Who Am I Again?

For kicks, I am asking my students to take an abbreviated form of the Meyers-Briggs personality inventory.  It’s supposed to sort of tell you who you are.  Online it’s possible to find a number of sites that offer the profile, but too many of them cost money.  I found one for my students to use that doesn’t charge.  So I ran through the inventory again myself and once again—for the nth time—I came out an INFP.  What is an INFP; well, here’s what they say:

The Portait of the Healer (INFP)

Healer Idealists are abstract in thought and speech, cooperative in striving for their ends, and investigative and attentive in their interpersonal relations. Healer present a seemingly tranquil, and noticiably pleasant face to the world, and though to all appearances they might seem reserved, and even shy, on the inside they are anything but reserved, having a capacity for caring not always found in other types. They care deeply-indeed, passionately-about a few special persons or a favorite cause, and their fervent aim is to bring peace and integrity to their loved ones and the world.

Healers have a profound sense of idealism derived from a strong personal morality, and they conceive of the world as an ethical, honorable place. Indeed, to understand Healers, we must understand their idealism as almost boundless and selfless, inspiring them to make extraordinary sacrifices for someone or something they believe in. The Healer is the Prince or Princess of fairytale, the King’s Champion or Defender of the Faith, like Sir Galahad or Joan of Arc. Healers are found in only 1 percent of the general population, although, at times, their idealism leaves them feeling even more isolated from the rest of humanity.

Healers seek unity in their lives, unity of body and mind, emotions and intellect, perhaps because they are likely to have a sense of inner division threaded through their lives, which comes from their often unhappy childhood. Healers live a fantasy-filled childhood, which, unfortunately, is discouraged or even punished by many parents. In a practical-minded family, required by their parents to be sociable and industrious in concrete ways, and also given down-to-earth siblings who conform to these parental expectations, Healers come to see themselves as ugly ducklings. Other types usually shrug off parental expectations that do not fit them, but not the Healers. Wishing to please their parents and siblings, but not knowing quite how to do it, they try to hide their differences, believing they are bad to be so fanciful, so unlike their more solid brothers and sisters. They wonder, some of them for the rest of their lives, whether they are OK. They are quite OK, just different from the rest of their family-swans reared in a family of ducks. Even so, to realize and really believe this is not easy for them. Deeply committed to the positive and the good, yet taught to believe there is evil in them, Healers can come to develop a certain fascination with the problem of good and evil, sacred and profane. Healers are drawn toward purity, but can become engrossed with the profane, continuously on the lookout for the wickedness that lurks within them. Then, when Healers believe thay have yielded to an impure temptation, they may be given to acts of self-sacrifice in atonement. Others seldom detect this inner turmoil, however, for the struggle between good and evil is within the Healer, who does not feel compelled to make the issue public.

Fortunately or unfortunately, I do think this captures, in its particular and peculiar language, some aspects of me.  Although I am a bit repelled at the idea that I have something in common with Joan of Arc.

The free online site may be accessed by clicking here.  It doesn’t take long.  Read carefully enough to understand the question but try not to think at all about the answer.

If you do run through the inventory, let me know what kind of person it says you are and if you agree or not.  Or if you think the whole thing is just bunk.

It would be cool to know who we are, especially us Tingles, since we seem a particular clan.

Again for the free online site click here. 

12 Replies to “Who Am I Again?”

  1. My type was ESFJ, “The provider.” This seems to be fairly accurate. interesting…job description: manager, public admin. etc.

  2. healer – you kill me!
    not that you are not a healer but that your students view you that way,
    you have something in common with Joan Of Arc….
    sort of like the cigs are your pattern for
    self-sacrifice in atonement

  3. healer – you kill me!
    not that you are not a healer but that your students view you that way,
    you have something in common with Joan Of Arc….
    sort of like the cigs are your pattern for
    self-sacrifice in atonement

  4. Everytime I’ve taken it I’ve been INTP (“the thinker” or “Architect”); except for once I was a tie with INFP. Introverted iNtuitive Thinking Perceiving. The first time I took the test was in my 11th grade high school writing class. The last time was when I was working for UCSD.

  5. More detail here for me:
    ISFJ
    Introverted 67% (distinctively)
    Sensing 12% (slightly)
    Feeling 38% (moderately)
    Judging 11% (slightly)

  6. Me again. I forgot to type it all:
    ISFJ
    Introverted 67% (distinctively)
    Sensing 12% (slightly)
    Feeling 38% (moderately)
    Judging 11% (slightly)
    “The Protector Guardian”
    There. I got it all in this time. 🙂

  7. Hmmm, I had to take the test over to get my numbers….I didn’t write them down the first time….I’m still ISTJ, as follows:Introverted 78, sensing 12, T is 38…what was “T”…oh, thinking I guess, and judging was a 56.

  8. I am a ENFJ “Teacher Idealist”
    Extraverted 33%
    Intuitive 50%
    Feeling 50%
    Judging 33%
    Career suggestion… counsler, teacher, manger, physician…
    Not insurance agent?
    Sounded pretty accurate to me.

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