Originally Posted by
Reficulris
One thing about socionics is odd to me. Sometimes it seems like they assume that everyone wears their personality on their sleeve. This seems somehow wrong to me, as many people shape perceptions about themselves to the extend where it's almost impossible to see their true self.
Let me explain what I mean:
When i'm applying for a job, meeting a client, walking the street or wooing a love, I will walk in a shield of created identity, bigger than life, more succesfull, disciplined, talented and interesting. I create this as a mechanism to protect the vulnerable emotional and flaky guy that I am. Ofcourse, after a while that guy will be known, but by then I hope to have added enough value to the lives of people around me for them to accept that person. Faking a certain personality, speaking a certain jargon, claiming certain believes is easy enough for most socially competent people (even if they, like me, don't like doing it).
Faking a type in an assessment is easy, doing the same in interviews usually isn't that hard either. While dating i'm quite sure everyone can at least hide their weakest sides.
For some people I know it has taken YEARS for them to look through the created identity, for some others i've dropped it a second after meeting, but obfuscating who I am never really seemed that hard.
Now, some of you will think this is inauthentic, and in a way it is, but showing who you are to people is a huge risk, so at least in superficial, first impression context it's more safe for me to play the role. This is not to say that i'm without quirks and such, just that those quirks could be considered to be adapted to the environment.
I'm not asking wether this is a good thing or not, nor am I asking about what function this deals with (i've got a pretty good idea). I'm just wondering how it impacts typing. A lot of people here assume they're good at typing and or judging people, even justifying their self-typing with that. Do you keep into account deliberate or non-deliberate obfuscation? I think many, if not most, people here hide more than they show, and often I wonder if socionics actually encourages looking deeper or just makes people more comfortable about their "typing" skills :s