# What's YOUR type?



## GrimThird (Jun 4, 2013)

Having made a few type me threads, and wondering at my own type for a bit, I started wondering about other people's process. So here's a chance, instead of typing someone else, give some idea of how you arrived at your own type. From the most obvious things that just fit, to the subtlest insights from exploring socionics ideas, here's your chance to share. Or not. Whatever.


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## Kanerou (Oct 8, 2009)

I came into the theory as an ENFP. I don't think I ever actually had the notion that my MBTI and Socionics types had to match; I looked at IEI, IEE, and EII and picked the one that seemed to fit best at the time (IEE). I suppose that lasted 6 months, 9 months... I'm not sure. After a paid analysis by a professional socionist, I ended up mostly between EII and IEI. I had not considered EII a possibility previously, due to not at all identifying with Rational or IJ temperament. He convinced me not to worry about the latter so much. I went back and forth for a while, mostly because I spent too much time depending on others' reasoning and because what type I wanted to be changed from time to time. However, looking at things for myself, Introverted Ethics did fit better than Extroverted Ethics, so I was eventually able to eliminate IEI and ease into EII. 

However, there were still problems with EII. IEI had been considered in part because of my want for someone protective in my life; it's a long story, and I won't go into it again, but I felt very strongly that the world was against me and I could not survive it alone, so I sought someone who could engage the world and keep it away from me, and I enjoyed having friends who would take on my grievances and be willing to avenge them. Early last year, I read Aestrivex's quadra descriptions and realized why my grudge-holding, dismissive nature never seemed to find a kindred in Delta: it was far more of a Gamma philosophy. My territorial, possessive, sometimes very assertive nature also did not seem particularly Delta, and I still do not identify with seeing potential within people (I'm pretty good at seeing the potential of objects, though). I went to the less-specific "Fi-base/ExI" for a while but eventually began listing ESI as my type instead. It's not a perfect fit either, but Gamma quadra does seem best for me.


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## Entropic (Jun 15, 2012)

I came to socionics with the idea that I could either be an LII or an ILI based on that I typed as an INTP in MBTI at the time, and I had heard that INTPs often ended up as ILIs or LIIs. Because I didn't know the theory I wanted to try to understand it so I asked for help. Because I was an adherent of Jungian cognitive function theory (which is not the same as JCF I want to add, in that I do it from the lens of the MBTI but instead I prefer a purer version of Jung), I believed that type had to overlap at some point, though I can't say when I picked up that idea. I initially saw socionics and the MBTI as separate systems, but it was before I delved deeper into socionics. 

At some point I realized that I was an Fi-Te type, and because I over-identified with Fi, I thought I had to be an Fi base or dominant type. Since I knew I was preferring intuition and my psyche is introverted, I must therefore be an INFP. I had looked into Reinin and figured that I was a delta based on Reinin back then, so INFP or EII made the most sense.

The process is difficult to describe, but eventually as I learned more and understood the system better, I came to a turning point with myself and my self-typing, feeling that Fi base or dominance didn't describe who I was. I felt frustrated with rationality in general. I was reading Gulenko's cognitive styles article again on wikisocion when it occurred to me in quite some clarity that I was a dialectic-algorithmic type, not a causal-determinist. I remembered that I was very fond of playing with dichotomies and finding what Gulenko wrote was a balance between the two, where each one is inverted into another without being either one like Yin or Yang. 

Because I knew for a fact at that point I preferred or valued Fi-Te, the only type for consideration was ILI because it too values intuition in the ego block. For me it wasn't so much that being a sensor was out of the question, but I knew I just wasn't one because that's not how my thinking is oriented. After looking into ILI again very quickly a lot of things just got painfully obvious to me like my dislike towards Fe was explained with Fe PoLR, and my inability to assert myself IRL despite often wanting to and having a strong desire to do it being explained by Se suggestive. It also made sense that a lot of things I had attributed to Te suggestive was actually Se suggestive. Te and Se can at some level be easily confused with another since both are goal-oriented in their own sense. 

Anyway, it was a fairly long and complicated process with a lot of things that were more mulling in the back of my head until I just knew what it was.


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## 0+n*1 (Sep 20, 2013)

@ephemereality, do you relate more to each of the 3 components (that in your case are synthesis/dynamic, negative and involution) that make your cognitive style or to the style by itself or to both equally? Do you relate to them strongly (dynamic>static, evolutionay>involutionary and negative>positive) or you were hesitant about some of them? Maybe now you see them clearly but. I was wondering what happened in your journey.


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## Psithurism (Jun 19, 2013)

A bit dislocated because it can be hard to remember but the gist is:

Learned about MBTI about 7 months ago. Did a few tests initially. Always got INTP. But I was in my more ''outgoing'' phases in life so I thought I was actually ENTP. I was also convinced I was an intuitive.

Eventually it became somewhat obvious I wasn't an extrovert so I decided to stick with INTP and joined the INTP subforum. After a couple months of hanging out there, I felt that INTP seemed to make a lot of sense yet for some reason I couldn't understand my dominant (Ti). I also made an INTP friend and eventually that made me realized that there were some parts of the way he thinks that irked me. The way he reasoned baffled me some times. It was my first actually interaction outside with forums with an INTP and it made a difference.

I also felt I was more ''emotional'' than most INTPs but in reality it was just a difference of cognitive function.

Anyways, after 2-3 arguments that I found were retarded and shouldn't have happened in the first place, we pretty much stopped talking and I started thinking perhaps I wasn't an INTP.

I remember going to the INFJ forums and almost feeling like vomiting in most of the threads but the INFP forums made me all mushy sometimes and I could relate much more over there.

But I couldn't really accept I was a feeler. Still, I thought I was maybe denying myself when I assumed I was a NT, so I sticked with INFP for a while.

But I couldn't understand Fi as dominant so I wasn't comfortable in the end. INFJ, I didn't even bother considering. So there was INTJ left but MBTI made them look so overly organized and dry that I had trouble entertaining the thought. But now I know that MBTI descriptions are just horrid. I also didn't get Ni definitions, it felt too ''out there'' and ''mystical''. 

I was getting annoyed so I decided to try socionics and everything just made more sense. 

Lastly, very recently, I asked another ILI for a bit of external analysis and that pretty much reinforced my type being correct. He has been one of the people I've gotten the most naturally along with in my life so far.


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## Entropic (Jun 15, 2012)

Mr.Rbtoo said:


> @ephemereality, do you relate more to each of the 3 components (that in your case are synthesis/dynamic, negative and involution) that make your cognitive style or to the style by itself or to both equally? Do you relate to them strongly (dynamic>static, evolutionay>involutionary and negative>positive) or you were hesitant about some of them? Maybe now you see them clearly but. I was wondering what happened in your journey.


I don't understand your question since the style is what you describe but it was more the description of the style that helped because I didn't understand those reinin back then.


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## 0+n*1 (Sep 20, 2013)

ephemereality said:


> I don't understand your question since the style is what you describe but it was more the description of the style that helped because I didn't understand those reinin back then.


That was my question. Thanks.


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## Word Dispenser (May 18, 2012)

I came into type personalizing it, as most people tend to. 'Ah, this person acts like me, thus, that must be my type.' Even to visuals, vocal tones, gestures, writing methods...

I took a test in college, I think it was, before I went into depth with MBTI and saw it merely as another categorization method in order to discover career paths-- And I received an INFP. I found it to be inaccurate in terms of my goals, and I found the 'introvert' idea to be jarring, especially because of the way I see the world. It's very extroverted (even if I'm not socially apt, or necessarily social with my hobbies and interests).

Then I got interested in MBTI, bouncing around as I read more and more in-depth, trying to understand the undercurrents of what constituted a type. 

Later, I took the test again, and received ENFP and then ENTP respectively. At that time, I was beginning to rely on self-observation, pitted against the observations of others. The toughest call, I think, was trying to decide between Ti and Fi, Te and Fe.

As I continued going into depth, I began considering widely disparate types, SJs, NJs, NPs, SPs, merely due to descriptions. Then, as I learned cognitive functions, and applied self-study, introspection and retrospection, I came to the conclusion that ENTP was how my brain was operating. This was after examining all types that had Ne, Ti, Fe, and Si as functions, in different orders.

There's a fairly solid layer of uncertainty, because I'm very mutable... 

But, I've come to terms with this as being true of all areas of understanding in my life, and Ne-Ti is the primary direction of my cognition.

It's only more recently that I've turned to Socionics, that I see it as being much more clear. There are a lot less holes.


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## Tainted Streetlight (Jun 13, 2011)

GrimThird said:


> Having made a few type me threads, and wondering at my own type for a bit, I started wondering about other people's process. So here's a chance, instead of typing someone else, give some idea of how you arrived at your own type. From the most obvious things that just fit, to the subtlest insights from exploring socionics ideas, here's your chance to share. Or not. Whatever.


A very interesting thread.

The skinny:
I typed ENTP in MBTI. I came to socionics and read that extroverted types don't have to change anything. I read the socionic profiles, and thought they were close enough. So here I am. I make up the rest as I go along the way.


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## AST (Oct 1, 2013)

I discovered typology via MBTI. I intially typed ISTJ, then ISFJ, which I thought fit a lot better. I later decided I was an ESFJ because I liked being around people. Despite that, I could not deny that I was an introvert, and so I returned to believing that I was an ISFJ.

When I started delving into socionics, intially I had asked if I was an SEI or ESE, because I thought I was clearly Fe with Si (or vice versa). A user here, whose name I remember but can't transcribe from memory, suggested I was EII. At the time, it made a lot of sense. Except that, I didn't really see the Ne creative, and I could not let go of Ti as a valued function. 

Later, I got into a discussion about typing someone else, and @ephemereality suggested I may be LSI. (Thank you for that.) I had never considered that as a possibility. I don't know any other LSIs, but I'd always wanted to meet one. So, I found that to be an intriguing suggestion, and as I looked into it, I found that I matched the LSI on every single Renin dichotomy, I began to take his suggestion much more seriously. 

And then it hit me, that I'd been undergoing a period of enormous pressure to use my role (internally and externally) function, Fi. Between that, and my Enneagram 9... I'd consistently mistyped. I've since found ISTP/ISTj/LSI-Ti to be a spot on typing. I honestly don't know how I could have ever typed myself as anything other than a Ti-lead. I really don't.


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