I Got Published on Thought Catalog!

Hi guys! Two weeks ago, I received a very pleasant e-mail from one of the Thought Catalog writers/producers named Nicole Tarkoff saying my article, which I will be posting below, is live on the site and that she enjoyed reading it. As an amateur writer myself, I’ve felt as though I was on cloud nine at that very moment because I never thought I’d reach this height ever in my life. I sobbed and jumped uncontrollably around the kitchen whilst trying to absorb the fact that it really happened. I’m so happy because guess what, I can finally cross this off my bucket list!

So you might be wondering what my article is about. It is about my personality type– a psychology thing I am very obsessed with. If you have been following me for some time now, you probably are aware that I love taking personality/psychological tests such as the MBTI personality test. I even mentioned it in one of my previous posts. Hehe.

When I was in first-year college, I came across this site that lets a person know his/her four-letter personality type. I took the test thinking that it is just probably another random quiz circulating on the internet. Well, I was obviously wrong because it turns out that it is backed up by Science. That’s the first time I found out I am an INFP.

Another site that confirmed my INFPness is Similar Minds. (The site also revealed my preferred and attraction type: both INFP.)

Jung Explorer Test
Actualized type: INFP
(who you are)

INFP – “Questor”. High capacity for caring. Emotional face to the world. High sense of honor derived from internal values. 4.4% of total population.

Preferred type: INFP
(who you prefer to be)

INFP – “Questor”. High capacity for caring. Emotional face to the world. High sense of honor derived from internal values. 4.4% of total population.

Attraction type: INFP

(who you are attracted to)

INFP – “Questor”. High capacity for caring. Emotional face to the world. High sense of honor derived from internal values. 4.4% of total population.

• Take Jung Explorer Test here.
• personality tests by similarminds.com

I’m not way too obssessed with INFPs that much, am I? Lol.

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What is an INFP? According to the description of the INFPs in a group I am a member of on Facebook, INFPs are The Dreamer or Healer type.

Introverted – Intuitive – Feeling – Perceptive. 

INFPs never seem to lose their sense of wonder. One might say they see life through rose-colored glasses. It’s as though they live at the edge of a looking-glass world where mundane objects come to life, where flora and fauna take on near-human qualities.

On the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator, INFP is rare personality type, found in only about 4 % of the general population. Yet, of the possible 16 types, it is the one most frequently found for gifted people. This scarcity, coupled with their extreme intelligence, renders them seldom understood, and thus, rarely validated in relationships.

INFPs are creative, sensitive souls who take their lives very seriously. They seek harmony and authenticity in their relationships with others. They value creativity, spirituality, and honoring the individual self above all else. They are very tuned into inequity and unfairness against people, and get great satisfaction from conquering such injustices. An INFP is a perfectionist who will rarely allow themselves to feel successful, although they will be keenly aware of failures. INFPs also get satisfaction from being in touch with their creativity. For the INFP, personal success depends upon the condition of their closest relationships, the development of their creative abilities, and the continual support of humanity by serving people in need, fighting against injustice, or in some other way working to make the world a better place to be.

Of the sixteen Myers-Briggs personality types, INFPs are among the most “right-brained.” They see the world through holistic lenses, grasping the “big picture” while skimming over what they might deem as inconsequential details. INFPs are often gifted both intellectually and artistically, excelling in whatever avenue they opt to channel their talents and energies

Highly creative, artistic and spiritual, they can produce wonderful works of art, music and literature. INFPs are natural artists. They will find great satisfaction if they encourage and develop their artistic abilities. That doesn’t mean that an INFP has to be a famous writer or painter in order to be content. Simply the act of “creating” will be a fulfilling source of renewal and refreshment to the INFP. An INFP should allow himself or herself some artistic outlet, because it will add enrichment and positive energy to their life.

They’re more spiritually aware than most people, and are more in touch with their soul than others. Most INFPs have strong Faith. Those that don’t may feel as if they’re missing something important. An INFP should nourish their faith. INFPs do not measure life in terms of the number of friends and acquaintances they have but rather by the quality of their friendships. For INFPs, the distinction between friends and acquaintances is very important; an acquaintance is someone they spend time with while a friend is someone with whom an INFP can share ideas and feelings. Their most valuable friends are people who understand their important values and accept them unconditionally.

INFPs are usually talented writers. They may be awkard and uncomfortable with expressing themselves verbally, but have a wonderful ability to define and express what they’re feeling on paper. INFPs who function in their well-developed sides can accomplish great and wonderful things, which they will rarely give themselves credit for. Some of the great, humanistic catalysts in the world have been INFPs.
In conclusion, these are deep, complex, somewhat melancholy people who are hard to understand.

People of this type tend to be: quiet, reserved, and kind; deeply passionate, sensitive, and easily hurt; loving and dedicated to those close to them; creative, original, and imaginative; curious and flexible in small matters; nonconforming.

Now, you might also be wondering how sure I am that I am indeed a 100% INFP. Here’s how: sometime in college, the school guidance counselors made us take a psychology test. It’s a requirement. After a few months, I received the result and that’s when I found out that I am undeniably an INFP. Yaas. Lol. (I lost the document though. I’m so sad.).

Since then, I did not stop reading about the Sixteen (16) MBTI types especially about INFPs. I also used this tool to understand my friends more as I know their personality types as well. And because I got ~sooo~  passionate about reading about this, I figured I can try writing about it too. So I did. And it was published on Thought Catalog YALL. Hehe.

Below is the corrected article because the one that was published on TC has a few grammatical errors, unfortunately. (I wrote it at 3 am and did not proofread it before submitting because I thought it wouldn’t be published but hey, it was so…) I’m so sorry about that! Please allow me to redeem myself this time hehe. I hope you have fun reading it. 🙂

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10 Things You’ll Always Catch An INFP Doing

INFPs are often secretive and quiet individuals. We put too much value on our privacy and silence that people perceive us as the mysterious type. You might even face a challenge when befriending one but fear not, an INFP herself will spill some tea about the things we fancy doing. If you happened to be interested in some of these INFP hobbies too, then, I think you can develop a fairy-tale bond with one faster than you say magic. Let’s get started.

1. DAYDREAMING. Yes, we INFPs are full-time daydreamers. If you have met one and he/she happened to like you, chances are, he/she has dreamed about frolicking in the forest and being alone with the birds with you already or… daydreamed about having a coffee-date with you at least.

2. READING A BOOK. You can hardly find an INFP who hasn’t read a single book. Hardly. As daydreamers and idealists, we fancy getting lost in literature. The more idealistic or illusory the story is, the more we’ll be into it.

3. WRITING. One thing us INFPs do when we want to release a good or unpleasant feeling or thought is we write them down. And we do it quite a lot. We skip meals to write and sometimes, we even do not sleep to… Uhm, write. We’ll write you a song or a poem. We might even write a book that’s dedicated or about you, who knows?

4. PAINTING/DRAWING. INFPs are creative people and as usually shy individuals, we often do not verbalize what is on our minds. Hence, we always try to find ways to release these things. It doesn’t matter if we’re good at it or not, we will always do something with our hands. We are born to always create. Our projects can go from just a simple doodle at the back of our history notebooks to a breath-taking colossal oil-painting. It really just depends on our motivation or how much we are hurting. Oops. (Please don’t hurt us for this though.)

5. SINGING. A part of our emotion-release process is singing. And we do not care about whether we could actually sing or not—as long as nobody’s on the other side of our bedroom door secretly listening because we’d immediately stop. Trust me, we know because we can literally sense everything!

6. LISTENING. INFPs are great listeners. We always enjoy listening to music, especially the ones that make us sad… or sadder. (You know, we need it for our… art.) We listen to upbeat songs too though, don’t get us wrong! INFPs can also be great friends because we are great listeners. We’ll even listen to you rant about that same problem of yours for the 37th time and you will barely hear us complain about it.

7. LURKING. Okay, maybe not lurking but observing. INFPs are often too shy to ask you personal questions so we’ll try to get to know you through your social media but only if we are interested. We also tend to watch people we like or don’t from afar. See, we notice everything. We feel everything. And if we finally sense that you are a nice person and you probably won’t hurt us, then we might finally initiate a conversation with you. (This rarely happens though.)

8. HIDING. You read it right. If an INFP feels sad or is just “not feeling it”, we’d hide or retreat or ghost or whatever to recover. We hide to recharge. You might not hear from us after a lunch out for up to 8 months but I swear you didn’t do anything wrong. Or maybe you did. It’s hard to explain. (Pro-tip: When this happens, know that we can be usually found in a forest near us, on top of a tree, in a library or a bookstore… Or maybe just in our room silently painting.)

9. THINKING. When INFPs are quiet and we’re “not” doing anything, we’re doing something for sure and that is thinking. INFPs think a lot. We think about death, space aliens, unicorns, why our cats ignored us 52 seconds ago, birds, fairies (a lot), philosophy, our favorite books, favorite dead authors and just about anything. Then again, I’m sad to say that you usually won’t know what we’re thinking about unless we either tell you directly because you’re important or we write about it.

10. LOVING. We INFPs are extremely passionate, sensitive and loving people. We just love our families and pets way too much and so well! You can be sure an INFP loves you when he/she tells and shows you. However, we usually only love people from afar and I don’t know why. *Sigh*. If you think we like or love you and there’s no chance of knowing where you stand with us, read what we write, tweet, and see what we draw about and you’ll know everything we will ever permit you to know. Trust me, I’m an INFP.

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That’s it. I hope you enjoyed reading about my little victory as much as I had fun writing about it. Hehe.

Are you aware of your MBTI type already? If you are, please share it with me as I am interested in knowing about you too! 🙂 If not, you can take the free personality test here. You’re welcome!

If you want to view the *cough* uncorrected and grammatically incorrect *cough* article of mine that was published on Thought Catalog, click here. (To be honest, I’m really bruised for life and ashamed of my mistake but for the sake of documentation, I’ll still share the link with you. Lol.)

See you in my next post. Have a great day!