Locating potential is how INFJs expand meaning in the world. That’s why you can stay so long in situations other people would leave. INFJs see what’s possible, and possibility keeps the situation alive.
You can say the exact thing that helps someone feel understood and also points toward growth. But when there’s no change, you become deeply disappointed, and eventually the disappointment becomes withdrawal.
But change is not the only thing that creates meaning. Vulnerability does too.
When a person says, in effect, “I know this is a problem and I still cannot make myself change,” they expose something deeply human. It’s why Michelangelo’s unfinished statues are so moving. You can see the figure he imagined and the stone it never escaped. The failure to become is part of what makes the sculpture feel alive.
People who cannot change are like that too. The distance between who they could be and who they are is not necessarily a failure of meaning. Sometimes that distance is the meaning.
So instead of withdrawing from someone who cannot change, what about moving closer by exposing the places where you—the INFJ with all the insight—cannot change either?
Sometimes the most meaningful contribution is to stop being the person with the insight. Become another person who cannot fix themselves. Because you are that person too. We all are.
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Pitting INFJ's desire to change against our willingness to be vulnerable is a false dichotomy. The way INFJs change is by Embracing Vulnerability. Embracing Vulnerability is how we test our Introverted Intuition -- our primary cognitive function -- against reality. It is how we are able to trust our intuition. ...and what is Introverted Intuition? It is subconscious systems thinking. My Substack is a place for INFJs and INTJs to gather and have deep conversations about our similarities and differences. bobcascaddan.substack.com