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Integrating the Inferior

Salomé

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Based on what [MENTION=5143]Salomé[/MENTION] said, I'm wondering if the inferior function just bothers T-doms a lot more than it bothers other people.

I haven't heard of any other types having that extreme a relationship with their inferior function --
Heh. Try this one:
In its extreme form, the grip experience of Introverted Thinking types may manifest as a feeling of profound and infinite separateness from the whole of humanity.

They fear that once in the realm of intense emotion, they may become possessed by it and never be able to get out. That is why descending into “the depths” is rare and entered into against the will of the Introverted Thinking type.

With greater intensity, inferior Feeling comes out as raw, extreme emotion.

Feeling judgment seems to become increasingly exaggerated and obsessive, reaching a point where it no longer serves a judging purpose but becomes unbridled emotionalism.
The IxTP experience of iFe is akin to hysteria. For INTPs, paranoia can be a not uncommon manifestation.

which isn't to say that I won't be easily convinced to the contrary, but the dynamic on this thread suggests that my hypothesis is correct, in addition to [MENTION=5731]Kalach[/MENTION]'s posts about Te-dominance being what led to the creation of this thread in the first place.
I think you're right. I have always maintained that Ts are more broken than Fs.

But, if you think about it, it's logical that primitive and raw feeling would be scarier / more disorienting than primitive and raw thinking. Not least because we are all equipped to experience emotion, whether we want to or not, but we are not all equipped to understand the inadequacies of our own thinking... Experiencing a rigid (though delusional) certainty is not necessarily distressing for the feeler (however frustrating it may be for the people who have to deal with the consequences of that individual's faulty thinking). Experiencing an extreme and primitive emotional outburst (your own or someone else's) is always distressing for a thinker.
 

Cellmold

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For example, with NFJs I’ve known- I’ve seen a tendency to jump to conclusions about the meaning of another person’s actions or words. Stories (explanations of ‘why) sort of instantly unzip in our heads for why other people do or say what they say or do- and it takes conscious effort to realize we aren’t actually seeing why *they* said or did it….we’re seeing why *we* would say or do it (iow: what it would mean if we said or did it ourselves). The benefit of pulling Ti ‘out of the shadows’ for NFJs is we can be aware that the way we make sense of the world isn’t necessarily because what we’re gleaming is the irrefutable truth about other people so much as it’s the truth about what it would mean if we were the ones saying or doing it. The less in touch an FJ is with the extent to which the way Ti ‘makes sense’ of others’ behavior according to our own limited experience of the world, the more we impulsively believe the first story (or ‘apparent causation’) that pops into our head is ‘clearly’ the truth.

This is a great point and one im not going to deny I am quite guilty of. In fact there is some pretty damning evidence of me doing this on these forums.
It's something to understand and rectify. The difficulty in doing this is of course great, but that is all part of the challenge and with that difficulty comes the greater reward, not for yourself alone; but also for those around you.

Ive read it can be an issue with most judging types, whether the judging function is primary or secondary, to jump to a conclusion or decision on an insufficient amount of evidence. Possibly this is more likely with feeling functions than thinking ones, but that may just be my bias towards people oriented judgements, as opposed to considering this in a non-people related context.

This may be more evident among those with extraverted judging functions as primary or secondary. Perceiver's might experience the opposite, as in taking a long time to come to a conclusion or decision. Although all people are capable of being judgmental, the interesting point is in how that manifests.


I do know for sure that one of my issues is not standing back long enough to take in enough information.

As a result I do a lot of backtracking and inefficient catching up in conversations as I suddenly clock on to the data that has now presented itself.
 

Salomé

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Theoretically it's supposed to be more an ENFJ thing, and I'm inclined to think the INFJs who get that way lean in that direction (towards being on the cusp of E) because Ni makes it difficult to cling so confidently to a first impression.
...
I can’t help but think when people complain about INFJs being this way- they’re actually dealing with something closer to an especially introverted ENFJ.
I disagree. I see far more evidence of this in Infjs than Es. Perhaps because the Es greater facility with Fe moves them to be more understanding, accepting and (paradoxically?) less judgemental.
I reckon this observation holds for all ExFJs - they tend to be warmer / more accepting than IxFJs.
I’m really not sure what influence ‘inferior Se’ has exactly, I don’t have much of a handle on that.
[MENTION=5731]Kalach[/MENTION] has mentioned that it can manifest as an exaggerated fear for physical security. I also think that INFJs can share with INTJs a pretty complicated relationship with their own (and others') sexuality. In the former it can look like frigidity but can mask something more... extreme.
While Te aux lends a dogmatic aspect to the impersonal realm, Fe aux can lend a dogmatic aspect to the personal one - i.e. a proscriptive morality informed by the same converging certainty of the Ni "vision".
Whereas, I think Fe-Dom morality tends to be more prescriptive than proscriptive (because it suffers fewer negative vibes from the promptings of inferior Se).

Maybe...
/making it up as she goes along
But I suspect 'inferior Fi' and 'inferior Ti' are similar regardless of S or N.
I think they express quite differently. I suspect (and my experience bears this out) Ns tend to be more susceptible to neurotic manifestations than Ss, simply because they are less grounded in reality to start with.

Actually, I think INTPs (and any type) are just as susceptible to their own version of tunnel vision- I wouldn’t say it’s an opposite problem so much as the same problem with an opposite kind of tunnel vision. That “sea of relativity with no life raft of certainty to cling to” is a sort of tunnel vision unto itself.
That is not how it feels. The experience is one of ever-expanding vision, with little objective criteria to chose amongst those vistas. Socrates expressed it best when he said the only thing he could be certain of was his own uncertainty. (He called that "wisdom", ymmv.) And Descartes, who could only be certain of his own existence because he was so preoccupied by being uncertain about everything else. In a sense, you are right that we cling to uncertainty as rigidly as Js cling to certainty. Those are our respective comfort zones.
It may be infuriating to deal with a Je’er who is having a hard time working your Ji input into their cognitive purview, especially if that Je’er is clinging to their own cognitive purview at the mercy of their own unconscious impulses …..but hot damn if it isn’t just as infuriating for us Js to deal with a Pe’er whose unconscious Pi makes them impulsively cling to every capricious whim, completely resistant to incorporate our Pi input into their cognitive purview. When a Pe’er is clinging to their own cognitive purview at the direction of their own unconscious impulses- as opposed to being aware of the influence inferior Pi has- they NEED to grab hold of those capricious whims (the less conscious Pi impulses are, the stronger that pull)…..and in Ti’ers, it takes the form of grabbing on to every single tiny immediate argument that comes to mind with no regard for the extent to which they’re only pulling up arguments that suit their immediate purpose (there’s no consistency- it’s all about arguing whatever gets them what they want in that moment).
This is confusing because Ti-doms do not have inferior / unconscious Pi, they have inferior Je. Perhaps you are thinking of Pe-doms..

In exaggerated cases- just like it’s obvious to other people when Je’ers are clinging to some ‘objective truth’ (which is anything but) because of some irrational core in themselves which they won’t acknowledge- it’s just as ‘obvious’ to others when Pe’ers are shape-shifting some ‘objective truth’ (which is anything but) because of some irrational core in themselves which they won’t acknowledge. The difference is that Je clings whole hog to a ‘truth’ (which is blatantly influenced by an irrational subjective core) which was already in place in their cognitive purview, and Pe clings whole hog to a brand new ‘truth’ (which is blatantly influenced by an irrational subjective core) regardless of how much it contradicts the ‘truth’ (which was blatantly influenced by an irrational subjective core) they were arguing 10 minutes ago. It all comes across as biased pigheadedness, but from different directions.
Hmmm. I have to wonder if you aren't just falling prey to the kind of cognitive error you accused your type of earlier?

It is surely contradictory to accuse us both of "clinging" "pigheadedly" to our views and also of whimsicality... Though I agree, it can look like this to others, in fact, on things that matter to us, we are steadfast - it's just that not very much matters to us. Or not to the same extent that it does to those who require more certainty / who fear ambiguity. In fact, some of the most steadfast people I know are Pe-dom/aux. And it has the advantage of not having an irrational quality to it - because they have Pe-d their way through most every eventuality, until finding the one that resonates with Ji - which makes them far more open to discussion - they have no fear that their belief will be shaken or threatened in any way. Close-minded people close their minds because they are fearful of the influence of others and uncertain of the strength of their convictions.

The thing you find frustrating - the way we drift from one semi-solid state to another ("shape-shifting" -nice) trying them on for size - this is the only way for us to approximate certainty about anything. (And we never quite feel comfortable there). If we were a metal, we'd be mercury - liquid at room temperature, quickly responding to changes in atmospheric pressure, but not incapable of holding a crystalline form. You guys would be lead - all but impenetrable, and fucking hard to melt. ;)

Playing Devil's Advocate is a way of achieving a richer and more complex view of a subject area. Ti tends to need something to oppose in order to understand anything fully. If you think about any of the great insights into the true nature of physical reality it has been accomplished by this kind of tension or opposition. It can seem destructive, or like a bloody-minded attempt to frustrate by onlookers, but it's actually the source of much creativity and the quickest route to truth - you only need one valid, anomalous observation to falsify a hypothesis, so working through all the harmonious observations is wasted effort. And Ti loves economy almost as much as truth.
Agreement does not stimulate our intellect, or satisfy a (non-existent) desire for harmony. We don't trust harmony. Harmony is a breeding ground for sloppy, soft-focussed thinking. The mistake is that we can come to trust discord (wrongly) believing that it doesn't have a hidden, negative agenda (which, of course, it often does).
 

EJCC

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Heh. Try this one:
The IxTP experience of iFe is akin to hysteria. For INTPs, paranoia can be a not uncommon manifestation.
This makes sense. It's interesting that both IxTPs and ExTJs tend to feel so unmoored from everything that they had once relied upon, when they're in the grip of Feeling. Interesting that it's kind of a control issue, for both types.
I think you're right. I have always maintained that Ts are more broken than Fs.
I'm not sure about this -- but I will say that T-doms probably have more deep-seated issues with their emotions. (Consider the thread I started a while ago, on anger!) It isn't just a little bit awkward, or frustrating, when emotions pop up out of nowhere -- you literally feel like you're coming unglued. And what's worse is, other people may perceive you the same way. I know an INTP, usually very sweet and calm, who had such a severe outburst that his wife threatened to call the cops. In school, I was reported to the principal once or twice for similar things, though I'd like to think that I have a better hold on my emotions now. But in my opinion, these things did not happen to me and to the INTP because of the severity of the emotional reaction, on its own, but because of its severity relative to our usual behavior, i.e. because we're usually so level-headed, logical, reasonable, that an emotional explosion freaks everyone else out too -- which we T-doms may see as yet another reason to remain out of touch with our feelings, to not show our emotions in a healthy way. And the cycle continues.
But, if you think about it, it's logical that primitive and raw feeling would be scarier / more disorienting than primitive and raw thinking. Not least because we are all equipped to experience emotion, whether we want to or not, but we are not all equipped to understand the inadequacies of our own thinking... Experiencing a rigid (though delusional) certainty is not necessarily distressing for the feeler (however frustrating it may be for the people who have to deal with the consequences of that individual's faulty thinking). Experiencing an extreme and primitive emotional outburst (your own or someone else's) is always distressing for a thinker.
Interesting. Rings true for me, but it'd be interesting to hear a F-dom's perspective on it.
[MENTION=9486]gromit[/MENTION]? [MENTION=13402]Saturned[/MENTION]? [MENTION=5578]bologna[/MENTION]?
 
G

garbage

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Uhhmm, nothing to add except that Feeling has fuck-all to do with experiencing raw positive/negative emotion. It's those common misconceptions that lead me to want to abandon the system altogether. Even Lenore and others refer to Fe as a rational function, along the lines of Te but with a different flavor.

I'll just prattle on about the thing that I normally prattle on about when this comes up: While there's only a loose correlation between MBTI test results and JCF, the Feeling dichotomy isn't itself correlated to neuroticism.

So, not so much a 'perspective' as much as a 'fact-correction,' I guess.
 

EJCC

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Uhhmm, nothing to add except that Feeling has fuck-all to do with experiencing raw positive/negative emotion with no rational thought. Even Lenore and others refer to Fe as a rational function, along the lines of Te but with a different flavor.
Not sure whose comments you were referring to, but if mine, then I apologize for articulating myself so poorly. Inferior F can feel a lot like that, ime -- even if it isn't, necessarily -- because it's so ignored and undeveloped; it would definitely be more rational in the dominant position. :doh: Sorry about that.

We had just been talking about how inferior T would be experienced by dominant Fs, i.e. whether it's as terrifying as inferior F is for us T-doms -- which is why I'd tagged you.
 
G

garbage

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Not sure whose comments you were referring to, but if mine, then I apologize for articulating myself so poorly. Inferior F can feel a lot like that, ime -- even if it isn't, necessarily -- because it's so ignored and undeveloped; it would definitely be more rational in the dominant position. :doh: Sorry about that.

We had just been talking about how inferior T would be experienced by dominant Fs, i.e. whether it's as terrifying as inferior F is for us T-doms -- which is why I'd tagged you.
No, I mean to respond to you in the following way: the thing you quoted doesn't resonate with me. I haven't read the thread, so I'm not sure where it's from (website, article, etc.); but it doesn't resonate with me mostly because.. well, it's flat out wrong. It makes the common mistake of conflating Feeling with.. .. you know, feeling. (Also, it's definitely not that it hurts my feelings, that it wounds me at the core, that I take it personally, or any other Feeling stereotype.)

Sorry for the misconception, tone, etc. I'm happy to try to help out with my perspective, even though JCF makes me want to stab myself in the brain. Which itself leads to the following.

Think of it this way: consensus in the books is that the secondary function serves the dominant--that, say, in an INTJ, Thinking serves to flesh out the intuition. I imagine that we can infer that the inferior serves at least the dominant as well.

So, if I were to take a first-stab at how this plays out in me, I'll say that I don't tend to 'do' logic for its own sake. Unified theories don't make me happy; meaningful unified theories that have societal benefit tend to.

And this whole discussion of mine has been an exercise in me using a logical system that I don't care about for its own sake, in order to 'translate' my perspective into understandable terms, because that might be useful to y'all. That in and of itself probably says something.

:popc1:
 
A

Anew Leaf

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Not sure whose comments you were referring to, but if mine, then I apologize for articulating myself so poorly. Inferior F can feel a lot like that, ime -- even if it isn't, necessarily -- because it's so ignored and undeveloped; it would definitely be more rational in the dominant position. :doh: Sorry about that.

We had just been talking about how inferior T would be experienced by dominant Fs, i.e. whether it's as terrifying as inferior F is for us T-doms -- which is why I'd tagged you.

I run from Te most of the time. I know I am an F, but overall I desire to be calm and collected and most of all under control emotionally. I may be all fluffy zingyness on the outside, but inside I operate best when my seas are calm and quiet and at peace. The problem is when something bothers my inner peace to the point where I have to express it somehow. Te wants to assert dominance and control of a situation and I can keep that in check most of the time, unless Fi is all riled up. Fi empowered Te is like, get out of my way and pray you aren't the target. I rarely allow the two to line up and plot mischief for this very reason.

In the best of times though, Te is extremely useful for expressing Fi's inner most thoughts in a clear and concise manner. When everything lines up within me... my inner compass of Fi shows me what I am feeling/thinking about something, and Te delivers that message very directly and simply to the world beyond.

I just tend to run from influencing others so much, and hiding my own opinions and thoughts. I am currently working on changing that and being more bold and Having Open Opinions. It's rather illuminating for me.
[MENTION=4945]EJCC[/MENTION], [MENTION=7254]Wind-Up Rex[/MENTION], and [MENTION=9602]YWIR[/MENTION] have all been good influences on me by showing me Te in its dominant position and how that looks. It gives me a better concept of how it can function within me... even if I am rather clumsy at it at first.
 

EJCC

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This is all kind of off-topic from what Salome and I were talking about :laugh: but technically you're getting us back on topic, so thanks for that.
No, I mean to respond to you in the following way: the thing you quoted doesn't resonate with me. I haven't read the thread, so I'm not sure where it's from (website, article, etc.); but it doesn't resonate with me mostly because.. well, it's flat out wrong. It makes the common mistake of conflating Feeling with.. .. you know, feeling. (Also, it's definitely not that it hurts my feelings, that it wounds me at the core, that I take it personally, or any other Feeling stereotype.)
I was quoting Salome, from her post at the very top of this page. ;)

You're right that it does conflate the two, and I have sometimes thought about that. But I think they're easily confused with T-doms, because a lot of feelings (lowercase) don't get released except in periods of intense stress, when we'll blow up somehow -- and times of stress are when inferior Feeling (uppercase) is technically supposed to show itself. Inferior Feeling will pop up as the direct result of a stressor, but will always have incredibly strong feeling tied to it; one Te/Fi example (b/c I can't speak for Ti/Fe at all, here), is if you've been trying to get something done that you consider to be extremely important, and someone has been getting in your way. You can't understand why they're doing it. You get increasingly angry. Maintaining composure and staying on task -- i.e. using Te at your usual level of skill -- becomes more and more difficult. And then you finally blow up at them. Someone -- maybe the person at fault, maybe a friend -- get one or two minutes of intense rage, in the form of a rant that begins with a focus and gradually generalizes and deteriorates. Why in the hell is this person standing in the way of this project, they ought to know that it's the best option, I'm just trying to do the right thing and how can they be so blind, I've put in all this hard work and they fucking walk all over me, why does this always happen to me, why am I surrounded by idiots. And then, after the rant, they may become withdrawn, and the deterioration will continue internally: Maybe I'm not surrounded by idiots, maybe the idiot is me, I must have done something wrong but I'm too stupid to know what it is, oh god why do I fail at everything I do, there was this one time I failed, and then this other time, why do I ever get hired for anything, why does anyone like me.

And then, once calmed down, the Te-dom may have this thought process: I hate feeling like that, I hate getting so upset and feeling so insecure, but I never feel like that except in massive amounts in situations like that, the rest of the time I feel fewer emotions and I feel them in moderation. So you start to associate those feelings with Feeling, because it's only under Feeling's influence that you recognize that they exist.

So my question would be: how should one go about separating the two? Type descriptions of ExTJs and IxTPs say similar things about how they will not show much emotion except when under the influence of the inferior, so how should you distinguish feeling and Feeling when they're so intertwined?
Think of it this way: consensus in the books is that the secondary function serves the dominant--that, say, in an INTJ, Thinking serves to flesh out the intuition. I imagine that we can infer that the inferior serves at least the dominant as well.

So, if I were to take a first-stab at how this plays out in me, I'll say that I don't tend to 'do' logic for its own sake. Unified theories don't make me happy; meaningful unified theories that have societal benefit tend to.

And this whole discussion of mine has been an exercise in me using a logical system that I don't care about for its own sake, in order to 'translate' my perspective into understandable terms, because that might be useful to y'all. That in and of itself probably says something.

:popc1:
That's a really nice way of looking at integrating the inferior. :) Thanks for this.

Check it out, [MENTION=7254]Wind-Up Rex[/MENTION]
 
G

garbage

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This is all kind of off-topic from what Salome and I were talking about :laugh: but technically you're getting us back on topic, so thanks for that.

I was quoting Salome, from her post at the very top of this page. ;)

You're right that it does conflate the two, and I have sometimes thought about that. But I think they're easily confused with T-doms, because a lot of feelings (lowercase) don't get released except in periods of intense stress, when we'll blow up somehow -- and times of stress are when inferior Feeling (uppercase) is technically supposed to show itself.
Though, we've got a dominant (secondary?) feeler expressing something very similar--y'know, the whole 'letting something get bottled up and then exploding' thing:
I run from Te most of the time. I know I am an F, but overall I desire to be calm and collected and most of all under control emotionally. I may be all fluffy zingyness on the outside, but inside I operate best when my seas are calm and quiet and at peace. The problem is when something bothers my inner peace to the point where I have to express it somehow. Te wants to assert dominance and control of a situation and I can keep that in check most of the time, unless Fi is all riled up. Fi empowered Te is like, get out of my way and pray you aren't the target. I rarely allow the two to line up and plot mischief for this very reason.
At least, I think so. At least, they sound very much like two sides of very, very similar phenomenon.

So my question would be: how should one go about separating the two? Type descriptions of ExTJs and IxTPs say similar things about how they will not show much emotion except when under the influence of the inferior, so how should you distinguish feeling and Feeling when they're so intertwined?
Fi and Fe are about moral compasses and what's right and wrong, or whatever. Y'all know the drill.

In contrast, stress. We have a way of trying the same old bullshit (our ego) at stressful situations, hoping that we'll eventually power through them. When the wall doesn't fall because our ego does fuck all for us, we become very much stressed and we turn to our inferior (that is, the parts of ourselves that we don't tend to 'know') as a last resort. (Over time, we learn to integrate these 'tactics' naturally into our psyche so that they're.. you know, not immature or so scary to us. That's a good thing.)

When any of us is stressed, we're pissed off or fearful--which are negative feelings. This does not mean that a Tx-dom taps into Fx in times of stress which in turn causes them to feel; rather, the feeling is due to the stress.

Shit, half of empathy, sympathy, and self-awareness is all about identifying the source of emotions anyway. :popc1:

My guess on the descriptions is that they simply make the same 'conflation' mistake.

I do tend to shy away from trying to explain all of this via our JCF models, as it's fitting a round peg into an ellipsoid hole--but there it is. It's a challenge at least :wink:
 

Evo

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I run from Te most of the time. I know I am an F, but overall I desire to be calm and collected and most of all under control emotionally. I may be all fluffy zingyness on the outside, but inside I operate best when my seas are calm and quiet and at peace. The problem is when something bothers my inner peace to the point where I have to express it somehow.

I have started to see patterns similar to the one above.

It's like the Fi-dom people are a softy on the outside and inside they're really just a badass...or if not a cook person...just an asshole on the inside.

I feel like inferior Fi does the opposite. Where the outside is a badass/asshole and on the inside...turns out they're complete mush.

I find Fi doms/aux to be cold sometimes.


A lot of feelings (lowercase) don't get released except in periods of intense stress, when we'll blow up somehow -- and times of stress are when inferior Feeling (uppercase) is technically supposed to show itself. Inferior Feeling will pop up as the direct result of a stressor, but will always have incredibly strong feeling tied to it; one Te/Fi example (b/c I can't speak for Ti/Fe at all, here), is if you've been trying to get something done that you consider to be extremely important, and someone has been getting in your way. You can't understand why they're doing it. You get increasingly angry. Maintaining composure and staying on task -- i.e. using Te at your usual level of skill -- becomes more and more difficult. And then you finally blow up at them. Someone -- maybe the person at fault, maybe a friend -- get one or two minutes of intense rage, in the form of a rant that begins with a focus and gradually generalizes and deteriorates. Why in the hell is this person standing in the way of this project, they ought to know that it's the best option, I'm just trying to do the right thing and how can they be so blind, I've put in all this hard work and they fucking walk all over me, why does this always happen to me, why am I surrounded by idiots. And then, after the rant, they may become withdrawn, and the deterioration will continue internally: Maybe I'm not surrounded by idiots, maybe the idiot is me, I must have done something wrong but I'm too stupid to know what it is, oh god why do I fail at everything I do, there was this one time I failed, and then this other time, why do I ever get hired for anything, why does anyone like me.

And then, once calmed down, the Te-dom may have this thought process: I hate feeling like that, I hate getting so upset and feeling so insecure, but I never feel like that except in massive amounts in situations like that, the rest of the time I feel fewer emotions and I feel them in moderation. So you start to associate those feelings with Feeling, because it's only under Feeling's influence that you recognize that they exist.

So my question would be: how should one go about separating the two? Type descriptions of ExTJs and IxTPs say similar things about how they will not show much emotion except when under the influence of the inferior, so how should you distinguish feeling and Feeling when they're so intertwined?

True story. This used to happen to me a lot in my past. I definately relate.

My ISFJ friend explained his situation with "Thinking" as a little scary as well. At first it was only after a traumatic event that he had an extreme lack of emotion.

This is a convo we had. He is a pretty mature person. He uses the hell outta his aux Fe.

Me ENTJ: What I wanted to ask you is if you feel something the majority of the day...like throughout your day are you experiencing emotion all the time?...some of the time? or a little of the time? I'm probably little of the time...only when emotion is provoked do i feel somthing. But just now i have started to understand this "conciousness" that people are talking about and if you make yourself feel the right emotions then of course you're being concious...your choosing your state of being...conciousness is many other things but i'm only experimenting with the emotional one now...I'm not very good at it...it's like that "emoting" you talk about. I get it now :) So I guess the real question is are you emoting all the time...even when you're alone? I can only do it when i'm alone or with one other person..other wise too many distractions.


ISFJ: I am ALWAYS EMOTING, alone, not alone, all day everyday....and get strange flashes of moments where I am not.(before it would need to be with a very strong or jarring or surprising or traumatic effect that I would switch into thinker, but now I can do it by desiring it and focusing on it) And I can play with this fun strange land, without emotion--or as I like to think of it, my thinker is coming online more and more, and as I stretch more into that land, where things aren't emotional...its strange, and very interesting, and very empowering. You must be doing the same thing from the other direction? :)


ENTJ:yea that's pretty much right, I am an empty vessel. feeling nothing most of the time...or at least I was...It's like we are meeting in the middle jack I LOVE IT! but you have to promise me you wont forever stop feeling...it's really nice to just have an isfj friend...they are never assholes.



-So to answer the question the only way I have been able to distinguish feeling and Feeling when they're so intertwined, is because I FORCE myself to conciously feel. But when it creeps up on me, I cannot tell if I'm using Fe because I'm blasting with emotion. Or just Te on crack trying to defend Fi. Or just Raw Fi. I have no idea how to distinguish in the grip if that's what you mean.
 

Kalach

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F

The knowledge and the structure.

Which, among other things, will focus and channel feeling.


Feeling, after all, in the sense of affect, is always feeling about. And Feeling, in the sense of judgment, constrains you as to how to be feeling about that.


Feeling has structure.


/victor
 

Z Buck McFate

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This is a great point and one im not going to deny I am quite guilty of. In fact there is some pretty damning evidence of me doing this on these forums.

Yeah, I’ve probably come across this way myself. A problem I can have sometimes is that I’ll react in a snarky way because of it- while I’m processing whether or not the impression I’m getting is correct- and I won’t realize the snark is sorta bleeding through regardless. It’s only later after the negative affect has passed that I realized it influenced my behavior in any way, and it’s like “oh crap.” Unfortunately when I ‘intuit’ nasty or offensive intentions behind someone else’s words/actions- even while I’m in the thick of processing where that impression is coming from and feel completely uncertain about whether or not the negative feelings I’m experiencing are founded- the anger, hurt or whatever will be there regardless until I figure out how I misunderstood something. As much as I try not to give those feelings weight when they immediately surface, they’re there and sometimes they show. [This is why I’ve said many times before- as have other INFJs here- that it’s embarrassing to have those initial feelings showing and the least productive thing someone can do is point them out or bring attention to the fact that I’m feeling it and it’s showing. My priority and focus is pretty much exclusively on figuring out if the ‘story’ that’s causing those feelings is true, if it’s actually about something else, etc- NOT exactly what those feelings are. I’ll figure out what the feelings are later, after I figure out whether or not they’re warranted.]



I disagree. I see far more evidence of this in Infjs than Es. Perhaps because the Es greater facility with Fe moves them to be more understanding, accepting and (paradoxically?) less judgemental.
I reckon this observation holds for all ExFJs - they tend to be warmer / more accepting than IxFJs.

*******


This is confusing because Ti-doms do not have inferior / unconscious Pi, they have inferior Je. Perhaps you are thinking of Pe-doms..

My theorizing about the consequences of not being mindful/aware of the influence Ti has in NFJs…..if only an inferior function can have ‘unconscious influence’, but not the tertiary- then that in itself would suggest: not only is ‘unconscious Ti’ stronger in ENFJs than INFJs, but only ENFJs experience it and INFJs aren’t influenced by ‘unconscious Ti’ at all. [This is actually why I’d started that post with “Theoretically it’s supposed to be more an ENFJ thing…”.] It makes no sense to assert a tertiary can have unconscious influence on INFJs (indeed, to assert it has more influence on INFJs than on ENFJs) but then turn around and say that doesn’t apply to INTPs.

In regard to INFJ/ENFJ- I’ve already stated that more often than not my experience of the ENFJs I’ve known is that they are calm and rational. The crazies are the exception. And I tried explaining my reasoning- maybe it was overlooked because I didn’t articulate it in a way that made sense- whenever an NJ leans towards being comfortable with reactivity and directly imposing their perception on the external world (where it seems like they truly can’t tell a difference between ‘this is what shared reality looks like to me’ and ‘this is what’s going on in shared reality’) then I’m inclined to think they’re more extraverted than introverted. At the very least, they’re more extraverted than I am because that kind of unquestioning certainty escapes me. And it seems to me like being Ni dominant just doesn’t allow it. We can dogmatically shut down and refuse to listen to anything further from certain people here and there when those individuals give us reason to doubt it’s worthwhile to put further effort into understanding their point of view- I’ll even allow that we can write people off based completely on projection…..but it’s not really INFJ terrain to aggressively impose our delusions on others. We shut down and withdraw instead. We split and chalk it up to ‘irreconcilable differences’. I like the way Kalach described inferior Se, I think it was in the ‘INTJ common issues thread’ (I looked just now, can’t find it and can’t be bothered to look harder- but it wasn’t quite “exaggerated fear for physical security”) and I think it applies to INFJs as well.

And I can’t remember where I’ve read this, but I can remember reading that in ENFJs the inferior can show up as using ‘logic’ which isn’t rational (though they argue it is)- even Jung said something about ‘unconscious’ extraverted feelers using logic which is ‘infantile and archaic’ or something- point is, it’s like their connection to others takes priority over sounding insane or controlling. (I don’t suppose anybody else has read this or knows what I’m talking about? There was even a thread here about it, but I suck at searching for threads.) I'm not hating on ENFJs here, only the crazy ones with no self control (and I spread that disdain amongst all crazy people with no self control, regardless of type). The other ENFJs I know are really incredible people and the best listeners ever.

The thing you find frustrating - the way we drift from one semi-solid state to another ("shape-shifting" -nice) trying them on for size - this is the only way for us to approximate certainty about anything. (And we never quite feel comfortable there). If we were a metal, we'd be mercury - liquid at room temperature, quickly responding to changes in atmospheric pressure, but not incapable of holding a crystalline form. You guys would be lead - all but impenetrable, and fucking hard to melt. ;)

Specifically the thing I find frustrating about Pe’ers is that you guys can argue something is black one minute, that it’s “the whole truth” about that thing…..then five minutes later (when the incentives have changed) argue “the whole truth” is that it’s white. It’s more than ‘approximate certainty’- it’s when it crosses the line into convenient ‘approximate certainty’ that it can become deplorable. The thing about dominant and auxiliary introverted perception is that it holds certain rigid templates up to information for quality control; but in lesser (and ‘unconscious’) forms it can inform someone’s judgment to make them gluttonously want to cling to brand new truths that’ll get them what they want in that moment. And the really dismissive “there’s obviously nothing more to see here” pushiness that comes with it is the ‘pigheadedness’ I alluded to. From a Ni dom point of view- when a person is inconsistent like this- it doesn’t look like “approximating certainty” in any authentic ‘search for truth’ kind of way so much as approximating the *appearance* of certainty with smoke and mirrors to satisfy self-serving ends. Not consciously of course, at least it’s not always conscious- it’s more like just impulsively arguing something because you can, impulsively chasing that magic Pe butterfly into the Land of Getting What You Immediately Want (be it some tangible advantage, simple ego strokes or whatever). The flaws in Pe’er reasoning are often as ‘obvious’ to us Pi’ers as the flaws in Je reasoning are ‘obvious’ to Ji’ers. Yes- it is worse in Pe doms (and especially so in e7), but it’s still there in Pe aux. In TPs it takes the form of incessant nitpicking, and in FPs it’s more like rationalizations.

eta: So it isn't just that you guys are so mercurial that frustrates me, I actually consider it a blessing from the Ps I don't get mixed signals from because I'm so NOT mercurial myself that I find it a helpful influence. As soon as I sense a tendency for that shape-shiftyness to have self-serving ends though- I have a hard time giving anything they say much credit.
 

Kalach

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I take that back. Inner Feeling has structure. Outer Feeling refers to structure.

Or at least, that's how these aspects of consciousness present.

This brings us to a central mystery: how does extroverted judgment have content at all? Introverted judgment has structure by being the imprint of order over introverted perception. But extroverted judgment cannot be such an imprint over extroverted sensation... or can it? After all, extroverted anything mirrors what is there. Thus, extroverted judgment is a record of and a facility with the order found to inhere in extroverted sensations.

The implication for integration of an introverted judging inferior (or possibly even a tertiary) is it lies in observing how that dominant extroverted judgment facility is conscious. It isn't conscious if it is mere record or mirror. So why is it conscious? In what aspect is it individual?

^ this is conceptualising.

To actually think your way through to the existence of your own personalising aspects... well, observe that my conceptualising isn't pure. It involves thinking too.


What if "integrating the inferior" is really better thought of as giving more conscious attention to matters auxiliary?
 

Salomé

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Uhhmm, nothing to add except that Feeling has fuck-all to do with experiencing raw positive/negative emotion. It's those common misconceptions that lead me to want to abandon the system altogether. Even Lenore and others refer to Fe as a rational function, along the lines of Te but with a different flavor.
Inferior functions are not rational. Inferior Feeling is directly linked with unregulated and primitive emotion. It is because of this experience of Feeling that unreflective thinkers are inclined to assert that all feeling is irrational, rather than just their own experience of feeling. If you had read more closely instead of feeling the need to make an immediate defence of Feeling against an accusation of neuroticism (that was never made) you would have noticed this. Inferior Ti is irrational too. ;)

Think of it this way: consensus in the books is that the secondary function serves the dominant--that, say, in an INTJ, Thinking serves to flesh out the intuition. I imagine that we can infer that the inferior serves at least the dominant as well.
We can make no such inference, since the Dom/aux are compatible, but the Dom/inf are not. They serve opposing agendas (which is why the inferior becomes inferior).

My theorizing about the consequences of not being mindful/aware of the influence Ti has in NFJs…..if only an inferior function can have ‘unconscious influence’, but not the tertiary- then that in itself would suggest: not only is ‘unconscious Ti’ stronger in ENFJs than INFJs, but only ENFJs experience it and INFJs aren’t influenced by ‘unconscious Ti’ at all. [This is actually why I’d started that post with “Theoretically it’s supposed to be more an ENFJ thing…”.] It makes no sense to assert a tertiary can have unconscious influence on INFJs (indeed, to assert it has more influence on INFJs than on ENFJs) but then turn around and say that doesn’t apply to INTPs.
I see what you're saying, but I qualified my statement according to my own observations. In any event, it may not be inferior Ti that leads to these kinds of cognitive errors.

I also did not say that it doesn't apply to Ti doms. I said that Ti-doms don't have inferior Pi. This is just fact - we don't. So the thing that winds you up about us isn't a manifestation of our inferior. It seems to be just your own dislike / misunderstanding of the nature of extroverted perception (which we consider a strength).

I like the way Kalach described inferior Se, I think it was in the ‘INTJ common issues thread’ (I looked just now, can’t find it and can’t be bothered to look harder- but it wasn’t quite “exaggerated fear for physical security”) and I think it applies to INFJs as well.
Here it is:
. Inferior Se for instance manifests not rarely as exaggerated concerns for physical security.
I guess you could "nitpick" about fears vs concerns....

. In TPs it takes the form of incessant nitpicking, and in FPs it’s more like rationalizations.
I don't see what nitpicking has to do with your accusations of intellectual flightiness, if I'm honest. When INTPs are accused of nitpicking, its usually because of our drive for precision and accuracy. This doesnt fit with your other observation- which suggests a more superficial engagement with a topic. There is obviously something that pisses you off, but you don't seem to be able to articulate it in terms which are consistent with my experience (of Pe doms/aux).

As soon as I sense a tendency for that shape-shiftyness to have self-serving ends though- I have a hard time giving anything they say much credit.
Yes, well you've already pointed out how this is a potential pitfall for your type. Perhaps this is a defence against having to consider new information after you have made a decision (something Js are notoriously reluctant to do) and rather than acknowledge that you are being pigheaded, it's easy to assassinate someone else's character/"self-serving" motivations. Pretty much the essence of an ad hominem argument, in fact.
 

Lark

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I've been focusing on working with some of my issues with inferior Fi as of late. I am curious how others have gone about integrating their inferior function, and what degree of success they might have had. A couple of questions:

How does your inferior function manifest itself? What personal issues do you relate to it, and what have you done to better integrate your use and expression of this function? How successful have you been?

I'm very interested in this too. At least in developing feeling traits as I've seen then manifest by others.
 
G

garbage

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Huh. Well, this is going to be as fun as drilling a 10-gauge titanium screw through my own hand, because the minutiae behind systems are boring and inconsequential as shit. But I'll play for a few posts.
Inferior functions are not rational.
For those with inferior Fe and Te, this needs to be reconciled with the notion that Fe and Te are rational functions. How?
Inferior Feeling is directly linked with unregulated and primitive emotion.
In what way?
If you had read more closely instead of feeling the need to make an immediate defence of Feeling against an accusation of neuroticism (that was never made) you would have noticed this. Inferior Ti is irrational too.
Don't make this personal. All I'll say is that (a) I was explicitly asked to chime in with my perspective, and I don't care about defending some categorization in somesuch a system and (b) I noticed; I just thought that the idea was without merit.
We can make no such inference, since the Dom/aux are compatible, but the Dom/inf are not. They serve opposing agendas (which is why the inferior becomes inferior).
According to those who hold the notion that opposing functions (e.g Se/Ni, Te/Fi) work in conjunction with one another, this is outright false.
 

Z Buck McFate

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I take that back. Inner Feeling has structure. Outer Feeling refers to structure.

Or at least, that's how these aspects of consciousness present.

This brings us to a central mystery: how does extroverted judgment have content at all? Introverted judgment has structure by being the imprint of order over introverted perception. But extroverted judgment cannot be such an imprint over extroverted sensation... or can it? After all, extroverted anything mirrors what is there. Thus, extroverted judgment is a record of and a facility with the order found to inhere in extroverted sensations.

The implication for integration of an introverted judging inferior (or possibly even a tertiary) is it lies in observing how that dominant extroverted judgment facility is conscious. It isn't conscious if it is mere record or mirror. So why is it conscious? In what aspect is it individual?

^ this is conceptualising.

To actually think your way through to the existence of your own personalising aspects... well, observe that my conceptualising isn't pure. It involves thinking too.


What if "integrating the inferior" is really better thought of as giving more conscious attention to matters auxiliary?

I’ve been having trouble conceptualizing how an extraverted function can have ‘unconscious influence’, and I think this explains the problem I was having. Because extraverted functions- while they may be internal processes, they’re more like internal constructs of external things (our subjective understanding of the object) and I’m at a bit of a loss as to how they could actively ‘unconsciously’ influence anything…..that if anything, it’s a matter of those constructs getting convoluted at the influence of introverted functions. Saying an extraverted function has an ‘unconscious’ influence is like blaming a crappy map for getting lost instead of blaming the crappy cartography (while being the cartographer). (Blaming Fe’er is blaming.)

Okay I glimpsed how an extraverted function could possibly have an ‘unconscious’ influence there for a moment, but now it’s gone.

I don't see what nitpicking has to do with your accusations of intellectual flightiness, if I'm honest. When INTPs are accused of nitpicking, its usually because of our drive for precision and accuracy. This doesnt fit with your other observation- which suggests a more superficial engagement with a topic. There is obviously something that pisses you off, but you don't seem to be able to articulate it in terms which are consistent with my experience (of Pe doms/aux).

The nit-picking can just be part of the smoke and mirrors if it's used to derail and control the conversation (and even control other people- though that latter is really more an ENP problem) rather than furthering the exchange of ideas. I believe you are the one who once said that an ENTP will hurt your feelings and then make you apologize to them (whoever said it, I agree and it’s a good example of ‘ENTP controlled by their own unconscious impulses’) . Much like ETJs are ruled by an irrational core- and the less they acknowledge this core, the more it controls their 'rational' outward judgment (making it look anything but rational)- NTP nit-picking can be geared to serving some hedonistic core. And the less they're willing to see it, the more control it has over 'what should be nit-picked'.

I'm not saying this is something all NTPs do- just like not all TJs are ruled by some dogmatic irrational core and all FJs aren't ruled by batshit projection. I'm just saying that's what the NTP pitfall looks like: solipsistic meandering which is less about [thesis + antithesis = synthesis] exchanging ideas as it is [my thesis + here's why your antithesis isn't worth considering = something I'll call 'synthesis', which is basically just my own thesis again after I've used 'precision and accuracy' to disqualify anything you said that doesn't appeal to me personally]. That drive for precision and accuracy isn't automatically magically objective (void of subjective influence) any more than NFJ projection is automatically magically insightful. The more the subjective influence is identified and brought to awareness, the less it convolutes thinking.


Yes, well you've already pointed out how this is a potential pitfall for your type. Perhaps this is a defence against having to consider new information after you have made a decision (something Js are notoriously reluctant to do) and rather than acknowledge that you are being pigheaded, it's easy to assassinate someone else's character/"self-serving" motivations. Pretty much the essence of an ad hominem argument, in fact.


Js have more access to stored information, particularly IxxJs, I think. And paying attention to the external world is taxing. I only need to touch a scalding hot pan handle once or twice to realize it's something to be avoided, or (on a lesser scale) watch a couple of Soderbergh movies to realize I don't get much out of Soderbergh movies. When I see indications that observations I've made should be modified- e.g. if I observe someone grabbing the handle of a hot pan without negative consequences- then I'll reconsider the precedent I've set for myself. But until I see some reason for reconsidering, repeating an action which will likely yield unfortunate consequences is just a senseless waste of energy and time. INJs don’t like being tied down to superfluous interaction with the external world and we avoid it where we can, just like NPs don’t like superfluous rules restricting their interaction with the external environment.

And it's only an ad hominem if the reason for dismissal does not directly apply to the reason something is dismissed. If a mechanic is consistently unreliable at fixing cars effectively- I suppose it would be an ad hominem to use that to accuse him of horrible cooking, but it would not be an ad hominem to use that as a reason to refuse to take my car to him for repairs. Unforgiving and impatient perhaps, but it wouldn’t be an ad hominem. I'm okay with 'unforgiving and impatient' where the alternative is being senselessly tied down to more interaction with the external world than is necessary (eta: but I won't deny the pigheaded aspect of it).
 

Evo

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I’ll figure out what the feelings are later, after I figure out whether or not they’re warranted.]

Same here

whenever an NJ leans towards being comfortable with reactivity and directly imposing their perception on the external world (where it seems like they truly can’t tell a difference between ‘this is what shared reality looks like to me’ and ‘this is what’s going on in shared reality’) then I’m inclined to think they’re more extraverted than introverted. At the very least, they’re more extraverted than I am because that kind of unquestioning certainty escapes me.

I agree


. And it seems to me like being Ni dominant just doesn’t allow it. We can dogmatically shut down and refuse to listen to anything further from certain people here and there when those individuals give us reason to doubt it’s worthwhile to put further effort into understanding their point of view- I’ll even allow that we can write people off based completely on projection…..but it’s not really INFJ terrain to aggressively impose our delusions on others. We shut down and withdraw instead. We split and chalk it up to ‘irreconcilable differences’. I like the way Kalach described inferior Se, I think it was in the ‘INTJ common issues thread’ (I looked just now, can’t find it and can’t be bothered to look harder- but it wasn’t quite “exaggerated fear for physical security”) and I think it applies to INFJs as well.


The part that's bolded...HOW CAN I DEVELOP THAT!!!?!?!?!? :worthy: That's my #1 problem! How do you not use emotion with that? Or is it because of the emotion that you refuse to listen?

I need to stop listening to others! GAH! I never can tell where to draw the line.




I'm not saying this is something all NTPs do- just like not all TJs are ruled by some dogmatic irrational core and all FJs aren't ruled by batshit projection. I'm just saying that's what the NTP pitfall looks like: solipsistic meandering which is less about [thesis + antithesis = synthesis] exchanging ideas as it is [my thesis + here's why your antithesis isn't worth considering = something I'll call 'synthesis', which is basically just my own thesis again after I've used 'precision and accuracy' to disqualify anything you said that doesn't appeal to me personally]. That drive for precision and accuracy isn't automatically magically objective (void of subjective influence) any more than NFJ projection is automatically magically insightful. The more the subjective influence is identified and brought to awareness, the less it convolutes thinking.


This is REALLY good. This explains what I have been trying to put into words. Thank you.
 

Z Buck McFate

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The part that's bolded...HOW CAN I DEVELOP THAT!!!?!?!?!? :worthy: That's my #1 problem! How do you not use emotion with that? Or is it because of the emotion that you refuse to listen?

I need to stop listening to others! GAH! I never can tell where to draw the line.


Well it’s not like it’s intentional. It’s more like- if a glass is already full of water, then no matter how much you try to pour more water into it you won’t be able to get it to hold more water. So it’s not like a boundary was asserted, but more like a threshold was met and interaction became unbearable. For me, I think the shutting down is because the emotion is there and I can’t really figure out what’s causing it, so I need to chalk it up to ‘this person is too different from me’ and leave it alone.

And I really can’t speak for all INFJs- it’s just my experience and it seems like the experience of the INFJs I happen to have gotten to know well enough- having that uncertainty, and having a really hard time narrowing down possibilities for why other people say or do what they do- seems to actually be a common thread for us. We do get the instant stories/explanations that unzip in our heads, but it’s pretty much always accompanied by an exaggerated concern that we don’t have the whole story- that’s the part that I think indicates Ni over Fe. It really is more of a “I don’t know what the truth is, I just know what you’re telling me doesn’t add up.” Of course, I’m also e5, so the ‘shutting down’ may be related to that as well- but it really does seem to me like a common INFJ problem.
 
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