INFP Introverts: The 64-Color Box

“Somebody, after all, had to make a start. What we wrote and said is also believed by many others. They just don’t dare to express themselves as we did. The real damage is done by those millions who want to ‘survive’—the honest men who just want to be left in peace. Those who don’t want their little lives disturbed by anything bigger than themselves. Those with no sides and no causes. Those who won’t take measure of their own strength, for fear of antagonizing their own weakness. Those who don’t like to make waves—or enemies. Those for whom freedom, honor, truth, and principles are only literature. Those who live small, mate small, die small. It’s the reductionist approach to life: if you keep it small, you’ll keep it under control. If you don’t make any noise, the bogeyman won’t find you. But it’s all an illusion, because they die too, those people who roll up their spirits into tiny little balls so as to be safe. Safe?! From what? Life is always on the edge of death; narrow streets lead to the same place as wide avenues, and a little candle burns itself out just like a flaming torch does. I choose my own way to burn.” —Sophie Scholl

Continue reading “Sophie Scholl and the White Rose”

At the age of 21, Sophie Scholl was guillotined by the Nazis for her involvement in The White Rose.

“My freshman year of college, I took the Myers-Briggs personality test. Four letters—INFP—and the computer printed eight pages about me (Introvert-Intuitive-Feeling-Perceiving). I still remember one section of the printout because it resonates so well with me. INFPs, it said, vacillate between two primary desires. Some days, we are monks. We dig up our insides like gardens. We sit by ourselves on the porch and write. We leave parties early to be alone. Other days, we are explorers: We create new projects, foster new ideas. We busy ourselves with hard work. We want to change the world.”

Continue reading “Saving Moments”

I’d been living in London when my world turned upside down and I’d had to come home. By the time my plane landed back in Sydney, all I had left was a carry on bag full of clothes and a world of troubles. No one to welcome me back, no place to call home. I was a tourist in my hometown.

Standing there in the arrivals terminal, watching other passengers meeting their waiting friends and family, with open arms and smiling faces, hugging and laughing together, I wanted someone out there to be waiting for me. To be happy to see me. To smile at me. To hug me.

So I got some cardboard and a marker and made a sign. I found the busiest pedestrian intersection in the city and held that sign aloft, with the words “FREE HUGS” on both sides.

And, for 15 minutes, people just stared right through me. The first person who stopped tapped me on the shoulder and told me how her dog had just died that morning. How that morning had been the one year anniversary of her only daughter dying in a car accident. How what she needed now, when she felt most alone in the world, was a hug. I got down on one knee, we put our arms around each other and, when we parted, she was smiling.

Everyone has problems and, for sure, mine haven’t compared. But to see someone who was once frowning smile, even for a moment, is worth it every time.

—Juan Mann

“There is always something to do. There are hungry people to feed, naked people to clothe, sick people to comfort and make well. And, while I don’t expect you to save the world, I do think it’s not asking too much for you to love those with whom you sleep, share the happiness of those whom you call friend, engage those among you who are visionary, and remove from your life those who offer you depression, despair, and disrespect.” —Nikki Giovanni

This Illiterate Brazilian’s Home Speaks Volumes
By Henry Chu, Los Angeles Times

Sao Goncalo, Brazil—Carlos Leite can barely read a word, but books revolutionized his life. Two years ago, he was doing construction work for a man who was about to toss out six thick, red encyclopedias. Leite asked whether he could have them instead. Thus a dream was born.

Within days, he hit the pavement, knocking on doors, begging people for more unwanted books. No contribution was too small, too big or too arcane. Skeptical members of Leite’s cycling club were dragooned into helping him collect donations.

His collection quickly multiplied. The original six volumes turned into 100, then 1,000. Soon, his humble home was bursting with 5,000 books of all types—worn classics, chemistry textbooks, dog-eared thrillers.

To Leite, though, nearly all the books are mysteries. Born into a poor family, he dropped out of school after third grade and, at 51, is practically illiterate. But books, he knows, are the gateway to a life of greater possibility and more promise than his own. It might be too late for me, a working man, he reasoned, but not for others.

So bloomed the passion that has consumed Leite’s free time over the last two years: transforming his home into a public library, free and open to all in this poverty-stricken neighborhood outside Rio de Janeiro.

Continue reading…

“When I started out, my hair had started to turn to silver. My friends thought I was crazy. There was not one word of encouragement from them. They thought I would surely kill myself, walking all over. But that didn’t bother me. I just went ahead and did what I had to do. They didn’t know that with inner peace I felt plugged into the source of universal energy, which never runs out. There was much pressure to compromise my beliefs, but I would not be dissuaded. Lovingly, I informed my well-meaning friends of the existence of two widely divergent paths in life and of the free will within all to make their choice. There is a well-worn road which is pleasing to the senses and gratifies worldly desires, but leads to nowhere. And there is the less traveled path, which requires purifications and relinquishments, but results in untold blessings.” —Peace Pilgrim*

“But to come back to what I said earlier, I know I don’t manage to persuade people to change, but I do it anyway. A story: A just man decided he must save humanity. So he chose a city and he studied and he learned the art of moving people, changing minds, changing hearts. He came to a man and woman and said, ‘Don’t forget that murder is not good, it is wrong.’ In the beginning, people gathered around him. It was so strange, somewhat like a circus. They gathered and they listened. He went on and on and on. Days passed. Weeks passed. They stopped listening. After many years, a child stopped him and said, ‘What are you doing? Don’t you see nobody is listening? Then why do you continue shouting and shouting? Why?’ And the man answered the child, ‘I’ll tell you why. In the beginning, I was convinced that if I were to shout loud enough, they would change. Now I know they won’t change. But if I shout even louder, it’s because I don’t want them to change me.’” —Elie Wiesel*

“I am driven by things that I don’t quite understand. Much of what I’m about, I truly don’t know how I came to it. I mean, I know in the intellectual sense. I know that coincidences appeared and I made choices. But there is a voice—my mother was possessed of that voice. Paul Robeson was possessed of that voice. Dr. W. E. B. Du Bois and Eleanor Roosevelt and Dr. King and Fanny Lou Hamer and others were possessed of that voice. I am just one note in a chord that makes a harmonic sound that gives me the sense of what I must do and where I must go without much debate.” —Harry Belafonte*

“I feel like Joan of Arc at times. My whole becomes uplifted. I, too, hear the voices that say ‘Come,’ and I will follow, no matter what the cost, no matter what the trials I am placed under. Jail, poverty, slander—they matter not.” —Helen Keller*

Many of us were children or not yet born, but there was a time when having a social conscience superseded personal wealth and popularity in sports, a time when empowerment among elite athletes had nothing to do with economics. You either believed in a cause and took action or you hushed up. In 1968, against the wish of his own nation [Australia], Peter Norman did something.

“I did the only thing I believed was right,” Norman said over a beer six years ago. “I asked what they wanted me to do to help.”

In the photo, he wears a badge identical to those worn by Smith and Carlos, identifying their Olympic Project for Human Rights. But Norman’s participation was more than a token. “While he didn’t raise a fist, he did lend a hand,” was how Smith explained it.

“Any other white guy, I don’t think he would have had the courage to go through with it,” Carlos said yesterday. “Our lives were threatened. We were being demonized in the media. People were saying we wanted the destruction of society instead of what we really wanted, equal rights. I just don’t think most white individuals would have been strong enough to make that commitment.

“At least me and Tommie had each other when we came home,” he added. “When Peter went home, he had to deal with a nation by himself. He never wavered, never denied that he was up there with us for a purpose and he never said ‘I’m sorry’ for his involvement. That’s indicative of who the man was.”

The Americans discussed their plan with Norman, then a 26-year-old physical education teacher and Salvation Army officer, before the ceremony. When Carlos realised he had forgotten his black gloves, Norman suggested the two share Smith’s pair. He then asked what he could do to support them, and Carlos managed to get an additional badge, which Norman attached to his track suit, over his heart. After the ceremony, Norman explained himself simply: “I believe that every man is born equal and should be treated that way.”

“I couldn’t see why a black man wasn’t allowed to drink out of the same water fountain or sit in the same bus or go to the same schools as a white guy,” Norman said. “That was just social injustice that I couldn’t do anything about from where I was, but I certainly abhorred it.”

[…]

Norman last saw Smith and Carlos last year, when San Jose State University, California, unveiled a statue, based on the photo, of its two alumni. Typically, he downplayed his involvement. “People don’t realise that they sacrificed their lives for a cause they believed in, and it was peaceful and non-violent,” he said. “I was glad I was with them.”

Read Full Article: Peter Norman
Read Full Article: Clenched Fists, Helping Hand

“When a person runs their life in hate and fear, the thing they fear most is the person who runs theirs in love and kindness.”

“We live in a society where a superficial definition of strength often takes the cake. Those who are physically strong, emotionally unfeeling, distanced, and stoic are often seen as the mightiest. Those who are vulnerable, feeling—dare I say human—are often seen as weak.”

“This is a story about four people named
Everybody, Somebody, Anybody and Nobody.
There was an important job to be done
and Everybody was sure that Somebody would do it.
Anybody could have done it, but Nobody did it.
Somebody got angry about that,
because it was Everybody’s job.
Everybody thought Anybody could do it,
but Nobody realized that Everybody wouldn’t do it.
It ended up that Everybody blamed Somebody,
when Nobody did what Anybody could have done.”

—Author Unknown

“Ours is not the task of fixing the entire world all at once, but of stretching out to mend the part that is within our reach. One of the most calming and powerful actions you can do to intervene in a stormy world is to stand up and show your soul. Soul on deck shines like gold in dark times. The light of the soul throws sparks, can send up flares, builds signal fires, causes proper matters to catch fire. To display the lantern of soul in shadowy times like these—to be fierce and to show mercy toward others, both, are acts of immense bravery and greatest necessity. Struggling souls catch light from other souls who are fully lit and willing to show it. If you would help to calm the tumult, this is one of the strongest things you can do.”

—Clarissa Pinkola-Estes

“Tenderness and kindness are not signs of weakness and despair, but manifestations of strength and resolution.” —Kahlil Gibran

“They’re an odd couple in every sense, but a monkey and a pigeon have become inseparable at an animal sanctuary in China. The 12-week-old macaque—who was abandoned by his mother—was close to death when it was rescued on Neilingding Island, in Goangdong Province. After being taken to an animal hospital, his health began to improve but he seemed spiritless—until he developed a friendship with a white pigeon.

“The blossoming relationship helped to revive the macaque who has developed a new lease on life, say staff at the sanctuary. Now, the unlikely duo are never far from each other’s side—but they aren’t the only ones to strike up an unusual friendship. Earlier this year, a pig adopted a tiger cub and raised him along with her piglets because his mother couldn’t feed him. And, in 2005, a baby deer named Mi-Lu befriended lurcher Geoffrey at the Knowsley Animal Park in Merseyside after she was rejected by her mother.” Source

“Perhaps the animal spirit is so great that one day it may inspire compassion in the human heart.” —Nan Sea Love

“Some people think only intellect counts—knowing how to solve problems, knowing how to get by, knowing how to identify an advantage and seize it. But the functions of intellect are insufficient without courage, love, friendship, compassion and empathy.” —Dean Koontz

“As the firstborn and first grandson, I was generally the center of attention in my family. Very early, I came to feel that the praise my mother and other relatives lavished on me was the warmest thing in the world. I used it to be self-centered and superior, to feel I should be waited on and adored. If persons outside my family didn’t treat me the way my family did, I saw them as mean and cold. It never occurred to me that I had an obligation…”

Continue reading “Coldness, Warmth & Mistakes”

“Before I met Aesthetic Realism, whenever I saw a very poor person, I am sorry to say that, rather than having compassion, I was angry that I had to think about him at all. I was economically fortunate and didn’t want to think about other people’s suffering. I used the fact that I was pained in other ways to feel I had a right to be unfeeling both to people I knew and those I didn’t know. The greatest kindness was shown to me when Eli Siegel taught me that I had to want to know the feelings, including the pain, of other people in order to like myself.”

Continue reading “What Does a Person Deserve?”

“Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect.” —Chief Seattle

The last piece of advice is to cultivate a sense of empathy. We live in a culture that discourages empathy. A culture that too often tells us our principle goal in life is to be rich, thin, young, famous, safe, and entertained. A culture where those in power too often encourage these selfish impulses.

There’s a lot of talk in this country about the federal deficit. But I think we should talk more about our empathy deficit—the ability to put ourselves in someone else’s shoes; to see the world through those who are different from us—the child who’s hungry, the laid-off steelworker, the immigrant woman cleaning your dorm room.

The fact that you’re here and participating in Campus Progress means that most of you have already done this better than most ever will. But, as you go on in life, cultivating this quality of empathy will become harder, not easier. There’s no community service requirement in the real world; no one forcing you to care. You’ll be free to live in neighborhoods with people who are exactly like yourself, and send your kids to the same schools, and narrow your concerns to what’s going in your own little circle.

They will tell you that the Americans who sleep in the streets and beg for food got there because they’re all lazy or weak of spirit. That the inner-city children who are trapped in dilapidated schools can’t learn and won’t learn and so we should just give up on them entirely. That the innocent people being slaughtered and expelled from their homes half a world away are somebody else’s problem to take care of.

I hope you don’t listen to this. I hope you choose to broaden, and not contract, your ambit of concern. Not because you have an obligation to those who are less fortunate, although you do have that obligation. Not because you have a debt to all of those who helped you get to where you are, although you do have that debt.

It’s because you have an obligation to yourself. Because our individual salvation depends on collective salvation. And because it’s only when you hitch your wagon to something larger than yourself that you will realize your true potential—and become full-grown.

—Source

“INFPs are very aware of social injustice and empathize with the underdog. Their empathy for the underdog and hyper-awareness of social injustice makes them extremely compassionate and nurturing…”*

“INFPs have the ability to see good in almost anyone or anything. Even for the most unlovable the INFP is wont to have pity.”*

“A key word for this type is ‘empathy.’ INFP children will often be the ones to ask their parents why they didn’t give the homeless man spare change, or why that woman is crying.”*

Forgetting to be Human
by Dick Staub

We have forgotten what it means to be human; the evidence abounds. Read the paper, weep, resist, pray, and then live a fully human life. Blessed with extraordinary spiritual, intellectual, creative, moral and relational potential, we squander our greatness on lesser pursuits and wonder why we feel restless and empty.

While globally 30,000 children die daily due to malnutrition and preventable diseases, children in the West spend hours in elaborate, addictive “interactive virtual reality” games. Unaware of a sense of mission and meaning in real life, they turn to a vacuous wasteland of mind numbing entertainments and “not-pretty” diversions.

In the political arena, spin obfuscates reality and candidates spend billions of dollars to get elected so they can acquire or hang onto power, which is then wielded on behalf of large faceless special interest groups. In religion, the marketing machine produces converts attracted to religious celebrities who are generally workaholics unavailable to their families—saving the world and losing their own souls.

Whether in Hollywood, politics, or religion the story is the same—a young person with passion and vision, unable to discern purity of motive from a raw, naked desire for power or notoriety and fame, enters the fray. Early successes fuel the quest—trade-offs must be made. Must be at this meeting or that, must sacrifice this daughter’s soccer game, son’s piano recital, anniversary dinner with the spouse. The noble cause trumps the noble life until the choices become a way of life and then there is no life worth living.

Dulling the pain requires stimulants, entertainments, diversions, sensations—“let me feel” is our cry. The pure feelings produced by love, family, friends, neighbors, or a walk on a sunny day or in a light rain are displaced by cheap, imitative, virtual or “extreme” experiences. Spiritual humans become sensate humans enslaved to our substandard lives, needing to pay the mortgage, unable to disentangle from the consumerist webs. The mighty fall—evangelicals being no exception.

One day a trumpet heard by the entire planet will sound, but we’ve waited 2,000 years and we are fools to believe that that day will be the beginning of the promised abundant life. In the now, we who know listen for and hear the music today. We dance a different dance—we are the resistance, we are summoned to be the creators, we see the truth and say it. We are called to be fully human.

Fully human, we embody the words penned by British poet Arthur O’ Shaughnessy:

We are the music makers.
We are the dreamers of dreams.
We are the movers and shakers.
Wandering by lone sea-breakers,
And sitting by desolate streams;
World-losers and world-forsakers,
On whom the pale moon gleams:
Yet we are the movers and shakers
Of the world for ever, it seems.

“And let me tell you something I’ve never told a soul. My grandmother had a very interesting theory; she said that each of us is born with a box of matches inside us but we can’t strike them all by ourselves…we need oxygen and a candle to help. In this case, the oxygen, for example, would come from the breath of the person you love; the candle could be any kind of food, music, caress, word or sound that engenders the explosion that lights one of the matches. For a moment, we are dazzled by an intense emotion. A pleasant warmth grows within us, fading slowly as time goes by, until a new explosion comes along to revive it. Each person has to discover what will set off those explosions in order to live, since the combustion that occurs when one of them is ignited is what nourishes the soul. That fire, in short, is its food. If one doesn’t find out in time what will set off these explosions, the box of matches dampens, and not a single match will ever be lit.

“If that happens, the soul flees from the body and goes to wander among the deepest shades, trying in vain to find food to nourish itself, unaware that only the body it left behind, cold and defenceless, is capable of providing that food. […] That’s why it’s important to keep your distance from people who have frigid breath. Just their presence can put out the most intense fire, with results we’re familiar with. If we stay a good distance away from those people, it’s easier to protect ourselves from being extinguished. […] You must, of course, take care to light the matches one at a time. If a powerful emotion should ignite them all at once they would provide a splendour so dazzling that it would illuminate far beyond what we can normally see; and then a brilliant tunnel would appear before our eyes, revealing the path we forgot the moment we were born, and summoning us to regain the divine origin we had lost. The soul ever longs to return to the place from which it came, leaving the body lifeless…”

—Laura Esquivel, “Like Water for Chocolate”