What does Success mean
to an ENTJ?
ENTJ people are realists, in
the most basic sense of the word. Not only because their thinking is based upon
a clear view of how things actually are in the world around them, but also
because their ideas and strategies are structured around those unambiguous,
"down to earth", commonsense beliefs which sum up the obvious and undeniable in
life. But while ENTJs might be pragmatic about the
immediate situation before them, they are scarcely satisfied with it until it
can be made more productive, useful or valuable. The ENTJ's
reasoning on such matters is always clear and generally unemotional. If action
can improve an item or a situation then it ought to be taken, and the ENTJ will
always be found in the midst of such action, organizing, planning and leading
the way forward until the best result possible has been realized. This makes
success for an ENTJ something that can be clearly seen, a real world result which
can be measured. And whether measured in dollars, bricks, bread or just happy
people, the successful ENTJ knows the result is due to their belief that it is
just plain commonsense to try and make the best of every situation and get the
most out if it for the most people.
Allowing Your ENTJ Strengths to
Flourish
As an ENTJ, you have gifts that
are specific to your personality type that aren't natural strengths for other
types. By recognizing your special gifts and encouraging their growth and development,
you will more readily see your place in the world, and be more content with
your role.
Nearly all ENTJs will recognize the following characteristics in themselves. They should embrace and nourish these strengths: |
ENTJs who have a well-developed Introverted Intuitive function to complement their dominant Extraverted Thinking will enjoy these special gifts: |
Potential Problem Areas
With any gift of strength,
there is an associated weakness. Without "bad", there would be no
"good". Without "difficult", there would be no
"easy". We value our strengths, but we often curse and ignore our
weaknesses. To grow as a person and get what we want out of life, we must not
only capitalize upon our strengths, but also face our weaknesses and deal with
them. That means taking a hard look at our personality type's potential problem
areas.
ENTJ's are strong, right minded and rational
people. This should be kept in mind as you read some of the more negative
material about ENTJ weaknesses. These weaknesses are natural. We
offer this information to enact positive change, rather than as blatant
criticism.
Most of the weaker
characteristics in the ENTJ stem from their dominant Extraverted Thinking
function overtaking their personality, stifling the natural expression and
balancing value of the other personality functions. In such cases, an ENTJ may show
some or all of the following weaknesses in varying degrees:
Explanation of Problems
Most of the problems described
above can be seen as a direct result of a too dominant Extraverted Thinking
function ruling the personality. In most cases this is exactly what is
happening, but it is also worth recognizing that some of the weaknesses in the ENTJ's personality that are more apparent to other Types,
flow not so much from the excesses of the ENTJ's
dominant function, but from the natural inferiority of their feeling function
and its lack of adaptation. We must also recognize that the level of expression
of all functions in all people is variable and that some of the problems
discussed here apply only to strongly expressing ENTJ's,
where the attitude which flows from using Extraverted Thinking exclusively to
guide them through life creates its own particular problems.
The over dominance of Extraverted Thinking leads to an intensely intellectual way of seeing the world, where values such as right and wrong, good and bad, useful and useless are judged only by their applicability to an almost mathematically exact - and to the ENTJ - always rational, attitude to life. Without the balance provided by other ways of seeing or judging, the ENTJ is unable to account for actions based upon the inner views or feeling behavior of others, hence such things are always judged negatively, either as irrelevant - or at best - as being of small consequence. Additionally, with their thinking attitude always turned outward and totally subject to the world beyond their senses, without the balance of some internally felt objectivity the ENTJ will often follow their ideas and ambitions without consideration for their own physical and emotional needs. Indeed, the ENTJ often feels that if only his project, his work, his outer reality would just fall into line with his own rational views then all would be well within his world and all his needs would be met. Unfortunately such an attitude can never be satisfied, for the world is not only rational, but also full of situations and human behavior which must be appreciated and understood by quite different, and again - to the ENTJ - often seemingly absurd criteria.
A healthy personality needs to
have a good balance between its dominant and auxiliary functions. For an ENTJ,
dominant Extraverted Thinking needs to be well-supported by their auxiliary
Introverted Intuitive function. If Introverted Intuition exists only to support
the intellectual rationale created by Extraverted Thinking, then neither function
is being used to its full potential.
Introverted Intuition is the ENTJ's access to their inner world, to the information that
could tell them how the world is affecting them. Because it is introverted, its
images arise from the subjective depths of the mind, and contain all that the
ENTJ has not considered within their strictly rational and object oriented view
of the world. Introverted Intuition provides the personally biased information
the ENTJ needs to balance this world view and protect the ENTJ from being
totally swallowed up by their selfless and yet single minded attachment to
facts, figures and a rationale they accept only from the world outside
themselves. Because this inner information is often opposed to the ENTJ's strongly held ideas it is often rejected, or if
accepted, turned outward to make negative judgments about external situations
or the behavior of others, rather than seen as a corrective balance to the ENTJ's own attitudes and behavior.
Solutions
To grow as an individual, the
ENTJ needs to recognize the role Intuition plays in their life, and learn to
understand its language. In particular the ENTJ needs to realize that their
intuitive function is not directed outward to the world, that its images are
personal, subjective and relate directly to the way the ENTJ's
inner self is being affected by both the outside world and their own behavior.
Introverted Intuition is not an
obvious process to understand, and quite unlike the rational, straightforward
thinking the ENTJ is used to. Nevertheless, if understood and fully utilized to
support thinking, it can make the ENTJ the most outwardly effective and
productive of all the personality types. For this reason it is essential to
allow this gift to become what it can be, rather than limiting its talents and
allowing it only to speak when it seems to agree with the ENTJ's
outwardly focused thinking. Below are a few specific suggestions to help you
apply Introverted Intuition.
Living Happily in our World as
an ENTJ
Some ENTJs
have difficulty fitting into our society. Their problems are generally
associated with a strongly dogmatic and overly rational approach to life,
coupled with an almost total lack of ability to understand the needs of others.
Where such a strongly expressing difficulty arises, the ENTJ finds themselves
constantly embattled by a world which refuses to conform to their ideals and
creates situations in which the ENTJ is out of their depth. Such situations are
often met by the ENTJ with such a childish emotionality that others are put off
and isolate the ENTJ emotionally. Such ENTJ's often
find themselves without friends, and with business partners or employees who
are unwilling to engage the ENTJ upon any matter other than strictly task
related questions. Such behavior in others only serves to bring out underlying
sentiments in the ENTJ which, via their badly adapted intuitive function, speak
to them of plots, nastiness and covert obstructive behavior on the part of
others. Suffice to say, such suspicions and childish sentiments coupled with
dogmatic demands to conform to the ENTJ's own way of
seeing the world can soon destroy families and close relationships.
It is incumbent upon the ENTJ
to break the circle of such behavior by allowing their Introverted Intuition a
place in their life. Through attention to this function the ENTJ can discover a
path to understanding and recognizing the effects not only their own behavior
has upon others, but also the greater possibilities which lie within themselves
for not only a harmonious relationship with others, but also a greater sense of
what might be best for themselves.
Understanding the feeling needs
and judgments of others is not an easy task for the ENTJ, but through their
Intuitive function they can find images and ideas which - whilst not speaking
directly to the feeling judgments of others - might allow them to see outside
the strictly rational circle of their world view in such a way as to recognize
that there is indeed a different perspective which must be taken account of.
Ten Rules to Live By to Achieve
ENTJ Success
1. Feed Your Strengths! Give yourself every opportunity to show
others your appreciation of a situation and how you could see it through to a
good outcome. Take charge where you can make it count.
2. Face Your Weaknesses! Understand you have limits too. Your
careful world view is not the whole deal. How things look and feel may not
concern you, but they concern many others. Try and allow such things to be and
learn from them.
3. Talk Time to Find Out How Others Really
Think. You need to
drive past your thoughts with others and let their appreciations of a situation
reach you at a deeper level. It will then be possible for you to take account
of their needs as real world objectives which if included in your ideas will
bring greater harmony and quality to life and relationships.
4.
Take Time Out To Let The Whole Situation Speak
To You. Don't
dismiss those abstract and seemingly hard to understand or bothersome aesthetic
and feeling judgments coming from others or from inside yourself. Drop
everything for a while, stop thinking and worrying and just relax into those
ideas and let them speak to you. Perhaps they can be accommodated, perhaps
something is hiding in there which offers a new way
5. When You Get Upset, You Lose. Your energy and rational understandings
are strong assets, but can be very harmful if they turn against you and leave
you with nothing but emotions you cannot deal with. Remember that others cannot
always be expected to fall into your ways of seeing, and when your drive to
make them do so fails you will suffer feelings of resentment and even
abandonment. You cannot deal with the world like this. Moderate your ideas,
allow others their spaces, and you will grow.
6.
Respect your Need for Intellectual Compatibility Don't expect yourself to be a
"touchy-feely" or "warm-fuzzy" person. Realize that your
most ardent bonds with others will start with the head, rather than the heart.
Be aware of other's emotional needs, and express your genuine love and respect
for them in terms that are real to YOU. Be yourself.
7. Be Accountable for Yourself. Don't blame the problems in your life
on other people. Look inwardly for solutions. No one has more control over your
life than you have.
8. Be Humble. Judge yourself at least as harshly as
you judge others.
9. Take a Positive Approach to Differences
in People. Don't
distress yourself and others by dwelling on what seem to be their limitations.
They need you to guide them and you need them to see things through. Try and
recognize who can perform the most ably within certain fields outside your own
competence. Let the feelings of others become a strength
rather than a hindrance to you.
10. Don't Get Obsessed! Recognize the value that personal world
has to you, your friends, your family, your own inner selnse
of self worth and life. Take pride in just being a good person and don't allow
external situations to control you. Try to relax and let the moment belong to
the best things you can find in others and yourself. Nothing out there is more
important than your own happiness.
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