The Balanced INFJ

Let’s get straight into it. The balanced INFJ is not a victim of their circumstance. They are not merely a recipient of how others around them are feeling. Instead, they are able to recognise when someone else’s emotions are influencing them, and they can actively choose to do their own work. Here are some real life examples of how an unbalanced INFJ shows up:

They are easily triggered by outer world disruptions without the skills to regroup or re-centre themselves quickly. This relates to their inferior function, extroverted sensing, (the 3 year old part of you) being left in charge to deal with grown up problems, which they can’t possibly solve.
They are dependent on the tertiary function (their inferior decision making function) which for INFJs is introverted thinking, or accuracy (your 10 year old). But of course the irony here is that an unbalanced INFJ does not realise this, but simply thinks that they have the facts and that they are right. When the accuracy is unbalanced, it shows up stubborn and detached from emotions.
They have a ‘Broken record syndrome’ running in their heads, which makes them repeat past hurts, unhealthy patterns, feelings of emotional turmoil and over analyse past situations with an inability to move on either to themselves or to their circle of friends. This syndrome will wear the INFJ out and they are left feeling disempowered and out of control of their own lives. This is the dark side of your auxiliary process, extroverted feeling (your inner parent) which, at it’s worst, sets no boundaries to preserve itself, and in fact goes to the outside world to find “evidence” to support its case against you as a lovable person.
They suffer from constant procrastination and lack of self motivation even for things they really want, because the flow state, introverted intuition (your adult self) is “in the dark side” of choosing to get overwhelmed by minutia, rather than gently prioritising and slowly keeping going with what needs to be done.

By contrast, the balanced INFJ is on purpose, be that purpose their business, their family or their job. Their purpose allows their perspectives run wild, but the path is regulated by a highly developed harmony process, which naturally looks after their own inner children’s (10yo and 3yo) needs first and then the needs of the rest of the world. The mature INFJ has leant to balance their outer harmony tendencies with a strong inner harmony work, which allows them to explore their outerworld lives freely, knowing that they have a regular, recurring inner world retreat booked into their diary. But most importantly, the balanced INFJ does NOT make grown up decisions with their inner child processes (introverted thinking and extroverted sending), instead uses them to complete fun projects (the 10yo) and to have silly fun (the 3yo). This kind of balanced INFJ does not give their power away by fulfilling expectations from others that they, themselves, have anticipated in a child like “I need to read you and fulfil your needs so that I can feel safe” -kind of way. The balanced INFJ has the patience to wait to be asked to fulfil a need, and instead of jumping into action to fulfil that request, they assess how fulfilling the request will affect them. Once they are happy with the “price” they have to pay to fulfil the request, they will say yes only if the price is something they will happily pay.

A balanced INFJ thinks positively, acts with integrity and can advance themselves most of the time. They also realise that contrast and challenges in life are what’s needed in order to facilitate growth. Balanced INFJs seek out contrast because they know it will bring them to the next level.

Here’s what you can do right now to start balancing out your INFJness:

Recognise that we want other people to feel good, and that it deeply satisfies us to serve those important to us. Once you recognise this, you can realise that in order for you to really serve those people, we need to start this sense of service with ourselves, so that the service we offer to others is authentic and of true value.
Realise that your “people environment” affects your emotional environment and so that you don’t lose yourself and who you are to others’ emotions or drama, you book “perspectives time” (read alone time) to carry out your daily personal development work. Yes, daily. This daily work will immediately regenerate the sense of who you are and over time it will help you stay on course to your own authentic life, even when things get challenging.
Recognise the need for an inner sanctum from where we chose to serve others. Claim a space for yourself right now. This space is one where others know to respect your privacy and your right to be alone with your thoughts.
Topping up your emotional bank account with self parenting practices before the account ever gets withdrawn from (even if with your consent). We’re not saying to be selfish, but rather self caring. Make sure that you have adequate quality/quantity of deposits so that when you serve others, your emotional reservoirs are not overdrawn. An unhealthy INFJ can have some self care & boundary procedures in place but their helping is reactive in nature, instead of contemplated. If you don’t care for yourself, you will carry out a disservice for everyone, which at worst can lead to the threaded INFJ door slam.
The fastest path to being a balanced INFJ is daily self parenting. There are many ways of doing this, but if you are ready to really take it on, we suggest that you check out our INFx Unveiled course, which gives you clear and easy to use tools for a solid, practical foundation on your self parenting.

Not everyone wants to live a balanced life. Some of us want to continue being the victim of circumstance, because the endless drama makes them feel important in life. What they don’t realise is that there are more healthy ways of feeling important and truly serving people around you from a healthy space of open hearted giving. If you are ready to master your life, INFx Project is the right forum for you. If you still need drama to define you, we suggest that you find friends whom with you can suffer elsewhere. We are here to empower ourselves and the world. There will be no place for victimhood here.

Have you enjoyed this blog post? Sign up for our newsletter and receive our free recording “8 keys to maximising your personal development”.

If you’re Interested in learning more about Inner Parenting, take a look at The 4 People Within®

course.