I've been digging through files of old paperwork on a research mission--completely separate from things that I'm actually supposed to be researching right now--and I'm finding myself being sidetracked by miscellaneous bits from my past.
A random booklet of papers grabbed my attention. It was my Myers-Briggs Type Indicator--taken for a job just over seven years ago. By a two point difference I was typed as an INFP instead of an INFJ. Introverted iNtuitive Feeling Perceiving. And for the first time ever I think a personality test actually got it right with me.
INFP: Full of enthusiasms and loyalties, but seldom tell of these until they know you well. Care about learning, ideas, language, and independent projects of their own. Tend to undertake too much, then somehow get it done. Friendly, but often too absorbed in what they are doing to be sociable. Little concerned with possessions or physical surroundings.
Interesting, isn't it, how that explanation sort of puts the first sentence of this post into perspective? I'm sure someone in my past, knowing what they know now, would have burdened me with an ADD label. Fortunately for my attention span and energy level my childhood was spent roaming the rocky hills and climbing mango trees in Mwanza, Tanzania with my faithful four-legged best friend Oblix the German Shepherd (he didn't climb the trees, just laid down at the base on guard duty) and not sitting in front of a television set.
Of course, once I started looking into the typecasting, I kept finding shiny stuff...other INFP's are/have been James Taylor, A.A. Milne, Amy Tan and Mary (you know, that Mary--though beats me how they got her to take the test). I'll take those for company. Fictional INFPs? Calvin, as in Calvin and Hobbes. Apparently it's genetic. I feel better already.
4 comments:
E.T. was on the list too...now that one makes sense :)
Wait... you're looking for famous people?
I'm an INFP/INFJ (depending upon when I take the test). I always loved those things - one of the only one (like you said) that seem pretty dang accurate.
And like the saying goes, as I get older I lean more towards Js... I guess I had to get thru P-ing. :)
Apparently only famous people make their types known...and now us. :D
Always sensed something special about you, ML! Guess I'm still in the p-ing phase of my life...
Ok, when you said Mary, that cracked me up!
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