SUBMITTED by lover-of-grey-matters
Note 1: This is how I experience my Ni; it does not have to fit to everyone’s. Ni is an introverted function and thus, subjective.
Note 2: My description of Ni is going to be a little vague. I think dominant functions are the hardest to describe for anyone, it’s like the air - you are so used to breathing that you forget it exists and find it hard to make note of it.
How Ni works: The myth is that Ni just ‘knows things without knowing’ and ‘is always right/precise.’ This is not true. Ni has a very solid base for the projections it conjures – the objective, wide-breadth extroverted sensing. Se collects every information indiscriminately and in volumes. Then Ni filters the data into projections/patterns.
I have previously compared Ni to a high-throughput chromatography machine – input a myriad of molecules with the cell extracts, and it will output the molecules you only need. The point is, Ni is not magical. It establishes patterns from a given dataset. High Ni users are less aware of the data collection process and thus can’t always trace the pattern back to the data, making it look like a ‘gut feeling.’ Furthermore, the part that the high Ni users are conscious about, the Ni itself – it too is abstract and subjective and hence, can be hard to verbalize. This further adds to Ni’s mystique.
So once again, to the people who do not understand how chromatography works, the machine may seem phenomenal. But that does not make the machine itself mysterious. It operates on a very simple principle, it just appears mysterious.
Ni and doing things: Extroverts have an extroverted function as dominant, which means they are quick to act and take charge (particularly Te and Se in my experience). People with a dominant introverted function need to step back and consult their dominant function first before engaging with the external world. This can be consulting whether it aligns with their internal values (Fi), or dissecting the whole deal piece by piece to understand all of its constituents (Ti), or accessing own personal sensory library for information (Si).
Ni-doms will go inwards first, except they won’t be seen actively doing something. They just sort of incubate for a while, then start doing it and they usually do it to perfection. Once again, it looks mystical, but it is not. During the incubation phase, our mind warms up and projects patterns, then taps all of those patterns for the best possible outcome and selects it to unravel a long-term plan. Once we start working, we act on the plan, which is very tangible to us. We can visualize the end from the projection our Ni has made and we simply continue to walk forward to it. It looks like the incubation phase does not have any ‘productive’ output, but for Ni-doms, to sit on something without doing anything is not important, it’s crucial.
For example, say I have something to write, maybe the literature review part of my thesis, or maybe just a post for this blog. For a while, I won’t do anything. I will trifle with some things and that’s it. But the ideas will be there, just not in the foreground. It’s a bit like a background music, it’s there and it sets the stage for the plot to follow. Then I will write something at one stretch, and it won’t need any editing or proofreading.
Because the Se-Ni thing is subconscious, I think Ni-doms rely a lot on their dreams and visions. I have countless times went to sleep thinking about a problem and woke up with a solution. And I am not alone, my brother is a tert-Ni and Ti-dom. He often wakes up with a new game plan for chess or a solutions to the math problem he had been pressing.
Ni and symbolism/puzzle: Ni-doms don’t always talk in symbolic languages. Actually I think it’s a bit hard for us, given how ‘personal’ our symbolism is, we find it hard to explain. Neither do I love puzzles very much. The symbolism is part of our worldview, not our expression. An example of this is the book Memoirs of a Geisha. Sayuri’s worldview is Ni, the water imagery with herself and such. She is not trying to express things through metaphors and similes, she things of the world in terms of those symbols. This is the same for me. I think of things is terms of what they represent. But unlike an Si user, there’s no sensory trapping to them.
Ni and perception: changing our worldview is hard for us. It’s not impossible, it’s just 'costly.’ We have to go though a lot of questioning and re-questioning.
This is true for the perception bit obviously. When it comes to our verdicts or judgments, we are more flexible.
Elizabeth Bennet (ENFP) has hard judgments, but her perceptions can change very quickly. The process in opposite for an Ni-dom. Again, Sayuri’s worldview/manner of perception is hard to change – she goes through war and poverty and settles in America and still has the same worldview she did back in Gion. However, her judgment about any people (like Nobu-san, Mameha) is very flexible and open-to-change.
Ni myths: Ni is not perfection, just a manner of perception. Being Ni-dom does not make you smart/creative/wise/interesting/deep by default. Ni-doms can by dumb and boring if they don’t channel their functional stack to usefulness, which is true for every other functions. They canbe delusional if they lack Se input. An example of shallow Ni-dom with countless mistaken interpretation is Melisandre from A Song of Ice and Fire.
That’s what I think of my Ni, and it does not have to universally true. I would love if someones adds to it.
Mod Note: Anal editor coming out in me, but even Ni-dom writers need proof-readers and editors. You ain’t perfect. ;)
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