I'm curious, how likeable or "Popular" INFJ's are amongst their peers and friends and social networks.
I'm likable as someone who smiles, gives compliments, listens, and is reliable. When young in school I was in a couple of leadership positions and was able to organize and make programs happen.
Do you have trouble spots?
Almost my entire life I struggled with feeling overwhelming social isolation and tended to feel the only option to connect was to offer listening and kindness to others, but when I felt vulnerable myself, I could never think of anyone I could trust to understand or listen to me. I cried alone a lot most of my life getting lost in abstract analysis of humanity and why connecting would forever be impossible. I always felt like I saw people through a glass. I wrote this poem when 16 and it summarizes most of my social feelings of my life:
Encaged in ice
Above me, below me
On five sides around me
Thick
Who can say to what extent?
Through it I see the forms of people moving
Elongated, twisted, compressed, then disappearing.
If I claw at the ice, my fingers will go numb
If I don't, my hands, my face, myself will feel like nothing.
Can you navigate the social landscape flawlessly?
No, but I can understand abstractly some of the social systems at play, but mostly the internal systems of each individual within those systems and the futility of much of it. When it comes to actually applying the information, it is bizarre how incapable I am of doing it.
Are you generally yourself? Or do you filter yourself for others?
I don't construct an image, but I hide most of myself. What is seen is true, but similar to wearing a burka through which you can only see one's eyes. Yes, those are the person's eyes, but most information is withheld.
Do people catch that you are different??
Not usually because it only shows up in my creative work and my inner thoughts, and people don't always pay much attention to such things.
Do people like you, basically.
My mindset is extra cyclical right now, but I'd say yes, people like me because they like what I have to offer and they want and expect some of it. They like me for self interest and not because they understand me 99% of the time.
My domestic partner is another INFJ, and besides my connection with my INFP sister and mother, and just a few friends to some degree, I can feel a reciprocal connection for the first time in my life.
Simply put, I've felt a lot of connection, tons of internalizing the emotions and psychology of people around me, but almost never feel reciprocity, so loneliness has been the norm for me socially.