About – Type Interventions

About Phoebe

For 30 years I have been using the MBTI to help me understand people and why they do what they do. I first discovered the concepts during a divorce seminar when I was 50 years old. The idea that I was an ENFP who was totally misunderstood by an ISTJ husband was an AHA moment for me that explained the issues in my marriage. Struggling with what to do with the rest of my life, I decided that Career Counseling was something I wanted to pursue. I found a graduate program in “Career Development” and was launched into my next life where the MBTI became an essential part of my counseling practice.

In California, I became a member of BAAPT where I was introduced to the very latest Type theories. There I met John Beebe who enhanced my worldview of Type into studying people through the lens of the 8 function-attitudes and the type dynamics of one’s conscious and unconscious functions. This opened me up to understanding the greater differences between the extraverted function and the introverted function preferences rather than the differences between the dichotomies (E/I, S/N, T/F, J/P).

While many in the MBTI community continue to use the dichotomies for counseling and coaching work, I use the 8 function-attitudes, type dynamics, conscious type development and Beebe’s 8-Function Model to help people “get unstuck” from self-sabotaging patterns. Because I now live in Florida where there are no local APTi chapters, I have changed my practice to this blog in order to help people with insight into: why they do what they do; what type-related patterns may not be working for them; how stress impacts their function-attitudes; and what type development practices might be helpful.

My Beliefs:

Each of the 8 function-attitudes has skills, aptitudes, and abilities that are gifts when they are working well but become real problems when they are not.

People are born with their Type preferences, as Jung believed, and survived childhood using coping mechanisms that relate to those preferences.

People have crises in their life that they need to learn from and grow or they will “get stuck” developmentally.

Relationships work only with understanding and appreciating differences.

Change is achieved by awareness of the problem, seeing other ways of handling the issue, deciding what is the best choice and then consciously practicing the change.

People resist what they most need.

Latest AH-HA

Recently someone told me that her mother said about her:

“Some people complicate the road to happiness.”

It struck me as a truism that is important to contemplate when self-reflecting.

Success Stories

This is a place for sharing anything you think you gained from a conversation or interaction with me. This is not just to boost my ego but to tell the world what worked for you. We can all learn from each other’s stories.

Phoebe Clark has deep expertise in the 8 Cognitive Processes - she knows it inside and out. As she and I share the same Dominant Function, she has helped me understand my "overuse of this." Phoebe not only identifies the problem, but gets to the core of the dilemma. She always helps me use it for my own development - and she does it so quickly. In my own practice with international people, I refer clients to Phoebe because she doesn't use complicated language - she simply addresses the underlying challenges that the person has. I think that she is an excellent Practitioner, and is a true Thought Leader in our field. Her work furthers understanding of the immediate problem, within the framework of ongoing development for that person.

Phoebe is an amazing type professional, educator, counselor. She was well ahead of the type community in integrating and making applications of our introverted and extroverted functions. She has an incredible way of listening and connecting with her client(s) and is wise and compassionate in being able to track people in their journeys. She helped me to explore my tertiary function. I had been struggling to understand what orientation it was, and felt that a great deal of the confusion was coming from who I am as a Japanese American woman, growing up with all-female siblings. Her ability to respect the possibility of the cultural impact of my family and culture within society helped open the way for me to become congruent with my individual and group values. It was powerful and healing.