[rachelwoohoo]

Hey intjforum,

I'm an enfp and I just googled this topic, but can't find much that's very satisfying. I'd like an in depth thread on this because I am seeking personal growth, and also am trying to measure how much I've grown as an individual in the past couple of months. Many of the more illuminating thoughts online on enfps as a mature individual come from INTJs, or some other forum.
For those of you who have had experience with a person who types as enfp, what have you encountered? Mostly it's easy to consider them as immature, or emotionally unstable, confused, self-centered, babyish in a way, non conformist, using emotional reasoning, not going in depth, not able to take care of their finances...
All of these things suggest that most enfps are not naturally skilled at fitting into the real world. I can relate to this because I'm an ideas person. That's the stuff that drives me. My real escape has been in academia, and this is the only avenue I might be somewhat mature in because I do passionately pursue details this way.It's also because it is a place where I find instant gratification for the work I do. This has been my way of coping, but there are different obstacles that I'm trying to overcome in my life unrelated to the academic world, and that is where I'm struggling right now.

I'd like to achieve a state of maturity. Oftentimes though, I question whether whether my actions stem from being mature, or are me being emotionally imbalanced. For example, the types of interactions I've had with people are limited because I recently have shifted into being open and gullible to being very cautious about who I decide to engage with, and what I decide to engage about. At the same time, I have become very isolated and see myself as out of place. Others see it too. The confusion about whether this is some noble thing I'm doing to myself or if I'm doing something wrong has led me to starting a thread like this. So what are your thoughts?

[Jouk]

As with any other type, one of the major factors in maturity stems from a deep understanding of who you are. Sometimes this can require dealing with some of the most negative and painful parts of us. The enfps I have known are great people, and had similar areas of immaturity:

- Trouble focusing, prioritizing, commitments.
- Insecurity, overemphasizing problems, letting emotions take over.
- Trusting untrustworthy people.
- Difficulty with critique and criticism.

Maturity isn't the absence of unwanted feelings and tendencies, but rather is the experience to deal with them with calm confidence.

The mature enfp will still have the energy, idealism and charisma of the immature version, yet will have the ability to handle their emotions and will have the diligence to accomplish their desired goals.

A certain level of maturity happens naturally over time, but this kind of personal growth can occur more rapidly if we are willing to humble ourselves and be open to the instructive input from those who know us best.

[JulietCapulet]

I wouldn't let other peoples unfounded opinions or stereotypes prevent you from feeling as though you can maintain "typical" ENFP traits and still feel "mature". Bias and lack of understanding can easily warp ones perception of what is acceptable and desirable in a person.


Regardless of mbti type, a healthy person in my view is someone who respects others and themselves in every way, and who contributes to society rather than being a burden to it.

[ludius]

I'm 28/male/ENFP. Let me tell you something: It's hard for an ENFP to be mature if the maturity scale is to be judged by non-ENFP. For me, maturity doesn't mean being on-time or being a man of few words or having a high-paying job or not playing video games. Maturity for me is the ability to make sound decisions when making tough choices; and, the ability to suppress yourself when your actions is harmful to yourself and others. Knowledge and experience will help you get mature sooner.

Having said that, I am still victimized by my ENFPness from time to time despite being cautious of trying to do mature actions and trying to make mature decisions. The main culprits are the following:

1. I tend to get upset easily when other people's actions and decisions are not going in harmony with my self-image and things that I value.
2. When my authenticity, which I labor so hard to build and maintain, is threatened and shattered by unpredictable circumstances. In other words, being misjudged.
3. When making decisions is clouded by my feelings. Most of the times, it means making myself vulnerable and exposing myself to dangers while trying to make a better situation for others.
4. I want to do or get something, not later, not tomorrow, but right now. Why right now? No reason; just excitement. It turns out that when I do something out of excitement, the outcome is often ugly and unbearable.

When I became out-of-control (or out my mind) due to being victimized by the said culprits, I tend to self-destruct by putting all my mind and physical energy over-analyzing my misery and how everything I touch is messed-up. While in this state of inner chaos, evil-thoughts are born and everything I do and everything around me becomes worse, and worse situations means new cause of depression.

I consider those culprits as the major and prevailing ENFP weaknesses. A mature ENFP knows about his/her weaknesses. And suppressing the ENFPness tendencies at the right moment is a key to overcoming those weaknesses. By suppressing, I mean controlling, not changing. An ENFP who try to alter his/her type never succeed and maybe end up messing up his/her own life.

You are mature when your decisions are no longer driven by your type's weaknesses, but rather based on true or false, or right or wrong.

As a fellow ENFP, maybe you will learn from this list of simple thoughts that I think is important for you to grow:
1) To please as many as possible is easier than to please everybody.
2) Sometimes shutting up is more effective in making others listen.
3) Be happy when people reject you because it means more time for yourself and new opportunity to meet new people.
4) Having a multitude of unfinished tasks is vanity.
5) The mind says to the heart: "I can do my duty to protect you from the outside world if you allow me to do the thinking and make the decisions."
6) Action should not come after a mere excitement.
7) It's not important how people think about you unless they are the people you care about and the ones important to you.
8) To forget is the fix to emotional torture.
9) The only thing that makes a mistake right is to learn from it.
10) It's a waste of time to justify or defend your actions to people who are incapable of making sensible judgements.

[Rivers]

How to be mature? By not being childish. Don't be too assertive towards people, respect their reservation and lack of enthusiasm, don't tell them they suck because of it. Don't speak every thought you have out loud, don't try to energize people too much. Shifting to responsbility is always a sign of maturity, I would say you're on a good road towards it. Also, maturity comes from realizing who you are, your strengths and weaknesses, and making the most of it. I can hardly tell you how you can do it since I'm an INTJ, I doubt my personal analysis would be appealing to you because I percieve the workd differently. Basically, work with what you've got, learn how to control finances, set goals in order to disperse the confusion. I would say you're doing a noble thing, just don't go losing yourself in the process.

[jonathanb]

My girlfriend is ENFP. She's very mature in the way she handles things daily (even finances), but very immature in the way she analyses real-world issues and problems. Meaning she understands the importance of tact and acting like an adult, but cannot really understand some parts of reality as an adult. So she could scold me for having "unrealistic expectations" of what I wish to achieve in life, but her carrier choice is much less realistic than my own plans...

[sappho celeste]

I consider myself a developed ENFP. In my opinion this equates to a kind of maturity.

As I've gotten over my shyness I was able to learn and adapt to different situations and personalities with relative ease. Although naturally I am more drawn to the INTJ/INTP circle because often times they are more fun to be around; since many of them have a wide range of interests and absorb vast amounts of information that don't normally include anything categorically superficial.

Occasionally I like to identify myself as either an INTJ or INTP and thus have the ability to come across as one pretty well (even without noticing sometimes.) But I know innately I am an ENFP because of the way I understand how my mind works.

[Alef]

Originally Posted by sappho celeste To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

I consider myself a developed ENFP. In my opinion this equates to a kind of maturity. As I've gotten over my shyness I was able to learn and adapt to different situations and personalities with relative ease. Although naturally I am more drawn to the INTJ/INTP circle because often times they are more fun to be around; since many of them have a wide range of interests and absorb vast amounts of information that don't normally include anything categorically superficial. Occasionally I like to identify myself as either an INTJ or INTP and thus have the ability to come across as one pretty well (even without noticing sometimes.) But I know innately I am an ENFP because of the way I understand how my mind works.

Would you care to elaborate on how your ENFP mind works? I'd appreciated it.

[sappho celeste]

	Originally Posted by Alef To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.
	Would you care to elaborate on how your ENFP mind works? I'd appreciated it.

Hm, so this is a deep and interesting question that goes to the heart of the topic of emotions and their relation to brain states. In general, there seems to be considerable disagreement in regards to the nature of its relation. But suffice it to say most people (myself included) are sympathetic towards the idea that there is such a connection at all.

Naturally, with my emotions serving as the catalyst, I'm more inclined to focus my conscious towards understanding why someone adopts an idea rather than the idea itself (but that is not to say that the idea itself isn't important to me at all.) I suspect it is because of my interest towards understanding the person I'm observing or thinking about. I think that my bias might be attributed to my current understanding that an idea does not exist without a conscious to attribute life and give rise in meaning to its cause. Here such things like morality and ethics are being realized. I value these things the most. In consideration of the things mentioned thus far, I dare say that ideas themselves seem rather null on it's own and, If I may add - boring.

I hope my fuzzy explanation helps!

[Curious ENFP]

As a very self aware ( double edged sword this one for those of us who over analyse) ENFP what you need to remember with MBTI is it is a continuum and ENFPs can be quite different from each other. I have met textbook ENFPs and they are extremely likeable but would drive me nuts. I now have to watch being too forthright and prefer someone to be straight up with their thoughts/criticism. Maybe as I spent 23.5 years with a ISFJ, nice but I am now with another ENFP and he is more like me in being straight up front. He doesn't over analyse ( my current self improvement project) makes decisions faster ( its now a joke when picking wine as he gives me time limit) but is more spontaneous. I prefer to be a bit more j like on some things. I guess having some big life crisis has matured me over the years. The important thing is be aware of you weaknesses/ shadow personality traits and accept you just have to work harder on those as they are not your preferred way of doing things. I believe if you accept yourself for who you are you stop feeling bad about being yourself and if you want to change you can.

[Tejeira]

A good friend is an 18 year old Male ENFP.

Everyone says he seems like a wise friendly old soul.

He is actually bubbly, sweet, funny, endearinng, and engaging to ALL.
Total kid, will have dance parties in our living room, just adorable.
Highly ethical.
A champion diver, going for the Olympics, so I know he has MUCH self-discipline.
Also he enjoys diving, and is quite social.
He is a responsible kid, loves his parents, and does right by everyone.
He does not want to have sex until the time is right.
He doesn't like profanity, and encourages people to be kind.
He wants to be a diving coach, a father, and a husband one day. He will be a great family man!

When he gets you alone, he is actually a wise counselor. Healthy "Feeler" types have a gracious way of talking to you, accepting you, opening you up, and encouraging you to reach for your dreams! They are fantastic people.

[Merryn]

One of the things that has helped me is realizing emotions provide a very unstable foundation for a good decision.

[jetplane48]

I can give you an example of an immature one: Too bubbly.

[KonTiki]

The life experiences that bring maturity usually arrive unexpectedly. But, if you're trying to develop maturity deliberately, one strategy suggested by DaveSuperPowers is to develop your minor functions. For an ENFP, those are your extraverted thinking (Te) and introverted sensing (Si). The easiest way to do that is to find somebody whose dominant function is Te or Si, and spend time with them. Maybe an ISTJ.


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As for what a "healthy" ENFP looks like... I work with an ENFP and she's certainly quite capable. Still, I can tell that she has to work extra hard to deal with certain people in our group. She sees the big picture and struggles a supervisor is focused on the details. She talks much less at work (surrounded by introverted bosses) than she does outside of work. Also, I'm pretty sure that she feels things much more deeply than the rest of us, and that's probably a challenge.