Our "Operating Charters"

[Eric B]

In my discussions with Lenore, she has described concepts such as differentiation.

The functions represent different ways of building neurological connections from the frontal cortex back to the limbic area; a neurological network that can support traffic associatively from many other areas of the brain. Most of the links that we've built from the cognitive brain back to the emotional brain belong to the function we've differentiated (as dominant).
She compared it to Ebay, the central hub of a network, which has an operating charter.

So we have an Ego-identity, a central hub with an operating charter (from our dominant function; hence, Jung's original eight types). The products of undifferentiated functions can reach consciousness, but only as they're linked to the "operating charter" of the network our dominant function has set up. This diverts their potential energic investment to dominant goals. When they are not linked to the network of the differentiated standpoint, they remain conflated with one of the archetypal complexes (the archetypes being understood by Jung as "the motivating effects of limbic events").

So thinking about all this, and in light of the conclusion some of us made here, that functions are better described as "perspectives", I have found a way to express the types and their functions by the perspective they have as their operating charter.
First, the perspectives:

Se: The environment must contain new experiences
Si: Life must be familiar to me
Ne: The environment must contain alternatives, new possibilities
Ni: Life must have an underlying significance to me
Te: The environment must be logically organized
Ti: Life must make sense to me
Fe: The environment must be socially friendly
Fi: Life must be personally congruent to me

These are roughly based on Berens' "The Philosophy of life that engages in {Xy}" in the Cogntive Processes book.

Se: There is always more to be experienced, and opportunities don't last.
Si: There is always a comparison to be made, and if it is familiar, it is to be trusted
Ne: There are always other perspectives and new meanings to discover
Ni: There is always a future to realize and a significance to be revealed.
Te: Everything can be logical, structured and organized
Ti: Everything can be explained and understood in terms of how it works
Fe: Everything can be considered in terms of how it affects others
Fi: Everything can be in harmony or congruence

I realized that my operating charter was that everything in life must make sense to me. As an "operating charter", "everything can be understood in terms of how it works" seemed too broad, and not personal enough, a description. However, it does tie into things needing to make sense.
If it doesn't, I will try to find out how or why. If I still can't, I become frustrated if it is concrete reality, and question it if it is an abstract belief. I realized this when thinking of how traditional Christian theology often puts down logic whenever they run across something they can't answer. They make a lot of strong pronounements on what "truth" is based on scripture, but their intepretations of it often lead to contradictions and things that don't make sense. When these are questioned, they will often appeal to "It is above our comprehension". Yet, you are supposed to still believe it regardless.
Many give up and abandon faith at that point, but I have seen that other interpretations (especially with the original contexts of things) do make it make more sense.
Hence, my auxiliary ties to the dominant operating charter, and will also help guide it.

So here are a few types I have tried to illustrate this for. For the "shadow arms" (6/7), I include the influence of the auxiliary, since the auxiliary is what sets the "arm" functions in their place.
Keep in mind, that these are not [necessarily] the archetypes now (except for where noted in my type). They're how all eight functions enter consciousness through the dominant charter. In more "limbic" situations that call for the archetypal complexes, they will erupt, in a necessary manifestation of the function; which is often negative.

INTP:
1 operating charter: life must make sense to me
2 the environment must contain alternatives/possibilities for things to make sense to me
3 life should be familiar to make sense to me
4 a socially friendly environment makes the most sense to me
5 the environment should be ordered in a way that makes sense to me
(Opposing Personality Complex: when it is not, I become stubborn about the ordering of things)
6 life's underlying significance should point to possibilities in the environment that make sense to me
(Senex archetype: things that don't make sense often seem to point to negative conclusions)
7 the environment's new experiences should make sense to me
(Trickster archetype: Current experience is used for setting logical traps, or being silly)
8 what makes sense to me provides congruence
(Demonic Personality Complex: when things don't make sense, it is very important to fix this to restore congruence, and it tears me up inside).

INFP
1 operating charter: life must be congruent to me
2 the environment must contain alternatives/possibilities for things to be congruent
3 life should be familiar to be congruent to me
4 a logically structured environment is the most congruent to me
5 socially friendly environments should be congruent to me
6 underlying significance should point to possibilities in the environment that are congruent to me
7 the environment's new experiences should be congruent to me
8 what's congruent to me makes sense

ENFP
1 operating charter: the environment must contain new possibilities/alternatives
2 here are possibilities/alternatives in the environment for things to be congruent [to me]
3 possibilities/alternatives should be implemented in the environment through logical structure
4 what's familiar to me provides the context for new possibilities
5 the significance of this is the possibilities it opens up in the environment
6 social environments should explore alternatives to maintain congruence
7 use possibilities and congruence to make light of what makes sense
8 try to experience all possibilities in environment

ESFJ
1 operating charter: the environment must be socially friendly
2 a socially friendly environment will be that which is familiar to me
3 there should be multiple possibilities for a socially friendly environment
4 life should make sense in order to enhance a socially friendly environment
5 sticking with what is congruent to me will keep me in step with my social environment
6 the environment I am experiencing should be conducive to a socially friendly atmosphere
7 looking for underlying significance in things should enhance a social environment
8 the environment should be logically ordered for a socially friendly atmosphere

ISTJ
1 operating charter: Life must be familiar to me
2 the environment must be logically ordered in a familiar way
3 life should be congruent by being familiar to me
4 lets add some new familiar environments
5 the current experience of the environment will validate what is familiar to me
6 the environment should be ordered in a way that makes sense according to what is familiar to me
7 socially friendly environment should have congruence according to what is familiar to me
8 any further significance in things should support to what is familiar to me

So does this make sense, and help anyone understand "function use" better? You can't just look at a person "using" a function and assume a type. You have to consider what context it is being used in; what the operating charter is.

 

[Venom]

YES. I absolutely agree! Sadly I'm going to have to say though that this is nothing new. I have been crying for months about how functions are "world views" that are ALWAYS on. They are not gears we shift in and out of. I think I got the idea mainly from that greenlight wiki site on lenore thompson.


"===" is function
"----" is just our general "undifferentiated conscious self"
"{{{{" is some enneagram
"(((((" is some enneagram instincts

Here is how the unenlightened gear shifters see it:

Human psychology:
((({{{{================----==============}}}}}))))

"Fi likes to talk to Fe by turning inwards bla bla bla more gear shift pseudo bullshit like they are each little CPUs...

The enlightened ones that see it like us::

Human psychology:
((({{{{{{{{{{=======-----------------------------=====}}}}}}}})))))

Ya, he's an entrepreneur/film/artist, but he's not automatically a Ne...his life perspective does not reflect that of Ne schemery/bullshiting

Functions are not individual gear boxes/cpus that communicate with eachother/strengthened/weakened! If you are an INTP, you generally see everything through a Ti world view, even when you're trying to do something some idiot thinks qualifies as "Fi".

:steam: (sorry about the emoting in your thread...I genuinely agree with you).

 

[Little_Sticks]

I like this too.

 

[Lethe]

I have found a way to express the types and their functions by the perspective they have as their operating charter.
First, the perspectives:

Se: The environment must contain new experiences
Si: Life must be familiar to me
Ne: The environment must contain alternatives, new possibilities
Ni: Life must have an underlying significance to me
Te: The environment must be logically organized
Ti: Life must make sense to me
Fe: The environment must be socially friendly
Fi: Life must be personally congruent to me

I enjoy reading your modified definitions --- it manages to capture the essence the perspective without reverting to ambiguous, and controversial terminology. This is difficult to do, when most sources use words that can easily be confused with other meanings.

"Fi likes to talk to Fe by turning inwards bla bla bla more gear shift pseudo bullshit like they are each little CPUs...

Functions are not individual gear boxes/cpus that communicate with eachother/strengthened/weakened! If you are an INTP, you generally see everything through a Ti world view, even when you're trying to do something some idiot thinks qualifies as "Fi".

I wouldn't be surprised if this was aimed at me (or others who think alike), but I'll address and clarify it anyway. Part of the reason why the ideas were expressed that way is to understand the direction in which a particular view came from (often using a traditional, fixed setting), not to imply that a function has a monopoly on any action. Though, living in this imperfect world, there will be certain areas where an individual may easily find higher concentrations of their desired "perspectives". And where a perspective has more leads to the actions that are determined by, and rewarded in the environment.

The example you used (that I had used) was showing how Fi was connecting to Fe through their lens: "Life must be personally congruent to me", and the Fe responds not by changing main frame of their perspective, but looking for Fe preferable attitudes within those "introverted" boundaries from the Fi's point of view.

"Problems cannot be solved at the same level of consciousness that created them." -- Albert Einstein

Indeed, functions do not individually exist on their own, but it is often described as such for basic, theoretical knowledge. By having another perspective (either through a function, life experience, etc.) involved in the process, it opens the doorway for more room to solve problems, and whether it affects the user's method of seeing or doing things remains solely their responsibility.

And this:

"The products of undifferentiated functions can reach consciousness, but only as they're linked to the "operating charter" of the network our dominant function has set up. This diverts their potential energetic investment to dominant goals." -- Eric B

Ya, he's an entrepreneur/film/artist, but he's not automatically a Ne...his life perspective does not reflect that of Ne schemery/bullshiting

Because from their standard interpretation, they cannot see how that state is achieved. While the function definitions themselves are flexible, many beginners improve on their knowledge by making connections to different events, and other ideas. Understanding the functions in a controlled space, is one of the quickest ways to learn the ideas before they can move onto working with multiple contexts, and factors, then at the same time being able to apply that knowledge.

It's like how children are taught "romance" in the most simplistic form [K-I-S-S-I-N-G], and when they get older, they know the concept well enough to see where else it can work, including the varying forms it arrives in. And the continuous journey of learning doesn't really end -- there will always be something new, maybe not here, but elsewhere.

 

[VagrantFarce]

"Operating charter" is a great way to express it, I think. I had some similar thoughts to this elsewhere, but I feel that you've done a better job expressing it than I did.

I'm still not convinced the shadow functions actually describe anything pertaining to reality, though - I always get the impression that Beebe included them because it made the function order more complex and seemingly more elegant, just for the sake of it.

 

[JocktheMotie]

Excellent stuff. I've always thought [ though I don't think I used to early on, I may have fallen into the trap of functions=skills in the beginning] to just think of functions as "cognitive orientations." They are filters in which we experience the world and order our minds. My Ti isn't "logic," it's my innate desire for the world of things and ideas to have structure, and for me to find that structure. Logic is a tool I use to achieve that. I am less oriented to the specific, physical detail of data than I am to its connection to something else, and what this piece of data means.

Great stuff.

I'm still not convinced the shadow functions actually describe anything pertaining to reality, though - I always get the impression that Beebe included them because it made the function order more complex and seemingly more elegant, just for the sake of it.

I'm not sure about the shadow either. I do not see how it is revealed and how it manifests, in reality, like you say. I don't think they're added for complexity however, but more for "completeness." I don't think you can have a functional model for the mind that only includes half of them.

 

[Eric B]

I enjoy reading your modified definitions --- it manages to capture the essence the perspective without reverting to ambiguous, and controversial terminology. This is difficult to do, when most sources use words that can easily be confused with other meanings.

Thanks. Yeah; that's what I've been aiming to do, as the the other terminology may often be trying to simplify it, but can also lose the essence in the process.

"The products of undifferentiated functions can reach consciousness, but only as they're linked to the "operating charter" of the network our dominant function has set up. This diverts their potential energetic investment to dominant goals." -- Eric B

just to give credit where it's due; that statement was from Lenore. I'm am not that expert in Jungian language yet. It's what really helped me with this observation.

"Operating charter" is a great way to express it, I think. I had some similar thoughts to this elsewhere, but I feel that you've done a better job expressing it than I did.

Thanks! I think I remember that topic, and it may actually have been one of my inspirations for aiming to put together this idea; though I see that it did seem to raise more protests than anything else.

INJ (Ni): "...reality is arbitrary, and we are nothing but irrational, pattern-seeking individuals. Every perspective is an assumption, and there is no right or wrong answer to anything."
ITP (Ti): "...the universe makes sense, and is governed by logic. As people, we are subject to the same rules as everything else and are no "better" or "worse" than anything else."
IFP (Fi): "...the world is shaped by individuals, with living emotional needs. We are all driven by subjective values that are specific to us and no one else."
ISJ (Si): "...the world is shaped by individuals or communities with their own loyalties, seeking to preserve what they think is important."

EFJ (Fe): "...people are social animals, and we need to feel embraced in a larger community in order to feel good about ourselves."
ETJ (Te) "...people love to take control. We measure, we exploit and we take as much as we can in order to feel good about ourselves."
ENP (Ne) "...opportunities for change come and go, and we need to keep moving if we're going to catch them. We're like sharks! We have to keep moving in order to survive!"
ESP (Se) "...everything is just a series of moments and sensations, and we're just animals at the end of the day. If we want something, we just go get it!"

Hence, the key seemed to be using more elemental definitions, rather than general "assumptions", which people might be less likely to recognize in themselves. Like for Ti, I say "the universe should make sense", not that it does (which seems to be a common way of putting it); for the problem of living is that life is more often not or at least not appearing as we think it should be. So the dominant's goal is to fix that.

I'm still not convinced the shadow functions actually describe anything pertaining to reality, though - I always get the impression that Beebe included them because it made the function order more complex and seemingly more elegant, just for the sake of it.

Again, the shadows are just suppressed opposite orientations of the primary four functions. For there are really only four functions, and we orient them in one of two ways, so that opposite orientation has to be somewhere, and it's [often] in the unconscious. And again, this shadow is really primarily when the "products of the functions" are not linked to the operating charter of the dominant, and the archetypal complexes then erupt in manifestations of the functions. Hence, I believe "the environment should be ordered in a way that makes sense to me" (a natural external application of the dominant internal judgment); and "when it is not, I become stubborn about the ordering of things" [and may try to arrange them myself], and this will play out as an "oppositional" Te.

 

[FalseHeartDothKnow]

Wow, very insightful...this could definitely help people who are stuck between two types because of dom/aux order confusion...well done

 

[Oaky]

I quite like it. Interesting.

 

[Eric B]

Glad to help with this. I always like to clarify things I think are cool or useful.

Should also add that though type is determined by both dominant and auxiliary, that the auxiliary is not apart of the operating charter.
So you should not necessarily expect it to be that integral to you. (Especially since Lenore points out that we often bypass it and go straight to the tertiary). It is what helps carry out the dominant's charter, however.

So while my wife may have identified with Se and Ni more than Si from Berens/Nardi's descriptions, the Si is clearly what works the most with her Fe.
Likewise, when first giving her those descriptions, she thought I was more "concrete", and that Si sounded more like me. But that's because I do often get heavy into tertiary mode and want things the way they were (like when they already make sense!) or demand concrete data, especially when particular abstractions don't make sense, like in some religious teachings (which is what she based that on). Hence, what Beebe described as the "inflation" of the tertiary.
(Lenore described to me what the concept of "inflation" originally was. It's when the ego thinks it's the center of the psyche, instead of the Self, which really is. So any function-archetype can be inflated, but the tertiary probably is the most, because of the fact it's what we use to defend the ego's dominant orientation after the dominant; hence, skipping over the auxiliary at times).

Another example of all this:
The ego is said to have an emotional investment in its dominant function. Hence all people [i.e. all types] have emotion. Some may try to stuff them more than others, but they are all there, and do come out, and it is not always an archetypal manifestation.
So emotion connected with something "valued" might be a typical "product" of the process of "introverted Feeling", yet you can't say they [types other than Fi types] are "using Fi" every time they display the emotion. And you can't say that only Fi users "know what they want for themselves".


 

[Eric B]

OK, now we can even make a type sorter out of this. Call it the "Lucky Two Type Test".
Perhaps I should make it a separate thread, but for now, let's see how much it catches on.

1. Which perspective would you say is your [ego's] operating charter?

a. The environment must contain new experiences
if chosen, go to 2a

b. Life must be familiar to me
if chosen, go to 2b

c. The environment must contain alternatives, new possibilities
if chosen, go to 2a

d. Life must have an underlying significance to me
if chosen, go to 2b

e. The environment must be logically organized
if chosen, go to 2c

f. Life must make sense to me
if chosen, go to 2d

g. The environment must be socially friendly
if chosen, go to 2c

h. Life must be personally congruent to me
if chosen, go to 2d

2. Which perspective would you say most informs your operating charter?

a (for 1a, 1c)
•Life should make sense to me
•Life should be personally congruent to me

b (for 1b, 1d)
•The environment should be logically organized
•The environment should be socially friendly

c (for 1e, 1f)
•Life should be familiar to me
•Life should have an underlying significance to me

d (for 1g, 1h)
•The environment should contain new experiences
•The environment should contain alternatives, new possibilities

 

[BlueScreen]

Question 1 might work better as a preference. ie. "I would like the environment to contain..." or "I would be happiest if the environment contained...". Because I'd definitely prefer the Ne option for 1, but I'm adaptable and it depends on the day/environment.

I'm not sure what the Fi line for 2 means. If it means my actions should be true to myself and others, that's perfect.

I like to look for sense in the environment too, but I am comfortable if it isn't there (as long as that's the truth).

p.s. good work!

 

[Eric B]

Thanks
I used the term "must", because this is the "operating charter"; the ego's modus operandi. Yes, it is a "preference", and we can be adaptable in day to day instances; but this is in an overall sense, in which you ultimately must have possibilities and such.

For Fi, I could not think of a better word. I knew from my own experience that Ti is about "making sense to me" (i.e. internal logical order). For Fi, "harmony" would be too ambiguous with Fe. I was thinking of asking a Fi user what would correspond in their psyche to Ti's "make sense to me", without creating the Forer effect that often occurs with Fi descriptions involving "likes/dislikes" or "importance".