Fun with letters!

Most of the time when I think about the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator personality test it’s about the F (feeling) and I (introverted) aspects of my ISFP personality. These letters are visible day-to-day and are often in conflict. For example, sometimes my F wants to go out and interact with people and their feelings, and my I wants to stay at home and introvert. The sparks that fly from these internal conflicts can be amazing to behold.

But another interesting letter is the S - or sensing – aspect. My friend and co-author Sherry uses a clever example to illuminate the conflict between that pair of letters:  the way to tell a sense-er from an intuit-er is to see how they cook up a new recipe. Some people follow the recipe item by item, while others use it as a guidebook and throw in whatever (the “routine vs. terror” scenario on page two of this article is classic S).

The recipe example doesn’t always fit. When you do something for a long time, you become more intuitive at it- someone with S tendencies who is also a professional chef will probably not need to follow a recipe. But it fits when experimenting with something new.

To be honest, I don’t cook much, so that experience is always new to me. When I do cook it’s a constant journey back and forth between the stove and the cookbook/internet recipe. I’ve had friends gather to watch me cook for their own entertainment.

According to Myers-Briggs, S’s are around 73 percent of the population – but all my close friends are intuitives. It’s a little stressful sometimes, because I need to have everything planned out, step by step, whether it’s a schedule or a building project, or I am lost. They just do stuff. “Want to go to the movies?” “Sure, what time?” “Who cares, let’s just go when we’re ready.”

It’s amusing even to me. Being an S can be pretty funny, and the greater your sensing tendencies, the funnier it is. Mopping and vacuuming are like mowing the yard – nice, even strokes along a specific pattern on the floor. The same pattern every time. Loads of clothes are washed in the same order every week, and usually on the same day. Sometimes I even make to-do lists that include “Make a new to-do list.”

The real downside of being an S that it can be scary to try new things. Once you’re comfortable with something, you can excel at it – but there’s a tendency to stay in your zone, to do things the same way every time.  You have to push to get past that - and sometimes it can be especially tough to put yourself out there like that when you’re also an introvert.

But at least I’ll always have a to-do list to fall back on.