Beautiful minds and reluctant heroes - the curious case of the INFP

What do Virginia Woolf, Vincent van Gogh and  Kurt Cobain have in common? They were all INFPs (my type) in the Myers-Briggs system and they committed suicide. INFPs are said to be the most idealistic type and have the highest suicide rates of all types. Strangely enough, they also frequently have heart-shaped faces and the rare redheads seem to be overrepresented among them.

INFPs are also known as “dreamers” (this is the noun most frequently used by my teachers to describe me on parent-teachers days to my parents), who prefer to live in their minds more often than in real life. I suppose I am not the only INFP who spent his childhood and teenage years reading books and comics and binge-watching movies, and of course dreaming up magical worlds and exciting stories, trying to escape real life whenever possible. No surprise that many of us become artists and writers.

What makes it so hard for INFPs to live in this world? To begin with, we are the exact opposite of ESTJs: extraverted (high dopamine), S (practical, materialistic), T (high testosterone, competitive and stress-resistant), and J (high serotonin, conscientious). I have argued before that ESTJ are personality traits that evolved

I have argued before that ESTJs are personality traits that served early farmers well, whereas INFPs have preserved more hunter-gatherer traits: egalitarianism, altruism and high social sensitivity (empathy). We are constantly told to be less sensitive, to be more extraverted and have more fun (dopamine), to be more conscientious (serotonin) and above all to be more assertive (testosterone). All of these things are hard for us, as we a really programmed to thrive on oxytocin, the hormone of love and laughter.

We are living paradoxes, as we are programmed to trust, only to find that most people aren’t as trustworthy as us and still we want to believe that all humans are good. We are programmed to set our self-worth to whatever other people think of us (which is basically losers) and this is how we come to hate ourselves and love everyone else. We are programmed to be highly (outgroup) social, and we frequently end up as loners.

Of all types, INFPs probably have the lowest stress-resistance of all types. My INFP son usually comes home from school with his brain full of cortisol, unable to do anything until he has come down, usually by playing videogames. INFPs are the quintessential orchid children, who thrive in loving and low-stress environments, but who fail in life if those conditions aren’t met. INFPs are probably not only the type with the highest suicide rates, but also the highest rates of depression and schizophrenia. Scientists nowadays are quick to put down such conditions on genes. However, these genes are ancient, stressful social environments are more recent.

INFPs dream of being heroes and changing the world for the better. At the same time, they are reluctant to go out there, because they feel so powerless. Many stories are actually about reluctant INFP heroes, invented by their INFP authors: Frodo in Lord of the Rings, Luke Skywalker in Star Wars and Peter Parker, aka Spiderman, the nerdy student who gets bullied by his classmates. In fact, INFPs are much more likely to be the victims of bullying than heroes. INFPs are the easiest prey for bullies: they are typical nerds or weirdos, have few or no friends to help them and are not even programmed to be non-violent.

INFPs have hunter-gatherer minds, that struggle more than any other type in this materialistic farmer world. Most of us even struggle to hold a simple 9-5 job. In a world that is materialistic and competitive and that doesn’t need poets, INFPs have to be stronger than everyone else. Small wonder that so many of us give up.

I am indebted to Jim Black for pointing out the facial features of INFPs to me.