Re: Seems to be a major problem area

Posted by Derf on October 08, 1999 at 20:39:02:

In Reply to: Seems to be a major problem area posted by Cory on October 08, 1999 at 18:20:27:

: The main problem (for me anyways) is that I don't know enough fours and fives in real life. Well, I might, but I don't know their type. I would need to compare myself to each of them and see how I act. How much emotion would I have to show to be a Four? Do I have to be more rational to be a Five? Etc.

No, no, and no. It depends on your internal motivations. The rest is just cream cheese. Keep that in mind, lest you forget it, and fall into the old trap of wondering "What stereotype do I *seem* like?" I know I'm prone to doing that.

Of course, come to think of it, this comparison game might get you at least halfway out of the mire. My point in the above paragraph was that you can't really count on behavioral comparisons, or even comparisons based on expressions of attitude, for one core motivation is capable both of painting in different colors, and of being painted somewhat differently in itself in different people. Yet, there's no arguing that there *are* structures, if only in a watered-down, generalized way in which the similarities, in behavior and apprearance, between two people of one type can be both intriguing to your eye for subtlety and maddeningly chaotic to your more concrete sensibilities. On the affirmative side, you might see, in people whose mental stability level is lower than your own, direct expressions of motivations that you're able to keep relatively under control. I see other (*quite* likely) Fours doing things that I only occasionally *imagine* doing. This is true particularly for "dead-center" Fours - that is, for those in whom neither wing is really prominent. In these cases, I don't necessarily have to be "healthier" than them, even. I can use my consciousness "space" between 4 and 3, which is a self-controlled mode of being, to observe people with less concern for self-control, people with less of a "shadow" cast over them. This is why I think it's important to consider level of health and wing when making "comparisons" between yourself and others. A Four at level 7 is certainly *not* going to resemble, in the area of personality, a Four at level 3.

Of course, when you're playing fair, and comparing yourself to people of your own subtype and level of health, then it becomes simpler. You might intimately know some individuals who fit these criteria, but all you really have to do is be on the lookout for people who seem like you in ways both fundamental and inexplicable, and use your objective eye to gauge their type. Predictably, I recognize myself in likely 3/4's, and thus affirm the possibility that I occupy that space as well. Your objective eye, in this exercise, can be more reliable than your subjective eye, since nothing so blindingly "close-up" as yourself can be reliably clear to you.

Derf

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