The Real Magic of The MBTI

Your personality type is just the beginning

Last year I was facing some quite dark days. Although I walked through this life for over three decades I still had no idea who I was.

And that exactly was my problem.

I was okay with not knowing my life's purpose. I thought I would find out automatically once I knew who I was.

Sometimes I envy squirrels. They know who they are and what they are made for. Tireless they collect nuts like crazy until the leaves fall down the trees. They never see collecting nuts as a burden and start every day with new joy. Nuts are what they are made for and they pretty damn know about it.

When I stumbled on the MBTI I got INFJ as a result. It gave me quite some insights about things I couldn't make sense of before. One of these was the Introverted Intuition.

However, I was surprised to learn that INFJ door slam and INFJ stare are quite common things. Before I thought it was just something odd about me.

The first important lesson I got from the MBTI was that I am not alone. There are more weirdos like me out there. What a relief!

But then I discovered the cognitive functions. That's where the real magic started.

They explain how we work under the hood, the obscure part that is hidden. I learned about the INFJ functional stack and that I am a feeler first and a thinker second.

That was just another surprise. Before I was all in my head with almost no conscious access to my emotions. But it all made sense when I learned how I got it all in my head and what caused it. There is actually a name for this. It is called the Ni-Ti Loop. And it can be perfectly explained with the interplay of cognitive functions.

The deeper I dive into the cognitive functions the more amazed I am. The deeper you dive into it the more you leave the superficial surface level of the MBTI.

Sometimes I think we are all more similar and less individualistic than we think. So in a way, the cognitive functions explain quite some part of your operation system.

Of course, as a human being your personality is not cast in concrete. You can evolve and outgrow your form. However, the very core stays the same. At least that is what I believe.

Thanks to the cognitive function I have a far better idea of how my brain works, and what my strengths and weaknesses are.

A better word for weakness is blind spots.

Although there is a somewhat given functional stack for each personality type you still have access to all the other functions.

Of course, they will never become dominant in your life. Nevertheless, you can access and use them with a bit of training.

Coming back to my initial point…

Do I now know who I am?

I guess it is a lifelong journey to find out who I am and what I am capable of. However, the cognitive functions gave me a good understanding of how I tick inside. I got insights into the core of my operation system.

I understand myself much better than ever before. This point alone is such a big relief as it dissolved so many of my self-doubts and the ruminations that came with it.

Now I feel at peace with myself. Sure sometimes days are dark. But now that I have an idea how I function I also know how to get out of such days again.

That's what I call magic…