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Equality or enhancement?

Which system of development is better.


  • Total voters
    20

Magic Poriferan

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I was thinking about the process of education, which then naturally lead to the general subject of self-development, which got me to ponder.
In education, you could say there are two general ways to focus.
You can focus on weaknesses, or you can focus on strengths.


When you focus on weaknesses, your goal is to work on improving them until they are of an equal standard to the disciplines you considered strong in your student.

When you focus on strengths, your goal is to work on them so that they go beyond a merely approvable level, all the way to a level of mastery.
You do not address your student's weaknesses unless they fall below a minimal level required to thrive.


So, which of these two systems is better?
This concept can be applied to almost anything that concerns flaws and merits, and so it is very relevant to the MBTI.

So to reframe it for MBTI self-development:
Ideally, should we try to Equalize our qualities so that we are balanced people, comfortable with all of our functions and the situations that may require them?

OR

Should we embrace our eccentricities, Enhance our dominant functions until we can make the best of them, and learn how to work around our weak functions, perhaps handing them off to someone that has them as dominant functions?

What do you think?


*I made this a poll*
 

Athenian200

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I think we should be careful to keep our other functions maintained at a certain level, but we should still focus primarily on our strengths, because that is how we were intended to work. That's what I think, anyway.
 

Wandering

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Both :D

I'm quite serious actually.

I think that the main focus should be on Enhancement, because this is where we will find strength and balance and motivation and basically what we need to keep going forward.

But a secondary focus should be on Equalisation, because this is what will round our personality up, remove some obstacles we are putting in our own way, eliminate some too-strong weaknesses that are slowing us down, and so on.

It's like walking, if you will. Our main focus should be on our legs, because they are what we actually use to walk. But having a secondary focus on the rest of our body, from how we hold our spine to how we move our arms to how we hold our head can help us walk better.

So I'd go for something like 75% Enhancement / 25% Equalisation, in general, though that is constantly open to changing depending on circumstances. There are times when focusing on a weak part of us to strengthen it must take precedence over the rest, but sooner or later the main focus must go back to our strengths or we risk exhausting ourselves.

JMO, of course.
 

Metamorphosis

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I normally go for mastery over equality, when it comes to the real world. But the fact is, it depends entirely on what you want to do, and what you believe your role is. I believe that there is a certain minimum level that I want all my functions at, but that doesn't mean that I won't try to increase some over others. If I were an INTJ that wanted to be a physicist I would work on my T and N. If I were an INTJ that wanted to be a politician, I would work on my E and F.
 

JustDave

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My vote is for equalization as IMHO balance is a natural thing and something worth striving for.

As an aside I know of people that lost their jobs due to their specialized skillsets (COBOL programmers, Mainframe programmers,etc.) falling out of favor. Whereas as their generalist peers were viewed by management as more adaptable and thus assets to their companies as those companies progressed.
 

MerkW

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I support enhancement. It is not necessarily always the best option, but in my personal case, I certainly have a strong preference for it. I have my weaknesses and I have my strengths. I am quite proud of my strengths, and interestingly enough, I am actually proud of some of my weaknesses (pedantry and social obliviousness, for example). My strengths and weaknesses make me who I am. Therefore, I wouldn't want to become balanced.
 

JustDave

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I support enhancement. It is not necessarily always the best option, but in my personal case, I certainly have a strong preference for it. I have my weaknesses and I have my strengths. I am quite proud of my strengths, and interestingly enough, I am actually proud of some of my weaknesses (pedantry and social obliviousness, for example). My strengths and weaknesses make me who I am. Therefore, I wouldn't want to become balanced.

On second thought, is balance a natural thing? I'm assuming it is but am not sure. What do you think?
 

JustDave

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The very word "natural" is a mystery to me.

For arguments sake lets say the term "natural" means something that occurs in nature without if nature is left to run it's course without (well I can't say unnatural) artificial intervention ... :huh:
 

MerkW

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On second thought, is balance a natural thing? I'm assuming it is but am not sure. What do you think?

I'm not altogether sure, to be entirely frank. The parameters of "natural" are exceedingly vague. Regardless, I think it all depends on the individual and on the circumstances. I assume that in some cases, a strive for balance is considered to be a natural drive or impulse, where in others, the drive for enhancement of pre-existing skill and behavioral sets would be considered so.

In other words, it could go either way.
 

JustDave

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I'm not altogether sure, to be entirely frank. The parameters of "natural" are exceedingly vague. Regardless, I think it all depends on the individual and on the circumstances. I assume that in some cases, a strive for balance is considered to be a natural drive or impulse, where in others, the drive for enhancement of pre-existing skill and behavioral sets would be considered so.

In other words, it could go either way.

Don't shoot me.

So since humans are natural whatever we do must be naturally must be natural?
 

Magic Poriferan

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A point of discussion.

Evolution favors specialists. The environment is comprised of lifeforms that have learned how to dominate niches. Jacks of all trades have failed.
Often, many specialists fail too, and become dead-ends on the evolutionary tree, but they still have a higher chance of succeeding than generalists do.

This is a reason I favor enhancement.
 

JustDave

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A point of discussion.

Evolution favors specialists. The environment is comprised of lifeforms that have learned how to dominate niches. Jacks of all trades have failed.
Often, many specialists fails too, and become dead-ends on the evolutionary tree, but they still have a higher chance of succeeding than generalists do.

This is a reason I favor enhancement.

That's as good a reason as any. The only thing I don't like about it is that I didn't think of it myself :devil:
 

Wandering

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Evolution favors specialists. The environment is comprised of lifeforms that have learned how to dominate niches. Jacks of all trades have failed.
I was wondering about that... and I can't say I agree.

I think evolution tries *everything*, and whatever works gets to flourish. In many cases it's specialists, but in many other cases it's generalists.

Take diet for example. Nature runs the whole spectrum over that, from over-specialised species that eat only one or two food sources (koalas, great pandas...) to the omnivores who (as their name indicates) eat almost anything they can get their grubby appendages on. And as long as their environment remains in balance, both types flourish, though the specialists tend to flourish more than the generalists. But should an unbalance happen, the specialists can disappear in almost no time, while the generalists will often survive.

So I guess that if evolution/Nature is to teach us anything, it's to choose a strategy and stick to it. Go for enhancement or equalisation, as you want, but be aware of the risks and advantages inherent to each strategy.
 

The_Liquid_Laser

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I think both are emportant with an emphasis on enhancement.

One problem with ignoring equality though is that it is possible to be so ignorant of something that you do not recognize that you are ignorant. It is important to be aware of one's weaknesses, so one can avoid them or find a way to compensate for them. Overall though it is better to develop strengths.
 

Magic Poriferan

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Another reason why I am pro-enhancement is that I think these eccentricities are a part of our identity.

The ideology of balance tells us that we must even out all of our traits until there is no longer an imbalance. Supposing everyone became perfectly even, would anyone be different?
I think we sacrifice our identity in attempting to level our traits.
 

cafe

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I don't see the value in making everyone equally mediocre. It's redundant.
 
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