As an extraverted feeling type, you may enjoy exploring the values and feelings of other people. You are curious about how other people think and see the world. And you like to discuss values in depth with other people. You like to process and reflect on what other people tell you. But people sometimes wonder if an extraverted feeling type lacks an ego – can you have a sense of identity if you’re an ENFJ or ESFJ? Turns out, yes.
In contrast, as an introverted and feeling type, will find that you prefer the actions you take as an individual to represent your values and your opinions. What do I do about my feelings and values? How do I represent my opinions and beliefs? The introverted feeling type is focused on actions produced by their subjective viewpoints. And the two characteristics are so different in this regard. The introverted and feeling types are concerned with their own viewpoints and how they represent their own feelings to the world.
The extraverted and feeling type pays more regard to how other people make them feel and what that makes them think. One of these feeling types sees themselves as acting in relation to the world around them. They are making decisions based on this environment. The other sees themselves as behaving in accordance with their sense of character and their own identity. And this brings up a question of ego: Is the extraverted types ego derived from the outer world? Some theories paint the picture of the extraverted and feeling type as lacking in ego and in personal identity. So are the decisions made by an extraverted feeling type purely based on what other people think and value? No.
Gaining an ego as an extraverted feeling type
It is true that other people play a key influence on how the extravert thinks and feels, but not always in a way that makes them more receptive to manipulation or social control. The extraverted feeling type has a maturing process in which their processed experiences gives them an ever increasing sense of personal identity. As an extravert, your ego is found in what you think and feel about what you see and experience. What do you decide to feel and think based on what you hear and see in other people?
Gradually, the extraverted feeling type gains a heightened awareness of their perception of other people. The processing of what they see is the extraverted feeling types own. What they decide that they want to do in retaliation to their environment. How they choose to respond, that is up to the extraverted feeling type, and their ego. This means extraverted feeling types will have a lot of opinions about what is appropriate. What is good, and what is right. But the way the extraverted feeling type discovers their ego comes from observing and listening to the people around them.
The extraverted feeling gets to know themselves and who they are by interacting with and finding a place for themselves in the community, and in the decisions they make representing that identity. What kind of person are you when you are faced with conflict? What kind of leader are you? And what kind of friend will you be? That is up to you, as an extraverted feeling type.
Extraverted feeling types
- See if other people feel the same way they do
- Ask other people what they feel to get a better idea of what they feel in retaliation to that
- Enjoy discussing their values and perspectives with other people
- Want to have harmony between what they see and what they feel in relation to it
- Ground their values in what they can see, touch, and observe with their five senses
