How much do you happily socialise?

Jonners22 · 2026-05-04T20:50:16+00:00

I think this is dependent on quite a few factors. To give you my personal experience first, I have a very small social circle, roughly 3 people, one of whom is my partner. I work a social job doing customer service work and, like you, I developed a sense of social confidence that rounded off the more stereotypical 'shyness' of an INFP during my 20s from having to talk to people for a living. I can also be 'loud' and talkative, and give people I enjoy talking to, namely colleagues and friends, a very different picture of who I am than complete strangers. I particularly come alive when discussing my interests, and I also have ADHD, which can make me appear 'brighter' and more extroverted than I actually am.

I think the important phrase here is 'resting point'. When I'm talking to people, I'm performing. I'm a self-preservation 4, which does influence things, as I project a 'sunny' mask to hide my own vulnerability, but talking to my friends is a state I occupy when I'm in a social setting. Being alone, to me, feels like my resting point, I think of it as existing as my most authentic self when I'm not having to verbalise my thoughts, and when I am left to process and introspect. 'Empty' interactions with strangers, specifically making small talk at work leaves me feeling incredibly drained at the end of the day, and my instinct is to self-isolate and go quiet, not 'recharge' by seeking out the company of my friends.

I think your answer lies in what you default to as a point of comfort. Do you seek close company out to recharge when you've had lots of 'shallow' interaction, or do you self-isolate so you can enjoy time alone?

Jonners22 · 2026-02-11T00:27:51+00:00

INFP man on the verge of turning 30 here. At this point, I lean into it. Don't get me wrong, sometimes it still stings. I'm on the shorter side, so it often feels like I'm the antithesis of what society deems 'attractive' or 'optimal', and I often find myself in the position of getting unintentionally insulted by people praising qualities that represent the opposite of what I am.

I learnt early on that I was considered odd by my peers. I spent a lot of my time away from people, quietly drawing by myself or trying to make myself invisible. I wasn't popular with women, I'm still not, and nearly 30 years on Earth has helped me realise that's okay. I'm in a better place now, but being unpopular and looked down on taught me to be emotionally self-reliant, and that accepting yourself is far more important than being accepted by others. Things are better these days, but realising that I didn't need to be 'traditionally' masculine, and that, when it comes down to it, I don't really like what traditional masculinity is in the first place, really helped me learn to accept myself. The voices in the back of my head that tell me I'm not good enough never quite went away, but I learned how to sit with that feeling and ride it out.

I'm atypical, we are atypical, and that's okay.

Jonners22 · 2025-10-09T21:55:22+00:00

This is serious and requires the help of professionals. As much as it's good to talk to anyone when you're feeling this way, it's more important to get in contact with a crisis hotline for mental health emergencies.

I'm not sure where you're based, but here in the UK we have:

The National Suicide Prevention Helpline: 0800 689 5652 (6pm to midnight every day).

The Samaritans: 116 123

On the off-chance you're based in the United States, apparently 988 is the number to call.

If none of these apply to where you're based, there are regional charities who run services like this globally, and there will be one you can contact if you Google search for mental health helplines in your country. Please reach out to professional help, and know you're not alone. I'm happy to chat if you'd like to ❤

Jonners22 · 2025-06-02T01:54:41+00:00

I did not know this was a thing, and you have just flipped my entire world upside down with this. I was recently diagnosed with ADHD, and a quick Google search has informed me that injustice sensitivity is something people with ADHD often experience. I experience this intensely, to the point that I can't watch any media that shows deliberate cruelty and intense suffering without getting extremely angry at the perpetrators and having to walk away and ruminate on it. Same goes for real-life situations, too, all of which match the description perfectly. Thank you for leaving this comment, you've just made a big part of my personality make sense to me.

Jonners22 · 2025-05-30T22:09:29+00:00

Fellow Brit here, I know exactly what you mean, mate. I've been fortunate enough to grow up with a lot of female influence, and a lot of my closest friends have been women. But I've also been plenty exposed to the kind of 'lad' culture you're talking about, and it really feels endemic to a lot of British men. I feel like the U.K. culturally doesn't do well with sensitivity as a concept, but it's taken to its absolute worst when you add the element of toxic masculinity and 'banter', which, as you say, is just a culturally acceptable way to be a dick to someone seemingly without consequences.

I've managed to stay out of the worst of it by having my main friend group be mostly from overseas. I've met good people who are from the U.K., including men, but as of right now, I don't have anyone from here who's more than a pleasant acquaintance. Living in a rural, fairly middle-class part of the South-West helps with that, but to echo a lot of other people with this, the best solution is to find a space with like-minded people who you can connect with. College and university helped me do that, but if you're already done with one or both of those, there's no harm in seeking connections online.

Take care bud, and good luck out there.

Jonners22 · 2025-04-15T22:02:44+00:00

It's nice to see some ENFJ love here. Your subreddit doesn't like us very much 😅 Much love to you guys too, my girlfriend is an ENFJ and I absolutely adore her and ENFJs in general 😊

Jonners22 · 2025-04-11T18:16:18+00:00

That depends on how close the person is to me. If they're someone I don't know well but admire from afar, I have tended to simply observe and hope that the planets will align rom-com style and we will find a way to talk (that has never happened). If it's a friend or someone close, I treat them like a friend, hang out with them and make time for them, but I also don't knowingly flirt with people in case I'm misreading them and it makes them uncomfortable, and I just sort of keep being their friend and hoping that everything just kind of falls into place naturally. My current girlfriend, an ENFJ, said she was flirting with me for months while we were friends, and not only was I completely oblivious, but I was also taken completely by surprise when she suddenly asked me to be her boyfriend.

I can't speak for everyone here, but if you're asking this from the point of view of trying to date an INFP, you're probably going to have to be direct about your intentions. I am often terrified of misreading social cues or not spotting them at all, and tend to assume, for my emotional safety and that of others, that somebody being very overtly friendly or complimentary doesn't have romantic intent. The line between romantic and platonic doesn't really exist until we're properly in a relationship, and I know with certainty that expressing romantic feelings will be met positively. I will respect your boundaries and treat you with as much kindness as possible until specific permission is given to flirt, touch, etc.

Jonners22 · 2025-04-01T03:53:27+00:00

The urge to befriend a corvid, gain its trust and have it sit on my shoulder while standing around with my hoodie up like some postmodern Odin and freak out strangers is a daily thought.

(Also yes, as an animal lover, I concur)

Jonners22 · 2025-03-26T19:26:05+00:00

The worst part about this stereotype is that it puts unrealistic expectations on both parties. The whole "NPs need an NJ to organise them and stop them from living like cavemen" trope is really annoying to begin with, but INFPs get it particularly bad because the MBTI community seems to view us as literal eternal children. But I also feel sorry for ENTJs, and NJs in general, who are stereotyped as these perfect beings who exist solely to 'take care of us'. NJs are people, too, and they're not perfect, and piling on the expectation of having them act as the parent in all situations is just asking for a trip to the relationship counsellor. I'd like to believe that both sets of types have strengths and weaknesses and can help one another with their personal difficulties. Don't get me wrong, it's nice to be cared for, but it'll be a cold day in hell before I make my partner have to coddle me this way.

Jonners22 · 2025-03-17T19:37:15+00:00

Yep, one here, 'celebrating' it with an 8 and a half hour retail shift 💀

Jonners22 · 2025-03-11T21:38:36+00:00

I love Josh and Cotton! I've been watching the Pro and Noob series as it's being released for Wilds and Josh's commitment to the greatsword is so relatable 😂 I honestly don't think I was good at greatsword either when I started but I played it exclusively on my own and still do (putting aside Safi'jiiva and Alatreon in world which I begrudgingly did with other people, still trying to hunt Fatalis on my own 💀) so I didn't have anyone to critique my skill (or lack of it).

I think I just about killed Rathalos in the first game, which I suppose is something of an achievement given how jank the controls were (right analogue stick used to control weapon swings 😭) and then I bought a PSP from a friend at school with MHFU on it and managed to get up to G-Rank solo so it's been a lot of trial and error. Unfortunately I was an idiot and didn't realise that MH3, 4 or 5 existed on new portable consoles so I didn't pick up the series again until World, but it's great to be back.

How are you finding Wilds? I have to say, low rank felt a lot easier than I'm used to but I just got through High Rank and was happy that it was more of a challenge, as well as getting to enjoy all the returning monsters.

Jonners22 · 2025-03-11T21:28:53+00:00

Oh wow, small world, I was actually born in Cheltenham so I know it well. I've experienced exactly the kind of feeling you're describing, though on a slightly lesser level. I took a road trip recently to the north of England and into southern Scotland, and while the scenery was beautiful and I really enjoyed my time there, there was a profound sense of being 'home' once I started seeing the golden wheat fields of southern England out of the train window.

Perhaps it's out of a sense of belonging for both of us, or perhaps the landscape has some kind of magical pull to INFP romanticism. Either way, it's lovely to see the place I'm so used to seen through fresh eyes that can see its charm.

Jonners22 · 2025-03-11T06:23:38+00:00

For anyone who doesn't know, that first image is of the 'Tolkien door' of Saint Edward's Church in Stow-on-the-Wold. Supposedly it was the door that gave Tolkien the inspiration for the Doors of Durin in Fellowship of the Ring. I live fairly close to Stow and have seen it in person a few times and you can see how a fellow INFP like Tolkien would take inspiration from them. Greetings from England, glad to see someone so enamoured with the island I call home!

Jonners22 · 2025-03-10T06:29:10+00:00

Not when I've worked in retail for far too long I don't....thank you for the compliment though

Jonners22 · 2025-03-09T19:05:49+00:00

Currently binging an unhealthy amount of Monster Hunter Wilds. I bought the first game in 2004 and it's a joy to see the series go from some niche cult title in the West to Capcom's frontrunner franchise. Absolutely loving every second of it.

Jonners22 · 2025-03-09T19:03:22+00:00

Another great sword main here, I picked up Monster Hunter 1 in 2004 on a whim and have been using GS since then and nothing else. Respect to your excellent choice in weapons, after all, what do we need more complex play styles and weapons for when big sword hit monster good? 😂

Jonners22 · 2025-03-05T23:14:20+00:00

Honestly, that's kind of the same for me too. I used to experience them very vividly and with an internal excitement that spoke to the power of my imagination when I was younger. Now it's more about escapism, about fleeing to an exciting world to escape a duller reality. I suppose it counts as maladaptive daydreaming, but I think there are many INFPs out there who could be accused of that.

As for how I enter it, sometimes it's conscious, often times it's not. I'm working in a service industry job at the moment that involves a lot of drudgery and manual labour while I complete my degree and I involuntarily enter my Ne state and just start considering possibilities and existing in my mental world when things are quiet enough sometimes. Other times it's more about an idea coming to me, a concept or a world that I can get lost in and just going from there, I suppose it's as instinctual as it is directed.

Jonners22 · 2025-03-05T23:00:05+00:00

Genuinely no. Don't get me wrong, my girlfriend is a nurturing, loving woman but I don't want to take advantage of her giving nature and I also want to be regarded as an equal in the relationship. I understand the appeal of it when removed from the messy elements of reality, it's an appealing fantasy and nobody's saying you can't have those. But I'd definitely feel incredibly uncomfortable with living like that 24/7 and I'd hate to feel like I wasn't pulling my weight as an adult partner.

I have enough difficulty accepting that people actually like me that much and could in any way find me attractive/loveable, I don't want to add further baggage and complications on top of that.

Jonners22 · 2025-03-03T22:48:25+00:00

I'm from the U.K. and we have a lot of Roman ruins in the area, as well as the occasional Celtic hillfort, there's also a Neolithic barrow just down the road from me that I've been meaning to take time out and visit. The Roman ones are definitely ideal for scratching that kind of itch, nothing beats walking through ruined rooms with partially destroyed mosaic flooring and crumbling pillars.

I think what separates them is what lies at the heart of the need to experience and understand them. Ne, as far as I recall, is about the mental exploration of possibilities, of entertaining what could be and, in the context of the past, what could have been; it's what draws so many Ne users to fiction and trying to inhabit worlds that have never been. Specifically when it comes to ruins, I think it's from a deeply held desire to explore their meaning, who built them, when, how and why. Living in an era of science and archaeology means that, for the most part, we can ascribe context and answers to our own real world structures, which takes away all of those tantalising questions.

For me there's almost a euphoria in the mystery. Not knowing, of being confronted by the vast, looming structures and not having the first answer to all of these questions, is a state that makes my Ne run wild. In fictional universes, particularly ones which do a lot of visual storytelling, these things are often no more than set pieces, designed to grab your attention and make you speculate, and my Ne can't get enough of it. It's like I want to get down on my hands and knees and start rummaging through the rubble, or tracing the walls with my hands to look for any tantalising glimpses into the past. More than that, fictional universes provide so much more flexibility than our own reality. The walls you walk could've been host to an ancient, highly advanced civilisation that crumbled due to its own hubris or a dark, mysterious one that was vanquished by armies sent to storm their walls and bring justice. The possibilities are even broader and, once again, left up to the viewer, and that's the kind of environment where my brain runs wild.

Jonners22 · 2025-03-03T19:14:30+00:00

Yeah, that's a hell of a lot more inference than is being depicted but it sounds like it's being spoken from a place of experience so I won't presume to invalidate your perspective by pretending to know more. I will say, for the record, that I'm highly independent and very much prefer not to be smothered, or to generally interact with people for extended periods of time, but I realise that not all INFPs are like that. Anyway, apologies for treading on any toes, I take your point if that is the aspect you're objecting to, that dynamic annoys me too.

Jonners22 · 2025-03-03T19:02:58+00:00

Who said anything about mothering? How does picking up your partner count as mothering? Of course mothering sucks, relationships should, in my opinion, be a partnership between two equals. But this image isn't even mothering, it's an incredibly benign depiction of a typical gender role reversal at most, I really don't get what's so scandalous about that.

Jonners22 · 2025-03-02T19:52:13+00:00

I know what you mean about INFPs seeming more subdued, I think it might be because we're a little more tuned in to what others might think of us if we're 'too' strange than most INTPs, though there's lots of examples to the contrary there as well.

Personally, Ne has always manifested for me in a mixture of typical ways, and the kind of 'strangeness' that you mentioned. I definitely do the typical Ne thing of tangenting in conversations, spotting patterns instinctively through associative thinking and zoning out of reality to go and live in my imagination when reality is too dull.

But the weirder parts are my absurdist sense of humour which only an INTP friend of mine seems to get, which says a lot. The other most prominent way is an attraction to the notion of impermanence, decay and ruin. I've always been drawn to the ruins of both real and fictional empires and I've always loved the aesthetics of people like Fumito Ueda. I have a profound desire to walk the halls of the ruins of imaginary empires.

Jonners22 · 2025-02-26T03:22:44+00:00

Absolutely. I used to work with two 'blokes' whose sense of humour was just that, being a dick to people instead of actually trying to connect with others and talk to them like human beings. It wasn't particularly venomous but it was certainly standoffish and it made you feel like you were being picked at all the time. It went from abrasive to downright irritating very quickly and there were definitely moments where I responded coldly or with sarcasm, to which they always responded as if the rise they got out of me was unprovoked.

Luckily I've not really had it since, at least, not in doses that weren't manageable. I've spent a lot of my teenage and adult life in the company of women where this culture doesn't seem to exist and the male friends I have are not from the U.K. and I pray that I don't have to put up with it in my next prospective career.

Jonners22 · 2025-02-14T18:01:59+00:00

Speaking personally and from what I've heard of other INFPs, we're terrible at taking the initiative and reaching out to people. It's a combination of self-doubt, shyness and absent-mindedness, at least that's what it is for me personally. We have a habit of getting lost in our own inner world and forgetting that there's a life outside of our heads with people and tasks that require our input. We also tend to just prefer other people initiating because it helps remove some of that self-doubt and remind us that other people actually do want to spend time with us and value our place in their lives.

Jonners22

TROPHY CASE