Extroverted feeling is not automatically conforming to external expectations or values. It’s the difference on where the feeling valuations are focused.
Extroverted feeling like extroverted thinking is basically focused on ordering reality because that’s what rational functions do and these are outer focused. Emotions for Fe types are primarily to be communicated to achieve a result.
That result is not necessarily harmony or conformity. They can use it to cause disharmony or to set themselves apart. They can and do use it to assert their own needs. Because the focus is on affecting the environment (as well as being susceptible to affect), then it makes sense that they operate with a common emotional language. This is what can confuse a Fi type. Fi types can pick up on nuances of emotion easily, but it doesn’t fit the often more simplistic meaning a person is overtly displaying. We really often just don’t know what to do with that information. Add Ne to it and you have decision paralysis.
[MENTION=18445]thoughtlost[/MENTION] ‘s experience of not being able to detect flirting well is not about emotion at all....that’s about the meaning assigned to behaviors. That post is a nice explanation of the 9 experience, but I notice all disconnect described is really about the labels given to emotions and behaviors, not in ability to sense the emotion itself. As is common with Fi when articulated well, many people likely can relate to that sentiment. A lot of people regardless of type are stumped by flirting and unsure how to interpret it.
However, Fe tends to view this meaning as objectively determined - because the purpose is to communicate and influence, which requires agreed upon terms. Many types struggle with this is in various ways, even some FJs (although I notice their real issue is knowing but not agreeing with or wanting to adjust). For IxFPs, it’s not uncommon for us to articulate inner human experiences that everyone goes through but no one talks about that much. It’s interesting how over time it can become a cliche. But I would expect anyone of any type to find themselves relating well to certain Fi expressions as Fi is ultimately not about the self but the inner human condition. A lot of this mutual understanding depends on the maturity of the IxFP and the other person.
Introverted Feeling, like introverted thinking, is primarily focused on refining an internal system of criteria, far more than applying that criteria to affect reality. In this case it’s the criteria for “meaningâ€, and so they primarily approach emotion as something to understand and interpret, and they absorb it or contain it without seeming to do anything with it. What they are really doing is perfecting their understanding. Since it’s pretty much always “under constructionâ€, they only express stuff directly when very necessary. They may also communicate their insights into “what things mean in the human condition†indirectly, and they certainly influence people this way. IMO, it’s not uncommon for these ideas to eventually go “mainstreamâ€, and suddenly they are as much Fe protocol as they were once misunderstood expressions of an inner experience never well articulated before.
Not to go on too much of a tangent, but I notice there is a particularly complementary relationship with ENFJs and INFPs where the ENFJ champions and mainstreams the Fi types inner experience (because as it turns out, it’s actually typically human). I think ENFPs and INFJs report something similar when it comes to iNtuition.
As I wrote in a past post, this is complicated when dealing with auxiliary functions, because for IxFJs, Fe is in service of the Pi ego. Fi in ExFPs can seem to have much in common with ExFJs for a similar reason.
So I thoroughly agree that an INFJ 4 will often display or seem to use mentality that people associate with Fi, but that’s because those traits aren’t really definitive of Fi or exclusive to it. That’s more the result of an introvert who prefers feeling and is an enneagram 4. When you factor in that Ni is very concerned with the inner nature of things or hidden dynamics / forces, especially within people, then there’s tons of overlap in their mentality with INFP 4s.
For all practical purposes, it’s hard to distinguish an INFP and INFJ when both are enneagram 4. I can usually tell in person rather easily, but it’s difficult to describe with intellectual terms. I think noting IxxP vs IxxJ mentality and behavioral patterns is the easiest way and it’s what made MBTI rather insightful as to deterring type, even if it has its flaws and can be inconsistent as a typing tool.
I have a concept for a function model that borrows a bit from socionics and Lenore Thompson that I think makes a lot more sense than the “tandem theory†currently popular on the internet (ie someone is “on the Fe/Ti axisâ€). I don’t think socionics is correct in how each function is experienced internally or how it appears, but I think the concept of what is conscious or unconscious is right. So an INFJ (NiFe in MBTI) would have conscious “access†to Fi as a mentality but often experiences it simply as a narrower version of Fe and somewhat superfluous. That’s often how I see IxFJs describing Fi. It’s like “whatever you can do, I can do better!†. Frankly, as an NP, that’s kind of how I see Ni. I know it’s deeper than Ne, but it just doesn’t seem to offer more on the surface and my preference for Ne thinking makes it seem sort of unnecessary.