Erik's theory on cognitive functions, shadows and development
Hi. My name is Erik. Here's my theory on type development, shadow functions, and I would love your thoughts and theories too. I'll do my best to answer any question. I've been working on this for quite some time. My general goal is to empower people so that they can change the world and make it into a better place.
The biggest two issues of the MBTI right now is
Providing reliable systems of reading type
Find deviations within a type to understand more about what a configuration really is and what a type really is.
The MBTI has not been able to accomplish this. The biggest clues are fMri scanners, Nardi, Linda Behrens and Beebes eight function model. I have also been involved in visual typing systems through the currently closed project of Physiognomy.me and I can say I truly believe that a â€type†can be spotted through visually studying a subject, through video footage, I can read you and give you clues on how you've developed and how you could learn to use your abilities to your advantage, and I want to pass this on and get more people involved in this.
What unlocked me to all these theories is that I actually got the perspective to look detachedly and just see what I find and what it could mean. It showed me that I had read myself wrong – I am an ENFJ and not an INFJ like I had assumed through old reading manuals.
What are the configurations?
You know of the model of the dominant function, the auxilary function, the tertiary and the inferior. This is accurate, this is important, get down to it, learn the functions and what they are. In brief, I'd sum up the different functions as discernment (Fx and Tx) and perception (Nx and Sx) functions. One of these functions make out your core â€you†- who you are, the engine/the gas driving you forward. When this is in charge, you're in flow, you're charging forward and taking down mountains with you. Then you have your auxilary function. That's your helpful parent or steering wheel, going â€There, where are you going with all this?â€
It is your compensating introverted or extroverted force in you. Kinda the key to solve all your problems. And really, most people have the most problems unlocking their auxilary, not their inferior function. You're starting off waaaaay too quickly. You need to know how to walk before you can bike. Or you'll be an ESFP who tries to look deeper all the time to be smart, but who doesn't truly value himself as he is, and as such more or less just derives pain from it. Let's go to the basics first.
The dominant function
The dominant function is kinda the emperor, and all other abilities are slaves to the emperor. In most people, the emperor rules through iron law, through divide and conquer. This is done by putting the tertiary at conflicts with the auxilary. The auxilary is more potent in the person than the tertiary, but whenever the person tries to access their auxilary they may struggle with two things
The dominant function tries to shut down the auxilary because it fears the auxilary will tell or make it do things to throw it out of it's power. For example, The Fe may fear that the Ni vision will cause it to lose touch with friends and connections or throw them out of their passionate state.
The tertiary function provides the escape route. It gives relief and it makes you revert to your natural state of behavior, for the INFJ for example, Thinking introverted strive for perfection and similar can keep you from interacting or pushing out with your Fe.
The dominant function is great – use it – but if your foot is on the gas but the hands away from the wheel, you are going to crash and it will not be pleasant.
But there's other mechanisms to keep you away.
The four shadow functions
Have been ignored for too long. Like they would make the image too complicated. Well, sorry to say it, but the image right now is shallow and does not fully explain or give people good ideas on how to grow.
The dominant shadow
When we're taught the MBTI we are taught you cannot change type and that you cannot be something you are not. This is accurate and important stuff. But as an ENFJ, to be told that your values are only derived from the outer worlds needs.. and to live by that.. is not healthy. And for an INFP to only live for themselves and not truly value others and see the value in others, that makes you self obsessed and hurts you alot.
We can say we only can be concious to four of the functions, but that's simply not true. There are levels to how concious a function within a type can be.
So for an INTP, your core is thinking introverted, and that's opposed by an extroverted thinking shadow fear in you. Thinking introverts value the objective data inside their head, they have this perfect idea in their mind, and they want to write it out to the external world and translate it to something real. But whenever you do, it never lives up to your expectations! It's never as perfect as it was in theory. The flaws hurt and bring alot of stress to the INTP. INTP's interacting with ENTJ's however, can often learn and start to value that, even if it is not fully perfect, it's still yielding results – you've gotten far on the way, you are getting there.
For the INTP, to access and flow better with themselves they need to deal with their subconcious luggage and fears and the core most important thing is to get rid of your shadows fears. Learn to value the objective data of the external world. Know in your heart that what you have in your mind is important and can be made into reality if you just put an effort into it.
Dealing with our subconcious shadows fear, frees us of the luggage and allows us to access more of our functions within ourselves.
The shadow auxilary
During a dream, I (ENFJ) saw myself in a room with a locked box of insight – answers I needed to find to an important question. It was though, guarded by my ENFP sister (in the shape of a witch) and the whole dream was full of the randomness and scary what-if questions of extroverted intuition. The cola bottles were full of goo. Everything was of. I felt a paranoia – what if x.. or x.. or x.. happens, and rather than opening or trying to open the box, I ran away, chased by the witch. I turned around and told her â€I WILL JUMP.†and she said. â€I will still have your body.â€
I have had many witch dreams before and after this dream, and only recently figured out it's meaning. The shadow auxilary keeps me from unlocking my Ni insight. The shadow auxilary is basically the fear that shuts down our ability to conciously access our auxilary fully. In dealing with this fully, I returned to the box during meditation, and forced the box open, and soon found the insight flowing into me. Suddenly I noticed what my core was, and why I was afraid and what was inside. I got in touch with Ni and was able to detachedly look at myself and why I was the way I was. My configuration shifted, rather than being a mediocre developed ENFJ who was partially shutting out Ni from the picture, I developed into one which was able to conciously access it. And everybody could notice the change in me.
The inferior function
The step that follows is getting more in touch with your inferior function. The basic struggles people have with this is that it is not fully concious and takes more effort to access, and also that the spinning basically makes you get more in touch with your subconcious fears and abilities.
The way to access your functions in general is basically in order of activation, Fe – Ni – Se – Ti – Fi – Ne – Si – Te for the ENFJ that is. The further down, the more processing power it takes to access it. It naturally leaves us drained to rely on it too much. Especially with a mediocre configuration. So you're spinning in flow, in the zone, interacting and having fun with people, everything works like a charm for you. But you have this Fi voice in you saying you aren't genuine, you aren't real, you aren't worthy of true love, you gotta be more perfect so people will like you more. That is the pain you are feeling. It's your shadow functions and your problems in the past, all your issues showing up to say hello. If you have alot of them, it's natural they would throw you off.
The inferior though is important to access, for the INTP's Ti, the Fe becomes the sword, and the Ti the sharpness. If you're just sharp but unable to cut or translate your theories and ideas into reality, you're missing out on the second half of the discernment process. You've made a decision but you haven't made it real. For the ENTJ, that problem is on the other side, you've made a decision, but you haven't really thought it through fully so it may be inconsistent or simply far off the charts on â€wrongâ€.
The levels of configuration
Mediocre: Medium use of the dominant function, weak use or half-blind usage of the auxilary, tertiary mostly an escape mechanism and inferior mostly related to as painful or stressful.
Balanced: Strong use of the dominant function, good use of the auxilary, tertiary used to provide relief and relaxation when necessary, and inferior used to translate your core into something better.
Powerful: Off the charts amazing, and able to access the shadow functions to help them see the full side of an aspect and find their way out of a sticky situation. In a recent dream, I found myself transforming into the witch, suddenly I could see new possibilities I couldn't before, I noticed patterns in the dream and chased something through hidden doors I could gain access to. And you can access this and gain hold of your inner abilities and strengths – things you've previously remained unaware of.
So should I marry an ESFP? /ISTJ
If you love him/her, sure.
Seriously though, under ideal circumstances, the mirror of your type is propably who you should be looking out for. But you can have fun with any type and you should use the system to understand and love all the gifts people bring.
Hi. My name is Erik. Here's my theory on type development, shadow functions, and I would love your thoughts and theories too. I'll do my best to answer any question. I've been working on this for quite some time. My general goal is to empower people so that they can change the world and make it into a better place.
The biggest two issues of the MBTI right now is
Providing reliable systems of reading type
Find deviations within a type to understand more about what a configuration really is and what a type really is.
The MBTI has not been able to accomplish this. The biggest clues are fMri scanners, Nardi, Linda Behrens and Beebes eight function model. I have also been involved in visual typing systems through the currently closed project of Physiognomy.me and I can say I truly believe that a â€type†can be spotted through visually studying a subject, through video footage, I can read you and give you clues on how you've developed and how you could learn to use your abilities to your advantage, and I want to pass this on and get more people involved in this.
What unlocked me to all these theories is that I actually got the perspective to look detachedly and just see what I find and what it could mean. It showed me that I had read myself wrong – I am an ENFJ and not an INFJ like I had assumed through old reading manuals.
What are the configurations?
You know of the model of the dominant function, the auxilary function, the tertiary and the inferior. This is accurate, this is important, get down to it, learn the functions and what they are. In brief, I'd sum up the different functions as discernment (Fx and Tx) and perception (Nx and Sx) functions. One of these functions make out your core â€you†- who you are, the engine/the gas driving you forward. When this is in charge, you're in flow, you're charging forward and taking down mountains with you. Then you have your auxilary function. That's your helpful parent or steering wheel, going â€There, where are you going with all this?â€
It is your compensating introverted or extroverted force in you. Kinda the key to solve all your problems. And really, most people have the most problems unlocking their auxilary, not their inferior function. You're starting off waaaaay too quickly. You need to know how to walk before you can bike. Or you'll be an ESFP who tries to look deeper all the time to be smart, but who doesn't truly value himself as he is, and as such more or less just derives pain from it. Let's go to the basics first.
The dominant function
The dominant function is kinda the emperor, and all other abilities are slaves to the emperor. In most people, the emperor rules through iron law, through divide and conquer. This is done by putting the tertiary at conflicts with the auxilary. The auxilary is more potent in the person than the tertiary, but whenever the person tries to access their auxilary they may struggle with two things
The dominant function tries to shut down the auxilary because it fears the auxilary will tell or make it do things to throw it out of it's power. For example, The Fe may fear that the Ni vision will cause it to lose touch with friends and connections or throw them out of their passionate state.
The tertiary function provides the escape route. It gives relief and it makes you revert to your natural state of behavior, for the INFJ for example, Thinking introverted strive for perfection and similar can keep you from interacting or pushing out with your Fe.
The dominant function is great – use it – but if your foot is on the gas but the hands away from the wheel, you are going to crash and it will not be pleasant.
But there's other mechanisms to keep you away.
The four shadow functions
Have been ignored for too long. Like they would make the image too complicated. Well, sorry to say it, but the image right now is shallow and does not fully explain or give people good ideas on how to grow.
The dominant shadow
When we're taught the MBTI we are taught you cannot change type and that you cannot be something you are not. This is accurate and important stuff. But as an ENFJ, to be told that your values are only derived from the outer worlds needs.. and to live by that.. is not healthy. And for an INFP to only live for themselves and not truly value others and see the value in others, that makes you self obsessed and hurts you alot.
We can say we only can be concious to four of the functions, but that's simply not true. There are levels to how concious a function within a type can be.
So for an INTP, your core is thinking introverted, and that's opposed by an extroverted thinking shadow fear in you. Thinking introverts value the objective data inside their head, they have this perfect idea in their mind, and they want to write it out to the external world and translate it to something real. But whenever you do, it never lives up to your expectations! It's never as perfect as it was in theory. The flaws hurt and bring alot of stress to the INTP. INTP's interacting with ENTJ's however, can often learn and start to value that, even if it is not fully perfect, it's still yielding results – you've gotten far on the way, you are getting there.
For the INTP, to access and flow better with themselves they need to deal with their subconcious luggage and fears and the core most important thing is to get rid of your shadows fears. Learn to value the objective data of the external world. Know in your heart that what you have in your mind is important and can be made into reality if you just put an effort into it.
Dealing with our subconcious shadows fear, frees us of the luggage and allows us to access more of our functions within ourselves.
The shadow auxilary
During a dream, I (ENFJ) saw myself in a room with a locked box of insight – answers I needed to find to an important question. It was though, guarded by my ENFP sister (in the shape of a witch) and the whole dream was full of the randomness and scary what-if questions of extroverted intuition. The cola bottles were full of goo. Everything was of. I felt a paranoia – what if x.. or x.. or x.. happens, and rather than opening or trying to open the box, I ran away, chased by the witch. I turned around and told her â€I WILL JUMP.†and she said. â€I will still have your body.â€
I have had many witch dreams before and after this dream, and only recently figured out it's meaning. The shadow auxilary keeps me from unlocking my Ni insight. The shadow auxilary is basically the fear that shuts down our ability to conciously access our auxilary fully. In dealing with this fully, I returned to the box during meditation, and forced the box open, and soon found the insight flowing into me. Suddenly I noticed what my core was, and why I was afraid and what was inside. I got in touch with Ni and was able to detachedly look at myself and why I was the way I was. My configuration shifted, rather than being a mediocre developed ENFJ who was partially shutting out Ni from the picture, I developed into one which was able to conciously access it. And everybody could notice the change in me.
The inferior function
The step that follows is getting more in touch with your inferior function. The basic struggles people have with this is that it is not fully concious and takes more effort to access, and also that the spinning basically makes you get more in touch with your subconcious fears and abilities.
The way to access your functions in general is basically in order of activation, Fe – Ni – Se – Ti – Fi – Ne – Si – Te for the ENFJ that is. The further down, the more processing power it takes to access it. It naturally leaves us drained to rely on it too much. Especially with a mediocre configuration. So you're spinning in flow, in the zone, interacting and having fun with people, everything works like a charm for you. But you have this Fi voice in you saying you aren't genuine, you aren't real, you aren't worthy of true love, you gotta be more perfect so people will like you more. That is the pain you are feeling. It's your shadow functions and your problems in the past, all your issues showing up to say hello. If you have alot of them, it's natural they would throw you off.
The inferior though is important to access, for the INTP's Ti, the Fe becomes the sword, and the Ti the sharpness. If you're just sharp but unable to cut or translate your theories and ideas into reality, you're missing out on the second half of the discernment process. You've made a decision but you haven't made it real. For the ENTJ, that problem is on the other side, you've made a decision, but you haven't really thought it through fully so it may be inconsistent or simply far off the charts on â€wrongâ€.
The levels of configuration
Mediocre: Medium use of the dominant function, weak use or half-blind usage of the auxilary, tertiary mostly an escape mechanism and inferior mostly related to as painful or stressful.
Balanced: Strong use of the dominant function, good use of the auxilary, tertiary used to provide relief and relaxation when necessary, and inferior used to translate your core into something better.
Powerful: Off the charts amazing, and able to access the shadow functions to help them see the full side of an aspect and find their way out of a sticky situation. In a recent dream, I found myself transforming into the witch, suddenly I could see new possibilities I couldn't before, I noticed patterns in the dream and chased something through hidden doors I could gain access to. And you can access this and gain hold of your inner abilities and strengths – things you've previously remained unaware of.
So should I marry an ESFP? /ISTJ
If you love him/her, sure.
Seriously though, under ideal circumstances, the mirror of your type is propably who you should be looking out for. But you can have fun with any type and you should use the system to understand and love all the gifts people bring.