@ OP -
what i find is that i have to limit certain things with certain people, and sometimes that becomes difficult. i echo satine's feelings about the "getting to know you stage", where things are much more open, and i am feeling the other person out. i do not yet know our incompatibilities.
as people get closer, my scrutiny also goes up. it's really quite rational - the more time we spend together, and the more i am going to trust you with my private information, the more compatible we have to be, on many levels. this does not mean type - i tend to get closest with NJs and FJs, for reasons somewhat unclear to me.
with one of my friends, i feel especially like i periodically open and withdraw in response both to her and things in my private life. she is an ESFP, very fun and open but also more interested in having people around all the time than i am. so if she starts wanting to go out every other night, or sending me 10 "what's up" messages a day, and/or if i am running into something hard or important in my life, i am more likely to withdraw from her. it's not that i don't like her, but i really just can't handle that, mentally or emotionally. i suspect that's what prevents us from getting any closer than we are, too. her interaction style is just really stressful to me when i have other things to cope with. i feel a little bad about it but i would hurt her more by acquiescing, letting stress build up, and then ending up directing it at her. so in that case withdrawing is a protective thing, really. for both of us.
whereas, take my ESFJ mom or ENFJ best friend, and things are much more steady with them. i even open up to them more when i am stressed, because they are more steady, and help me pinpoint things when i am lost in a sea of information, especially my ENFJ friend. talking with her when i am under pressure makes me feel more comfortable, more assured, more able to handle the world. the same goes for when she vents to me, we can both pour our insecurities on the other and it doesn't throw us off kilter. we also share more moral values than myself and my ESFP friend, so it's just easier to get along. i don't have to restrain myself as much.
my one other relevant quirk - in relationships, i am likely to quietly pull away when the other person displays some kind of behavior that just makes me feel
weird inside. i had one boyfriend who i discovered totally freaked out sometimes while driving. like he would really panic at having to stop short, or if a car pulled in front of him. i've had anxiety issues in the past; i know maybe he had a bad experience in a car wreck (he would always weasel out of talking about it), or something like that to make him act in such a way. usually i would want to help address it. but for whatever reason in this case it was just a huge internal red flag for me. all of a sudden i started seeing more and more places in his life where inconsistent, reactive behavior like this surfaced. about a year later, after our relationship was over, he revealed to me that he is a really awful communicator when he and the other person are not in the same physical space - as in he cannot do long-distance
anything - so i feel all the more assured in my decision not to pursue that relationship further. are these things even related? i don't know. it doesn't seem like it. maybe, maybe distantly. but a few of my relationships have ended like this... i escape due to feeling averse to some quirk, right before discovering something that would have imploded in my face. i don't understand it, but do thank the N gods for it.
re: NTJs - INTJs are easier than ENTJs. i have a good ENTJ family friend but she does wear me out a bit sometimes. i can't really keep up with her and we don't easily gravitate towards the same subjects when it comes to what's "important"... we like discussing new gadgets and dumb people but she is not much one for NF topics. also she is a bit more blunt in social situations than i can handle sometimes... last time we were out to eat she explained the impracticalities of her "boob shelf" with the waiter... hilarious but so, so awkward...
:blushing: