Why I Type so many INTJs

Arvid Walton 28 Comments

“You’ve typed a lot more INTJs than any other type”

I believe you submitted this comment under the questions section?

Either way, a question was implied, and I will honour your request.

Reason #1 I am an INTJ.

I don’t know your type, but based on the content of your comment, I know you’re not an INTJ. Try to imagine what it would be like if you had only ever met two or three other people who shared your personality type (discounting the internet).

I’ve had one INTJ professor (last year), and that was a glorious ride. Halfway through the year, there was a brilliant moment in which I discounted another student’s incorrect interpretation of Ralph Waldo Emerson and the professor set me on a pedestal with words.

Then, my ESFP sibling has a friend who claims to be an INTJ, but whom I haven’t interacted with enough to actually tell. Also, this same kid’s dad is supposedly an INTJ, but then, I haven’t talked to him much either.

Regardless, I have interacted in person with only a few other (confirmed) INTJs. (I admit part of this is that I’m a self-professed hermit –and a lot of the other INTJs are too, thus we rarely bump into each other).

As human beings, we all need someone to relate to, and for types that are less rare, relating to other people is far easier. People need to feel that they are understood, and when they don’t have that – they make friends with fictional characters. INxJs have it the worst when it comes to this because there. is. no. one.

I had an INFJ roommate last year, and after the first time we sat down and talked, she said this, “I’ve never met anyone who understood me before.”

That said, INxJs are particularly good at being better friends with fictional characters than real-life people because they have something in common with INxJ characters.

Naturally, I look for INTJ characters when I watch film or read books, so of course, there are more of them on this site. I also tend to spot INTJs instantly because…well obviously, it’s easier to spot bits of yourself reflected back at you than it is to spot bits of other people (that is, if you’re an Fi user).

So, this is my answer:

Reason #2 INTJs are the most Abused Types in Fiction.

Chances are, the majority of your favourite characters are INTJs (regardless of your personality type). People fetishize INTJs to no end, and writers take advantage of that fact when creating fiction.

Sherlock is fetishized to no end. Friedhelm Winter is the favourite character of nearly everyone who’s seen Generation War. People walk around wearing Batman shirts.

They try to convince themselves they have something in common with these characters (yet, if they’re not INTJs, the most they can have in common is circumstance –never thought process).

In fact, there are a lot of people (in real life and on the internet) that pose as INTJs. They’ve taken the test and let their wishes skew the way that they answer so that they can call themselves an INTJ, and then they pathologically convince themselves that they are one (without taking so much as a second to objectively analyze themselves as they are rather than how they wish to be).

Regardless, writers understand that people are drawn to INTJs in a Byronic sense, and they use that as a marketing tool. They see the INTJ as a puzzle that is to be admired and “figured out.”

Writers who aren’t INTJs themselves frequently misunderstand the INTJ and write them merely as their stereotype (which is unfortunate for all of us real INTJs). You can spot a real INTJ writer by how accurately they’re able to portray the INTJ personality type.

Usually, the thing to do (for a non-INTJ writer), is to create a character that is cold and unfeeling but give the audience just enough pathetic reason to love them that they will root for the character no matter what they do.

Make him a Thomas Barrow a jerk, but also give him a deep internal struggle that makes his cruelty justified.

Make Sherlock a cold, semi-sociopathic antisocial, but give him an intelligence that wows the socks off of every girl in the neighbourhood.

You get the idea.

Whenever I do anything that seems questionable or know something intuitively that should be impossible to know, my ESFP sibling is always there to mutter…”You INTJ.”

28 thoughts on “Why I Type so many INTJs”

  2. Now I do feel like you mistype sometimes.

    I’ve read your typings, and I find that a lot of your Function Descriptions are tacky:

    Take the Einstein Typing for example:

    “by personal emotion. He wanted most to be true to himself and often went directly against his parents orders even if it meant losing their trust, love or funding. He was a bit of a radical, and all as a result of hating the school system, Einstein revoked his citizenship of Germany at age 15 without telling his parents. As a young man, he married a woman that his parents hated, and was rejected by them for years to come. Einstein was a bit of a flirt in school and tended to be a bit of a quiet ladies man (if you’ve ever seen one, you know what I mean).”

    Now just because Einstein was a radical doesn’t make him an Fi-Dom by any means. Ne is more interested in denouncing the system for the sake of it. Also, you could say his behavior is a result of his tertiary-Si instead, as you mentioned he wasn’t big on social rules and traditions within the Si-Function. Can’t you argue then that he was a radical because he was against traditions? Just because Einstein is independent doesn’t make him Fi-Dom, in fact often Inferior-Fe hates being limited by people as well.

    Also your definition of Te for Einstein, is a bit off:”Te: Albert Einstein didn’t see the need to talk more than was absolutely necessary. In fact, he didn’t speak a single word until he was five years old, when after years of his parent’s believing there was something wrong with him, he asked in perfect German”. So just because he didn’t talk until he was 5, means he’s a Te-associated type? I mean that just doesn’t make much sense. Wouldn’t a Ti-Dom also not see an rational reason to talk, in fact wouldn’t they think about what point there would be to asking it? Ti doesn’t automatically mean that one talks because they are confused. Te is more about what is true while Ti is thinking about IF it’s true.

    Like L said about Kira, I’m not 100% certain I am correct, but I do find it peculiar that you type a lot of famous people as INTJ’s. I could discuss my reasons as to why later. I do think this however; you have some degree of confirmation bias when it comes to typing, and anything that remotely screams INTJ to you, is INTJ(even when it might not be).It does suggest that you like to glorify INTJ’s, espically with the Ask an INTJ anything section. If you want to further discuss this in private, email me @hasandeustch@gmail.com

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  3. Hi. I just wanted to thank you for taking the time to explain why you’re writing these blogs. It feels a little strange to me however, not having to ask you why. Haha. Not that I couldn’t come up with other things to ask you why about. I’ve often found people get rather annoyed when I ask why. Anyway, a very interesting read, and I am also enjoying the articles concerning Ender and other characters. When I am finished typing out this comment, I will bookmark your site for further study.

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    • I always ask why, and I prefer the company of people who ask why, because it tells me which people are listening with the intent to understand versus those who are listening merely with the intent to respond.

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      • Well, the two most commonly asked questions for me are: Why, and, how does that work? Lol and when I ask how does that work, I’m not necessarily referring to something technological. Of course, people often get impatient with me when my questions are too detailed. Really, even if it’s only 3 questions. So that makes my interactions with people rather…interesting sometimes.

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      • Other than myself, I know no other INTJ. I feel very different from every single person around me yet I never feel lonely .. I enjoy my company so much heh.
        I enjoy this blog as well.

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    • I thought this article was really interesting and insightful. However, I thought that people mostly had Batman merch mainly because he is a superhero and there tends to be a lot of superhero merch (because people think they are cool) and not because his personality is fetishized. I could be mistaken, however…

      Sorry if this seems exessively nitpicky, I just thought that was an interesting point.

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  5. Thank you for this. Reading this blog posts makes me feel like I’m not alone anymore. Oftentimes, when I meet people, they tell me, “I’m going to figure you out.” Or they compare me to a puzzle as if I am some sort of game for them to play with. It bothers me that people don’t seem to realize that I’m human, too. I wonder how long before they actually learn the weight behind their words.

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  6. I’m an INFP majoring in film to become a screenwriter. You said INTJs are often inaccurately portrayed in fiction. How would you write an INTJ character?

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    • That’s a good question. I don’t know what type of INTJ you’re looking for, but from an INTJ with an ENTJ stepfather and sister, I think I can give you a more feeling version of XNTJ:

      My ENTJ stepdad is basically a bulldog in his career and personal life. He knew what he wanted and rose to the top quickly and efficiently, and is downright frightening to his underperforming employees; He’s not afraid to let them know he will “trim the fat,” so to speak. But he’s stuck in a Te/Se loop, so when it comes to his personal life, he and my ESFP mother like to party hard, and have a REALLY bad judge of character when it comes to choosing trustworthy friends (which has put our family in more than one financial crisis). His Fi makes him extremely generous to his loved ones. Recently he had to fire a few employees that were personal friends, and though he did it without complaining, he was depressed, got sick, and his back went out. If you didn’t know him well, you’d think he was shallow, but I’m privileged to know the deeply caring and surprisingly intuitive, open minded individual that he is.

      My sister is an example of a mature ENTJ. She rides the fine line between introverted and extroverted (always scoring INTJ on the tests), but since she was a little girl, her desire to effectively organize people has shown through. She is great at reading people, seeing as she made it through most of her schooling without writing a paper because other people wrote them for her – including me, but in my defense, I was genuinely passionate about whatever she made me write, and she always gave me something in exchange. Her Fi is strong and mature; she genuinely cares about people, and is kind to others without being disingenuous. I have always admired her unshakable moral code, even when it doesn’t seem sensible (ex: maintaining contact with our estranged father; no one can get her to budge on that). She is distressed when loved ones hurt themselves by making irrational decisions based on how they feel vs. how they will benefit. She’s rising more quickly than her peers in her profession as a nurse, but admits to me that she is terrible at small talk with her patients (better than me, though). That said, she is the best person I know, and my absolute favorite human being.

      I think I am an example of an immature INTJ in pursuit of maturity. Despite suffering from depression through most of my childhood/teenage years (which = Ni/Fi loop, meaning strong negative emotions and disillusionment that led to bad decision-making), I’ve known what I’ve wanted to be since I can remember, and spent hours everyday as a child learning and obsessing over art and writing. I was kind of an intense, idealistic kid with a passion for philosophy and a distaste for things I didn’t need. Ex: we found an old Christmas letter from my childhood a few years ago, saying something like: Dear Santa, I would like two new pairs of jeans, because my current ones have holes in them. P.S., I would also like new socks for the reasons stated above. Thank you.

      … Even I have to admit, that’s kind of weird coming from a middle class kid. But as a child, the only things I needed were books, pen and paper. So yeah, I was the weird one in the family. In therapy, I developed my Te which changed my life. I am focused on my goals, giving me enough tunnel vision to see what’s important to me. Does it mean I don’t care what others think? No. Does that mean I’ll let that influence me? No, unless there is a valid reason that is more effective than my own.

      Relationships are my Achilles heel, but learning to communicate without bulldozing over people’s values has been very helpful. I’m extremely independent in relationships, sometimes going weeks without contacting friends because I enjoy my alone time. But I like people; I like learning why they think and feel certain ways, I like how romantically poetic some can be and am annoyed by the unnecessary cruelty in others. I’ve been obsessed with the human soul since… forever, and believe in God, and have learned most of the beliefs of other religions, including atheism (I know it’s not a religion), in order to find nuggets of truth.

      I will say, before I finish, that most claim that INTJs do not feel, or at least, do not feel very often. I can’t speak for anyone else, but my first thought when I read that was that feeling nothing meant feeling hollow, or empty inside – a sense of purposelessness, which is a horrible feeling whether you’re an INTJ or not. But if it’s anything like I feel when my Ni and Te are in full force, it would actually be a sense of peace. I am peaceful inside, and not truly affected by the outside. I know who I am, who I love, and who I am meant to be; everything else is inconsequential in comparison.

      I hope this helps, and if you need more info about an accurate portrayal of a depressed INTJ, read Arvid’s posts on Hamlet – spot on, especially the mood swings. I sometimes forget how much I used to hate/love someone, among other things (my age, for one…).

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  7. It also makes sense that many here would be an INTJ, INTJ’s would seek out knowledge at great lengths regarding their type. The poll on your site reflects the two most frequent types are INTJ/INTP, both obsessive learners (one for practical implementation and the other for personal discovery).

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  8. To be honest, I rather wish I wasn’t an INTJ at times, and were more action-oriented like my ENTJ cousins. But with the need for space to process, my behind-the-curtain leadership, a future-minded long-term strategic thinking, a sense of sensory impulsivity and almost unconscious knowing that I know something and an emotional disregard for others, there’s no escaping the truth.

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    • Adam, this was actually my initial reaction when I found out about MBTI and being an INTJ. I was bummed and went into a few seconds of denial imagining it was a test mistake. Alas, way too close to reality. The profiles say INTJs prefer blunt honesty and no truth scares them, and well, yeah. Agreed. Ok, I get it, I accept the truth.

      Then shortly after I read about INTJ fetishization and fiction stereotypes here, and I kinda got mad and annoyed at it… I had never consciously realized how it was in so many places, because I avoid watching and reading a whole lot of popular things. The articles here have been an eye opener to say the least.

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    • I took the personality test over and over trying NOT to be an INTJ female. It gets unwanted attention that interferes with my drive to do what I do best: break things down to simplest form and execute almost anything w superior efficiency and accuracy with as little effort possible. Try being a little girl w this personality. No female role models. Guys are perplexed. Imagine being trapped w a brain that rapidly processed EVERYTHING from EVERY ANGLE. It’s exhausting competing w yourself for constant improvements and impossible standards at all times emotionally, physically and mentally while needing to consider things with moral depth, scientific processes and all principles of the fine arts. INTJs feel at incredible depth incomprehensible to most and incomparably unforgettable to very few. It is a sh!tstorm and very difficult to understand if not like minded.

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  9. INTPs are probably the least used characters in fiction. I do not believe I have read or seen more than 5 INTPs in fiction but I have always liked them.

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    • That’s definitely true. I don’t yet know the reason for that, but they definitely always make me laugh by how much the remind me of my Dad.

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      • I think it’s because INTPs are not very decisive or impulsive. It’s hard to write a character whose response to an important problem is to think things through carefully and logically. An INTP Doctor would constantly be running back to the TARDIS to spend an hour or a year analyzing a crisis, and an INTP Harry Potter would consult books and experienced wizards rather than rushing into trouble. INTP flaws tend to be less sexy. Caution? Shyness? A tendency to get too wrapped up in our own internal worlds? Not great plot fodder. It’s fun to watch characters manipulate each other, even if we loathe them for it – less fun to watch an INTP be earnestly kind or socially awkward or simply withdrawn.

        The INTP characters we do see tend to be side characters, sometimes advisors. They’re useful for non-NT protagonists when the plot needs some good perceptive analysis to advance. But yeah, it takes a special kind of story and storyteller to really explore the INTP.

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        • I’m an INTP myself and one of my main characters is an INTP because I thought it would be fun to make a character who was like myself, plus one hardly ever sees INTP characters in fiction.

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        • An INTP Doctor would be hilarious and brilliant. I personally love INTPs (I’m an INTJ). The few INTP characters I’ve read about are extremely intelligent, and their absent-minded habits and procrastination are always put to humorous effect. I’ve been trying to write an INTP character in for the main protagonist in one of my novels, actually. She’s not really knowing what’s going on and is so awkward in social situations, but is, of course, very intelligent.

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  10. It always was quite obvious to me there are more INTJs typed here, especially that it’s a place somewhat dedicated to fighting INTJ stereotypes, too.

    But I started thinking about the sources of INTJ fetishization. At first glance dominant Ni – or, more precisely, the NiTe connection – occures as the most important factor. Ni-doms are rare, therefore fascinating, and INTJs’ aux Te gives an impression of possibility to see, understand and relate to their thought proccess. Obviously it’s not fully true, especially if the observer is not a Ni user (as an INFP I often feel unable to follow the thoughts of my INFJ mother or INTJ boyfriend, even if I know the mechanisms). But people crave an illusion of being smarter than they really are, and see dominant Ni as misterious, fascinating, and extremely useful, especially that most of the population lacks it.
    But then, wondering about the quasi-byronism, I view tertiary Fi as more important in the case. Popular culture loves “introverted intelectuals struggling with their feelings”, and that’s what IxTJs are usually brought down to. ISTJs’ presence and admiration in pop culture may be much less intense, but than there is Spock, or Severus Snape (both mistyped as INTJs though, which is sympthomatic).
    Could this make sense?

    (My apologies for possible language mistakes, I’m not a native English speaker. And sorry for that amount of INFP jubber!)

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    • Yep, I think you definitely have a great understanding of how the Jungian functions play into the fetishisation.

      When it comes to ISTJs, I think people are less likely to fetishise them because people are less drawn to Si. Ni is more out-of-the-box, and people love anything that is new, different and surprising.

      My siblings and I tease my ESTJ mother because her Si makes her predictable. When we go for dinner, she likes to go to the exact same restaurant, where she will then order the exact same meal that she has for decades. To a lot of people Si-Te routine is boring. They’re attracted to Ni because it problem-solves in unexpected ways that leave you thinking, “why didn’t I think of that? Oh, wait, I never would have thought of that if it had been left up to me.”

      In terms of tertiary Fi -yes all the way.

      And, no need to apologise for your English (I may be an English major and an INTJ, but I’m not immature enough to waste my time complaining about other people’s English. That would be like a dentist complaining about how other people brush their teeth.) Furthermore, never apologise for INFP jubber. I love it. INFP jabber makes me smile (which is saying something considering the tertiary Fi).

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