I think there's a lot to that Fe is to Fi as Te is to Ti observation. I was watching a series of youtube videos with an INFP and INFJ going at it. The INFJ was expressing the same kind of frustration with the INFP as an INTJ would toward an INTP (very diplomatic; they were talking about the frustration, not being frustrated) ... except it was all dealing with feelings instead of objective theoretical observations.
For my part, I don't think Ti gets in the way so much as the Ne from an INTP hides crucial info from me, that it takes
forever to get out. I don't find my own Ti anywhere nearly so annoying.
With respect to Te vs. Fe, I find that INFJs tend to sound a lot like INTJs to me. It's only when we disagree that I find out it's an INFJ, because the terms of the disagreement take a long time to discover.
And yes, I think you're right with respect to Fi. It's where our confidence lies. However, I think you have it backwards: Fi isn't confident in its feeling/subjective truths, but rather it is confident in Te's objective truths, which are verified in the real world. (It is a naive confidence, at times, but gradually less so as the INTJ matures.)
you say objective truths but i hear pragmatic and empirical. to me these denote half-truths and white-lies. they are about implementation, rather than what i consider truth. i find Fi and Ti to be far more rooted in an all-encompassing understanding of truth.
your point about confidence confuses me at this point, but i think it is bc you are showing me something i do not understand. i see Te truth as regulating what is doable, or finding a way to make it happen. and ultimate authority goes to the Ni context-finder to produce a complete inner working mind's eye vision of what is important, a best vantage point to see the most. i don't know how to describe it but i feel like intjs hold on to a faith that infjs rarely have. this feels like an unchangeable Fi faith.
whereas i find that intjs often have far far far more realistic expectations and less unhealthy relationship projections/ideals/hang-ups. infjs get suckered into religious guilt way too easily.
On the Fi threads mirroring was brought up. It isnt really a choice-it is an innate biological response. I dont choose it, it just happens. Evolution found a cute way to cheat and insure that we aid the weakest members of the group, as otherwise we suffer their pain. So while I can pick these behaviors apart and describe them analytically, recognize they are as innate as your Ti/Fe. When I cheated with Fe, Fi went away. It was so calm and peaceful.
I would suggest Fi is the most draining of the judging functions to use.
As for Fi truth? For another Fi user, it is the truth, albeit then judged according to the standards of Te. Yes, help them through pain, react to the Fi presentation, but then apply Te to give them advice-ie tell them what they need to do. Te is pretty fucking bossy. But from the perspective of Fe, it looks like Fi just won. But later the other Fi users will observe if the Fi user repeats and then judge them via Te accordingly. Te is fucking harsh.
this doesn't completely fit my perspective of many many batches of enfps that i've seen. i think it is wrong to assign it to Fi 1 to 1, tho i think it's very much in the range of nfp potential. but many people don't go down this path at all.
i also think the understanding of Fi vs Fe is misguided. i walk down the street and i feel others (when i'm blissed out). i can hear their thoughts and feel their smiles, their hand-gestures, their body language. i know exactly where they are within their conversings. i see them within an endless and differentiated series of scopes, uncovering the way they relate to the world in an infinite loop. but it all happens instantaneously, i know what they want, what they are made up of, where they're from, etc.
i think amargith produced some great expressions of Fi in this thread, and it seems like wielding this huge emotional compass. and feeling really fuckin confident you know where you are, that your instruments are extremely advanced, that you know a far-greater range of distinct emotions, and that those models allow you to make accurate emotional predictions in others.
i know plenty of nfps who know exactly how to find my emotion and make me trust that they've got it under control, i'm in good hands with Fi, etc. the whole "emotional game" thing makes sense to me, trying to discern what you want, what you hope for, how you feel (security level!!!!), what you expect(ation), where you're coming from, who you think you are, how you relate to your own emotional experiences, etc.
i do think Fe types can be empathetic in more ways than Fi types seem to think. when i feel blissed out, it's bc my heart-center feels more awake. like i'm leaning forward from my chest, open, allowing the world to pour in more freely, confidently, unfiltered, and that i'm listening for the emotional resonances of the world, its thoughts, its consciousness. and most of all the objects that interest me, that inspire me, that make me feel more more more.
i think the probingness of amargith's examples also demonstrate sx/so. not all nfps are as assertive. i find that sx of any function can be perceived as pushy (i know i can be, at times), and overstep boundaries. but we can't all be sp doms.
I disagree with your first statement. Though Fe is definitely practical, as is Te, Fe is a tool to me. Nothing more. Fi is who I am. That to me is more important than a tool, and therefore gets more priority and more importance.
and Ni is who i am. but i'm a better person when i allow myself more feedback from other functions. i think we all identify with our dominant function, mostly, but the balance that comes from expansion, learning, and varied centers of awareness seems unquestionably good to me.
Whether it's a byproduct or not, you somewhere along the way attached a feeling to the thought, an emotion, and it is your emotion that makes you feel happy or sad. A thought itself has no emotional flavour. Neither happy, nor sad.
How would anyone know your thoughts unless you tell them? So any thoughts that are private, stays private. Any thoughts that are manifested, projected out, is not private any longer. It is still within your control - what to make private, what to make public. In this, you give consent for it to be played with.
Emotions that are private, or public, regardless, are still a person's feelings. It doesn't necessarily give you the right to play with them.
You make a statement about suicide. I take that statement and start thinking of possible other responses to it. It's not about you, or me, it's about the topic of suicide.
You have a feeling about committing suicide. I take that feeling and start to play around with them in possible ways. It is about you, and me doing it to you, about your personal stance/feelings on suicide.
Imagine the difference.
There's a reason why there's something called emotional abuse, but no such thing called a thought abuse - except "thought police"/censorship - where one is stopped from thinking. Emotional abuse is not about stopping someone from feeling, though. It is about making them feel something negative that is not what they want to feel.
Emotion is felt. A thought is neutral, unless a value is attached to it (then, it becomes paired with a feeling/an emotion).
for F types their thoughts are primarily organized thru emotional experiences, resonances, and relationships. fucking with the thoughts of an Fi type who doesn't feel prepared to defend them, and having what seems to them to be a condescending dikembe mutombo finger "not in my house" air enrages them bc it traps them in ideas and words that they cannot escape. it threatens to devour their subjective truth with an objective one based on language and what you call thought. F is implicit, holistic, and indefinite. it is unfocused, but wide-ranging.
