This blog was created because after moving to Florida in 2016, I could not find a group, a volunteer activity, a community where I fit in and was needed. My bridge groups all failed because the people were either so dysfunctional or so competitive that I gave up playing. My attempts at giving workshops using the MBTI fell flat. I didn’t have a dog to walk so I knew literally no one in the 2 blocks that were in my HOA community. Fortunately, I got breast cancer and had to move back to Houston, live with my daughter and get treatment at MD Anderson for 14 months.
After surviving that abuse of my body, I woke up to find the world in chaos politically and in which I had no voice. I wrote emails to Joe Scarborough of MSNBC, answering his on-air questions about why Donald Trump acted the way he did. Told Rachael Maddow what Trump’s future actions would be. Wrote comments to many NY Times and Washington Post articles that were not nasty or controversial enough to get noticed.
Moving back to FL in July, I realized that the only community that was “woke” enough to hear my voice was the MBTI practitioners. They spoke my language. After reading “The Personality Brokers” by Merve Emre, I was saddened by her lack of understanding of the MBTI beyond the dichotomies of E/I, S/N, T/F, J/P even though she had taken a qualifying course. I talked with my friend, Evelyn Lemoine, President of APTinternational (APTi), about my concerns that the use of the Instrument was being limited to Management Consultants for team building and executive coaching. I knew that not enough time could be given in that application to do much other than “test and tell.”
With being shut in by the Covid-19 virus, I realized that the blessing for me was that I could again join BAAPT and APTi to enjoy the Zoom presentations that would bring me up to date on the latest theories and applications. I am so enjoying that opportunity.
Now the question is: what can I contribute to this community? I have always believed that understanding the 8 function-attitudes helps people know more about themselves and others than the four-letter type approach. While that may not be politically correct, it has worked for me in all my counseling experiences. I have tried teaching what I do through MBTI conference presentations, Bulletin articles and workshops but I haven’t felt successful.
Realizing that the only thing I have to offer is my perspective on why people do what they do, that is to be the purpose of this blog. Here you will find articles offering my opinion about Stress and Type, Conscious Type Development, Type and Relationships, Type & Self-Esteem, and whatever else I can come up with. I will offer an “Ask Phoebe” column that is more about raising awareness of what may be happening in people’s lives than it is about giving advice.
The place for readers input will be the “Typopedia” column which is dedicated to coming up with definitions of the 8 Functions that are written by members of the community who have that function in the Dominant/Hero position. In all the publications that describe the 8 function-attitudes, the descriptive phrases are conjecture on the part of the author and I have a need for those descriptions to be written by those who experience them at their best. We’ll see if this works…
In conclusion, what you will be getting from this blog is my hypothesis as to what is happening and why people do what they do using the framework of the 8 function-attitudes and John Beebe’s 8-Function Model. For questions about psychological type and work issues, relationships, stress, and type development, please write a letter to: AskPhoebe@typeinterventions.com. Longer-term counseling around “getting unstuck” and conscious change management can be arranged by e-mailing: phoebe@typeinterventions.com.