blog policy

Attention: Non-Native English Speaking Readers

AsideArvid Walton 9 Comments

First of all, thank you to all of you who have been kind and respectful, and ultimately, all those who have successfully torn down the language barrier between us.

I dabble in multiple languages and am more than familiar with the struggle of trying to communicate with native speakers of languages that I am not perfect at. I am also very familiar with the difficulties of trying to communicate with non-native speakers of my own native language (English). Now, being well versed in the problems of both sides of this struggle, I would like to address a few things that have caused disagreements on this blog in the past.

Bottom Line: Meaning will always be Lost in Translation Continue reading →

Why You should Stop Saying you were “Traumatized” by a TV Show

AsideArvid Walton 6 Comments

Why you should Stop Saying you were Traumatised by a TV show...

Anon asked: “You’re the first MBTI expert I’ve come across who’s typed the characters from Unsere Mütter, Unsere Väter, and since you’re an INTJ, I must know. Were you emotionally traumatized the first time you watched it?”

Continue reading →

Update and Thank You

AsideArvid Walton 28 Comments

I’d like to extend a very hearty thank you to everybody who has contributed to help this blog stay afloat in the last several months. And that includes those who have written guest posts as well as all those who have contributed respectfully to the site discussion. It’s not infrequent that I receive very rude comments from strangers who aren’t regular followers, and it’s refreshing to see both the healthy discussion that all of you have created, in addition to all your kind concern about how I’m doing.

Speaking of which, it’s not likely that I will be getting better any time soon (potentially never at this point). I don’t have a solid diagnosis for what’s wrong with me (I’m being tested for things still), but basically I’m dealing with chronic, widespread pain and fatigue that has gradually gotten to the point of being debilitating.

That said, I will probably not be writing an overwhelming number of posts on this blog for a long while, so to a large extent, it will be dependent on guest writers to keep running…as well as my own ability to review and post those pieces.

Thanks for all your kindness and support, minions! It means a lot!

So I just saw all of your comments…

AsideArvid Walton 8 Comments

Don’t think I’m ignoring them. I swear I will reply to them all after I finish finals.

Also. I just looked at my inbox…which is bursting with a million and six questions and character requests.

As a temporary measure intended to save the life of Arvid Walton, I will be shutting down the Ask an INTJ Anything and Request a Character sections on this blog. Fear not. I shall reinstate them once I get caught up on the many hundreds of questions and requests that beset me there.

In the meantime, I would highly appreciate anyone who wants to help with the character typing queue, and I’d like to further thank all those who have contributed up to this point.

In the next week or so, I intend to announce the winners of the last contest along with the answers to the questions posed about me.

Simultaneously, I will confront the horrors of my inbox. Or possibly I shall run away and write poetry.

A Friendly Note to my Minions

AsideArvid Walton

The Book Addict's Guide to MBTI | #MTBIThank you for all of your fantastic, intelligent questions. You all have beautiful minds.

On that note, I promise I’m not ignoring your questions.

They’re not being answered in the same order they were asked because I want to give adequate time the more complicated ones. Easy questions I can simply dump out a response the same day and then put the post in the schedule, but not all questions are that simple. Some require a fair amount of research, so be patient in waiting for them.

In case it wasn’t evident, the queue is very lengthy and growing by the day. I would gladly welcome any help typing –especially with any character marked with an ^ symbol. Those are characters that I won’t personally be typing for whatever reason (most just because I refuse to watch the movies/shows they come from).

I’m a busy person. I’m going to college, working two jobs and writing a book. Any help would be much appreciated.

Please make Requests in the correct location

I know it’s easy to request characters in the comments, but please stop. I like to think I’ve set this system up so it’s easy for you to make requests, but if not, please inform me otherwise.

In the meantime, requests should still be made here: Request a Character

Also, please stop making duplicate requests. I’ve redesigned the queue by combining it with a directory of the characters I’ve already typed. From now on, you’ll be able to look at both the queue of requested characters and those that have already been typed together. Already typed characters will be linked to their respective posts, and untyped characters will simply be listed. So, whenever I refer to the queue, I’m now talking about the Character Directory.

Just to be clear, Ender Wiggin, Jack Harkness, Peeta Mellark and Elisabeth Bennett have already been typed. You can find them in the Character Directory.

To my Grammar Nazis

AsideArvid Walton 3 Comments

Recently, I’ve gotten an influx of grammar-correcting comments, which I’d like to address. I believe grammar is expressly important, but it’s not the most important thing in writing.

You spelled ______ wrong! Don’t you understand how important grammar is?

Being a grammar nazi is a poor way to assert your intelligence because it merely expresses emotional immaturity. A grammar nazi is a person who lacks the self-control necessary to restrain themselves from voicing their inner-critic at inappropriate times and places. He misses the big picture in order to focus on minute details.

Correcting other people’s grammar does not make anyone think of you as a genius. A person may be academically intelligent, but that does them no good if they lack emotional maturity. On a larger scale, this is why Ender Wiggin was chosen to fight the bugger war over his brother Peter. Both were incredibly intelligent, but one of them lacked emotional maturity.

I completely understand the urge to correct other people’s grammar –believe me. However, self-control is far more important. If you can’t control the things you chose to say, then who are you? Because you’re not your own person. You’re simply being swayed one way and another by your emotional responses to things that aren’t important.

“Recognise is spelled with a Z.”

Yeah, maybe in America, but in the UK, we spell it with an S. My earlier attempts to cater all my spellings toward Americans (who comprise the largest percentage of my readership) were a flop, and I’ve gone back to UK spellings.

Consider this. Which is more important? Somebody else’s correctness, or your maturity? Are you simply going to react to everything you see, rather than assertively making a decision as to how you will respond? Are you going to sacrifice your own maturity for the sake of something you probably can’t change?

I am an English Major. I knew the risks of deciding not to spend an extra ten minutes editing per post on this website. It’s for this very reason that I specifically avoid connecting this blog to the books/stories that I’ve published.

I apologise for any grammatical errors you may find on this blog. I’m sorry if they offend you, but they don’t offend me enough that I’m going to spend my entire day off trying to fix all of them.

Now Accepting Guest Writers!

AsideArvid Walton 3 Comments

The Book Addict's Guide to MBTI | #MTBIAs many of you are aware, I am a busy college student, which can often make it difficult to fill many of the requests that come through my inbox. I would be glad of any interest in helping to fill some of those requests. Furthermore, I love to hear from my readers! 

If you’re interested in writing a guest post or contributing content to my blog, I will gladly accept contributions from readers of all MBTI types. Continue reading →

Once Again, Widening the Blog Focus…

AsideArvid Walton

The Book Addict's Guide to MBTI | #MTBIAs always, I’m making changes to the way this blog is being run. Currently, my followers are all conscious and aware of the Meyers Briggs theory. However, I’d like to target the focus to a more literary audience, not making it requisite for readers to have a background understanding of MBTI before they reach my site.

Continue reading →

Now Open to Typing Real People

AsideArvid Walton

Oh, dear, has the content policy changed again?

As many of you will know, my content policy is subject to change over time –mostly to keep me interested because I think we’d all be very sad if I got bored and then stopped posting on this blog.

After a while, I start to get tired of only typing one genre of characters, so I’ve gradually branched out. At first it was just literary characters, then I started doing occasional teen fiction, then some authors, then some movies, then some telly…

Generally, this is how my thought process with regards to the blog policy looks.

So here’s the basic policy change:

I’ve now expanded from doing strictly fictional characters and authors to doing other real people because contrary to what I expected, I actually had loads of fun answering that question about how acting style is influenced by personality. The reason it was so interesting was that it’s a completely different challenge from typing fictional characters.

When it comes to real people, it’s actually more difficult because fictional characters embody the stereotypes more closely. Real people are more three dimensional, so I get a kick out of figuring them out –not that I don’t already do that to my friends…

And for those of you concerned about loosing your literary typings, don’t fret. The literary characters will always be my first love, and there are loads more of them in the que (I’m officially scheduled all the way out to December 1).

Ground rules for requests:

If I don’t know who they are, I probably won’t take your request. I’m notorious for not knowing anything about celebrities, so all the ones that I’ve typed so far actually took quite a bit of time out of my day because I had to research their personalities, watch interviews and look at their behavior.

In general, I’m not going to be doing any singers or pop-stars. Celebrities are limited to film-stars, political and historical figures and the like.

Also, I’m only going to take celebrities that are on my list of interesting people (which, may actually overlap with yours, so don’t fall apart yet). The same goes for historical figures and authors (ergo, no Rick Riordan, J.K. Rowling or Dan Brown).

You’re welcome.

Will be starting with Nikola Tesla on Friday.