Balanced INFP

What is a balanced INFP and why should we aim to become one? Did you ever meet another INFP and think “my gosh, I’m so glad I’m no longer at that place of insecurity and destructive story”? This is a common occurrence to a mature, balanced INFP. To reflect back into their own past and really identify with their type brothers’ and sisters’ struggle to find their own place in the world brings back memories of how much anxiety they used to feel. And the struggle was real. Most balanced INFPs report back their memories of holding other people accountable for how they were feeling and being easily offended. It was exhausting. A client of ours, Adele, was reminiscing: “I can’t believe how much I used to blame others for how I was feeling. It was always someone else’s “fault” when I wasn’t following through with my commitments. It was like others had the power to determine what I was going to achieve any given day and how trapped I felt in my life, unable to make a decision. The worst thing about it was the emotional nature of literally EVERYTHING. The almost obsessive checking in with how I was feeling about things made me disconnected from the people around me and induced a whole different reality from how they were seeing it. This discrepancy in realities caused me a huge amount of anxiety and left me exhausted for days. And the anxiety didn’t stop there. It was increased by me trying to control my surroundings, not to mention new situations! They were the worst. And when it all got too much to handle, I would become shut down and self absorbed, and often ended up slipping into depression. It was a very volatile time for me. It was really hard to keep a brave face when I was struggling. I was unable to ask for help, as I always prided myself for being so independent in my personal development. I was just not able to balance things out between my inner and my outer world, and I was often called selfish and even aggressive by those close to me. And even though at first I was shocked by those statements, I had to accept them as the evidence was staring me in the face -separate parties of people who were not in any way related to one another would give me the same feedback. I just had to own up and look at my level of maturity.”

These kinds of struggles are not foreign to INFPs who are on their personal development journey. Most balanced and successful INFPs report that the #1 reason why they succeed in life is because they abandon the idea that they already know most things. These men and women often report that they had confused “knowing how things make them feel inside” to “how things actually were in the real world”, and as long as those two were not congruent, they had a hard time bridging the gap. But this gap can indeed be bridged. It can be done by balancing out the different cognitive functions of the INFP and learning to bring that introverted magic into the outside world.

Because INFPs have a strong internal compass that governs how they make decisions, what those decisions are based on can usually not be easily articulated in words beyond ‘it just feels right’. A balanced INFP learns to translate their inner compass, they can become extraordinary speakers, leaders and artists, and transform the face of earth as we know it.

Balanced INFPs have a candid ability to directly influence others emotions because they have an intimate understanding of feelings deep within themselves and can transfer these feelings to those around them. This can make them a legendary coach or mentor.

All and all, a balanced INFP loves connecting deeply with others without becoming someone else’s decision maker. When these talented, creative and artistic individuals mature even further, they usually find some way of expressing this in their lives to be truly happy and fulfilled, every single day. Adele gladly confirms what we wrote here, she says: “Of course, as an authenticity personality type, the ultimate happiness becomes from feeling sovereign and fully in charge of our own lives. This begins with knowing that only we are responsible for our own emotions, which usually results in us becoming a very centred and steady individual. When we own our own lives fully, we become focused on our mission, can be very industrious in getting the job done. We explore the world around us testing new situations to see how we feel about things, and then use this data to influence our future decisions. When we truly settle into ourselves, we use habits based on past tried and true experiences, and create more flow and ease in our lives. This will help us engineer situations to test how they feel on a small scale so we can go bigger and better each time we try - checking in with ourselves intermittently to make sure the outcome is aligned with our deep core values. This tends to inspire others to go for their passion and focus on their own life’s purpose and missions. Needless to say living a purposeful life is important to us, and if we can serve our community in a meaningful way, we feel that our lives have been meaningful. I know I might be a bit biased, but I think we are the best type to help nations mature through our own mature expressions. Your self parenting exercises have been the key for me in balancing myself into this maturity and I will always be grateful.”

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