The INFJ Personality type has been destroyed by the online culture surrounding it. With a majority of people all identifying with the rarest type, there are now countless articles and videos about the INFJ personality type, all arguing different things about what it means to be an INFJ. INFJs have been granted superhuman abilities in the world of the MBTI.

There is now a mist of mystery shrouding the INFJ. If INFJs really are everything at the same time, then we are nothing, at the same time. INFJs miss out on the chance to really understand themselves, as articles grabbing at them with clickbait titles, and descriptions written in the forer effect, take away from any real introspection and chance to learn about and discover yourself. We can’t get our story straight on what INFJs are, so suddenly, INFJs are everything, all at the same time.

The Problem With The Online Culture Surrounding INFJs

Articles online paint a very disturbing image of what INFJs are. First, we have a large community of spiritual people, mediums, all clinging to the INFJ description. INFJs are said to be people with psychic powers. This is a misconception. I don’t believe psychic powers are real – and if they are, they are not native to INFJs alone.

Secondly, we have a large community of people who have suffered trauma at home, people who have felt misunderstood, people who come out of deep anxiety and tragic events. All cling to the INFJ description as a comfort blanket, but any type can experience trauma.

Now, we get articles from people stating that all INFJs have had difficult childhoods, or that all INFJs attract narcissists, or that you were treated badly growing up because you were an INFJ. But that’s just not true at all. When people say INFJs will never be understood, or that INFJs are constantly used by others, that suggests some deeply unhealthy things about the personality type. We are somehow superhuman Jesus Gandhi Buddha Superstars, but at the same time, so crippled and emotionally damaged, that we can barely function. When I think of true INFJs, I look to people like Frank James, David Badurina, Joseph Gordon Levitt, Aurora, and many of the beautiful creators across the world. The INFJ is not some kind of spiritual-political-intellectual superclass. We are creatives!

Thirdly, we have the Forer effect. Online articles succeed in:

Claiming that INFJs are the most extroverted of all introverts, yet at the same time, the most secluded, lonely, and sheltered of all personality types.

Claiming that INFJs are the most logical of all personality types, more logical than even Thinking types.

Proposing that INFJs are the most deeply feeling of all personality types, as they somehow possess a unique empathy that no other personality type has(?)

Claiming that INFJs are the most cold and analytic – that we have no personal feelings and that we merely address other people’s feelings and that we do so in a purely rational way.

We should all be able to notice the contradictions of these statements, but the cotton sugar effect of reading these kind of things is highly addictive. We crave the sugar and ofcourse, anyone who reads articles like this will want to identify as an INFJ.

It’s time we change the script

I want people to start getting their own definitions straight. Stop describing universally human things as being unique to the INFJ personality type. Stop trying to paint the INFJ as some kind of superhuman Hitler Messiah Obama Savior Jesus figure, here to guide humanity to the next stage in human evolution, or burn everything down if that doesn’t work.

Stop pretending that being an INFJ is some kind of mental illness, when it is a completely normal, but unique way of functioning, just as there are other personality types, and normal, healthy ways of functioning.

Most of us INFJs are just normal human beings. We lose ourselves in our creative process. We love ideas. We spend most of our time in our own world, puzzling out mysteries and trying to understand the universe. We are introverted, and we are intuitive, and we are secondarily feeling, and we are judging personality types.

We have Introverted iNtuition as our dominant process, and so, we are Creators first and foremost. We can act or do whatever we like, just as any personality type, we have no limits, just preferences. We love the art of creating and can spend years working on ideas in our head, while forgetting about practical matters. We suffer in the system, as we try to make room for our creativity, but have to work to put food on the table. Or we go hungry, as we commit fully to our intellectual process, but struggle to scrape by. We feel boredom and pain as we adjust to corporate life, and can struggle to prioritise friends and family as we work to better ourselves, so that we can bring our ideas to fruition.

We are beautiful and flawed people just like anyone else. We are capable of empathy, but also of causing pain and harm. While we create, we can forget about our loved ones and about caring for ourselves and our own needs. We can be self-absorbed, and sometimes, we can forget to take care of our own needs. We are not defined by the fact that we are rare, that’s just an United States based statistic and has no bearing on how understood or misunderstood we are.

Why INFJs Are The Most Misunderstood

Because people have gotten the idea that INFJs are somehow better human beings, or that Introverted iNtuition is somehow a better cognitive function.

Because people are making money writing articles about INFJs, and get more clicks when they write these articles in a general sense, so that anyone can identify with the type, and that everyone will identify with it.

By the way, my website is completely ad-free and I provide this resource to help people better understand the personality type. I’m primarily interested in supporting creative types and people who want to understand themselves better.

I just want people to understand the INFJ in a full and complete sense, without stereotypes. I don’t want to start a war against mistyped INFJs. I think they have been just as hurt by the stereotypes as real INFJs have.

Like I said, we are missing out on the chance to truly understand ourselves as we have to spend hours getting past all the fluff and misconceptions we encounter online. And the goal of personality psychology should be to understand yourself, right? Not just to read something nice and reassuring and comforting.