One of the reasons why people abandon their true selves is because their parents and other authorities—teachers, other adults, older siblings, etc.—tell them they should. The magical, dreamy intuitive child is hounded by the sensing parent to “get your head out of the clouds.” The perceiving child is labeled a lollygagger, a slacker, told to “stop dragging your feet!” The sensing child is ridiculed for weeping over her scratchy jammies, told to stop picking at her food, and punished by having food or other creature comforts withheld. The thinking girl is told she’s too much of a tomboy, to be more feminine, that she’s cold or mean, or too serious. The feeling child is the crybaby, too thin-skinned, “always sniveling about something.”
“Fun” in Western culture is always extraverted, and our ideas of success in family life and business are largely based on the extraverted sensing functions. Introverts and the intuitive are considered oddbodies, and never quite fit in.
There’s a place for everyone in this world, or should be, yet in practice I see that even as enlightened adults we sometimes fall into the trap of colluding with those archaic, negative voices that say, “Not good enough.”
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. dreamed that his children would live in a world where they would be judged by the content of their character. What a great dream.
For Further Reading
Wiki: Keirsey Temperament Sorter
Daryl Sharp on Personality Types
