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[INFJ] When an INFJ doorslams you / cuts you out of their life / breaks off contact

LittleV

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I was like that for a very long time. Now I've swung the other way. Maybe [MENTION=15291]Mane[/MENTION] will be right and I can look forward to being more balanced and open in the next several years.

I've come to consider myself mostly a free agent when it comes to relationships. The people I'm obligated to interact with are very few and people that are allowed to 'damage my calm' are even fewer. I can count them without using my toes and most of them are blood kin. I won't be shamed like I was for years by family, church, or society for looking after myself. I'm indispensable to a shrinking handful of people. Everyone else is just fine without me. :D

I agree about being a 'free agent'... but I also value the 'ideal' that most people should be "as kind as we can to one another..." as I have a lot of responsibilities. I think I'm getting a sense of where my 'edge' lies, also due to the many, amazing people I have come across on my personal journey.
 

cafe

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I agree about being a 'free agent'... but I also value the 'ideal' that most people should be "as kind as we can to one another..." as I have a lot of responsibilities. I think I'm getting a sense of where my 'edge' lies, also due to the many, amazing people I have come across on my personal journey.
Kindness is huge and usually doesn't cost a lot. Almost always worth it.
 

Z Buck McFate

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[With the disclaimer that I haven’t actually been reading most of the new posts in this thread…]

I am assuming no power disparity, but it is irrelevant in any case. How you handle the information and how you handle the person are two separate but obviously related decisions. If I need to lose some weight, that is true regardless of the intent of the person who told me so, and I should act on it. I may take further action toward the person if I felt the remark was mean or insensitive, but that is a separate step. There are four possible combinations:

1. Comment is valid and made with ill intent
2. Comment is valid and made with good intent
3. Comment is invalid and made with ill intent
4. Comment is invalid and made with good intent

I, for one, can more easily gauge the validity of a comment than its intent, and so prefer at least to start there. I am not going to throw away valuable input just because I do not like the messenger, or his/her intent had nothing to do with my personal development.

So, just out of curiosity, do you perceive any difference in how much weight to give the information between options 1 & 2? It’s my experience that an ulterior motive (whether done consciously or not) actually adds quite a bit of relevance to how much weight should be placed on the information.

There’s a difference between simply ‘not liking someone’ and suspecting a person of trying to lead perception in a self serving direction with their words (be it consciously or not- we all do the best we can with what we know, and this type of thing is far more often unconscious than not *and* far more common than most people are want to believe). There are actually quite a few people I like who I wouldn’t trust (we may have interests in common and I find their insights provocative, yet I know from experience they can be deceitful) and many people I don’t especially like but who I think have sound judgment (I sense no deceit, but would still rather stare at a white wall than have to interact with them). The point I’m trying to get at here is I think that to say “not liking someone” is a gross over-simplification and belies the extent to which it actually is pretty reliable to write off certain sources or to take previous experience of someone into account while deciding how much weight to assign what they're saying.

There is a valuable moral to the Boy Who Cried Wolf story. It’s relatively easy to go ahead and check for a wolf if the little boy who keeps crying wolf is right outside (iow: it’s easy to check the validity of a comment instead of going by source when the work of investigating it is easy); in which case, I think Coriolis' comment above holds true. But when it requires effort- say for example the boy is two miles away and it must be traversed on foot every time you hear him cry…..that’s when it becomes more reasonable to accept/dismiss according to source.

I’ve said before that I think Ni is something like a Rube Goldberg contraption: it can take forever for information to makes its way through the Ni filter. This is not a choice- no amount of trying to make us feel bad for being this way (which honestly, is what this thread feels like an experiment in) will change it- it’s just the way Ni is. It is not always easy to assess the validity of a comment on the spot- we certainly don't do it as quickly as Ji dom/aux (and shouldn't be expected to)- and in such situations, it actually is pretty reliable to turn to past experience of whether or not someone’s judgment ultimately jives with my own. Life is too short to spend that much time processing information from sources that have proven unproductive and/or even distressing (to me- this isn’t to say they shouldn’t be valuable to themselves, but they just aren’t valuable to me).
 
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S

Society

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[MENTION=7842]Z Buck McFate[/MENTION] raises an interesting question (probably not the one she intends): how do you measure if a mental framework is trust worthy? let's apply it here..

and lets be more specific: you have a person whose deeply held personal beliefs about themselves stems from discrediting the perspectives of anyone who experienced it differently. do you find that belief trust worthy when it can affects you or people close to you? maybe it's a medical professional who always done a pretty decent job, and he knows this because the perspectives of those who complained about the result of his work didn't jibe with how he felt about his own work - he did not like the role they gave him in claiming he's treatments was hurting their health or resulted in the loss of loved ones. maybe it's an architectural engineer who has never done any mistake, as long as you don't count for those few insulting people claiming their floors collapsed. maybe it's a teacher who treats your kids with nothing but the best of heart, as long as you don't count those horrible parents claiming he was abusive to their children.

would you trust any of these with your health? your home? your children?

you have someone who determines their beliefs about how they affect others based on picking and choosing which other's experiences count and jibe's with their own self image, and now you are in the position of becoming "others", one of those people whose perspective will only count or not depending on whether it corresponds with this person's ego.

are there beliefs about themselves reliable? is this someone trustworthy? or does it still not matter simply because it's "true for themselves"?
 

Coriolis

Si vis pacem, para bellum
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So, just out of curiosity, do you perceive any difference in how much weight to give the information between options 1 & 2? It’s my experience that an alterior motive (whether done consciously or not) actually adds quite a bit of relevance to how much weight should be placed on the information.

It is not always easy to assess the validity of a comment on the spot- we certainly don't do it as quickly as Ji dom/aux (and shouldn't be expected to)- and in such situations, it actually is pretty reliable to turn to past experience of whether or not someone’s judgment ultimately jives with my own. Life is too short to spend that much time processing information from sources that have proven unproductive and/or even distressing (to me- this isn’t to say they shouldn’t be valuable to themselves, but they just aren’t valuable to me).
You are mixing up two different criteria. Yeghor was addressing emotional factors: the tone of the other person's comment, feeling put-down, feeling hurt or becoming depressed because of their remarks, causing you to want to avoid them. What you describe here is the person's track record in providing worthwhile information, a much more objective measure. The two may be related, but are not the same, and should not be confused with each other. As you point out, a good friend can have a poor track record of giving reliable information. Conversely someone who seems (and maybe is) determined to put you down all the time may be perceptive enough to use truth as the tool. (The truth often hurts more, too.)
 

yeghor

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You are mixing up two different criteria. Yeghor was addressing emotional factors: the tone of the other person's comment, feeling put-down, feeling hurt or becoming depressed because of their remarks, causing you to want to avoid them. What you describe here is the person's track record in providing worthwhile information, a much more objective measure. The two may be related, but are not the same, and should not be confused with each other. As you point out, a good friend can have a poor track record of giving reliable information. Conversely someone who seems (and maybe is) determined to put you down all the time may be perceptive enough to use truth as the tool. (The truth often hurts more, too.)

I think the bolded part does not match with what Z Buck meant...

I, for instance, classify the perspective/information source, not with regard to his/her reliability in terms of veracity of information/judgment but in terms of his/her hostility/friendliness towards me (friend or foe based on intent and previous rapport), as a preliminary evaluation...See below:

Z Buck McFate said:
There’s a difference between simply ‘not liking someone’ and suspecting a person of trying to lead perception in a self serving direction with their words...

From what I understand your preliminary evaluation consists of identifying whether the information is true or not...I do not know what further steps you take to analyze (different components of) the information...

I guess the difference in our way of handling information coming from any source (be it friend or foe) stems from the weight we assign to different components of the information...

Let's say my evaluation system is primitively like:

EC = Emotional Content
LC = Literal Content

INFJ = 0.5 EC + 0.5 LC.... Perhaps yours is like INTJ = 0.2 EC + 0.8 LC ...which perhaps means you are much less susceptible to the emotional content of the communication/transmission...so I guess it has something to do with the difference in our internal/core framework...

(I am still not sure if the wording "emotional content" fits here...what I meant with intent in the first place feels to me more like a charge or payload in the information, something that has the possibility to zap/burn my core, anyway...)

Let's say a friendly transmission is like : FT= 0.4 EC + 0.6 LC and a hostile transmission is like HT = 0.8 hEC + 0.2 LC...and also remember that in the hostile transmission, hEC = negatively charged/payloaded...

In this primitive model, INFJs framework is more inclined wrt INTJ to put more emphasis on EC...so a negatively charged hEC constitutes a much higher risk to fry my internal framework/core...

So turning back to virus analogy:

A negatively charged information coming from a hostile (based on intent) entity = file with a virus/trojan horse disguised as a regular software/patch

A neutral or positively charged information = file containing a regular software/patch

INFJ preliminary evaluation in terms of hostility/intent = antivirus software

Accumulated Ni-Ti patterns based on past data/burns = antivirus definitions

Doorslam = Firewall

INFJ Secondary evaluation after preliminary evaluation = a ) Installation = a lengthy Ni-Ti evaluation process, which may not be initiated at all depending on the preliminary evaluation...may not always be worthwhile...if you initiate it for everyone you end up being a codependent...bending to everyone's whims...

b) or as Z Buck put it...the file may be quarantined or disinfected (removing or mitigating the charge/payload by assigning a relatively low weight coefficient to the source), after which the Ni-Ti process may safely be initiated...

Transmitter of the file with virus/trojan horse = Hacker !!!

What happens in the event of installing negatively charged content without due diligence = System control seized by the Hacker !!! Power disparity...

Coriolis said:
I, for one, can more easily gauge the validity of a comment than its intent, and so prefer at least to start there. I am not going to throw away valuable input just because I do not like the messenger, or his/her intent had nothing to do with my personal development.

So...how do you determine/know valuable input? in terms of content, quality, effect etc.?
 
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yeghor

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[MENTION=7842]Z Buck McFate[/MENTION] raises an interesting question (probably not the one she intends): how do you measure if a mental framework is trust worthy? let's apply it here..

and lets be more specific: you have a person whose deeply held personal beliefs about themselves stems from discrediting the perspectives of anyone who experienced it differently. do you find that belief trust worthy when it can affects you or people close to you? maybe it's a medical professional who always done a pretty decent job, and he knows this because the perspectives of those who complained about the result of his work didn't jibe with how he felt about his own work - he did not like the role they gave him in claiming he's treatments was hurting their health or resulted in the loss of loved ones. maybe it's an architectural engineer who has never done any mistake, as long as you don't count for those few insulting people claiming their floors collapsed. maybe it's a teacher who treats your kids with nothing but the best of heart, as long as you don't count those horrible parents claiming he was abusive to their children.

would you trust any of these with your health? your home? your children?

you have someone who determines their beliefs about how they affect others based on picking and choosing which other's experiences count and jibe's with their own self image, and now you are in the position of becoming "others", one of those people whose perspective will only count or not depending on whether it corresponds with this person's ego.

are there beliefs about themselves reliable? is this someone trustworthy? or does it still not matter simply because it's "true for themselves"?

This is exactly what makes me wary of you...

You are not stating your position...by doing that you are not committing yourself...you are not putting yourself out there...not putting your hand under the rock but expect us to...you do not relinquish the inquisitor/prosecutor role and by doing that you are keeping us in the defendant position...

You expect us to reveal our core to you...You should then first lay yourself bare...make yourself vulnerable...even the playing the field...
 
S

Society

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You expect us to reveal our core to you...You should then first lay yourself bare...make yourself vulnerable...even the playing the field...

again with the "us" - i already have, plenty of times, again and again. what use is it to repeat it for your sake? not "your" as in "the INFJs", those who have being part of these discussions and ready my posts before have already seen it, and the few of those who then decided to take a step further and genuinely willing to explore their core have being rather amazing. but "your" as in you [MENTION=20531]yeghor[/MENTION] - i already described in full what is it that you offer me in continued acting out of your own ignorance, even right now your analysis of my general position based exclusively on how you experience your own position is quite likely to turn out to be an interesting puzzle piece, as is the fact you can't even answer the question above without primarily being concern with its unfortunate implications about you. what is it of higher value that you think you can offer? your self righteous justifications & portrait of your self image? i don't know if you noticed but anyone who has came here with any problem with INFJs in their lives has in return gotten samples of that in spades, and you already added to that pile. what else?
 

Fidelia

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I identify a lot with LittleV's comments. What one person finds intolerable about INFJs won't necessarily bother another person. In my own experience, Ne vs Ni creates more friction than people generally recognize. I think the suggestions offered for how to get an INFJ to be open to your perspective ring true for me.

Along with that, Z Buck's comments about crying wolf and past track record are definitely true for me. Although I don't necessarily agree with the tone or delivery style that yeghor has used in this thread, I also find that intent and delivery make a tremendous difference for how receptive I am to hearing something that may be difficult to hear.

I will admit though that whether in written or spoken word, I have a bad tendency to skim for generalities. Upon rereading, or talking through something, I sometimes find that I over read emotional tone that may not have been intended (probably because my emotional tone generally IS a huge part of my message and if people ignore that, they often don't get the complete picture of what I'm saying.). I also sometimes find that I have missed important details that I need to take into account. In addition to that, I am a little stubborn and need to be convinced that I really am wrong through seeing how it affects the parties involved. That works much better when it is not delivered in a sledgehammer way, but when something is said and I am left to think on it for some time. I am responsive to criticism, although sometimes I need some private time for the frustration or hurt at hearing something to wear off, and will mull something over for a long time after someone says it to see what part of it is my own reaction, what their motives for telling me are, what our history contributes to the overall picture, and to solicit reactions from others.

This is a very minor example, but this year for lessons, I decided to have a parent meeting at the beginning and give an outline of the proposed concerts for the year that the children would need to attend. I invited parents to give me input and also to point out any conflicts etc. I figured that they needed more notice than I had given them the previous year, as everyone has very busy schedules. This was done in August. However, at Christmas time, I had all kinds of parents complaining about having to go to the only concert we were doing for Christmas - it was 15 minutes out of town, it might go until 8:30 and they figured that was late (the youngest child was 10!), the weather could be bad, they had other obligations the same day (which had been accrued long after I had given them the dates)...One family in particular publicly said the day before the concert that they just wished that teachers in the community would get together to plan dates so everything wasn't on the same day. That was the straw that broke the camel's back. I was already driving two loads of people there, I had done everything possible to give them advance notice, and I had even given them choice about which concert we would do. In addition, I had cross-referenced my date with other teachers and put it on a public list so that they could avoid that date. I also had requested parents to be at lessons, where I give weekly reminders about concerts, and they had not come for the previous few weeks as they had been in the middle of a bunch of work engagements.

However, over the holidays, as I reflected back, I realized
1) This was a response out of frustration at being too busy. It wasn't personal.
2) I should have sent out monthly reminders of what dates were coming up so that people had it on their radar at all times. Part of the reaction was caused by suddenly realizing how busy they were and they didn't know how to fit everything in.
3) This is an education process so that parents understand that we are not doing concerts just as a performance opportunity, but rather it is part of teaching the families and children how to budget time, get organized, interact together and so on. It is the work of several years.
4) I need to communicate my vision more clearly, so that parents see that I am actually saving them time with their children in their personal lives, by developing routines and decision-making protocols. Most of the parents are at the beginning of their families, while I have seen a couple of generations of kids in music and learned a lot through that process.
5) One comment that is not harshly delivered does not have as negative a tone as I feel it.
6) In the future, maybe we do need to reconsider whether there is time for a concert at times of the year when people have a million other obligations.

I think the same has been true for my personal relationships, even though it often takes even longer, the more emotionally involved I am. If I am upset, there needs to be sufficient time for me to depersonalize the situation, before I am able to sort it out more objectively. Rarely is one person's or the other's perspective 100% accurate, and so it takes some time to try to sort out all of the details and decide what makes the most sense to do.

Another problem for me is waiting too long before voicing any frustration or resentment that is building (probably because I don't want to cause someone I care about pain) and bending too much, until it is the last straw and everything comes rushing out. I've realized over time that this is actually making the other person's decisions for them, and it is also not right to leave their input out of the equation till my mind is made up. That's something I'm working on doing differently, but it's still really hard for me to know when and how to bring something up or what is important and what is fleeting and petty. This is partially because it takes a long time for me to even know what I feel myself. I don't trust my own judgement until I have a lot of "evidence" built up to back up gut feelings. By then, I am less open to the other person's read on the situation if it doesn't seem to have any common elements with mine.

Because I haven't always drawn firm enough boundaries in the past, I probably am more sceptical now of just accepting another person's assessment of a situation as fact, particularly if it serves their interests for me to adopt their POV. I think I did once feel that any criticism of me was fact and it was highly embarrassing, especially if it was pointed out publicly. However, I think I am learning that it is better to have conflict and have things out earlier on and then you don't get to an impasse sort of situation later where you are so emotionally involved that you need distance to be able to let things cool off and where your POV on the situation is not set in stone. Sometimes I also need my attention drawn to a situation and although it stings a bit at first, I can come up with some improvements on my part for later.

I still would say that there are some people that I've decided it's just better to disengage with, because we are never going to see eye to eye, and nothing productive is coming out of the conflict. Sometimes that changes with time, and sometimes it doesn't.
 

Fidelia

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One other thought-I think for me, sometimes criticism is disorienting if it is completely at odds with my perceptions. While of course, I suppose it's difficult for one to completely separate ego, I don't think that's completely what drives my reaction. Rather, it's disconcerting to think that everything that are normally reliable ways by which to perceive and navigate the world are no longer trustworthy. If someone told me that I was mistakenly perceiving something as red, which was in reality yellow, I wouldn't just accept that statement immediately because up till this point my eyes have always been dependable. However, if you offered me an explanation for why your perception is reliable, the consequences my mid perception might have, Oran explanation of how a previously reliable sense now longer is, then I'll go and investigate, talk to others and reconsider.

During grad school I taught a class which the students were required to take and didn't want to. No one had been successful with it before, and I was given little guidance. I had no experience teaching at that level, but my emotional intelligence is decent and I thought I had a decent read on how people were responding in the class. When my reviews came out and were brutal, the devastation for me was not just embarrassment at having not delivered what my boss wanted, but rather that my perceptions were so off. I lost all confidence in anything I previously thought to be true about myself or my interactions with people. It was one of the scariest times in my whole life.

Now, 8 or 9 years later, I can much better separate out what I was responsible for, and what I was not. The fact that I wasn't a perfect prof, wasn't the issue, but rather trying to figure out what was my faulty perception and what was factors which had nothing to do with my teaching ability.
 

Cellmold

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Running away is always easier than confrontation. Gandhi said that and if he didn't...I did.
 

prplchknz

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I've done the literal door slam, have someone chase after me angrily and slam the door in their face hard.
 

Z Buck McFate

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You are mixing up two different criteria. Yeghor was addressing emotional factors: the tone of the other person's comment, feeling put-down, feeling hurt or becoming depressed because of their remarks, causing you to want to avoid them. What you describe here is the person's track record in providing worthwhile information, a much more objective measure. The two may be related, but are not the same, and should not be confused with each other. As you point out, a good friend can have a poor track record of giving reliable information. Conversely someone who seems (and maybe is) determined to put you down all the time may be perceptive enough to use truth as the tool. (The truth often hurts more, too.)

I’m not entirely certain I know what you mean by ‘tone of the other person’s content’ and the like, I generally don’t pay as much attention to tone as I do to content. I’m inclined to say that I pay attention to emotional content (?) and I compare that content to everything else the person says/does (and everything they have said/done in my past experience of them, and probably many, many other factors as well).*

I think the “you are fat” analogy might serve as an example of that which might be measured objectively and quickly. While there are contingencies which do make ‘source’ somewhat relevant (is the person saying it because they care about me? are they saying it to shame me/boost their own ego? etc.)- in the end, that doesn’t really affect whether or not the statement is true. It might affect how important I believe the information should be to me, but it doesn’t affect how true it is.

A hypothetical example of the other end of the spectrum though (more along the lines of the ‘checking for wolf requires walking two miles’)- if someone points out how I’m not being fair, or if someone tries to give me feedback about how I ‘should’ react to something differently or how I 'should' perceive something differently. If my past experience of someone is that they rarely or never hand out suggestions like that cavalierly, they demonstrate consistent self-awareness and/or their judgment hasn’t proven clouded by their own defense mechanisms in this regard- then I’m going to put a lot more effort into evaluating how it could be the truth.

On the other end, an example of what I may notice that makes me give someone’s opinion less weight in this regard: having a knee jerk tendency to explain what other people are doing wrong without really ever owning up to many flaws oneself, especially if those explanations are elaborate (and always about how someone else should accommodate); or providing ‘flaws’ about the self in some “I recognize I have flaws too” gesture- but the flaws they suggest they have themselves aren’t really commensurate. It’s not that I think this kind of thing stems from bad intentions or lack of earnesty (I usually assume people are as honest with themselves as they can handle in that moment), but ‘advice’ they give seems convoluted by their own (usually unconscious) needs. It implies one-sided expectations (along the lines of what yeghor said- it’s an imbalance in ‘power’). Even if there’s some truth to what they’re saying - at a certain point (once I’ve noticed a pattern) it becomes so distressing to even consider the information that I have to block ‘the source’ out altogether: not doing so would be akin to agreeing to eat something I’m 90% certain will give me food poisoning. That's exactly how I perceive “information” that will only cause a bunch of unwanted distraction/grief that I’m left sorting through because I was willing enough to give it a chance. <- I believe this is something Pe types struggle with understanding: bad ‘information’ can incite lasting sour affect that we can’t choose to simply forget.

I wouldn’t consider that^ ‘objective’ criteria, but I wouldn’t say I dismiss according to ‘tone’ either. I want to say it has something to do with overall fairness of expectations in the interpersonal dynamic- if it seems like there’s an imbalance of some sort, that can’t be ignored. I won't even assume the other person has unreasonable expectations- I'll just know that I sense an incompatibility and that I should at least distance someone because of it. If the distress it causes builds up at a faster pace than I can begin to explain why I sense it, then I need to block them out entirely. And it really isn't about "liking someone" or "not liking someone", or even emotional tone: there are many people who don't set off these alarms who I don't especially like, and there are people who I do like but the mixed signals/inconsistent content ultimately become too distracting and I can't deal with them. [As an example, even though I don't really 'like' the tone yeghor has taken in this thread, I still agree with many points s/he has made (although it might not be the best example, because I can understand how this thread can be such a trigger). I can handle someone being angry or upset with me- I just really need for the content of what they're saying to make sense and be consistent/fair.]


*I don’t consciously compare- it’s more like a background program that’s always on in my head, pulling up experiential data. In fact, I think the reason it’s so distressing (at times) to put up with inconsistencies is because it’s not a conscious process. I become immediately aware something isn’t adding up, without really knowing why or what it is. Certain people trigger this more than others, it sets off a series of internal alarms and the distraction of it can be overwhelming; something will seem unfair, and I’m left with a pile of extremely vague impressions to sort through and figure out. This is why we back away instead of saying something: the urgency to get away from a source can feel strong, the reason for the feeling is not immediately clear. This isn’t “unhealthy Ni run amok”. Ni is always vague, even when it’s spot on accurate.
 

Coriolis

Si vis pacem, para bellum
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I think the bolded part does not match with what Z Buck meant...
Only the second sentence referred to ZBuck's comments. The first referred to yours.

I, for instance, classify the perspective/information source, not with regard to his/her reliability in terms of veracity of information/judgment but in terms of his/her hostility/friendliness towards me (friend or foe based on intent and previous rapport), as a preliminary evaluation...See below:

From what I understand your preliminary evaluation consists of identifying whether the information is true or not...I do not know what further steps you take to analyze (different components of) the information...
Yes, I try to judge by the truthfulness and usefulness of the information. Is it consistent with other things I know to be true? with information given me by others, or obtained elsewhere? is it internally consistent, or consistent with observable facts? When there isn't time for such an analysis, I am forced to give more weight to the provider of the info, but I do it by considering how reliable their information has been in the past.

INFJ = 0.5 EC + 0.5 LC.... Perhaps yours is like INTJ = 0.2 EC + 0.8 LC ...which perhaps means you are much less susceptible to the emotional content of the communication/transmission...so I guess it has something to do with the difference in our internal/core framework...

In this primitive model, INFJs framework is more inclined wrt INTJ to put more emphasis on EC...so a negatively charged hEC constitutes a much higher risk to fry my internal framework/core..
An oversimplification, but not bad. I tend to discount what you term "emotional content" because, hard as it may be to determine the truth of someone's comments, I find this EC even harder to evaluate. I focus on the content I know how to interpret.

So...how do you determine/know valuable input? in terms of content, quality, effect etc.?
See above. Mostly consistency, agreement with information obtained through other sources, and ultimately utility.
 
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Coriolis

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I’m not entirely certain I know what you mean by ‘tone of the other person’s content’ and the like, I generally don’t pay as much attention to tone as I do to content. I’m inclined to say that I pay attention to emotional content (?) and I compare that content to everything else the person says/does (and everything they have said/done in my past experience of them, and probably many, many other factors as well).*

I think the “you are fat” analogy might serve as an example of that which might be measured objectively and quickly. While there are contingencies which do make ‘source’ somewhat relevant (is the person saying it because they care about me? are they saying it to shame me/boost their own ego? etc.)- in the end, that doesn’t really affect whether or not the statement is true. It might affect how important I believe the information should be to me, but it doesn’t affect how true it is.
I don't really understand tone, either, but listed it as one of the things yeghor mentioned in his evaluation of what people say. See above about evaluating emotional vs. logical/factual content.

The highlighted is correct. It's already been mentioned that people who care about you and have your best interests at heart don't always give good advice. Your tendency to trust them because of their intentions can therefore lead you quite astray. I do consider the source of information, but more in terms of background and expertise than intent or emotional content. I will trust the dentist's advice about my teeth more than that of my great-aunt Mildred, for instance. Even so, if it is a critical or high-stakes procedure, I will do more homework here as well.
 

Eilonwy

Vulnerability
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Impression time. The last few days I've been thinking about this thread, trust, choices, talking, patterns, and goals. I was going to write a post about these things, but then something struck me: the words and phrases used by the INFJs posting in this thread. Words like survival, self-preservation, shame, harm, damage, dominate, and power-play. Strong words. Catastrophic words. All in response to being asked to consider listening to a different point of view that might not be flattering. And I thought, "What the heck are we so afraid of?", because I use these words, too. I tend to focus on the worst possible outcome. Why?

Maybe my speculation in another thread about feeling powerless has some merit; I don't know:

If you're looking for a more depersonalized answer, I can only offer speculation. Perhaps I'm more sensitive to certain signals that are present in interpersonal relationships. Perhaps I've learned to interpret those signals based on the very early relationships formed in my family and community when I was, essentially, a powerless child. Perhaps I then identify with being powerless unless I learn otherwise. Keep in mind that other people aren't as sensitive to the same signals, so perhaps I've also learned that trying to explain what I perceive is difficult. So, I end up creating my own interpretations and projections of behavior based on all of that--an Ni model that can be difficult to adjust once it's in place.

So, perhaps I sacrifice my feelings because I feel powerless to do otherwise in order to keep the relationship running smoothly. Which is actually a bad Ni-model to use in personal, one-on-one relationships, because then I'm sacrificing instead of compromising and I will eventually resent that and the person I feel made me sacrifice, when in actuality, I'm the person making myself sacrifice. That's why I had to learn to take responsibility, to be accountable, for my own choices. That way I no longer feel powerless and I don't feel the need to blame other people for my own choices.

So, is the doorslam a way to feel in control? To have some power in the relationship? A way to avoid being vulnerable, or making choices that we find unpleasant in some way?

I stole this TED talk from someone's blog because I think Brene Brown has it right about vulnerability and connection. I think that's what happened with me when I took the chance and took another look at this thread and at [MENTION=15291]Mane[/MENTION].


You know, everyone here is free to make their own choices. If you're fine with severing connections completely, or avoiding them in the first place, that's your choice. Own it instead of rationalizing it as being someone else's fault. Because if you want connections and want to keep them, it seems you have to be willing to be vulnerable. Slow processing times, trust issues, and low energy, notwithstanding.
 

yeghor

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I’m not entirely certain I know what you mean by ‘tone of the other person’s content’ and the like, I generally don’t pay as much attention to tone as I do to content. I’m inclined to say that I pay attention to emotional content (?) and I compare that content to everything else the person says/does (and everything they have said/done in my past experience of them, and probably many, many other factors as well)....

Subtext or Undertone may be used instead of Emotional Content perhaps...As you also said, alarm bells ring when an inconsistency between Literal Content and the Subtext/undertone Content is detected based on past experience...
 

yeghor

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Joined
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Messages
4,276
...

If you're looking for a more depersonalized answer, I can only offer speculation. Perhaps I'm more sensitive to certain signals that are present in interpersonal relationships. Perhaps I've learned to interpret those signals based on the very early relationships formed in my family and community when I was, essentially, a powerless child. Perhaps I then identify with being powerless unless I learn otherwise. Keep in mind that other people aren't as sensitive to the same signals, so perhaps I've also learned that trying to explain what I perceive is difficult. So, I end up creating my own interpretations and projections of behavior based on all of that--an Ni model that can be difficult to adjust once it's in place...


http://lightshouse.org/lights-blog/parentification-of-children


So, perhaps I sacrifice my feelings because I feel powerless to do otherwise in order to keep the relationship running smoothly. Which is actually a bad Ni-model to use in personal, one-on-one relationships, because then I'm sacrificing instead of compromising and I will eventually resent that and the person I feel made me sacrifice, when in actuality, I'm the person making myself sacrifice. That's why I had to learn to take responsibility, to be accountable, for my own choices. That way I no longer feel powerless and I don't feel the need to blame other people for my own choices.

By doing that you start reclaiming your sense of self...you start looking after yourself as well...

So, is the doorslam a way to feel in control? To have some power in the relationship? A way to avoid being vulnerable, or making choices that we find unpleasant in some way?

No, doorslam is aimed at severing the parasitic connection/dynamic, which basically ends the relationship...or preemptively not allowing the connection to establish in the first place, having detected a parasitic pattern...On the contrary, I tend to lower my guard/defenses in my relationships, perhaps too much, to my detriment...

...

You know, everyone here is free to make their own choices. If you're fine with severing connections completely, or avoiding them in the first place, that's your choice. Own it instead of rationalizing it as being someone else's fault. Because if you want connections and want to keep them, it seems you have to be willing to be vulnerable. Slow processing times, trust issues, and low energy, notwithstanding.

Both parties should be willing to be vulnerable...they should not try to strongarm each other...

There's also the question of what to do if the other party is not willing to accept the severed connection?
 
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PeaceBaby

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In the INFJ world, people are chosen or elected to fill a role and then are expected to play the part. Playing that part successfully or poorly is dependent upon the actions of the other. The role of sibling, friend, partner ... inside the mind are the things an INFJ thinks each role is supposed to be.

For example, to be a successful friend, here's the list of things that are expected from you:

1.) Listen to me as much as I listen to you.
2.) Demonstrate goodwill towards me through acts of thoughtful consideration.
3.) Approach me in the manner I prefer since that demonstrates your goodwill.

etc etc.

These criteria enable an INFJ to create a "scorecard" and continually measure whether or not the people around them are living up to the standards of "how a *insert role* is supposed to be". Because this can be measured, an INFJ can thus make decisions on how low the score gets to go before they make the proclamation that this person is a toxic, parasitic person and consequently should be cut from their life.

It's all about power. The following quote is bang-on:

So, is the doorslam a way to feel in control? To have some power in the relationship? A way to avoid being vulnerable, or making choices that we find unpleasant in some way?

Yes, that's how I see it. It is about control, and it's not necessarily a bad thing because INFJ's often feel that powerless sense of not being able to have the external world structure to their preferences. It's easier for INTJ's because they are dealing with the object world and people don't form the locus of where they enact their control. But people ... people are so unpredictable. One day they do something the "right" way, the next day they don't. So people who are consistent are very prized in the IxFJ world because the ability to project what the people around them are most likely to do is very valuable to both Ni and Si. The results: IxFJ's surround themselves with the people most "right" for them. The downside really doesn't exist for the INFJ (aside from their chagrin when people disappoint them) but those who are close to them may feel like they must dance the IxFJ dance or be written off or worse, doorslammed.

It's all about the power.

An aside: The phrase toxic people is so dehumanizing imo. People can act toxic, and do toxic things, but that doesn't make them TOXIC people. Most people are just here on this earthly plane struggling along to be the best people they can be, dependent on all the programming instilled in them as children and the challenging life experiences they are working through and trying to grow from.
 
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