edcoaching
New member
- Joined
- Jun 30, 2008
- Messages
- 752
- MBTI Type
- INFJ
- Enneagram
- 7
You'd probably enjoy the discussions on these things that go on at type conferences in the bar at night...
There's a lot of dissent about how the extraverted and introverted forms of the preferences work. I'm in the camp that doesn't think you can divide Ne from Ni quite so neatly. In fact the difference may be more in how we process than in the what.
My Ni for example only functions well when I can think, reflect (yeah, well, my dominant function happens in the internal world...). Brainstorming sessions--I have to ignore what's going on and get my own thoughts going. Just about all of my colleagues prefer ENFP and I have to tell them, "Keep going--I'm thinking and I'll be with you in a minute." They're used to it. I do modeling based on internal vision and external stimuli, so I don't buy into the clear-cut distinctions. I can use my N alone in my office envisioning the best way to design a training workshop. I can use it in a classroom when things aren't going right (if I'm the observer, not the instructor, or if there's a pause so I can get my thoughts together) to come up with a totally new technique in the moment to fix things.
My ENFP colleagues are just the opposite. They want to talk things through to get their Intuition going. One, if she's stuck and can't meet with a colleague, heads to the Mall of America where all the action feeds her Intuition. Our orientation to the external world defines how we use the functions in a huge way, not just the nuanced differences between the E and I forms of the functions...
There's a lot of dissent about how the extraverted and introverted forms of the preferences work. I'm in the camp that doesn't think you can divide Ne from Ni quite so neatly. In fact the difference may be more in how we process than in the what.
My Ni for example only functions well when I can think, reflect (yeah, well, my dominant function happens in the internal world...). Brainstorming sessions--I have to ignore what's going on and get my own thoughts going. Just about all of my colleagues prefer ENFP and I have to tell them, "Keep going--I'm thinking and I'll be with you in a minute." They're used to it. I do modeling based on internal vision and external stimuli, so I don't buy into the clear-cut distinctions. I can use my N alone in my office envisioning the best way to design a training workshop. I can use it in a classroom when things aren't going right (if I'm the observer, not the instructor, or if there's a pause so I can get my thoughts together) to come up with a totally new technique in the moment to fix things.
My ENFP colleagues are just the opposite. They want to talk things through to get their Intuition going. One, if she's stuck and can't meet with a colleague, heads to the Mall of America where all the action feeds her Intuition. Our orientation to the external world defines how we use the functions in a huge way, not just the nuanced differences between the E and I forms of the functions...