Poll: Is knowing your best-fit type important?

[RDF]

How much of it is internalized now though? As in you type someone and react/speak accordingly without really thinking about it.

Interesting question. In my case: No, 90 percent of the time I don't react/speak to people according to their type.

I didn't learn MBTI until I was 42. By that time, I already had my own way of dealing with people, my own persona that I brought to the table, my own message to deliver, and my own ways of taking charge of a situation. Before learning MBTI I already knew from experience that various people might react to me and my message in some odd ways; but that was no reason to change me or my message. Overall I just figured "people are people" and didn't worry too much about their reactions.

Things haven't changed much since I learned MBTI. For most people and situations, I just bring the same old "me" to the table as always. After all, I'm Fi, not Fe; I don't feel the need to "manage" the reactions of other people in a normal conversation. (Since I'm Fi, I tend to take it for granted that the universe revolves around me and my reactions; it's up to the other guy to keep me happy. )

With me, MBTI comes to the forefront mainly at times of conflict or stress. If the wife and I are in a weird mood and nitpicking at each other, or if I'm in a meeting and my boss and co-workers are at each other's throats, then I quickly inventory everyone's MBTI types and remind myself how they handle stress so that I can get a handle on the dynamic and manage the situation if that's necessary. Or if I'm telling someone an important message and they don't seem to be getting what I'm saying, then I'll stop for a second and think about whether my message needs to be crafted better for their personality type. And of course, I use MBTI to manage my own reactions under stress; in many ways self-knowledge was the single biggest thing I gained from learning about MBTI.

It's true that in the company of a couple important people or easily identifiable types, I may adjust to those people on a regular basis and mirror their type somewhat. But I used to do that kind of thing even before I knew MBTI: Around the intellectuals I acted like an intellectual, and around the partiers I partied.

Overall, learning MBTI didn't change how I interact with people on a routine (social) basis. [Edit:] But I do keep MBTI close at my side and routinely analyze social dynamics through the MBTI framework when the dynamics get a little strange and need analysis.

FL

 

[s0532]

How much of it is internalized now though? As in you type someone and react/speak accordingly without really thinking about it.

robble? no sure how to answer that. I don't get all strategic with my interactions or anything, doubt it's made me more slick socially. (Actually, maybe it's made me more socially retarded- inadvertently using type as excuse.) But more tolerant when people are chatty about details, lately even embrace that aspect of hanging with S friends. Ns put up smokescreens. Myself included. Overall though, just more I am conscious of how much my thoughts about interactions are overlaid by the framework.

you?

 

[MacGuffin]

you?

I'm not sure.

I think it has unconsciously affected me in some ways, both positive and negative. Sometimes I find myself patiently waiting for the point of a story after sitting through a bunch of irrelevant details, other times I can be almost rude in cutting someone off cause I know they won't shut up otherwise.

I don't consciously think at these times, "oh she's an S" or "he's an E".

 

[rivercrow]

I agree exactly with what s0532 said. I'm not quite sure how to vote that on the poll...

FL

True, I didn't include a "attitude over time has changed" option. Polls, to me, are always snapshots, anyway.

This conversation has certainly gone differently than I'd expected, but it's far more interesting than I'd anticipated.



As for the thread itself....

I know who I am. That's important to me.

I've been misunderstood most of my life and I've found that attempts to change that usually fail. So I've largely given up. I've cross-stitched a couple plaques of "INTP 5w4," realizing that this means very little to 90% of people anyway. Irrelevant.

I have people ask me to type them or others. I usually refuse without explanation, which garners some interesting comments of its own. Some of the reasons given here--pigeon-holing, burdening of expectations, etc--are my reasons. I'm concerned for the unknowns around the target of speculation, even with people I consider close friends.

I met a woman who had been mistyped. She'd operated for some time under the assumption that she was one type. She took the MBTI and went through self-verification as a whole different type (NJ stayed the same, nothing else). When she got the MBTI results back (different than expected), she was shattered, blown completely out of the water. I'm not understating the impact this information had on her. She and I had several discussions about her experience and, from what I could see, her "new" type was her best-fit type.

Up till then, I had considered type more of a game; owing to my own set of internal:external identity disconnects, I'm comfortable working with hypotheses. After watching her go through this, I don't take typing lightly.

I only joke about type with people I've observed as solid enough to joke back or be unharmed by my poking. I think there fewer than a handful that I will banter with. Even then, I usually caveat everything.

 

[Totenkindly]

I think it has unconsciously affected me in some ways, both positive and negative. Sometimes I find myself patiently waiting for the point of a story after sitting through a bunch of irrelevant details, other times I can be almost rude in cutting someone off cause I know they won't shut up otherwise. I don't consciously think at these times, "oh she's an S" or "he's an E".

Sometimes I do, sometimes I don't.

I think my perceptions come more as an immediate and overall awareness of the person and how they are functioning (I "recognize" them and the behavior patterns attached to them); but in order to think about it and double-confirm the intuition, my mind immediately breaks things down into the separate functions.

And sometimes I will work consciously from there (e.g., "They're very S, they would find [this topic/angle] boring, but would really seemingly enjoy [this other angle], so go there instead.")

 

[proteanmix]

I met a woman who had been mistyped. She'd operated for some time under the assumption that she was one type. She took the MBTI and went through self-verification as a whole different type (NJ stayed the same, nothing else). When she got the MBTI results back (different than expected), she was shattered, blown completely out of the water. I'm not understating the impact this information had on her. She and I had several discussions about her experience and, from what I could see, her "new" type was her best-fit type.

This is a very interesting situation. I wonder how much of my identity has become bound in "I'm an ENFJ." People say that they have stayed the same person since finding out their type, but I can honestly say I've changed. I think certain aspects of my personality have been amplified since finding out about MBTI and I sometimes feel internal pressure to act more like an ENFJ than what I did before I knew my type.

While I think most of these changes have been beneficial some of them I don't particularly like. This isn't the best example, but I used to be more snarky towards people and say what I really thought more often. Of course I had more people disliking me then (not that many ), but I miss that about myself. Now I'm more likely to keep criticism to myself and feel more obligated to protect other people's feelings even if it would be beneficial to myself or the other person. This is a direct result of finding out my type and how an ENFJ is supposed to act.

As far as how I respond to others, I often find myself wondering what type someone else is. I've found MBTI more useful for self-examination and less so with other people. My INTP brother is a perfect example of this. He's very well liked, not scientifically inclined, funny, outgoing, very much into his appearance (has more products than me), likes to go out, and other non-INTP tendencies. If he ever got around a bunch of INTPs I'm sure his type would be questioned. But I have no doubt that he's an INTP and he says the INTP profile fits him. Another example is that S/N tends to bell curve, I don't think that when I'm talking to others about abstract (whatever that means) topics that they don't understand what I'm saying on that I don't understand them.

MBTI gives me the barest insight to people, I'm more likely to rely on what kind of experiences and interactions I've had and go from there. It works for me so I'll stick to it.

 

[RDF]

I'm not sure.

I think it has unconsciously affected me in some ways, both positive and negative. Sometimes I find myself patiently waiting for the point of a story after sitting through a bunch of irrelevant details, other times I can be almost rude in cutting someone off cause I know they won't shut up otherwise.

I don't consciously think at these times, "oh she's an S" or "he's an E".

Maybe one could say that MBTI has given you some general added insight and confidence about social interactions, to the point where you feel comfortable taking a more active role in conversations (steering them, setting your own pace for them, etc.)

Just guessing.

In my own case, my 7 years in the military (and interacting with people almost 24/7 during that time) had given me enough experience even before learning about MBTI to make those kinds of personal judgments in conversations. IOW, even prior to MBTI I used to think, "This guy is giving me too much blow-by-blow; I'm going to jump in and speed things up." Or I would think, "This guy is moving slow, but I'm going to wait and give him room to develop his point at his own pace."

With respect to those kinds of direct social interactions, learning about MBTI didn't really change anything for me. MBTI mainly just systematized and explained a lot of things that I had already figured out or noticed previously by myself through experience anyway.

Also, particularly for other people who learn about MBTI at a very young age, changes attributed to knowledge of MBTI might really just be normal personal growth and maturity that would have occurred anyway. MBTI perhaps just helps systematize things a bit.

Again, just guessing.

FL

 

[ptgatsby]

As a few have said, when trying to work out my type, it is important to me that I get it right... but I don't really care what 'right' is. I'm quite open to being any type. If I was really worried what type of person I was, I'd want a little more choice than 16 types! That, and I'm not comfortable being put in a box - not only does it not sit well with me, but I believe we are all a bit more complicated than that.

For the most part, I see personality as a gradient. I'll rank higher or lower than the other person and that's what I use for relationships. I started with stronger type views I have now... but either way, I didn't buy into the functional view. As a result, I don't see a huge difference between types, or the type casting, or the functional typecasting. I'm more interested in drawing theory from people than applying a theory to people... which means I rarely care to stick people into a box, to limit my thinking along type lines. I apply the same view to myself, giving me my answer... Nope, don't care.

 

[typologyenthusiast]

Yes. Type is important for self identification to tell me more about myself even something i didn't know previously, my psychological aptitude. A pragmatic use of type knowledge will be direction of a choice of job, a choice of education major.

 

[Kingu Kurimuzon]

No, it’s not. I used to think it was important.

I’ve become bored with type theory. Knowing my type doesn’t seem to really benefit me in any way. It just makes things worse

 

[Pionart]

Well, humanity went up until recently without knowing, so it can't be that important.

But with correct knowledge of type it opens up certain approaches to self-development that would otherwise be obscure.