Type spotting & why it's so tricky
Hello, everyone!
If you've been around the MBTI block, you know that typing can be hard, full of guess work, and be downright confusing. Have you noticed that cognitive functions can throw off someone's perception of an overall type depending on which ones they're paired with? Or two types that you'd never think could be confused can make you double-take if they happen to share some functions or are the shadow/mirror image of each other?
For example, I've been noticing that Fe/Si (Extroverted Feeling/Introverted Sensing) can seem a lot like Fi/Se (Introverted Feeling/Extroverted Sensing) in certain ways. Depending on our own type, that can also color how we see the cognitive functions showing up in others because it subconsciously looks familiar/foreign to us, so we're more likely to lean towards or away from certain conclusions more than others. It can make your brain hurt sometimes, but it's fascinating to see the deeper details of how this all works together, isn't it?
I personally believe it's impossible to know for sure 100% what someone else's type is, and unless you're the author who wrote a character with a certain type in mind, typing fictional characters will always be speculation. People can mistype themselves & others for all kinds of reasons:
lack of knowledge
stereotyping
misattribution of a cause
lack of data
personal bias
fictional vs. real
Everyone is unique, humans are complex, and there's always more hiding under the surface than meets the eye. I'll be sharing some resources that I think do an excellent job of explaining these blind spots while also going into the differences of the intorverted/extroverted versions of the cognitive functions: intuition, sensing, feeling, thinking, judging & perceiving.
I love MXTX and talking about what we love/admire/wonder about these complex characters--MBTI is just my vehicle to open that conversation. I've been thinking over the last week about how to approach this blog & how to better format it for talking openly about the possibilities of a typing & how these characters might be operating under the surface, so I might be changing my first few posts while also leaving some open questions for you all & sharing some other resources to help us talk about the cognitive functions & how they work.
(For example, a future post might be: Wei Wuxian: Introverted Sensor or Extroverted Sensor? or Luo Binghe: Introverted Feeler or Extroverted Feeler? I'd then go and find examples for both options & have you guys guess which one you think is more likely)
I'm always open to the possibilities, so let's explore them together! :)












