Why INFPs think of themselves as âfrauds.â
When youâre an INFP, your biggest insecurity is that you have nothing to say.
You perceive most people as insightful, intelligent and interesting, while you are a dullard who canât even string three words together. Itâs not just that youâre shy â you feel like thereâs something mentally WRONG with you.
I felt this way for decades, but I got over it by thinking about it this way. The reason everyone elseâs stories are so fascinating is because YOU are the one processing them. YOU are connecting dots in your brain that make what you hear much more âinvolvingâ than the same story processed through a non-infp mind. In other words, youâre too imaginative for your own good.
Conversely, you have incredibly high standards for what constitutes a worthy conversation and what doesnât. Comments about yourself, for example, seem egotistical and pointless. How you day is going? Who cares!!
So you LIMIT your options SEVERELY when communicating with another person, and tend to choose the words that end the conversation because you donât want people to find out youâre an imposter.
Yeah, thatâs the main thought that goes through your head, right? Youâre stupid and incapable (handicapped, maybe?) and nobody has found out yet. But oddly enough, nobody seems to notice. Nobody has EVER told you that you are dumb. Weird, isnât it?
Thatâs because youâre not dumb. You simply have impossibly high standards. Youâre an INFP, remember.
Like I said, I struggled with this for decades. I was an âimposterâ for decades, yet I STILL manage to be âsuccessful,â despite judging myself as a âfraudâ all those years ago.
Thatâs because Iâm NOT a fraud, and neither are you. Once I realized this, I also realized that I DID have useful things to say. This post, hopefully, is one of them.
So donât harsh on yourself, and please let me know if this helps. You see, I still appreciate verification that Iâm not a fraud, even when I know itâs not true.
Itâs No Fucking Problem.
Your Pal,
Space Monkey
