. And being an INTJ engineer, you know which one suffered. But I'm not an engineer any more. So at age 56, I'm starting a whole new life to fulfill my INFJ half.

And I will need your help to do it including even some help with dating site profiles and answering questions like: Why do women “slam the door” when I tell them I’ve never been married and don’t have any kids. Kids I can understand if they have small children but when did having a divorce become a necessary thing? SLAM! LMAO. They are making all kinds of assumptions that are incorrect. What response do I write back to prevent the door slam before they have even met me?

I’m going to be an open book to you guys here on this forum through my journey. That’s the only way I feel that I can really improve myself. There is a reason for how everything has turned out to this point. And now that I know and better understand my INFJ half, I think it was all psychological in order to work out the conflict. I’m really beginning to believe that INTJs should never be wired this way.

So please ask any questions you like. But I will have to put some of them off for additional threads. Way too much information and millions of questions. But I promise to keep track of all your unanswered questions to respond in future. I know this is going to be a big project but hay this is what retired INTJ project engineers do for fun.

You can get background information about me by going to my profile information or the introductions forum.

 

Yea, it's crazy. That video was as significant to me as the first time I took the Myers Briggs test. But the video was only posted to You Tube 4 months ago!

 

I haven't a clue either. Maybe it's just a guy thing.

 

Good video. Thanks. Excellent description for the difference between extraverted thinking (INTJ) and extraverted feeling (INFJ). And his description for extraverted feeling is exactly what I do for people that I love. I try to build consensus with them about feelings and do so very strongly. If I can't get consensus with them then it bothers me badly. It can actually hurt in your guts. Logic and reasoning just don't matter to me at all.

However for everyone else, I use extraverted thinking. Everyone's internal feelings about things doesn't matter to me at all. I try to build consensus using only logic and reasoning.

 

Your right for a normal INTJ. And what I have been trying to say ineloquently in non-MBTI terms is that in a relationship I flip from Fi to Fe towards that person. Of course I know what Fi feels like. I experience that daily with everyone. And I experience more intense Fi feelings for my parents and siblings. But this Fe is something entirely different. It feels entirely different. I act entirely different from my normal INTJ self. Virtually everything that Maghen LeVota describes in her video is what I do and feel. In the middle of a relationship, everything that I do feels fine and normal. I'm just following whatever feels like the right thing to do for me. Everything is totally subconscious. I don't recognize it as being strange or unusual in the middle of it. But after the relationship has ended and I finely shift back to my normal INTJ self 24/7, which takes a while, my god, who was that person? I don't recognize myself. Why was I doing all that? Well I know why. It is to avoid any conflict what so ever. Because any conflict, even just a minor heated discussion, causes great internal turmoil. Your stomach gets in knots, you can't eat, you have difficulty sleeping, headaches ect. And if there is a big blowup in the relationship with a lot of screaming and shouting, that truly feels far worse like a close relative has died. That just feels so bad like you wouldn't believe. So to avoid all this suffering, your subconscious starts directing you to do things to avoid conflict. Your kind of aware that things are different but you just want to do different stuff than you did before so it doesn't feel odd. You now just want to do different things with this new person in your life. That's what Maghen Levota is describing in the video. Her INFJ girlfriend is just doing what feels right for her.

But it's not just about doing things differently, I can also feel the other persons emotional state. Their emotions sort of become my emotions. But I also know why they feel the way they do intuitively. This can take a while, like many months being around them all the time. If feels the same in my head as what I do when I sense breaks in logic as an INTJ. My subconscious is just playing connect the dots on what it knows - - but instead of logical steps, it’s working on what it knows about why this person feels the way they do.

I've got only a small idea of what the INFJs go through on this forum. They use Fe for everything but what I do is narrow focused. But I can really empathize with them.

 

Developing Fe? Not in my case. I’m sure I was born this way. No development required. I can remember in first grade, at 6 years old, having this hole in my gut needing to live in the Love Bubble. That same feeling went with me through my teenage years and through my adult life. I can remember school age crush after crush. I remember in my early teens counting how many crushes I had between 1st and 6th grades. I remember 20. Something like that will really smash your self-esteem around girls as a teenager. I would be interested to know if typical INFJs have done the same thing. I bet they have.

I think at this point most of the book material out there should be tossed out for this. Some of it would still apply like what does an INFJ do and feel in my situation and how to best deal with it so it doesn’t completely swallow you up.

There is one thing I would like to try when I get a SO. That is to retake the official MBTI test while thinking about what you would do with your SO as you answer each question. I know people have done this and they end up with a slightly different type.

 

dragulagu, I read the article about shadow functions. The Fe that I feel doesn't match well with the shadow function theory. They seem to be mostly talking about these functions showing themselves during times of stress. And I think we've all done that. During times of stress, I know I've done something and thought "Where the heck did that come from". The Fe that I'm using feels good and natural. And it doesn't just come out for a short time-- a hour, a day, a week. It's "on" all the time when ever I'm with the SO for however long or short the relationship last. It also feels natural to use the Fe just like using my Te when I'm in INTJ mode. As long as the relationship is good I'm on cloud 9. The only time things start feeling bad is when the relationship turns sour. Then all hell breaks loose inside.

 

I totally agree with you!! I'm really think that the whole MBTI thing is only a small part of what's happening in people's head. And everything other than the 4 letters INFJ is just BS. And even then take a look at me. MBTI missed a big chunk of who I am. Is it a useful tool -- Oh yes. Is it incomplete -- Oh yes. Just step back for a moment to reflect on what is really going on -- Do you honestly think that with just 100 questions you can explain everything that's going on inside a mind? Really!?! Come on! It defies common sense.

As far as what was going on inside my head as a child -- I definitely had some INFJ going on. I also had a strong INTJ too. And just like in adulthood, starting at age 6 I used INFJ for romantic relationships and INTJ for everything else. I remember by mom being amazed at how I could see breaks in logic. I remember specifically at about age 7 or something my mom and grandmother looking at each other with this shocked expression and saying "How did he figure that out?" But which one would have been dominant if I was nurtured differently? Te or Fe? I wondered about that.

 

Thanks dragulagu. You have been a big help. This is the kind of thing I need to better understand myself.