Werebudgie
I want my account deleted
- Joined
- Jan 20, 2014
- Messages
- 398
- MBTI Type
- INFJ
- Enneagram
- 6w5
It seems to me that discussions about differences in INFJ and INFP cognitive functions tend to drift toward dialogue about "Fi versus Fe" or (less often, sems to me, but still sometimes) "Ni versus Ne." While useful, these comparisons are limited because they're about dominant function versus aux function.
So I figured I'd start a thread for INFP-INFJ discussion that takes as its centerpoint our respective dominant functions: Ni versus Fi, or Fi versus Ni.
I want to leave the specific topics relatively open and invite musings, examples, reflections etc on our respective Fi-dom-ness and Ni-dom-ness as they relate (or don't relate) to each other.
So I'm going to offer an example just to add some specific substance as a contribution, but will do it behind a spoiler so as not to overly direct the possible experiences and topics that might come up the thread discussion. Here's my example - Fi and Ni as organic landscapes:
So anyway - what are your perspectives and experiences, INFPs and INFJs? How do Fi and Ni as different dominant functions affect your experiences, ways of moving in the world, interactions, communications, our relationships with each other?
So I figured I'd start a thread for INFP-INFJ discussion that takes as its centerpoint our respective dominant functions: Ni versus Fi, or Fi versus Ni.
I want to leave the specific topics relatively open and invite musings, examples, reflections etc on our respective Fi-dom-ness and Ni-dom-ness as they relate (or don't relate) to each other.
So I'm going to offer an example just to add some specific substance as a contribution, but will do it behind a spoiler so as not to overly direct the possible experiences and topics that might come up the thread discussion. Here's my example - Fi and Ni as organic landscapes:
I've often referred to Ni, my dominant function, as my "organic landscape" - it's the perceptual world that is most like home to me, that makes the most sense to me, in which I feel most comfortable moving.
A couple of months ago, my INFP partner and I had a sort of clarity moment about one difference between Ni as an organic landscape for me, and Fi as an organic landscape for her.
It started as I was trying to describe how Ni is a perceiving function. I was saying that the landscape of my Ni perception exists as real whether or not I am in it or even whether or not I exist. This landscape is not some personal reality I have created (as Ni is all too often misunderstood to be). It is, instead, an existing "place" that I perceive from my specific subjective vangate point in it. It exists. I do not create it. I just move and perceive within it.
I said: in this way, the landscape of my Ni perception is like the city we live in now. It existed before I moved here. It would exist if I moved away. It would exist if I never existed at all. I haven't created it. Instead, I move within it and perceive it from my specific positioning and location in it.
And my INFP partner's eyes lit up and she said (paraphrased): "Oh! I get it! I am my own organic landscape!" She talked about how she has traveled all over the world (which she literally has) and in her travels and in her life, she always carries her own inner "home" (organic landscape) with her wherever she goes, that's how Fi works as her organic landscape for her. Fi is like her personal ground - she said she's like an island that provides herself with her own ground to stand on.
As a Ni-dom, I am inside a landscape that I have not created but that I perceive ... I am one little bit moving within this huge landscape, perceiving from my specific vantage point.
In contrast, as a Fi-dom, my INFP partner IS her own organic landscape. It wouldn't exist without her because it is created by her. She is her own home.
I can be pulled out my organic landscape. In order for me to get centered again in that situation, I have to move myself back into that landscape, re-position myself - move myself from alien landscapes back into my organic Ni landscape. She would never need to do that because she is never NOT in her organic landscape. She is in her organic landscape by definition, all the time, because she IS her own organic landscape.
One result of this difference between Ni-dom and Fi-dom is that we have, without always understanding why, defaulted to moving together in her organic landscape. Because I can be pulled out of my own organic landscape and she can't be pulled out of hers (her organic landscape IS made up of her, while mine isn't made up of me).
So our mutual meeting place defaulted without explicit discussion or decision to her Fi world. It did so because that's where she is and is made of what she is, and she can't leave it, is is made of her self - while I can move my little self between different external landscapes, even though I am most well when I center my perception in the landscape of my Ni perception.
Another result is that it's hard for us to understand such different meta-realities of organic landscapes. From my perspective, I can't imagine standing on the ground of my own self. It's like an impossibility of physics, a mind puzzle, how could I be my own landscape? Where would I stand if the ground is my self? That's not ground, that's .... yeah, it boggles my mind. And I won't speak for her on this, but I know she has her own view of how weird my organic landscape is, how weird it is to have "home ground" be something I have to enter and move within rather than how it is for her as a Fi dom.
A couple of months ago, my INFP partner and I had a sort of clarity moment about one difference between Ni as an organic landscape for me, and Fi as an organic landscape for her.
It started as I was trying to describe how Ni is a perceiving function. I was saying that the landscape of my Ni perception exists as real whether or not I am in it or even whether or not I exist. This landscape is not some personal reality I have created (as Ni is all too often misunderstood to be). It is, instead, an existing "place" that I perceive from my specific subjective vangate point in it. It exists. I do not create it. I just move and perceive within it.
I said: in this way, the landscape of my Ni perception is like the city we live in now. It existed before I moved here. It would exist if I moved away. It would exist if I never existed at all. I haven't created it. Instead, I move within it and perceive it from my specific positioning and location in it.
And my INFP partner's eyes lit up and she said (paraphrased): "Oh! I get it! I am my own organic landscape!" She talked about how she has traveled all over the world (which she literally has) and in her travels and in her life, she always carries her own inner "home" (organic landscape) with her wherever she goes, that's how Fi works as her organic landscape for her. Fi is like her personal ground - she said she's like an island that provides herself with her own ground to stand on.
As a Ni-dom, I am inside a landscape that I have not created but that I perceive ... I am one little bit moving within this huge landscape, perceiving from my specific vantage point.
In contrast, as a Fi-dom, my INFP partner IS her own organic landscape. It wouldn't exist without her because it is created by her. She is her own home.
I can be pulled out my organic landscape. In order for me to get centered again in that situation, I have to move myself back into that landscape, re-position myself - move myself from alien landscapes back into my organic Ni landscape. She would never need to do that because she is never NOT in her organic landscape. She is in her organic landscape by definition, all the time, because she IS her own organic landscape.
One result of this difference between Ni-dom and Fi-dom is that we have, without always understanding why, defaulted to moving together in her organic landscape. Because I can be pulled out of my own organic landscape and she can't be pulled out of hers (her organic landscape IS made up of her, while mine isn't made up of me).
So our mutual meeting place defaulted without explicit discussion or decision to her Fi world. It did so because that's where she is and is made of what she is, and she can't leave it, is is made of her self - while I can move my little self between different external landscapes, even though I am most well when I center my perception in the landscape of my Ni perception.
Another result is that it's hard for us to understand such different meta-realities of organic landscapes. From my perspective, I can't imagine standing on the ground of my own self. It's like an impossibility of physics, a mind puzzle, how could I be my own landscape? Where would I stand if the ground is my self? That's not ground, that's .... yeah, it boggles my mind. And I won't speak for her on this, but I know she has her own view of how weird my organic landscape is, how weird it is to have "home ground" be something I have to enter and move within rather than how it is for her as a Fi dom.
So anyway - what are your perspectives and experiences, INFPs and INFJs? How do Fi and Ni as different dominant functions affect your experiences, ways of moving in the world, interactions, communications, our relationships with each other?