(Part 4) Top products from r/infj

Sorry, three weeks later and here I am!

It's hard for me to give advice in a way, because my path into design was quite unorthodox. I started as a computer science major in college, but quickly shifted into a more broad "Information Sciences and Technology" which included human-computer interaction but also things more networking related. It was a great "catch-all" for various technology-related fields. I ended up enjoying the HCI part the most by far.

My first "real" job was working for an agency as one of their developers. I can distinctly remember hearing how the creative director had started as a coder and moved entirely into design and for a while that notion was appealing to me. I taught myself design on the side, devouring many books and carefully examining the site designs created by our designers.

A few years later, I was working for a college as their web manager and saw a window of opportunity; they were beginning the process for a website redesign. Almost as a lark, I pushed out what I thought the new website should look like and presented it to the other members of the web committee. They all liked my design and decided to work in-house with me as the designer and principle developer.

So my advice for you is perhaps a little generic, but I think still helpful: never stop learning. Keep reading all you can about UX, UI design, HCI, and the industries that interest you for product design. If you see an opportunity to grow professionally, whether that is a promising job offer or some project that has just coalesced, be bold and try your hand at it. Don't talk yourself out of a chance to grow before even trying; it's an easy pitfall.

For breaking in: read all that you can, for example this book is an excellent resource and quick read. Have an opinion on everything; for the things that you don't know, be curious and thoughtful. Recognize what makes for a bad user experience and what makes for a good one. Be empathetic.

Hope that helps. Good luck to you!

It might be that blogging isn't for you, and if that's the case, there's nothing wrong with that! You know you enjoyed writing a book. I think if the main factor holding you back from working in another (even if just for fun), is feeling you shouldn't do it yet, maybe you could try and identify your reasons for feeling that way. Are the reasons for not doing it as strong as the sense of purpose you feel when writing? Is it because you truly don't want to work on another book until you hear from your editor, or is it because you feel like you're supposed to wait to write until you hear from the editor? Several of my favorite authors have books that were released after they became well known, but were written before their actual first published book. So I don't know if there's any clear should/shouldn't in your situation!

I have a few books (both regular and workbook style) on planning out a blog saved to my wish list.

I have a small, 4 year old blog with a small following (around 200 views a day on average during times I'm not actively writing on it). It mainly was built by connecting with other bloggers and commenting on their blogs, as well as by learning about how to get my blog to show up in Google searches (I only had to learn it once, do it, then haven't messed with it since, although I probably should). At first, it was only read by my family and friends. I am considering these books because I haven't felt like writing lately, and want to put more thought into the structure of my blog.

EPIC BLOG: One-Year Editorial Planner

The Ultimate Blogger To-Do List

How To Style Your Brand

Blog, Inc.: Blogging for Passion, Profit, and to Create Community - I borrowed this one from the library yesterday.

If money were no object, I would get this one because I really like parts of it, however the parts about taxes and employees and the like wouldn't be of use to me! I also don't know why it's for women not men... Marketing, I suppose The Conquer Kit: A Creative Business Planner for Women Entrepreneurs

This is my favorite of the guided journal type books I purchased. Design the Life You Love I am only a little into it, however I think it is perfectly suited to our personality type.

Edited: formatting and forgotten thoughts

With only my phone on me, I'm just going to list out some of the non-fiction I've enjoyed on my commute recently.

Smoke Gets in Your Eyes: And Other Lessons from the Crematory - Caitlin Doughty Great reading for the morbidly inclined.

Silver Screen Fiend: Learning About Life from an Addiction to Film - Patton Oswalt I would only recommend this book for true cinema fans. It's enjoyable if you get the references and are also a procrastinating creative.

God'll Cut You Down: The Tangled Tale of a White Supremacist, a Black Hustler, a Murder, and How I Lost a Year in Mississippi - John Safran sort of reminds me of Jon Ronson. Good true crime, fish out of water stuff.

Yes Please - Amy Poehler Great advice, hilarious. Get it on audiobook.

Carsick - John Waters John waters being John Waters.

Manson - Jeff Guinn A super fascinating breakdown of the 1960s, and the environment that held Manson is much is a biography. I'm really excited to read his new book his writing about Jim Jones and the 1970's.

Currently on Girl in a Band by Kim Gordon, very excited about it.

Ah, I understand now. Thanks for clarifying!

If you're interested, here's the book I was talking about. Super fascinating read.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0380538687?fp=1&pc_redir=T1

> I personally don't know that much about real INFJs (I mostly know about my type, INFPs, INTJs and INTPs)

Yeah, it's the same with me. I know about all 16 types in a really vague way, but I am only well informed on INFJs and their common mistypes (especially INFPs).

INFJs love pleasing other people. We see enhancing other people as our function in life. We absolutely hate hurting people. Things you might not think twice about will eat us alive. We love to beat ourselves up over the damage (real or imagined) we do to other people. We pay way more attention to other people than we do ourselves. Basically the opposite of an INFP.

Which is why I said in the beginning he's not an INFJ. We would never ever do that. Even an unhealthy INFJ would not behave that way. Unhealthy INFJs are scheming and manipulative. An unhealthy INFJ would still at least feign interest in order to manipulate you...they would not simply bail on you.

> So I already made up my mind, that I personally don't know enough about him to confirm or contradict his statement, thus he gets the benefit of the doubt. For now. Doesn't mean that I am not listening to you.

I am just providing information. I will never know your situation as well as you do. I only have your posts here to go on. What you do with it is entirely up to you.

> Yeah, I am still not sure, what exactly he is lying about though.

It's possible it might not be anything. Some people are like that. They like the power that lying gives them. There may be no reason other than that.

In this situation (Straight guy, straight girl?) I would assume he's lying to get into your pants maybe.

> That's something I noticed about INTJs as well.

INTJs are actually really similar to INFJs. We have the same congintive functions; the two middle ones are just swapped. INTJs will still care about people too, sometimes almost to the same degree as INFJs. It's just not a priority for them like it is with us.

> I think you might be confusing them with psychopaths. Sociopaths are quite impulsive and thus rather easy to detect.

There is no clear distinction between the two. In Psychology, both terms are used interchangeably. From what I can tell, people generally use the term "sociopath" to refer to Psychopaths that are still functional. Meaning Psychopaths that can control their impulses. But the actual clinical definitions are not distinct from each other.

I don't know if you're a reader, but there is a great book on them - "The Wisdom of Psychopaths: What Saints, Spies, and Serial Killers Can Teach Us About Success" - https://www.amazon.com/Wisdom-Psychopaths-Saints-Killers-Success/dp/0374533989

It goes into a lot of detail about how they think, and the ways they use to manipulate people.

> I have a huge interest in people in general. So, I don't even stay away from getting to know assholes better, because I wanna find out how they "work".

As long as you're aware of it. That's all that really matters.

Pretty sure it's this one. Just Your Type: Create the Relationship You've Always Wanted Using the Secrets of Personality Type.
by Paul D. Tieger

I'm in the middle of 5 different books because I am a bit of a moody reader (sometimes I'm in the mood to read something funny, other times I want something mysterious, something informative, something that will give me second hand embarrassment, etc.)

Currently I'm reading:

• Everything's Eventual by Stephen King
  
• Orange is the New Black by Piper Kerman
  
• Paddle Your Own Canoe by Nick Offerman
  
• Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn
  
• The Food Truck Handbook by David Weber
  
  On my "next to read" list:
  
  
• The Little Friend by Donna Tartt
  
• Not That Kind of Girl by Lena Dunham

Happiness: A Guide to Developing Life's Most Important Skill by Matthieu Ricard, best thing you can do for yourself especially if you're an INFJ.

I'm not one for non-fiction, but I had to read this in high school and really enjoyed it.

https://www.amazon.com/Mindset-Psychology-Carol-S-Dweck/dp/0345472322

Recommended Reading:

• Nudge (by Richard Thaler)
  
• Predictably Irrational (by Dan Ariely, he's great)
  
• Drunk Tank Pink (by Adam Alter)
  
• The Design of Everyday Things (by Don Norman, the godfather of cognitive psych)
  
• Brain Rules (by John Medina)
  
• The Tipping Point and What the Dog Saw (by Malcolm Gladwell)
  
• edit: Thinking Fast and Slow (by Daniel Kahneman)
  
• edit: The Emotional Life of Your Brain (by Richard Davidson & Sharon Begley)
  
  (Those are just the ones I have sitting on my bookshelf... I have a dozen more on my Kindle that I can add to the list if you're interested.)
  
  ---------
  
  Authors & Speakers (lots of TED Talks):
  
  
• Dan Ariely
  
• Malcolm Gladwell
  
• Rory Sutherland
  
• Daniel Pink
  
• Simon Sinek
  
• Robert Sapolsky (evolutionary biology professor at Stanford and hidden gem)
  
  ---------
  
  Let's start a book club! :)

Neat. Haven't heard of that book. I plan on reading Boundaries soon which I think has a similar premise.

In the alley from a guy named Joaquin. Heyoooooo!

If I'm being completely honest:

Pain. Leaning into fear. Eventually, refusing to settle for a default life. Creating my own meaning. Focusing more on what I am being more than what I am doing or having. Moving out of my comfort zone, returning to it only when I need a break.

At default, I would go on a month-long growth binge every 6 months or so. Now, it is every day. The days feel much longer. Living life is so much more satisfying than watching it pass by. Death is always around the corner.

Edit:

Oh right, timeline. These are the ages I had the strongest epiphanies and what was linked to them:

• 4 introduced to The Prophet
  
  
• 5 had empathy explained to me; blew my world open
  
  
• 8 existential crisis about the mortality of my mom; cue the beginning of depression
  
  
• 14 discovered TOOL
  
  
• 16 read The Fourth Way
  
  
• 24 read Man and His Symbols
  
  
• 34 had a kid; separated from wife. Both have resulted in more growth than everything else combined. Can recommend a kid. Wouldn't wish separation/divorce on anyone, but even being the unwilling party, so much growth through pain to be had there.
  
  Plenty of interstitial growth happened between those ages, but those are the epiphanic ones.

Everyone I talk to who has these problems, I recommend this book.

It describes how you can eliminate cognitive dissonance and has helped me IMMENSELY. I grew up with a BPD abusive mom and I have lived a long time suffering from the effects of it until I got coherence therapy (much different than cognitive behavioral therapy). Unlike CBD it will erase your dissonance completely instead of creating coping mechanisms that compete with it. It disconnects and rewires synopses when done properly.

It's basically a book about reconsolidation for deeply imprinted emotional memories. Something that was thought to be permanently unerasable until 2004.

You feel it in your brain when reconsolidation happens. You will know when you're fixed.

I hope this helps you.

Gut feeling, intuition, rationality, biases, decision making and the mental processes behind them is a fascinating study and has served me well in my professional career and my private life. If interested in learning more , then look at this chapter "A Model of Heuristic Judgement" (PDF) ^((1)) by Daniel Kahnerman. He also wrote a very accessible, New York Times bestseller book "Thinking, Fast and Slow" ^((2)) (Amazon link)

Kahneman expands on "dual process theories" - namely, that we rely on both intuition and reason, where one process, intuition, is quick and the other, reason, is slow. There can be troubles at the speed of processing or when one system is wrong. When I was in the military my commander chastised my speed of decision making during a critical situation saying "Major, I need you to function, not compute!". Slow vs fast thinking.

Another interesting look at this topic is this article (PDF) ^((3)) who suggests that "people at least implicitly detect that their heuristic response conflicts with traditional normative considerations. I propose that this conflict sensitivity calls for the postulation of logical and probabilistic knowledge that is intuitive and that is activated automatically when people engage in a reasoning task."

^((1) Holyoak, K. J., & Morrison, R. G. (Eds.). (2005). The Cambridge handbook of thinking and reasoning. Cambridge University Press.)

^((2) Kahneman, D. (2011). Thinking, fast and slow. Macmillan.)

^((3) De Neys, W. (2012). Bias and conflict: A case for logical intuitions. Perspectives on Psychological Science, 7(1), 28-38)

I share your frustrations wholeheartedly. The fact that there are people in this world that were unwanted and unplanned for completely baffles me and is something that I view as a serious crime against humanity.
Your point about children and low self-esteem is a huge issue that I believe to be near the root of the problem. However, I believe a further question must be asked: Why are parents absent from the lives of their children, and as a consequence, why are children forced to look for attention and attachment through their peers and online communities?
The answer to this, I fancy, can be found through systemic causation; that being our capitalist system.

If you're interested, this book explains goes through the point you made about children and the loss sound emotional support.
http://www.amazon.com/Hold-On-Your-Kids-Parents/dp/0375760288


This lecture (Gabor Mate) goes through the bio/psycho/social injustices of our economic system.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AaAJQR_9Dg8