An intense crush don't know how to handle

[David Nelson]

An INFJ romantically interested would not become distant in my estimation. In fact quite the opposite, they are more likely to over contact you. What specifically makes you think he's an INFJ?

 

[Elder]

This question is for you INFJs, how one can differentiate when you're just being nice or you like someone romantically?

I might be being influenced by your description of the infj you are wondering about, but I think when it is more niceness it will come out when I am in proximity with a person and then shift to other focuses as my proximity changes. Like you described with your guy. When I'm not with people that I haven't built a deeper reciprical connection with, they may fall off my radar unless something brings them to mind again.

When there is some bigger attraction or connection (not necessarily romantic) driving me, I am more likely to make effort to connect even when the person is no longer in proximity.

I hadn't noticed this in me before, but in reflection on your question I can see this pattern in me.

I will also say, just to confuse things, that when I feel more deeply drawn, I can get shy and withdrawn and wait for signals of reciprocity. Sounds like you have given plenty of that, though?

I will also also say that I can be unchacteristically bold when I am deeply attracted. I have had occasions of romantic declarations (sometimes that were not returned) when I just couldn't bear not speaking my experience any longer.

I don't know if any of that helps, but it's a view from my perspective at least.

 

[lostENTP]

Well, without being an expert, I'm going to try to list the reasons why I think my crush is an INFJ:


First of all, keep in mind that I am an ENFJ. I have a special gift for capturing personality and understanding and empathizing with other people's feelings. I've always been like this and that has influenced my life, even directing my professional career along paths I didn't plan on.


Well, he is a lot like me in that, he is very intelligent, analytical, perceptive, empathetic, profound in his analysis, he is extremely diplomatic, he is a born mediator, he always tries to make everyone feel understood and important. I can't give you more details but part of our job involves having those qualities and that is why we both do the same thing.

When we met I had the feeling that we connect very quickly, sometimes we understand each other with a look or at least I feel that. He is able to read me with amazing ease, but so am I, although he may not realize it so much because my extroversion sometimes makes me seem somewhat innocent, but I'm not.


And I know perfectly well that he is an introvert, he doesn't like to go out much, he doesn't like parties and noisy places, but he is sensitive to music and he likes interesting conversations. He likes to talk to me about his feelings, but without talking about them explicitly, in an indirect way but that I immediately understand. Sometimes he looks at me intensely as if trying to read my deepest feelings, I keep looking at him mischievously and I think that he likes it and it disconcerts him at the same time. I smile a lot and I know he likes it, he told me. He secretly takes pictures of me and then he mischievously sends them to me. We play to like each other but we both know it's just a game…or was it? I don’t know anymore...


The point is that in some ways we are very similar but I am very outgoing and he’s more silent and reflective. I have always been attracted to strange and eccentric introverts, always, they are like a magnet of sweetness and mystery for me. They bring me balance and calm to the permanent effervescence that bubbles in me, I adore peculiar and eccentric people, they fascinate me, I want to discover them, get to know them, delve into them and at the same time I love to disconcert them when they realize that there is another human being capable of reading and understanding them and who is also capable of expressing their feelings and affections so openly and without fear.


By the way, he is older than me, about 10 or 11 years, even so I think that the generational difference is hardly noticeable or I do not perceive it.


Thanks for reading me.

 

[David Nelson]

Well, without being an expert, I'm going to try to list the reasons why I think my crush is an INFJ:


First of all, keep in mind that I am an ENFJ. I have a special gift for capturing personality and understanding and empathizing with other people's feelings. I've always been like this and that has influenced my life, even directing my professional career along paths I didn't plan on.


Well, he is a lot like me in that, he is very intelligent, analytical, perceptive, empathetic, profound in his analysis, he is extremely diplomatic, he is a born mediator, he always tries to make everyone feel understood and important. I can't give you more details but part of our job involves having those qualities and that is why we both do the same thing.

When we met I had the feeling that we connect very quickly, sometimes we understand each other with a look or at least I feel that. He is able to read me with amazing ease, but so am I, although he may not realize it so much because my extroversion sometimes makes me seem somewhat innocent, but I'm not.


And I know perfectly well that he is an introvert, he doesn't like to go out much, he doesn't like parties and noisy places, but he is sensitive to music and he likes interesting conversations. He likes to talk to me about his feelings, but without talking about them explicitly, in an indirect way but that I immediately understand. Sometimes he looks at me intensely as if trying to read my deepest feelings, I keep looking at him mischievously and I think that he likes it and it disconcerts him at the same time. I smile a lot and I know he likes it, he told me. He secretly takes pictures of me and then he mischievously sends them to me. We play to like each other but we both know it's just a game…or was it? I don’t know anymore...


The point is that in some ways we are very similar but I am very outgoing and he’s more silent and reflective. I have always been attracted to strange and eccentric introverts, always, they are like a magnet of sweetness and mystery for me. They bring me balance and calm to the permanent effervescence that bubbles in me, I adore peculiar and eccentric people, they fascinate me, I want to discover them, get to know them, delve into them and at the same time I love to disconcert them when they realize that there is another human being capable of reading and understanding them and who is also capable of expressing their feelings and affections so openly and without fear.


By the way, he is older than me, about 10 or 11 years, even so I think that the generational difference is hardly noticeable or I do not perceive it.


Thanks for reading me.

Very interesting. For me, as an INFJ, being understood by another in a deep way is one of the most desirable things in life. I know most people could say the same, but because INFJs have such depth that many cannot see, it’s much greater a need for us than most. It reduces our sense of alienation for one. I bet he is very attracted to you.

 

[John K]

@lostENTP are you really looking for a resolution? All the body language of what you are saying is that you are really quite drawn to this position of unrequited uncertainty. It feels like you fear either of the two obvious ways of resolving your dilemma, and it's the never-ending potential that is the benefit you get from it. It's a way of generating hope - the idea that there can be something better than you have at the moment. The fears of course are real. One is that the actual situation if you did partner up with your INFJ could be a let-down, and most relationships carry an element of that in them when people try to live together in the real world - and there is the messy prospect of two breakups to negotiate too. A second fear is that you are mistaken in your friend because INFJs are notorious for giving people their deepest needs until it crosses their boundaries and then it could go any which way - if he isn't interested then you lose the mystery of the hope you have now.

Your options are really quite straightforward in practical terms. You could simply cool things down and let the situation fade away, or you could discuss it with him and find out where he is on all this, which would give you some more information and some more definite choices. Another option is to talk to your partner about your life, your needs and your dissatisfactions and get things out in the open with him - I don't mean your crush on someone else, but your need for something more out of your relationship.

I must say that I'm surprised that you are lost in uncertainty as an ENFJ. This type is pretty assertive, and ENFJ folks usually organise people around them decisively - they tend not to be lost in uncertainty, but can pose the opposite problem for those around them . If you really are wanting the open-endedness and unresolved possibility of uncertainty, then choose that and be content with it. If you want a resolution, then use that ENFJ power to seek and constellate a solution - your INFJ is unlikely to take that initiative himself, and I suspect that your husband won't either, so it seems to me that only you can take this to a resolution.

 

[lostENTP]

@lostENTP are you really looking for a resolution? .

A resolution would lead me to the unsolvable problem of losing something I love

I’m just going to leave this here:

 

[John K]

A resolution would lead me to the unsolvable problem of losing something I love

I’m just going to leave this here:

I really feel for you and hope things will resolve themselves. Sometimes there is no option but to wait for time, wind and waves to carry away all the complications - they very often do eventually, even when every course of action has sharp regret.

 

[lostENTP]

An update on my situation, I´m using this to vent and try to organize my feelings, please don't judge, just read and try to open your mind.

Recently we had the opportunity to be together on a business trip in which we spend many days in a large group. We weren't in principle trying to spend time together....but destiny or whatever rules the universe allowed us to be together several times during the trip, I wasn't expecting this, I didn't want to force intimacy, closeness, the bonds, but the universe decided to do it for us....and it happened, I just can say that we didn't go physical, but now our closeness, trust, bond, attraction is more than real, and now we really know that we have hopelessly fallen with each other, no need words, but we both know it. We both have the feeling that we are so similar, soulmates? who knows? I just have to add that he has opened to me in a way I wasn't expecting, and has been so sweet, tender, and overwhelming...

At this point I don't really know what is going to happen, none of us is forcing anything, it is just happening... the universe has decided that we should find each other in this madness of life, why? because probably it was meant to be. Now I feel hopeless and happy, there is a hidden fire burning and healing my soul at the same time.

Thanks for reading

 

[uuu]

As someone mentioned in another thread recently, you may wish to look up the idea of an "internal" vs. "external" locus of control.

and it happened
...
he has opened to me in a way I wasn't expecting
...
it is just happening
...
the universe has decided that we should find each other
...
there is a hidden fire burning and healing my soul at the same time.

I am sure that your INFJ, the universe, and the spiritual force you describe as a "hidden fire" all played their own part in whatever happened on this business trip. But surely you played your own part in it too, no? The fact that you are so eager to explain this as something that happened rather than a choice you made makes me wonder if you feel guilty or regretful about cheating on your husband.

It is possible, as you say, that your life's course is to divorce your husband and marry this man. But if you decide to do so, I hope that you can make the decision with your eyes open, and make that choice autonomously rather than saying it just happened. And I hope that your INFJ can take ownership of his actions in the same way.

I caution you against placing too much faith in MBTI typology or viewing everything through that lens. It would be unfortunate if this superficial theory about what sorts of people are best suited to each other came to disrupt a marriage that you have invested many years into.

Have you spoken to your husband about what happened?

 

[lostENTP]

The fact that you are so eager to explain this as something that happened rather than a choice you made makes me wonder if you feel guilty or regretful about cheating on your husband.

We didn't cheat on our spouses, we haven't cheated, we found each other and connected in many ways. Maybe we come from different cultures and have different perspectives of what means "cheat"—feeling attraction to other people while being married means you cheating? If you don't act on it, you are not cheating but of course, this is my personal point of view. There are cultures that believe that women should be totally covered by a burka and if they don't do it they are adulterers committing a crime and others believe that polygamy is natural. Moral judgments are just a reflection of your culture but could not be always objective.

 

[uuu]

We didn't cheat on our spouses, we haven't cheated, we found each other and connected in many ways. Maybe we come from different cultures and have different perspectives of what means "cheat"—feeling attraction to other people while being married means you cheating? If you don't act on it, you are not cheating but of course, this is my personal point of view. There are cultures that believe that women should be totally covered by a burka and if they don't do it they are adulterers committing a crime and others believe that polygamy is natural. Moral judgments are just a reflection of your culture but could not be always objective.

Indeed, there are cultural dimensions to consider here. I apologize if I made any incorrect assumptions.

In the cultures I have lived in, cheating can involve a sexual relationship, but it can also consist of a strong emotional connection, such as spending time together in a romantic and passionate setting or exchanging confessions of love. When you said

now our closeness, trust, bond, attraction is more than real, and now we really know that we have hopelessly fallen with each other, no need words, but we both know it. We both have the feeling that we are so similar, soulmates?

I took this to mean that you and this man have become romantically involved, even though not physically.

 

[lostENTP]

I took this to mean that you and this man have become romantically involved, even though not physically

well, according to my culture we have always stayed on the borderline of correctness and have never crossed the boundary of being "romantically involved" but the attraction is pretty obvious...is complicated

And I don't base my attraction on MTBI type...in fact, I'm starting to think we both are ENFJs but his initial reluctance to be spontaneous with me was due to the attraction he felt... Anyhow, assessing compatibility was not my initial motivation to join this forum, I just wanted to know more about this personality type. I do believe MTBI is an interesting theory, In fact, my general personality traits are very well described according to it....