One of my infp friends has written to me about intensity and communication, two qualities of the introvert that are linked together to form either our greatest suffering or our greatest gift. We know so much with our intuitive knowing, perceive so much, have so much to share because we love all living creatures … but words are so limited for this purpose. That is why we hang back, stay silent, think long after a conversation has passed, I could have said this or I should have said that. We enjoy writing because we can take the time to organize our thinking. The “n” in infp also means that we think intuitively and are telepathic like our cousins the infj’s. This article is for the infp and infj introverts. We are known as the Healer and the Counselor. Think about what this means. Our whole lives are about getting information to other people. The very meaning of these descriptions is that we have something to give that others need. Healers heal and Counselor counsel. Let’s look at some of the challenges and rewards of getting this information across to others. I think I have some good answers for you to meet this challenge.

Three Beginning Steps

Step 1 Trust Your Intuition.

First off, where does our information come from? We are “n”s or intuitives. We don’t know where our information comes from. It just comes. Doubt not!

Step 2 Know Your Brain Hemispheres

Information comes to intuitives through their highly developed right brain function and yet it must be delivered through a left brain process, speech. Some have better bridges between brain hemispheres than others. If you feel particularly lacking in this area, you can develop brain hemisphere balance by looking at a circle. It’s that easy. Carl Jung drew mandalas every day for many years. Drawing mandalas is another way.

Communication involves four aspects: speaking, listening, reading and writing. Introverts excel at three of these, listening, writing and reading. Extroverts excel at speaking. Please keep this perspective in mind. It will give you confidence the next time you’re faced off with a loquacious extrovert who uses his mind like a battering ram. One solution is to maneuver the situation so that you can write rather than speak or read a written statement.

If you are going to deliver your information by speaking, however, here’s how you can get better at it. Learn to make the trip from the right brain to the left brain. This ability can be learned with practice and I will explain more about this.

Step 3 Intensity is Your Friend

My infp friend, Roxie, worried that she was too intense to do her job as a Master Coach. Undoubtedly she has been told this her whole life long! She has been told this by every person she ever dated and by every person who ever tried to teach her anything. I know!

Lately Roxie was told by her own coach to “lighten up”. Roxie’s solution was this, in her own words. “I have discovered that an avenue to the lightness I seek as a masterful coach is to stop trying to explain my ideas which are complex, passionate, and flow from me every minute of every day. . I have also learned to not try to find words to embody my passion. I can choose my ideas, weigh them, choose to act on those that are light, choose to share a relevant part of an idea with another person rather than the whole idea. I can feel my passion and make use of it without the fruitless struggle of trying to find words that not only communicate it, but also embody it. I find that when it comes to ideas and passion, they are not easily expressed in words, and for purposes of communication and in the interest of lightness, less is more. Nevertheless, the issue of intensity remains for me.”

This is painful to read. Who among us infps cannot identify with this struggle?

Is the answer really to dumb down, as Roxie’s coach has suggested or anyway, that’s how she has interpreted her coach’s coaching (!) ? Is the whole of this world a Procrustean bed for us, where we will lop off our limbs to fit the norm?

Carl Jung, the transcendental psychiatrist upon whose work personality typing systems are based, has stated clearly that the process is not to change -- not to try and be something else -- but rather to discover (uncover) who we are and become that more consciously. In this case, to dumb down lacks integrity and it will rob Roxie of her great infp gifts. Having interacted with people on intimate terms about their life problems for two decades now, I am quite sure they choose me because of my ability to comprehend the complexity of their lives and personalities and to come to terms with its breadth and depth . It is in fact because of my intensity and focus, depth and comprehension that they come to me, an infp, and not someone else. But I have had a lot of experience putting things into words, so let me pass some of this along to you.

How do I get my ideas across? What has made me successful at this? I have found an elegant solution and in so doing I stand on the shoulders of giants, as our introverted friend, Sir Isaac Newton, would say.

The elegant solution is so simple … metaphor.

Great Intuitives Use Metaphor

What is a metaphor? This is like this. That is like that. Only leave out the “like”. Here’s a famous example.

Shakespeare used metaphor when he said in MacBeth (V, v, 19)

“Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.”

There are two metaphors here. Life is compared to an actor and to a story an idiot tells.

Metaphors call our attention to the similarities between two things that make both of them clearer.. They are the powerful natural language of the intuitive introvert. Poetry in other words. You may not think of yourself as a poet but you can do this if you try. Let me elaborate.

The Great Wisdom of the Ages was Conveyed in Metaphor

The great intuitive books of knowledge, the Bible (the parables of Jesus), the I Ching, the Runes, the Tarot Deck … all use metaphors and similes to convey profound wisdom.

I recently consulted the Runes and received a very helpful answer in the form of a metaphor. This is how it happened.

In the past three weeks, I have had three sudden and near deaths in my closest circle of relatives and friends, a brain tumor and two heart attacks. In all cases the person was young and seemed healthy. In addition, while out jogging I had seen a disemboweled raven. It was a very big bird. Its feathers were spread out across the grass. They were so beautiful! I have also found two rattlesnakes on my property. One stood still long enough for me to get a terrific look at every detail of its body. Its tail has black and white rings like a raccoon, making it a Western California rattlesnake. The other was very young and I succeeded it holding it in place long enough for Russell the Rattlesnake Man to come and take it away for humane re-release. The third was a tiny black and white ringed snake

I decided to approach the Runes for a reading. I drew one stone, ISA or “Standstill”. This was my message, the “meaning” of ISA.

“You don't understand the meaning of the standstill, the need to surrender. Every rebirth is preceded by a phase of gestation, which is your situation now. You feel your usual energy diminishing and every try to go on will show that. Grow silent, realize where you hold on to the old and let go of it. That, which is full must be emptied, in order to fill up again. Give in and prove to be courageous and faithful, so you can leave the isolation you feel now behind you."

The I Ching would probably be even more cryptic than this. It might simply say, “Empty what is full.”

I connected with this message. I heard the wisdom in the statement and it seemed to speak directly to me.

The core of this statement is a metaphor that comes to mind from the word gestation. It seems I am 9 months pregnant. And what does that mean? My mind wanders back to my own pregnancy and the waiting. My ex-husband was in Viet Nam. I took off work the last two weeks and sat in the garden. It was the most beautiful spring and I was in an utter ecstasy of peace and deep fulfillment as I waited. My daughter was born April 13th.

Is there any rushing the baby? Is there any rushing the beginnings which are going to follow these endings and these signs of profound change that are coming? I think of my ancient friend Phyllis who said she always managed to be alone for several weeks before the major events in her life, never realizing it till later. She thought it was good to get in touch with yourself before a big change.

Our lives as women involve so much waiting. I think of Penelope, waiting for Ulysses, weaving her tapestry and holding the suitors at bay. I think of Andromeda, chained to her rock, waiting for Perseus to rescue her. We wait. And since my waiting this time depends on a man that I love profoundly, my mind wanders to gestation from a man’s point of view. He is waiting, too, but how is his waiting different than mine?

The seed is planted in the dark. We have always known our mother but we have not always known our father. In our short history on this earth, we only recently understood how pregnancy occurs and only until the structure of DNA was discovered by Maurice Wilkins, Rosalind Franklin, Francis H.C. Crick, and James D. Watson in the 1950s would be begin the process that would determine the father for absolute certainty. We have always known the mother.

The inner and the outer compliment each other. The seed is planted actively by the male in the receptive female. During gestation, the female is active and the male is passive. Pregnancy is a very immediate experience for a woman. Characteristically it is a time when a man is very busy elsewhere, feathering the nest. This process repeats itself when a man cultivates a field and plants grain. Perhaps this is one of the origins of MST (Male Standard Time). During gestation there is nothing to do but “something else”. The baby will not come a moment sooner. I am waiting for my man and he is waiting for things to be ripe. I will trust his judgment. Because he is not involved, he is more aware of the ripening than I.

What the Rune writer has done is to take the problem at both the mundane and the intuitive level, showing the universality of the experience, but also helping me pinpoint my place in time and space. Only an intuitive can do this kind of holistic thinking. And this is what infps and infjs have to give in the world. This is why they come to you, to us, for healing and counseling.

This is why I think Roxie’s decision to simplify the information creates a Procrustean bed. What limbs will she lop off the body of her intent to do this? Our value in the world is our complexity. How can we make this work for us and not against us?

There is a Simple but Elegant Solution

Metaphor.

Practice putting complicated things into as few words as possible. I’ll get you started. Today the Cox Cable people came and screwed up my order like I knew they would. I tried to warn my roommate this was inevitable. I felt like Churchill standing in front of Parliament as Chamberlain headed over to sweeten the pot for Hitler. Aaaargh!

Or, today the Cox Cable people came and screwed up my order. He asked if this was the right house and then proceeded to go next door and cut their cable because of something he saw that was mislabeled. This reminds me of Highway 165 here in town. We all know it as that but officially it is Martin Luther King Highway. So when someone moves here or is visiting, they want to know where Martin Luther King Highway is and nobody knows. The map doesn’t map the territory.

The I Ching Uses Nature Metaphors

The great Chinese book of wisdom, the I Ching, uses nothing but nature metaphors with commentary. You can learn to pick metaphors from nature very easily to begin with and make them more elaborate as you go. If you were nature, right now, what would you be … a rock, water, sky, wind, rain, a forest, a mountain, a wildcat …. ?

I asked the I Ching about the direction I’ve been going in with this article. I got two hexagrams (or answers)# 30. Li = The Clinging Flame changing to Changing to # 42. I = Increase.

The first answer describes fire rising in two tongues of flaming beauty. Hmmm. Make me think romantically. The commentary says =, “Thus the wise man, in propagating this brightness illumines the four quarters of the world.” My love for this man, prompting this question and ultimately this article, will benefit others.

The next answer describes wind and thunder. Things are building up. What will increase will be good if I imitate what is good and you imitate me imitating what is good. Then we will be what the I Ching calls “superior” or enlightened men and women. We must also recognize and eliminate our faults because they will increase too if we don’t. This is because it is a time of increase.

You Can Learn to Use Metaphor, Too

In my classes we also compare ourselves and each other to flowers, bodies of water and trees. Try it. If I were a flower, I would be a daffodil. If I were a body of water, I would be the Mighty Mississippi … no, wait, the Volga! If I were a tree, I would be a huge ancient oak tree in the Druid forests of England.

What about you? Give it a try. Keep practicing and eventually you will be able to say more in less words than anyone you know. This is the best of all possible worlds!

I have a very moving example from an infp introvert who visiting her grandparents one holiday. There was a lot of hustle and bustle going on. She became quieter and more intense. Eventually someone turned to her, irritated, and demanded to know, “Why are you always so intense?” She thought for a moment and replied, “Because I love Grandma so much.”