So I am so confused.
I thought you developed primary, then secondary, then tertiaty function, and that the slow growing on the tertiaty function was what causes folks to mature as they get older. Then all the other functions can sort of pop up at times and get you into trouble.
But then in Lenorre's book she keeps stressing development of the secondary over the tertiary and then shoves a couple of eatra functions between the secondary and tertiary.
To me NeFiTe makes sense and lord knows we would not turn the ship over to just Fi.
Have i missed something here?
Lenore's advice is sound and really does work in practice. No matter how well developed the tertiary function, it gets very defensive under pressure. It tells the dominant to carry on doing what it's always done, the problem is everyone else's fault. When the going gets tough, it's advice is always the same, regardless of function type: Run Away!
That can mean literally running away (for extraverts) or running into the security of your inner world (for introverts). This approach serves to relieve our stress in the short term (another name for the tertiary is the "Relief" function), but ensures that the same issues will crop up again later as we have not really dealt with them or learned anything new.
Developing and using our auxiliary seems to be the only effective long-term solution to the recurring dilemmas in our lives. It forces us to take a different approach than we are accustomed to; it also allows us to deal with our less preferred territory (Introversion or Extraversion) on it's own terms, instead of fobbing it off or avoiding it. It means taking the High Road instead of searching for an escape route. It is not easy; it forces us to make compromises and adjustments and - God forbid! - it may even allow us to admit that we were wrong or mistaken about something, which Westerners find very hard to do.
Most importantly of all, it is the path of growth for all types. Once the auxiliary is working nicely to balance out our dominant approach, all the other functions start to fall in line and start working the way they were designed to do. Otherwise, they tend to get out of control and go to war with each other. Look around at other people: how many of us can honestly say that we are not riven by unresolvable internal conflicts on a frequent basis?
As for the chapter in her book on the four "shadow" functions, that info has now been superseded by the work of John Beebe and others. Just ignore that chapter - Lenore herself knows that it is out of date. Every thing else in her book has stood the test of time and is still applicable today.
I have done some counselling work, and if I know a person's type then I always try and get them to apply their auxiliary to their problems. I don't always use the technical jargon, of course, but that is the single best piece of advice I can offer. It supplies a person with the necessary tools to sort out their own dilemmas, or at least to know where to go to find a solution.
To use myself as an example, my auxiliary is Fe. My natural tendency is to try and solve all my problems on my own using tertiary Ti. If I can't solve them, then Ti will convince me they're not worth it, just ignore them completely and hope they go away on their own. Despite myself, I still do this a lot of the time. Sometimes, however, I "wake up" and remember Lenore's advice to use Fe instead of Ti. That usually means I need to get up off my ass and go talk to someone I trust for their advice and opinions on my dilemma. Even if they don't provide the answer, simply doing this enables me to see the problem in a new light and to decide on an appropriate course of action.