ISTJ · 4:19am Jan 25th, 2014
I guess at some point in your working life, you will encounter the Myers-Briggs personality profile. This is a kind of four-by-four Sorting Hat that will reveal which of the sixteen houses you belong to.
I'm an ISTJ. Which, in English, translates to "minion." I am the orc laborer beneath the White Tower, forging swords. I am the contractor on the Death Star, working for benefits. I am one of those ridiculous rubber-suited guys trashed by Mr. Incredible, who were only working for the weekend and free beer.
As I was sitting through my last lecture about Myers-Briggs, I entertained myself by sorting the Mane Six by temperament. Most were easy-peasy:
Rainbow Dash: Artisan. Stimulus-seeker, duh!
Twilight Sparkle: Rational. Knowledge-seeker. She lives in a library!
Applejack: Guardian. Security-seeker. AJ epitomizes the Guardian type.
Fluttershy: Idealist. Identity-seeker. How many times have we seen Fluttershy struggle to re-invent herself through her caring for her friends and critters?
The last two have puzzled me.
Pinkie Pie. You might assume she is an Artisan. But she lives not for herself, but for other ponies' smiles. I judge her a Champion, a subset of Artisan. The idea that Pinkie is introverted may seem counter-intuitive, but we have seen ("Party of One") that she has a rich inner life.
Rarity. You could make the slam-dunk of Aritisan and call it a day, but I'm not so sure. I see her as INFJ: introverted, intuitive, feeling and judgmental. It might surprise you that I think of Rarity as introverted, but look at the facts: come rain or shine, good fortune or ill, she works in solitude in her shop and holds to her inner vision. She is a Counselor, I reckon.
The Myers-Briggs test is not destiny, of course. But thinking about it might give you some insight into a character that you thought you understood. And, if you take the test yourself, some insight into your own thinking.
I could never get a straight answer out of that test. I've always gotten useless answers out of general psychology tests, but on this one in particular I find that I've been on both sides of each dichotomy enough that I've never gotten any real result out of it at all. Still, it's fun to look at all the different personality types and compare yourself to them. Just remember nothing's set in stone.
And there's also this:
cartoonoveranalyzations.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/mbti_pony.jpg
Good ol' Myers-Briggs...
(Pony version of dubious accuracy can be found here at Derpibooru.
Solid INTJ here.
At first glance I would have to disagree. It has been some time since I studied this, but I thought the major distinction between Introvert/Extrovert was "where do you recharge and get your energy from? It was my understanding that Extroverts get their energy from spending time with people, while Introverts while Introverts get their energy from spending time alone.
(Of course it has been quite a while since I have ever though about this stuff, so it is entirely possible I am confusing and mixing up different half-remembered bits
)
The MBTI is quite neat. Finding it was very helpful to me, simply because it meant I could know more about myself.
Interesting 'fact': About one-third of us bronies are, like SIGAWESOME and myself, INTJs.
I think Pinkie's more of a performer. She's definitely an extrovert.
I don't want to be a party-pooper (Pinkie would never approve!) but I never had much use for any sort of personality type system. The results never mean much to me.
I mean, by the definition they use I'd be an extrovert--not a word that anyone would use to describe me. And their split between intuition and sensing makes zero sense to me. I think both abstractly and concretely depending on the context. It's pointless to ask me which I do more, because it all depends on which situation I'm in. And I'd never call what I do intuition no matter how abstract the thinking gets.
So. Um. Bah, humbug.
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The thing to keep in mind is that each of the four scales represents a spectrum of possibilities. For example, I'm only slightly more an S than an N. I'm good with details, but I usually have a good grasp of the big picture.
What I find most valuable about these assessments is that they remind us that we don't all think alike. We have different drivers, and these can lead to conflict and therefore to stories. For example, in "A Friend In Deed," the basic conflict comes from Pinkie not quite wrapping her head around the idea that Cranky really does prefer peace and quiet. I could imagine (and, hey!, maybe will write) a story called "Twilight's Quiet Day" in which Twilight just wants to spend the day reading in the Library, and her friends keep trying to "rescue" her from her isolation.
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The description of the Performer type is very persuasive, I'll agree.