[Posting this now while catching up, so apologies for redundancies.]
Over time, I've realized that Fi users care passionately and deeply about a select few people in their lives and would do just about anything for them. Fe users care more generally and diffusely about a wider scope of people. That is not to say that I don't have levels of care, depending on how close someone is to me, but it's not a tap that is just turned on or off. As a Fe user, Fi's care can sometimes seem over the top or else non-existent. I'm sure that to a Fi user, Fe care seems kind of superficial and sometimes nosy.
To a Fe user, actions are really the evidence of care. Therefore a Fi user deciding they don't feel like attending a family function, even if it matters a lot to you, or them not acknowledging a person's efforts even if they feel a little invasive (or at least suggesting an alternative action that would be better) often is interpreted as a lack of care for the person or else immaturity/selfishness. Stony silence or grumpiness in the morning simply because the Fi user had to get up seems rather selfish (because those cues and attitudes convey to the group or to the Fe user that they are somehow responsible and should be doing something). Not responding when someone talks to you or acknowledging their presence in some way is taken as something deliberate, when it fact I've discovered that it is not intended in that way at all. To Fe, this is confusing, because if you follow Fe rules, you generally always know when someone is upset and then take measures to negotiate fixing it. With Fi, there appears to be no way to know and a Fe user has a much harder time just shrugging their shoulders to what feels like a personal accusation (or failing that extreme selfishness! - are you noticing a pattern here?)
Again, very little is neutral to Fe. Every action, comment, look, bit of body language is usually a cue that all is well (appreciation is being shown in some way) or that all is not well (and people pick up on it and try to adjust things so more people can feel happy with the situation). When the Fe user feels they are making these adjustments for the Fi user, but it is not being reciprocated, they can also become resentful (while the Fi user wonders what on earth is wrong, or else leaves the person alone to work it out - which is further interpreted as not caring!)
It wouldn't occur to most Fe users that a card detailing their appreciation for the Fi user and what qualities they appreciate about Fi user would be seen as an awkward present (because for the Fe user that would be about the best thing they could get!). This can even discourage the Fe user, because they are really not sure how to show appreciation (something they really need themselves) in any of the conventional ways they are used to doing. (I've found Fi people often seem put on the spot by compliments or public recognition too).
I kinda want to step in and add a little bit of this feels somewhat instinct variant related. [edit to add: I’ve just noticed PB has mentioned this too.] Some of it resonates, but a lot of it seems ‘so variant’ flavored to me. For instance- I relate to ‘action’ being evidence of care. But something like a family function- I’m going to guess there’s inherently more value in that to an ‘so variant’ than there would be to me (least ‘so variant’), and therefore it feels like less of an overall burden to ‘so doms’.
I think as a least ‘so variant’ Fe’er, I can seem callous about the ‘importance’ of my participation in some things (as support, or…whatever) for simply not directly understanding what ‘so variants’ place importance on. When I look back on a past relationship- the other person (let’s say, ‘Pat’) expressed frustration with me sometimes because I hated going to weddings or social events just as a ‘girlfriend’- it made me feel like some kind of bizarre fashion accessory or something, because (in regard to certain events) I knew that I didn’t especially get along with certain people and didn’t understand why Pat would feel a need for me to go
knowing that I’d be wanting to leave from the moment we arrived. I would never have expected that of Pat, it would even feel really selfish of me to expect that- but then that in itself was also a problem because Pat interpreted this as ‘me being embarrassed of Pat’ when I didn’t expect Pat to come along. Back at the time, my reaction was something like “But you don’t even like this friend! You can never get enough of telling me how much you don’t like this friend- so WHY WHY WHY would it bother you that I assumed you wouldn’t want to go?!?†Stuff like that came up all the time- and in retrospect, I think a lot of it was about me being least ‘so variant’ and having no clue why certain things were important (and reciprocally- I think it was hard for ‘Pat’, probably, to understand the cost of superfluous social activity to me). Both ends looked selfish to the other because neither directly understood or could empathize with the others’ cost or priorities (by ‘cost’, I mean the negative affect caused).
BUT! I do relate to instinctively thinking cues demand some sort of action. If someone expresses disdain- even just with an annoyed glance- at something I’m doing, I
hear “please stop.†And it seems like what I’ve heard from Fi’ers in this forum is that it’s annoying, because only ‘please stop†means “please stop.†But then I feel rude actually saying “please stop†to someone myself, so it’s kind of a catch-22. And also- for example- if someone comes in and sits down next to me, clearly grumpy and agitated about something, I
am going to feel obligated to do something. Unless I know this person and understand from previous experience that they want to be left alone with their feelings and trying to help will only agitate them more, I’ll feel like I’m as good as slapping them in the face if I ignore the cues.
And you're saying it feels like we an just turn on or off our concern for others?
No, it's not the your concern with the same person gets turned on or off, but rather the tap is on full blast for a select few, and completely off for many more. Fe feels more comfortable with halfway on for a wider range of people, with the flow of concern adjusted to the situation.
And this, specifically, I’m thinking may apply more to ‘so dominant’. It very much seems to me like ‘so dominants’ spread their attention over a wider range of people, whereas what ‘makes more sense’ to me personally is turning it on full blast with only a few people.
[edit to add] Although! It's worth mentioning that I have noticed with some FPs I know- regardless of whether the focus of people is large or small- Fi users seem a bit less consistent to me. Something that would warrant concern one day might not warrant concern the next, and that confuses me. I gather that- for them- it's all about expressing or showing how much they're feeling at that particular moment (?, or something, I don't really get it). But to me it's confusing. It's like expecting me to find value in using a ruler, but changing what the actual distance of an 'inch' is on a whim. (And as always, worth mentioning: it's NOT my experience of every FP, only a few of them.)
