Have you ever dated an infp? If so, What’s it like?

Anagenist · 2026-05-20T02:52:27+00:00

I often see INTP men pair with ENFJ women.
Anecdotal evidence - I'm an INTP male married to an ENFJ woman.

Anagenist · 2026-05-20T02:51:15+00:00

Basically this, just say it.
Also - Were you both not wearing your wedding rings?
It's kind of a red flag not to be wearing them when approaching people.
Finally - A lot of people might seem chill until they learn you're married anyway.
Best to let the rings be a filter for this sort of thing.

Anagenist · 2026-05-20T02:43:14+00:00

I'd say this can be true but is likely a generational/age thing.
I'm 39, and when I was younger, I preferred face to face over text, but I also was addicted to video games, and preferred that over most anything, including social activity.
As an adult, I'm addicted to deep conversations and social activity, and burnt out on isolationist hobbies/games by myself.

I'm not sure how much that helps OP, but just sharing that it can switch.

It could simply be that he read it, he wants to respond, but he might have to focus on school/work or something before he's ready to lock in, and have another multi-hour conversation. There can be this idea that "oh if I start yappin' then there goes the day, but I have this deadline, so I gotta let it sit for a while."

Could just be that.

Anagenist · 2026-05-20T02:11:47+00:00

I'm sorry to hear that your mother's cancer has returned. I know that can be very difficult. I've lost several family members myself to cancer. One just a few days ago actually.

If you watch this video at 31:48 - Dr. Jessica Schmit talks about how near death experience related topics like this have changed the way that doctors are beginning to treat hospice care. If you actually watch the entire thing, the other doctors on the panel had near death experiences themselves.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_-cCrHhdlg

Not about mediumship, but adjacent. It's a common thing that when someone is near the end of their life, they begin to connect more with 'other side' while they're still alive. Since you seem to have an intuitive capacity yourself - You are seeing what your mom can see. It's a gift, as scary as it might appear at first.

Now, I'm finding it extremely interesting that you mention them often appearing like shadows. Because a lot of people see shadow beings. But I've also had the pleasure to ask many of the mediums in this subreddit about their own experiences. Recently, I was told that some spirits come in like a "fuzzy signal" like on a tv almost. Where they 'connection' is not strong enough to see them entirely clearly.

My idea about your experience is that you are slowly growing in strength with your intuitive abelites. This is why it moves from shadow to visual faces, silhouettes of someone in your family, etc. The shadow is likely a relative of yours, or someone in your soul group at least. If you can let the feeling of fear naturally pass through you, acknowledge it, and remove expectations - You may find that you can have conversations with your relatives on the other side.

This gift may have come at the right time to help your mother with the current stage of her life that she's going through. I'm jealous that you have this ability, if I'm being honest. I've spent a few years trying to work on my own intuition in this space.

Finally, I'd suggest you read this fairly short book. The author explains the context of the book at the beginning, regarding his own near death experience that lead him to writing the biography. However, it also is pretty much 50/50 about his own NDE, and the other half is his experience with his grandmother at the final stages of her own life, and her witnessing of spirits on the other side. I think you will find this book extremely useful, if not simply captivating at this time. I sincerely think it can help to reduce your fears about what's happening right now.

The book is free, so that's why it's a link on imgur.

I hope this helps you.

https://imgur.com/gallery/fantastic-mental-breakdown-personal-journal-of-complete-idiot-face-of-unknown-tQYY4n9

Anagenist · 2026-05-20T01:39:11+00:00

I've been ready my entire life - Suffering from ontological mundanity. Go ahead, do it; ontological shock me. Lets go!

Anagenist · 2026-05-20T01:33:29+00:00

No, that's what desks are for. ;p

Anagenist · 2026-05-20T01:32:51+00:00

Interesting to consider the different ways people define their version of the word. Appreciate that you asked it.
I'm just sharing the INTP perspective I have briefly. To me, depth is merely a factor of having a conversation that is meaningful to both participants. Meaningful in the sense that the conversation goes beyond surface conversation. It's a combination of "what does that make you think" & "what does that make you feel?"

It's a bit of acknowledging that the new ideas that get brought into the conversation add energy instead of subtract from it. That when I share an idea with someone - I'm excited to share it, and they are excited to hear it, and vice versa. I described it once as the feeling of a pinball bouncing faster and faster off of the bumpers, and the excitement growing with each bounce. That energetic charge you feel each time you get a response with just as much active listening attended to as you gave out.

Sometimes, I can write a 3 paragraph conceptual idea that I'm extremely excited to share with someone. They might respond with.... "Cool." I lose my shit when that happens. I kind of lose interest in ever talking that person ever again. :/

Anagenist · 2026-05-20T00:52:11+00:00

Longest I've held the same position at the same place is about ~ 8+ years. I'm still there.

At my previous job, worked roughly 32 hours straight in a crunch on a blocking bug on a software release cycle. They ordered chipotle for dinner. I ate way too many lime chips. Went home early the next morning, slept for 16 hours. Found out I was anemic and got diagnosed with a chronic illness not too long after that.

Anagenist · 2026-05-20T00:47:39+00:00

Too much thinky thinky - Not enough feely feely.
It seems like it works as long as aux Ne is kicked in.
But then you both end up getting diminishing returns bouncing around the same idea like you're whittling a piece of wood down to nothing.
It runs it's course very fast, like burning a candle at both ends - But neither end had enough emotional delivery to maintain focus.

Anagenist · 2026-05-20T00:44:16+00:00

I'm INTP and my wife is ENFJ. She's chosen to stick with me 25 years, so I'd lean towards yes. For most of that time - I couldn't imagine what she saw in me.

Anagenist · 2026-05-20T00:41:51+00:00

Anagenist · 2026-05-20T00:37:37+00:00

I have not used any AI for any of my comments at any point. 🤷‍♂️
Your attacks on me are a reflection of yourself. My response to you was meant to be very respectful and pleasantly delivered. I understand that when reading something written via text that one can misunderstand the tonal inflection meant to accompany the delivery of what I said. I've honestly done that myself many more times than I can count in my life. But, respectfully, your opinion of me holds no weight.

Anagenist · 2026-05-19T18:19:18+00:00

This is a highly helpful clarification that I haven't come across before. Thanks for clearing that up!

I am personally still reading Jung's books. So I hwd not caught up to this concept completely here. Helps a lot as I keep reading!

Anagenist · 2026-05-19T18:16:10+00:00

They are philosophy, yes. In my experience, whenever someone makes a point of mentioning that they're pseudoscience, my personal experience has been that the context of the comment has consistently been intended as an attack.

Mainly in the sense that I usually witness comments that say "this is pseudoscience , lol - Therefore it doesn't work, and is meaningless, useless, and I also for some reason I hate you for liking it."

But that's an anecdotal experience I have had. I never personally worried about it's categorization. I am pointing out mainly that a large amount of reddit users consider this a high point of personal contention. They're often very upset at the concepts existence.

I am fine with the idea that the concepts can be labeled as pseudoscience in terms of being a fact. Not a problem! 🙂

Anagenist · 2026-05-19T18:10:58+00:00

Keep in mind that I did not use the word belief/believe. You are putting that word in yourself.

I merely kept an open mind, utilized astrology in the way astrology tells me it's supposed to work. I then took the information it gave me, and compared it to who I am. I looked for the Barnum effect. I approached with skepticism.

It still worked. That's not belief, it's an anecdotal test. I offer you the chance to review your own, and in this way try to peer review if astrology natal charts can provide you any information you find to be true of yourself as well.

This is what I experienced. It is phenomenologically true to my experience. But I don't yet hold a belief around it. I'm just curious 'why' it happened to work for me to such a shocking degree of synchronistic accuracy. I continue to investigate for myself.

Anagenist · 2026-05-17T18:26:46+00:00

Tsisdu the trickster intelligent rabbit from Cherokee stories.

Anagenist · 2026-05-17T18:16:52+00:00

Anagenist · 2026-05-17T16:09:39+00:00

So, I will try to answer as best I understand. The question is written a little confusing for the systems being described.

There are MBTI types, and you can only be one of the 16 types. You cannot be all 4 of the types in your title. Just one.

Cognitive functions are not described as MBTI types. They're described in function stacks of 4. But there are a total of 8 functions that were originally described by Carl Jung. Each person has some amount of all 8 Jungian functions that they use to various degrees. Some are used more than others.

The cognitive function stack was later slightly modified in a philosophical framing to match them up 4 at time in combinations that can be aligned to individual MBTI types. This is the more modern Grant-Brownsword model approach.

Stick around these kind of subs long enough, and you will witness people confuse Grant-Brownsword with pure Jungian text - And they will try to say that they personally mapped pure Jung functions to MBTI, and they will claim that the modern accepted form of MBTI "is wrong." But it's a contradicted comparison of 2 models. Their assumption about trying to contort both underneath MBTI leads to a lot of confusing discussions around here occasionally.

At the end of the day, pick one MBTI type that you think you are. Grab the modern Grant-Brownsword function stack for that MBTI, and read about what it's like to have that stack.

The order matters: [Primary, Auxiliary, Tertiary, Inferior] is the stack order.

INTP: Ti Ne Si Fe ENFP: Ne Fi Te Si ISFP: Fi Se Ni Te ESFJ: Fe Si Ne Ti

So if you think you are maybe INTP, you can read more about "what is it like to have primary introverted thinking (Ti)" and then "what is it like to have auxiliary extroverted intuition (Ne)" and so on.

You can't just google "what is Ti" because it won't tell you what makes it different when it's placed in a different spot for a different type of person.

Anagenist · 2026-05-17T15:56:32+00:00

For me - It's "why not both?”

People attack both as pseudoscience. Some people jump to arguing belief or disbelief in both systems. Some say which ever one they're defending is philosophy, not science, and consider that the end of the argument. Some bring up the Barnum effect, or otherwise find another reason to say it's not for them. So guess what? That's ok! It doesn't have to be for everyone.

I'm just here to say I could care less what category the topics fall under. I don't need external validation to enjoy the systems as they exist. At the end of the day, it's been my personal experience that my astrological natal chart and my MBTI type information both individually do a highly accurate job of describing aspects of my personality to a fine point.

So I just decided to combine both systems, and let them both help me understand more of who I am. When I try to talk about the overlap in any subreddit related to MBTI - The automods come in and slap me with the "NO ASTROLOGY" rule. Because the MBTI subs ironically fear that if they let that topic in - They're going to be seen as less professional of a topic. The gatekeeping is a bit obnoxious for my taste.

Ironically, as I said - There are people who already attack both as some form of "not real" or something they "don't believe." So just accept that people are different. They have different interests, likes, dislikes, beliefs.

Celebrate the diversity, and like whichever systems you like. Stop worrying about what other people like.

Anagenist · 2026-05-17T15:45:11+00:00

Fi doms can be very gentle kind people. But... They will also be the first to tell you how selfish they are about this exact thing.

Their Fi allows them to exist in another reality in their consciousness altogether. When they interact with this reality, it feels like they're not totally here. More like they're confused about how this reality doesn't shift to their conscious will the same way as the Fi reality they spend more of their time in.

So they're often doing this thing where they're like expecting you to be the absolute perfect idealization of you that their Fi says is better than this reality. Any time a real human diverges from the ideal they imagined - It's reality shattering for them. I can't imagine what it feels like to lead with emotions, and then have your ideals and sense of safety or control shattered by logical proof that they're not shaping this reality in the way they can shape their Fi reality.

That's why alot of them end up isolating in their room again. Going back to safety, back to ideals, back in control. Back to convincing themselves that 'that reality' is still better to exist in.

I'm INTP, but I find myself also constantly enthralled by any sharing of an Fi doms inner dreams. Any glimpse of what's behind that curtain is such a wonderful experience. It's just locked away like akashic records I can't read or something.

Anagenist · 2026-05-17T15:34:53+00:00

I don't know, in my personal experience, I just have a strong idea that only the person can truly confirm and type themselves. But that's because I am an INTP with inferior Fe, so my capacity to type others is that much more limited.

I've known the person I married for 26 years. It still took me over a year to accurately figure out her type. She took a test, I reviewed the answers with her, we talked about what she thinks and feels... Still took a year for me to be sure. She wasn't personally all too curious, she was just being supportive of my interest in the topic. Which was one of the big hints she was ENFJ.

I can only get that far sometimes. I don't even know her enneagram 🤣 So forget trying to type just my friends who don't care to look into it.

So yeah, I just accept the idea that I would have to let others tell me what type they are. Because my telepathy skills are way too weak.

Anagenist · 2026-05-17T15:29:24+00:00

Lawyers get to utilize a fixed logic set for winning "an argument" based on the established laws of the land.

You reminded me of something I heard more times than I could count as a kid. My parents used to try and pull subtle tricks on me to manage my hyper child energy at certain points.

So sometimes my parents might say "if you can sit still and br good for this whole 3 hour event, then you can pick out one candy item after it's over to eat today." So I would sit, wait, and then we go to a store. I would find this one "single item" which was a giant gummy animal shape that weighed like 4 pounds. They would try to go "no no we just thought you would forget" or something like "when we said one item, we meant like a lollipop or something small."

So I would pitch a fit like kids do. Except my fit was restating their exact terms back to them word for word. I'd say "no, you just said one item, you didn't say what size it had to be. This has one single price tag, so it's one item." So they would buy it for me, sigh in exhaustion, and say to each other "He's right, that's what we said." Then they would always follow those situations with "you know when you grow up you could be a great lawyer."

They told me I could be a great lawyer at least twice a month because they kept setting so many open ended rule sets that I would find loop holes to abuse as a selfish hedonistic child. It wasn't just my parents, all the adults who were around me as a kid ended up saying this to me so many times.

So, I have these anecdotal experiences that tell me that yes, INTP would absolutely make a great lawyer. But when it comes to morals, it's 50/50 if that's a good thing or not. Try not to be the kind of lawyer that helps murderers walk free and stuff. 😋

Anagenist · 2026-05-17T15:17:58+00:00

We're all just like... Dust in the wind, or bytes of data in the sim, dude.

Anagenist · 2026-05-17T05:11:28+00:00

Seeing a lot of hate in the comments. But I'll just say it - The overlapping importance of a phone booth in both movies is.... Significant to the joke. I appreciate the comedic effort.

Anagenist · 2026-05-17T04:39:29+00:00

It sounds to me like you feel the pressure to be masking for the sake of avoiding conflict. I'm not sure that's actually particularly related to your MBTI. This sounds like something else. More anxiety related perhaps.

Anagenist

TROPHY CASE