[Merseydolphin]

Has anyone read The Highly Sensitive Person By Elaine Aron? I find it a helpful book that could have been written with INFPs and type 4s in mind. She has a excellent website as well.

[KiloBravo]

From cover to cover, I believe that if you are an INFP, and have not at least skimmed through it then you are missing out on a great resource.

[connieculkins]

I think the book is basically describing INFJs and secondly, INFPs. It is a great book for putting a positive spin on a personality that is not often viewed well in western society. The part I don't agree with is the recommendation about using a persona to 'appear sociable'. IMO a persona is just a euphemism for being fake and though it might be a useful tool, as an HSP myself I can often see right through people who have cultivated a persona and it can be very off putting. When a person is 'putting on an act' I wonder who the real person is and if I never see that real person I have zero interest in that person. I have no tolerance for falsity.

[saintless]

I am starting to read it, but for I am not sure if I honestly like the book. I find some parts of it annoying, and I would go as far as to say it doesn't always feel 'grounded' to me but I am pretty sure that claim is not grounded in and of itself.

[KiloBravo]

I think I sense a poll coming on

HSP Notes: HSPs and Myers-Briggs Personality Types

I was excited to read that one of the things that very likely will be offered at the West Coast HSP Gathering is a chance to take the Myers-Briggs test, and have the results "interpreted" by Jacquelyn Strickland. I have already had the test administered twice (and came out INFJ, twice, although there was some debate on the "S" vs. "N" preference the first time) in the past 10 years, but it's the interpretation that interests me. And especially getting the interpretation done in a setting where there are likely to be "others like me." INFJs are quite rare, accounting for one about 1% of the population.

From my interaction/participation in HSP groups, I have periodically seen surveys done on personality type, within those groups. Of course, these have been pretty "informal" polls, and keep in ind that the number of people to respond to them might have been 200, or fewer. But still, the results have been quite "telling," at least for me...

MBTI types INFP and INFJ are the predominant types in the HSP community-- at least the online HSP communities. I can't, of course, speak to whether or not these distributions would hold for HSPs who do not use the Internet as a research, contact and participation tool. Anyway, by loose extrapolation of several polls (at different times) it seems that type INFP accounts for as many as 25-30% of online HSPs, while INFJ accounts for something on the order of 12-15%. This is certainly statistically significant, in so far as none of the other types account for more than maybe 5-6%.

It is also interesting that (to the small degree I have been able to gather this data) types INFP and INFJ predominate even more heavily in the Adult Indigo groups. It's almost a "requirement" to be an NF-type (Intuitive-Feeling) to be an Indigo.

I love the idea of being among people where these rare traits are "common" rather than an "oddity."

[KiloBravo]

My first poll i'm so proud!
Highly Sensitive INFP or INFJ?

[niki]

The Highly Sensitive Person ? HSP