full disclosure i have been anxious to film this video i know probably like five enfjs and they're all stellar so i sit here and try to give advice about what enfj's need to work on all i know are really great enfjs i've heard of i've heard of stories from other people that have met unhealthy enfjs but all i know are really great enfj so i'm like okay growth advice for these amazing people enfjs are some of the best communicators around they are the mom of their friend group the counselor their friend group they're really there for everyone i've noticed a lot of enfjs are passionate about really big social causes and there's something about talking with an enfj that just seems like they're looking directly into your soul hey everybody i'm alexis if you're new to my channel i do have an instagram account if you're interested in checking that out i post more like list bite size things whereas this video is more of like an in-depth video i also do offer coaching so if you want like personality type verification or if you just want any coaching or just want to pick my brain um you can dm me on instagram as a side note i have been loving the conversations i've been having on instagram so you can just do like a little voice memo you know so as i get going if any of this seems like it's not you and there could be a miss type i notice especially with a lot of fjs they tend to be mistyped for whatever reason i mean there's mistyping with all the types and most of the reason for that is the tests are pretty reliably inaccurate so even if you've got the same result for years and years and years the test is reliable but it's kind of like reliably wrong in my experience it's usually one letter off sometimes two letters off they can usually get it that much correct but it's usually one letter off it seems like so it's kind of important to look into that and see you know if there is a better option out there you might want to look into the infj the esfj the entj and the enfp and maybe look into those and see if those make sense if you're fresh off the 16 personalities website you just took the test that's myers-briggs so you're familiar with like the four letters i e s n but it actually goes like all the way back to the early 1900s with carl young and he coined what are called cognitive functions but it's basically eight ways that people perceive the world and make decisions and they've since hooked up different personality types to the eeg machine and they find that certain personalities tend to rely on some regions of the brain more than other personalities do and these kind of correlate to the cognitive functions so after he coined the cognitive functions myers and briggs came along and they said okay well if you use this function in this function we'll call you the esfj if you use this function this function we'll call you the infp but it was really just meant to be a code and now it seems like all people know is i versus e n versus s but there's really a whole level deeper so i'll kind of show you the code basically that myers and briggs came up with so the middle two letters are kind of the meat of this the n and the f everyone's second letter is called their perceiving letter it's kind of how you take in and organize information and everyone's third letter is considered their judging letter it's not like a bad way judging but it's just how you make judgments how you make decisions how you decide things like ultimately what criteria do you use to decide this is a better decision than this decision so if you're a j it means you show the world you're judging letter it means you extrovert your judging letter so for you that's f so it means you extrovert your feelings it means you're oriented on the external feelings you're not so much oriented on your inner feelings you're oriented external feelings how is the group feeling and that automatically means you introvert your perceiving letter so you're focused on your inner patterns not necessarily the patterns going on out here and then since you're an e an extrovert it means you predominantly prioritize the extroverted one extroverted feeling and you secondarily prioritize the introverted one introverted intuition so let's make up your first two cognitive functions your first cognitive function is extroverted feeling your second cognitive function is introverted intuition out of the eight cognitive functions that there are every person uses four and they show up in kind of specific ways so the way you find out your third cognitive function is it's the direct opposite of your second function they're kind of like a yin yang pulling at each other they're the exact opposites but together they come together and they complement each other the opposite of introverted intuition the opposite of introverted is extroverted the opposite of intuition is sensing so extroverted sensing is your third function and that's the direct opposite of introverted intuition there's inner patterns and then there's external sensory information that you take in your fourth function's direct opposite of your first function since your first function is extroverted feeling the opposite of extroverted is introverted the opposite of feeling is thinking so introverted thinking is your fourth function so there's like taking in the external groups feelings and then there's how you on the inside think about things and those are kind of opposites pulling at each other but when you integrate them all they kind of make a balanced complete picture after you watch this video if you want like more in-depth explanations about the cognitive functions or maybe you want like just further in-depth information about myers-briggs i do have a myers-briggs 101 playlist that goes kind of chronologically from easy to more uh complex um and in that playlist i do have several videos that go into more definitions about the cognitive functions like one is what are cognitive functions one is what are the four types of extroverts what are the four types of introverts and in those three videos i go into more detailed um definitions of the cognitive functions so your first cognitive function is extroverted feeling it's the external feelings and everyone's first function is who they feel like they are you are using this function in many contexts of life you know you use it at work use it at home use it in your finances how you make food you know basically every area of your life people use their first function so for you you're basically always oriented toward the external feelings nowhere in these functions do you have any introverted feeling you know what i mean like you're not so much selfishly focused on your own internal feelings you're always like focus on the group's feelings maybe even at the expense of yourself enfjs are the most likely type to be able to based on looking at a person know exactly what they're feeling just by looking at a person enfjs are great with their words very motivational with their words and it's because you're tapped into the external feelings you know exactly what words would motivate people you're so tuned into people it makes the nfj's phenomenal orders and speakers extroverted feeling makes people very warm because you're oriented toward other people's feelings and you want to make people feel at home and it's warm and inviting none of these functions really in themselves are actions that you would take it's kind of a brain process but because you use the certain brain process it will lead to certain actions so like it might lead you to make your home more warm probably have some candles going i put on a sweater because i noticed a lot of fj's wear sweaters i'm also wearing all black because seems like all the nj is like black and this is one of the functions that makes enfj's like great counselors because they're so turned tuned in to other people and other people's needs and they tend to you know counsel their friends take care of their friends the mom of the friend group the counselor the friend group and there's something just so soft about enfj's speech any of the efjs in general they just speak in a really kind way it's not blunt and harsh you know like that like when i'm around enfjs i get like hey how are you doing it's so nice i mean enfj especially when they're healthy can really just feel like a warm hug like you could just tell anything to these people i feel like just like very safe around these people and so yeah i would say this is a good function for enfjs to use you're probably using it already like 95 of the time and i would say that's a really good spot for you everyone's second function is not really as comfortable to go to because it's introverted so if you're an extrovert you don't want to go to an introverted function if you were an introvert you wouldn't want to go to an extroverted function you know it's just kind of like out of people's comfort zones and the analogy that i use with introversion and extroversion is that it's like food and water and it's like that in that they're both needs you might have a preference that you like food more than you like water but you need them both and that's how i feel like extroversion and introversion are you have a preference for extroversion it might give you more energy you might enjoy it more you might feel more like yourself but ultimately it's in your best interest and will give you the most fulfillment if you can stretch out of your comfort zone and to get into more introversion and i have the same advice for introverts to get out of your comfort zone and for them it's to get into extroversion and the reason that you need both x version and introversion is because they give you two different things introverted functions kind of distill down to clarity and depth and wisdom and extroverted functions kind of expand and they blast it out and so if you get this deep wisdom with your introverted function and then you can broadcast that to people and then you can help people with it that's really the ultimate mix you know you know a deep impact that's what those two things give you and with too much extroversion it's not a deep impact it's just kind of like a shallow impact and with too much introversion it's just very isolated and slothful introverts and extroverts kind of have different issues but the more and more healthy you are i think the more and more people would tend to being like ambiverts and getting really um mixed on the two i want to specify it has to be quality extroverted time and quality introverted time binging netflix is not what i mean when i say get down to depth and wisdom and clarity netflix and watching netflix is introverting but i don't think that's really what's going to move the needle so for enfjs their second function is introverted intuition and the introverted functions distill down to clarity and they get deep on the inside and kind of organizing all the patterns that maybe you've seen and it's where is your life trending it's called is college attendance trending up or down is mental health trending up or down and it's kind of it's taking the broader picture to look at trends and some personalities will look at tons of trends like college could be doing this it could be doing this could be doing this could be doing this and they kind of blast all the possibilities but what introverted intuition does is it kind of narrows in and it says what is going to happen and it's kind of making a prediction in your own life and in whatever your interests are kind of noticing trends and noticing patterns it makes you really good at noticing like patterns within other people this is what makes enfjs interested in philosophy i've seen a lot into philosophy i've seen a lot who want to be professors or who really enjoyed higher education this is the function that i think you know really makes enfjs visionary and really gives them some like intense like really deep impactful communication because when you're looking at the trend like let's say you're sitting down and you're having a conversation with a friend and you look at like how their life is trending or you're noticing patterns in your life and because of a little bit of fe and mixed with that ni you can really see to like the heart of them like you can see deeply what's going on the ni goes deep and the fe keys you into the other person you really can just like know instantly what's going on with a person and this is where you get kind of like i don't want to call it like psychic but this is where you can just like look at a person and know what they're feeling this is what makes enfj is really perceptive really inspirational and i is about the trends of your life and if you want to help people and you're looking at the long-term impact of your life you know sometimes a lot of enfjs are interested in social causes they want to make an impact on the world have a very humanitarian bent this is where we get into some relationship stuff a little bit because i think if enfj's are watching this video they're gonna want this video to be focused on relationships a little bit more and i've noticed a pattern with all of the fj types all of the extroverted feeling types they're so hit in on other people's feelings that sometimes they let bad people into their life and if they're just focused on the present moment and not the long-term consequences they kind of keep these people in kind of spoken on the present moment i'll help them right now help them right now help them right now help them right now they're not realizing that that's kind of creating a bad future when you meet someone if you can really get into this process and say where's this relationship going and don't think about their potential think about getting to ni and say realistically where is this going where is this relationship trending and if it's going in a bad direction and it's not going to be healthy i think you know you should cut them out sooner rather than later you know in a calm way it's really good for enfjs to really take care of themselves i think a lot of fjs don't take care of themselves and if you can get into ni you can say okay this relationship's not going in a good direction maybe i should just cut it off before we get so invested and it's going to be really messy so i'd say for enfjs ni is the function to boost up it's your second function it's like a potential strength it's probably underused because it's introverted but that is really what you should work on in many contexts of your life say how can i look at the depth and the clarity and you know philosophy and my vision and the future how can i do that my finances how can i do that in my marriage with my friendships with what i eat what types of hobbies that i have with the career that i have and you know just brainstorming every single area of your life how can you be using ni a little bit more because some people tend to use their second function in like two contexts of life but it's important to use it over a broad context of life so your third function is extroverted sensing and everyone's third function tends to be kind of an overused weakness especially when you're younger like if you're watching this if you're in your teens and twenties this function is really a sore spot for younger people i've noticed for older people they can kind of tend to integrate like all of their functions and do it pretty well but the younger someone is the more likely they're in this third function and they're using it in an infantile way and honestly in kind of an annoying way in my opinion people annoy people it's with this third function so it's extraverted sensing and extroverted sensing is all about the external senses so looking at the sights and the sounds and it's very immersed in the present moment it's very in its body you know introverted intuition extroverted sensing are opposites they're like a yin yang so introverted intuition is like in the mind and extroverted sensing is in the body introverted intuition is in the future extroverted sensing is living like fully immersed in the present moment and i wants to dissociate from the body and conserve energy be in a dark room s e wants to expend tons of energy and have lots of bright sounds and fun and like fun things and colors if an enfj gets in what's called a loop that's when you're in your first and third function it creates a problem because those are both extraverted and so like i talked about earlier if you're too extroverted you're losing the depth and impact and the clarity and you become scattered and shallow so what i've noticed people tend to do is it's kind of like a light switch with their second and third function i mean it's kind of a polarity anyway so you could say the first and fourth functions or like a light switch also like you're doing this one or you're doing this one but the thing is with the first and fourth function people are just always in their first function like they never flip the light switch down to their fourth function with the second and third function i find that people are kind of switching back and forth all the time and it would be better if it was switched up more often in ni than it was in se but people oscillate back and forth with their second and third function and that oscillating creates a lot of problems in many different personalities and i think for the enfj this creates some issues so you know living in the present moment is good i mean especially for other personality types but for the enfj they tend to be doing that kind of negatively in kind of an avoidant way living in the present moment as a way to avoid the future like staying in a relationship with someone for too long in the present moment to avoid the long-term consequence of having to cut off the relationship because you don't want to have a difficult conversation with someone so everyone's third function is really kind of an avoidant thing and people go there in arguments like i know some enfjs who get like really um like in their body during arguments i think a big problem with enfj is just overbooking extroverted sensing is like oh yeah i want to do this and it doesn't really think so much about long-term consequences it's just like oh this person's right in front of me right now so i gotta say yes to them and that leads to a lot of overbooking and running ragged it's in too much extroversion that means you're not gonna get enough time to really think about what you want extra sensing can be about appearances um it's really you know it's very focused on like what do things look like in the external world so a lot of enfjs i know are really attractive this um enj's in general i i find for my preferences dress very attractively but there's one enfj i know and i've i've heard this many times which is kind of an unfortunate thing actually my friends like they're like she is so nice and so pretty and they were like how come she's never dated anyone because she she like really wants to date someone she's been single for a long time and she hasn't really dated anyone and she's like so attractive she's so nice people are like why why isn't she dating it when she wants to date it seems like everything's great like what's the deal in my opinion what i think it is she doesn't have enough introverted intuition people don't ever get to know her you know extroverted feeling is always asking about the other person and extroverted sensing is also extroverted so it's seeking things in the external world and no one knows her no one knows her introvert intuition no one knows her thoughts and her like she is philosophical she's intellectual i've had very intellectual conversations with her but it really takes a lot to draw that out of her it's a lot of you know sometimes the infjs can really ask a lot about the other person oh i want to fix all your problems i want to know all about you and they forget like their own problems and you know it means the relationship's kind of one-sided and you have to think like if you have a lot of one-sided relationships where you feel like you really know the other person they don't really know you you've got to think like you're the common denominator in that pattern i don't mean to be like critical i mean i say sort of things to all the personalities i love enfj so i don't want to i don't want you to think that i'm like criticizing you or anything i just want you to be the best you can be and really the only criticism is just to like show you know show me more of who you are and i think sometimes enfjs help other people so much but they have their own issues going on inside and if they you know if they stopped avoiding the introverted time that stuff would come up and you would start thinking about your future and where that's going that'd be some really good like meditative time what's your purpose why are you on this earth like what do you want to be doing with your life and you know if you spend too much time extrapolating you can't really answer those questions and so you avoid by asking other people those questions and helping other people with all their problems but i think it's really important for the nfj to make sure that their life is like really good and try to force yourself that you need to get the introvert time every day before you get the extrovert time because you're always going to prioritize the people you you prioritize the people of your the people you love like that's not going to be an issue for you but it is going to be difficult for you to prioritize yourself so i would just challenge you every day prioritize yourself first in a deep way you know asking yourself the deep questions what what am i made for what's my life purpose why am i here what do i want to do with my life what do i want to do with my career you know long-term future things and then you can use a little bit se to be doing that today so you got the future you know exactly what you want for your future and you do that daily um but sometimes enfjs can be kind of forgetful of the future and just they're living in the present moment at the expense of the future so enfj's fourth function is introverted thinking and everyone's fourth function especially when they're younger just seems to be turned off like if it's the light switch analogy like i talked about you're an extroverted feeling 98 of the time which means you are two percent of the time an introverted thinking and i've just noticed the younger people are the more likely that is to be true so this is another introverted function so this would be another point that'd be good for you to bump up i don't think you should become an introverted thinker um but let's say like if you're using introverted thinking two percent of the time maybe you could try to bump that up to 10 of the time i think people's back functions really what causes issues and relationships like i think your front two functions like you just go all the way like if you're in a career setting like i think your first two functions like you just go but then when you're in relationships the biggest hang-ups are your weaknesses like at work you can just kind of like go to town on your strengths your weaknesses will be managed with other employees but when you're in like relationships it's really important to kind of work on those back to functions because not any other employees managing your weaknesses and it just like hurts your spouse or whoever so yeah anyways i'll have to say maybe just bump introverted thinking up from like two percent to ten percent so introverted thinking and actually for feeling they're opposites introverted thinking has really no problem with conflict the the types that lead with introverted thinking like the entp doesn't lead with it but it's second and they're like known as the debater um intps are known to you know argue and debate things also it's from a very impersonal place and they just like to do it you know it's not hurting anyone's feelings they don't get their feelings hurt if they argue other people aren't getting their feelings hurt these types just like to do it and they just like to sharpen their ideas it's not it's not personal and they feel like really recharged and they enjoy the experience afterward especially if it was like very intellectual you know as soon as it gets personal i think that's when the introverted thinking users aren't gonna like it anymore so i think for the enfj when they have introverted thinking and they're not using it that much it can make you kind of conflict avoidant i think that would be something to work on expressing your controversial thoughts expressing your needs you know just practice like it would be better to have five minutes of small conflict um than an hour of like i don't say raging that makes the nfj sound terrible it's not really as bad as making it sound but better than like an hour of like raging conflict that really hurts people you know so i would just say like stick up for your needs like if something hurt your feelings you know learn some good conflict resolution skills you know sometimes the best way to avoid conflict is just you know to engage in a difficult conversation and you just have great communication skills especially you get into you know fees tune into the other person and i is really tuned into their perspective and what they might be thinking and efj is have great levels of empathy so i think you could be great you're one of the best types to be great in difficult conversations i think so if you could just like stick up for your needs and say you know what it's going to be a small little conflict called a little micro conflict and then we'll be good i think it's hard for enfj sometimes to get criticism i think all the fj's are just a little sensitive to criticism and i think it's because that puts you potentially in introverted thinking introverted thinking kind of criticizes on thoughts it assesses its own beliefs like what do i think about things let's make sure i'm not believing any lies and it kind of like checks itself all the time it's always like cleaning out its beliefs i'm wrong here so i'll get rid of that i'm wrong here so i'll get rid of that and what's your fourth function that can just be very like overly critical of yourself and i just feel so sad for any of the enfjs that um criticize themselves too harshly and i could imagine that if an enfj was giving criticism during that conversation they'd be so they'd be like oh yeah and they'd be so receptive and they would be i can imagine that you'd be great in a conversation about criticism i imagine what would happen is then after the conversation you go and like you really beat yourself up about it i don't want any enfjs to beat themselves up you know like i think enfjs are a great personality and if you can just give yourself some more like self-acceptance like it's okay to have controversial beliefs it's okay if you win at a board game and other people lose like it's okay if you win at the expense of other people like it's just a game you know like your needs are important like you are included in the needs of everyone and to spend some alone time not taking care of other people is a really good thing for you to do and i think it's the healthiest thing that you could ultimately do for everyone in your life you know if you really want to take care of everyone in your life you have to take care of yourself first and i really really really mean that i've been around some efjs who refuse to take care of themselves and it ends up poisoning like the atmosphere um of the home and it's kind of the phrase like if mom's not happy no one's happy and i think that's a prime extroverted feeling phrase it's like extroverted feelers are so good at setting the tone and 98 of the time they set a really good tone but that two percent of the time when the when like the mom or the extroverted feeler is not happy it really just poisons the environment and so i just urge you to say if you won't do it for yourself do it for the people around you because it is in the peoples around you best interest for you to take care of yourself and it's clearly in your best interest but i think enfjs are so just like selfish selfless that they might not want to do that just encourage you like take time for yourself another thing i say was if you develop a little bit of introverted thinking introverted thinking says things like exactly how it means says it very precisely um it's not emotional it's not hurting anyone's feelings it just kind of like will state facts or the people that use introverted thinking will state facts i think that's going to like just not be passive aggressive like don't drop hints you know dropping hints is just like a not an introverted thinking way of communicating just say like exactly what you mean mean what you say um just don't assume that other people are anticipating needs in the way that you are like you're excellent at anticipating needs other people who are not extrovert feeling users are not doing that and they're not doing it because they hate you um they're not doing it you know despite you were to be mean they are just using different parts of the brain that also contribute something valuable to the world and that's kind of sad that like unless you're around an extroverted feeling user um they're probably not going to be taking care of you it's the level that you take care of other people and that's probably just like a need that is somewhat gonna go unmet and just know that they have their own strengths that they're bringing to the table and it's just kind of the cost of specialization you know they have their other gifts and the cost of that is maybe they're not anticipating needs like you are so if they're not anticipating needs like that if you have a need you got to really just come out and say it black and white you got to think in that that for you to express what you need you have to have gone in and thought about in an introverted way what you need and then once you've had time alone and you've thought about what you need like if i could have my way in this situation this is what would happen and when you think about that then you can kind of clearly communicate that to people but you got to take the introverted time to think about what you want and then you got to use the introverted thinking to express it in a clear way and enfj is unique gift to the world is there outstanding communication and i want to just like get into that like more deeply like they are incredible communicators i have never met anyone who communicates as well in my opinion as enfjs from a stage one-on-one in a group like they are great with people and moving a room and communicating in a deep way um i knew in enfj and she really got into introverted intuition and in my opinion she was really into philosophy and in college she wanted to be a professor she thought about being an interviewer and i saw her on a panel and she was kind of the one asking the questions on this panel and she would just get like deeper and deeper with these questions i mean she made like a fantastic interviewer i knew another enfj who was a professor i knew another enfj who's a counselor i knew one enfj was a counselor and a professor like switched careers and one of them she's outstanding professor i mean she made being a professor um be like a counselor role it was like the whole class was being counseled at once it was like this group counseling session it was really good it was incredibly safe environment incredibly deep this particular enfj was also vulnerable about herself which i think was really brave one way to create a good extroverted feeling culture you know is to share about yourself and be vulnerable and that kind of spreads to the whole group and she really knew how to do that i knew one enfj this was like in a church setting and she would come up and talk to everyone and when she was with you she but you know you feel like she was with you um you know if enough days are unhealthy they're kind of like you know distractible and with extroverted sensing but the cnfj she was like with you like ni has an intense focus like it is like focused on the other person and when they look at you in the eyes it's like they are seeing into your soul um i know another enfj who was um a worship team leader it was incredibly like he's incredibly positive and uplifting um he is constantly giving very like specific compliments um compliments to the character of the person um really just saying like this is your identity like he would just say things like the compliments he would give they're like they're just great like juicy compliments uh the cnfj like he would say he's like the way you play the guitar just moves people and and he would go he would a much longer compliment than what i just said but it's just it's stuff like that it's not just like good guitar playing it's like the way you play guitar moves people and is very impactful and there's something very special about you and he would just if they're very good at like pulling out the gold nuggets in people and just highlighting that like i think that's such an enfj gift i think sometimes people don't know what's special about them they don't know what their strengths are and enfjs can pull it out enfjs make phenomenal leaders phenomenal communicators enfj is just the full package i've seen i don't know if you've heard of um love who he's another like mbti like youtuber um and he'll do these ranking videos like type most likely to be popular type most likely to be intelligent he kind of like ranks them and enfjs um rank highly in like every category they're they do very well they're just very well rounded um they can be good with people they can have deep intellectual conversations um they're also just super fun like they can i've been some enfj that are just kind of like the life of the party um they'll go on you know i've seen some they're like really in their body and they'll run they're usually so attractive in really good shape in my experience and i just love being around them um i knew one enfj who had a coffee shop business and the way he ran a coffee shop is different than other people run a coffee shop i mean he knew the names of people and they would come in he would just ask deep questions and it's always with that tone of voice like i just cannot express enough like their tone of voice that they have it's just so soothing like those were like hey how are you doing and something about it just feels like like if you have anxious energy coming in the way they talk to you just like calms it down now that i'm thinking about it they probably know that i have anxious energy and so they're trying to do that oh no you've probably been watching my energy this whole time well full disclosure i have been anxious to film this video because i know the least about enfjcs and i know any other types i know probably like five enfjs and they're all stellar so i sit here and try to give advice about what enfj's need to work on all i know are really great enfjs i've heard of i've heard of stories from other people that have met unhealthy enfjs but all i know are really great enfjs so i'm like okay growth advice for these amazing people you know you don't need to solve all the world's problems at once um i think extroverted sensing has that chaotic energy that's like we gotta do this we gotta do this we gotta do this we gotta do this solving all the world's problem i'll help you and i'll help you and i'll help you um you know you have permission to think about what you want out of life to think about your long-term vision your life purpose and what do you want um and you just have permission to zone in and focus in on what you want because whatever it is whatever you selfishly want that's what's in the world's best interest that's what's in your family's best interest your friend's best interest for you to selfishly go after your long-term vision in an introverted way to spend time alone thinking about your vision some you know really deep introverted time um thinking about that and fleshing that out that's what's in everyone else's best interest i love you guys i'm hoping that it didn't come off critical at all because i have no bad things to say about you i'm just thinking about like what potentially could be happening based on these cognitive functions my real life experience with the nfj's is only positive so so i do offer coaching um if you're interested i could do like type verification personality coaching just to pick my brain session you can um dm me on instagram for that um my instagram account is alexis m kingsley and i post more like list things on there like more like bite-sized things whereas here it's more of a deep dive so if you're interested going check it out um i will pop on screen right now i do have a playlist myers-briggs 101 playlist like i mentioned which goes from like most simple the most complex yeah hopefully didn't come off too critical thanks bye