Comments on: You are what you believe

By: greg

greg — Tue, 15 Mar 2011 15:11:02 +0000

I spent the whole last year going through a quarter life existential crisis trying to figure out what game I wanted to play (retail was fine for college, but I want a grown up job with grown up pay and it’s frustrating starving with a crappy job and everyone you know expecting more from you) I have the aptitude for a great many things, but I’m done with the get-in-serious-debt going to school to be further behind financially and professionally game. Some of my friends are doing this and I think 80k in debt to make 55k a year. After looking at every career imaginable I realized that it was partially the game I was playing that mattered (if I became an attorney I’d cry myself to sleep at night) and partially the rewards I wanted. I have always wanted to work in film, but I’d rather have financial stability and a nice house and comfortable work hours (lol, I can’t understand. Why some people work 80 hours a week to make 100k a year… its the same as 40 for 50k… maybe they live to work, lol) so I decided to find a medical sales job and work really hard at that game and maybe it wont be ramen another night.

By: bgap

bgap — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 19:05:21 +0000

Thanks for this life perpective! As an INFP, I’m always looking for a new angle on how to deal with a society dominated by ESTJ’s. The hardest part is that the d@mn rules change, at least in certain games. I say this as a business owner who had it all worked out, then the recession hit, and that game TOTALLY changed, and now I’m working 3 times as hard making 1/3 the money. Still, it’s way better than the game of “I have to work my ass off at a job I hate so I can eat and pay mortgage” game, and yet I have moments when it seems that I’m one step ahead of the “bankrupt, foreclosed, divorced and living out of my car” game. It’s a lot for this dreamy INFP with ADHD to handle….Then I have a P moment, and I thank ________ (insert your name for god here) that the human spirit is so deeply resilient.

By: Nick

Nick — Thu, 24 Feb 2011 14:29:39 +0000

Agreed on the last point. I may have spent time in my 20s and 30s being unproductive but I have in my head that I am going to work until I’m 75 if I physically can. So in all ways I will end up working the same amount of time as everyone else who retires at 65. Kind of a Benjamin Button thing.

By: Spring

Spring — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 15:46:42 +0000

Lily, after much deliberation, I decided on graphic design. I feel quite comfortable doing it and I do it anyway. I just need some formal education to round things out.

Corin, I never wanted to be like other adults I saw. It seemed they were all pretending. But the problem is, I never decided what I actually WANTED to do. I would like to one day be able to work so that my husband doesn’t have to worry about that stuff. He has been the sole breadwinner for 10 years. I agreed to work once he decided to go back to school over 3 years ago. I worked from home doing customer service. Then my position became more detailed and I had to meet quotas and I couldn’t work with the customers and take my time with them. I became discouraged and restless and I quit. It’s been a serious struggle for us financially since he went back to school. It had also been a strain on our relationship.
I have to say that reading your blog has made me feel a little more hopeful about being able to make a living and even travel and help others that are in need. Infps can be misunderstood as being lazy or unmotivated. I cannot tell you how many times I’ve been fired for not taking initiative and not focusing. Coupled with this, I have epilepsy. For a long time, I thought that my behavior was a result of having so many seizures as a child. It’s been a long, hard journey, but I feel that things have been turning around.

By: Corin

Corin — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 09:23:31 +0000

As I grow older, my definition for “real” adult has broaden greatly. I think to be a real adult, a person has to talk full responsibility for the current state of their life and accept the consequences of the actions that have brought them to where their life is now.

It doesn’t mean getting a job. I’ve worked really hard so my wife wouldn’t need to work so she could focus on other things. Now were working hard so I don’t have to have a job. I find it really weird that Western society is so focus on telling us that the mature way to live is to make money by having a job so you can work until 65 and not work.

I just don’t meet many people who would continue their current paying job after “retirement”. I look at it this way. If you love what you’re doing, you never really retire from doing it.

By: Lilly

Lilly — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 07:42:26 +0000

Maybe you wouldn’t avoid work if you did what you loved for a living. Graphic Designer? Spanish Interpreter? Nutritionist? Why not?

By: Spring

Spring — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 04:40:37 +0000

I managed to avoid participating in the “not die” game for all of my adult life. I went from living with my parents to my husband supporting me. I became “allergic” to working and I’d spend my days learning web and graphic design, Spanish, healthy eating and whatever else tickled my infp fancy. But, this wore on my marriage and I felt very insecure around other people because I wasn’t a “real” adult. So, this lead to isolation and I continued to play the “dependency” game. This game requires being extremely creative because you have to come up with more and more excuses as to why you should be allowed to skip what everyone else in society has to do.
I like your take of Tony Robbins theory because it helps me to separate things in my head. I feel like most of the time everything that I take in goes into a large bowl of soupy nebulous slosh. For the past year, I’ve been playing the “Not suck at being me” game. I had to admit to myself what I was doing and now I’m working to turn it around.
At the same time, I’m working on the “Show my family I love them” game.

By: Rob

Rob — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 18:29:04 +0000

Hm, I have to admit, I’m also a ‘glitch’ person. Always trying to shortcut things.. maybe trying to be too clever.. and looking back a ‘glitch’ is a glimps of an alternative game… but still a game with possibly a different reward.

I think the hard thing about being an INFP is that it’s a rare type, so ‘modelling’ is tougher, so finding the game that fits an INFP is harder. (plus all the other aspects of one’s charactaristics that are not covered by the INFP type)

By: Corin

Corin — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 16:19:04 +0000

I use to think what’s the point. Everyone is chasing their various rewards and I didn’t want to be part of that. I would only play the “I don’t want to die” game which meant getting a job, food and rent. However, I realized how unsatisfying doing well at only that one game became. It’s the games that make life interesting. So after that, I started the “I want to have good friends” game. That one just took years and years.

By: Lilly

Lilly — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 05:53:36 +0000

I think in observing the world a lot, I sometimes end up focusing on the perceived insignificance of the game, which can in effect overwhelm my desire for the rewards. But those desires nevertheless present themselves time and again. I might as well expect it, and not allow myself to get so detached to the point of no longer feeling a need to act.

Thanks. This blog has helped me see the virtue of “games” more sharply (and I’m sure you know how important virtue is to an infp).