Dominant Extroverted Feeling in ESFJs
Extroverted feeling is ESFJ’s primary way of interpreting the world. As feeling (that is to say, awareness of sentiment) pointed outward, this makes them very perceptive of the emotional states and well-being of others as well as to the social parameters and expectations that generally guide human interaction.
Frequently communicative and diplomatic, and with an impetus to create a positive fellow-feeling, most ESFJs come across as tactful and courteous individuals. Many know how to act enticingly and in a lively manner, doing that extra something to form bonds or assert the value of the particular relationships they have with people, even when working within formal or stifling protocols (such as corporate or professional work environments). By approaching people with a mixture of keen interest in them and a wish to inspire a feeling of fellowship or community while at the same time navigating off of established social conventions, it is hard to escape their cordial, if unspoken, invitations to participate in mutually giving relationships with them.
Most ESFJs find people truly fascinating and display a willingness to harmonize greatly with others as a way of getting to know and forming bonds with them. People are their medium and they tend to absorb much about the world through socializing with others. By instinctively linking each concrete interaction with the overall social mores they are aware of, many come to wield a soft power as the representatives and models of how one should be, behave, and act in our society. In interactions with them, one can almost feel as if they speak not just as people but as representatives of society’s collective values and expectations in general.
Inquisitive, many ESFJs gain a sense of energy from experiencing the emotional states of others and being involved in their lives. Most have an unconscious and natural attentiveness to the body language and social gestures of those around them, intuitively picking up on what certain looks or glances mean, how a person carries themselves or gesticulates, and from that basis, are able to obtain useful unspoken cues as to what might be troubling or animating a person; how one person feels about another, and so on. This information tends to come unconsciously or automatically to them, as an instinct or “horse sense,” and can sometimes appear to ESFJs as if these are not their judgments, but objective facts about the world in much the same way as one might see observations like “this orange weighs 150 grams” or “that engine has 670 horsepower” as facts external to one’s own cognitive operations.
With extroverted feeling as their topmost function, their acute awareness of social etiquette and gestures can also lead to a clear cognizance of what is the conventionally proper thing to do in almost any situation. This awareness of theirs can be even too acute at times, such as when someone neglects to send a greeting card or flowers to mark special occasions in others’ lives. Such deviations from etiquette can easily come to stand out very clearly to ESFJs, much like a highlighted and brightly lit object would stand out against a dark background in a photograph. Breaches of protocol or etiquette can be experienced or construed as hurtful, even if it was not the neglecting party’s intention, since it oftentimes is in fact simply other people’s awareness that is comparatively less keen in such matters when compared with that of the ESFJ.
Extroverted feeling, being focused outwards, on the outer realm of observable phenomena, may, when coupled with the ESFJ’s auxiliary introverted sensation (which we shall get to later), make the ESFJ especially focused on actions rather than with the internal emotional landscape of others.
Whereas ENFJs, supporting their feeling with intuition, might view a person’s actions as determined by their internal emotions or ideas, ESFJs can at times experience this process as if it were in reverse. That is to say, the situations and special occasions at hand almost determine their mood independently of their preceding dispositions. For example, if a loved one’s birthday is at hand, many ESFJs may feel a tinge of happiness or elation, ready to participate in a jubilant celebration and welcome the opportunity to affirm to the other party that they are cherished and appreciated. In this way, many may introject or internalize factors from their environment as a way of determining what they are feeling or experiencing themselves, allowing them to harmonize and align greatly with what is going on around them.
Among less experienced typologists, ESFJs are sometimes unfairly stereotyped as empty or vain because of this inclination. What such characterizations miss is that feeling is a rational judging process. Far from being illogical or irrational, feeling—and particularly extroverted feeling—can tell us how people will react to a given occurrence or phenomenon and, as such, whether that thing will be deemed acceptable or unacceptable to us as human beings. ESFJs can thus almost be thought of as social engineers in this way. Just like how an engineer or a scientist may feel uncertain about the empirical consequences of a decision or action unless they have had time to conduct field studies and gather data, the ESFJ will study the emotional and social ramifications of phenomena based on the opinions of others and the group consensus among their peers. This propensity makes many ESFJs highly dependable and excellent managers of socially-oriented groups or boards, making sure that everyone is on board with an initiative or the next step in a process and that everyone's needs are being met in an engaging and respectful manner.
Auxiliary Introverted Sensation in ESFJs
Introverted sensation, being directed inward, is more interested in the internal contents of the mind than what goes on in the outside world. While ESFJs use their dominant feeling to explore and examine the external world, interpreting what they encounter by situating it in a finely-tuned web of relationships and social judgments, introverted sensation augments this disposition by keeping minute track of facts, routines, and previously established or experienced ways of being and doing in the world.
Contrary to extroverted sensation, which is attuned to the objective facts as they exist at hand in any given situation, introverted sensation orients itself by way of recall or the mental reproduction of facts previously experienced. In ESFJs, where introverted sensation manifests in service of extroverted feeling, such previously experienced facts often pertain to facts about relationships, social judgments, and people. What someone does for a living, whom they are married to, their birthday, their likes and dislikes—these are all things ESFJs tend to remember in vivid detail. For them, even a bout of small talk can be a way of expanding their repository of facts about objects and people, which they then use to guide their actions and hone their judgments to be more effective and accurate in their judgments.
Such internalized facts lie at the heart of the mental parameters of introverted sensation, as it often manifests in ESFJs. Without even being aware that they are doing so, many ESFJs are constantly cross-checking their prior, internalized experiences (for example, their prior experiences of a person or relationship) against the behavioral standards or morals of society or of a given group to determine whether or not the consequences of the matter at hand will be deemed humane or inhumane; whether a given initiative will cause conflict or strife; or harmony or harm.
Learning about and becoming intimate with the commonplace facts and regularities of social conduct often preoccupies younger ESFJs and, as such, can sometimes make ESFJs appear shy or introverted earlier in life. As they mature, however, their internal repository of facts and regularities tends to grow, causing them to be surer of themselves and come more into their own. Until their internal repository has grown to a sufficient extent and proven itself to be correct on numerous occasions, ESFJs, particularly when younger, will often feel uneasy offering an opinion or formulating their thoughts in a vacuum, devoid of the possibility of probing the group consensus or gleaning insights about what is really going on through interactions with others. They need time to grow as people, to come to understand the various social dynamics that they are faced with through experience, until they finally attain a wide array of experiences that they feel self-assured predicting what the significance of a given occurrence will be.
Though ESFJs can appear appreciative or jubilant, particularly in the way they manifest positive emotionality in the name of affirming relationships or activities, they are nevertheless not to be counted among the truly excitement-chasing types. Indeed, what ESFJs more often truly crave is stability and predictability—deep yearnings in them that attest to their auxiliary introverted sensation. Operating as it does off of a previously experienced storehouse of facts, introverted sensation excels in situations where the matter at hand can be deciphered by referencing similar matters one has previously engaged with, whereas challenges requiring immediate and bare-boned improvisation are, as a rule, the arena that allows the extroverted sensation types to excel.
As such, ESFJs frequently seek to create or be part of communities where each person can rely on the companionship and cooperation of the other members of the group. Where challenges can be delegated or handled communally so that no member is left blind or behind and each person shoulders the tasks they excel at in order to help the other members out. In this way, caring and well-being come to be seen as communal affairs and not just the responsibility of the individual.
This yearning, which may at times go unrecognized or unverbalized in the ESFJs themselves, invariably leads to a set of inner codes of conduct or expectations concerning how we must treat and aid one another and what responsibilities and duties we should shoulder in the name of caring for one another. According to this inner code, it will appear exceedingly clear—almost self-evidently so—how we must behave and conduct ourselves to be good to those around us and avoid hurting others. Often, such codes or standards may seem self-evidently clear to both the ESFJ and those around them. But they are in fact the result of the ESFJ’s combination of acute sensitivity to social standards and fellow-feeling, coupled with their ever-increasing repository of previously-experienced situations and facts that, in unison, serve as a guide for how the present situation should be approached. As such, ESFJs may frequently, and to the surprise of both themselves and others, come to act as the representatives of the default societal norms and morals that reign around them—the person others consult to uncover what one should do in a given situation.
Tertiary Extroverted Intuition in ESFJs
Extroverted intuition is the ESFJ’s third-most function and, as such, their gateway to the unconscious and pathway for dealing with their almost wholly unconscious inferior function, which in their case is that of introverted thinking. Extroverted intuition orients itself by way of conceptual associations and unrealized possibilities in the outer world that have hitherto never been developed in full. As such, extroverted intuition serves as a useful counterbalance to the ESFJ’s introverted sensation, which seeks to align the present situation with what has previously been experienced and how it has been approached in the past.
Tertiary intuition prompts ESFJs to put the dictates of immediate constraints or societal expectations on hold in the name of exploring alternating attitudes and values and untested ways to approach or feel about them.
Intuition can thus animate ESFJs to explore differing perspectives and attitudes than those prevailing in their immediate environment. Since introverted sensation is stronger in them, ESFJs are rarely carefree souls throwing caution to the wind, even though at first glance, if one observes them in their intuitive mode, one might be tempted to think so. ESFJs are typically not inclined to let their intuition lead them into blind anti-authoritarian or anti-establishment rebelliousness, pawning their future in the service of some pipe dream or turning into rebels without a cause. In fact, to the contrary, their impetus to explore what lies on the other side more frequently tends to take the form of becoming acquainted with alternative ideas and lifestyles as a way of breathing new life into their own environment and to expand the sum total of ways to perceive and relate to the constantly changing needs of people. Even in their mode of going beyond the beaten track, many ESFJs are careful to maintain respectable morals and conduct and often eventually settle down, preferring tangible stability over intangible pies in the sky in their lives.
One way this counterbalancing intuition often manifests in ESFJs is through cultivating unusual knowledge about foreign cultures or civilizations. For example, an ESFJ of European or North American descent may delve into the culture of a foreign civilization (such as an Arab, East Asian, or Indian one). The ESFJ may learn the customs and language of this alien civilization, and indeed, owing to their typical reliance on people and direct experience, may paradoxically have an easier time letting go of the morals and mores that reigned in their native homeland than many other Westerners would have. In this mode, they would not necessarily expect that processual dialogue would bring about some grand realization or process of alignment between the two civilizations, but simply absorb and understand how each party views a given matter, moving effortlessly between the two worlds as the courteous diplomats many ESFJs are.
Some ESFJs may settle down in these foreign civilizations, becoming honorable members of the foreign culture of their choosing. Many, however, also go through such explorations as a phase that rounds off their character before returning to the land of their birth, content and secure in the knowledge that they have experienced alternative viewpoints and mores as a way of them growing a stronger sense of identity, only that is uniquely their own and separate from the norms of their ancestral society, though paradoxically, being the bridgehead between two such societies and groups of people will often be observed to be their medium for such a branching out.
In well-rounded ESFJs, extroverted intuition also often grants them a positive and constructive view of possibility and change. Their connection to extroverted intuition fills them with a vital and spontaneous energy, which makes them quick to brainstorm, motivate, and energize others to be involved in the generation of something new. Be it a get-together, a fundraiser, or just a time and a space where people can share who they are, be accepted, and delight in mutual steadfastness and mutual acceptance of the group.
In this way, most ESFJs differ strongly from ENFJs, since ESFJs rely on extroverted rather than introverted intuition. Most ENFJs naturally gravitate toward and are more concerned with grand visions; what things would be like if people worked together toward a common goal that stands outside of time and space as a manifest destiny; the fate of a people, a group, or even the entire world. By contrast, ESFJs tend to be more interested in tangible well-being; the well-being of a group or a people, as revealed by the accommodation or privation with regard to their immediate needs. Where ENFJs often have a clear vision of how they want things to emerge and how they want things to be, ESFJs see the possibilities of what unspoken rules the community should embody to support each other. The ENFJ intuitively perceives the structured, harmonized outcome and works toward it, aligning others to believe in it. The ESFJ seeks to align people with the emotional experience, and through this path, the structure will follow.
ESFJs may not know exactly what vision will come to pass or what form it will take, and are in this way less concerned and more flexible with such things than ENFJs. Consequently, ESFJs know that whatever does come to pass will have a firm foundation—one aligned with tangible reality and one that they will have helped generate and establish.
It is this embrace of positivity towards possibility and the celebration of it that helps ESFJs really develop their extroverted intuition. Through intuition, mature ESFJs will go beyond the tangible elements of social communication and gestures and recognize the ideational content inherent in social rituals. The metaphorical purpose, the archetypical meaning, and the spirit contained in sociality, will stand out more clearly to them; the immediate is marked and reflected on and fused with the conceptual to create a bridge to the noetic, thus augmenting their cognitive processes by adding intuition to the mix.
Inferior Introverted Thinking in ESFJs
While ESFJs primarily interpret and analyze the world through extroverted feeling, with an emphasis on what social roles and connections reveal about the things observed, the opposite of this cognitive process is introverted thinking, which organizes what has been observed internally according to impersonal principles and procedures. As with all inferior functions, introverted thinking is largely unconscious in ESFJs and therefore tends to manifest in only a rudimentary way in them. In immature or undeveloped ESFJs, their inferior thinking most often takes the form of an indeterminate, intruding anxiety or negative thoughts, where it is not clear to them where these thoughts come from. Their inferior introverted thinking, when not allowed its due, thus forms an inimical counterweight to their usual, gracious, and reassuring personas.
In other words, unhealthy introverted thinking becomes a source of uncomfortable inward stress for the ESFJ. They feel like they want to be a good person, but keep having these involuntary and uncomfortable negative ruminations that seem to arise as if of their own accord. Instead of looking to extroverted intuition to broaden the sum of possibilities, they ask themselves, “Is there another way of viewing the situation that might account for these deleterious thoughts?” ESFJs with unhealthy introverted thinking are liable to project their negative ruminations onto non-essential variables or parameters that they feel they must constrain, control, or eliminate. Their focus on these non-essential parameters is thus not for want of intelligence but for want of a healthy connection to their inferior thinking.
When functioning unhealthily and cut off from introverted thinking, it is not uncommon for ESFJs to become possessive and controlling. Their repressed thinking function will fabricate standards or expectations, as if out of nowhere, that impose themselves on the consciousness of the ESFJ, who consequently becomes obsessed or preoccupied with making others meet these standards, unable to let others follow their own path, unable to simply let go. In this mode, it will frequently seem to the ESFJ as if there is some overwhelming internal definition or justification for why others should follow their standards, but the giveaway, pointing to unhealthy introverted feeling, will be that no one else seems to follow or share these justifications, and if the ESFJ attempts to elucidate them, they will recurrently come out as made-up ersatz reasoning or busybody moralism, both attesting to their superior extroverted feeling trying to blot out the presence of their inferior introverted feeling.
One paradox in this regard is that the more the unhealthy ESFJ tries to make others conform to their standards and expectations, the more controlling they appear to others, and the less likely others are to either want or be able to live up to the expectations of the ESFJ. Thus, their attempts to make others align and comply (often in their own heads, done in the service of harmonization) will, in this mode, ironically lead to more discord and strife. This, in turn, fosters more negative and intruding thoughts in the ESFJ, sometimes culminating in a desperate self-sacrifice on the part of the ESFJ where they will sacrifice themselves on behalf of others, often without this person’s awareness or request, exactly because the ESFJ is in the grip of such a negative, downward spiral, feeling more and more that they or their values are unrecognized and that the whole situation is slipping and deteriorating, lingering on the brink of disaster.
ESFJs often overcommit and become overworked in this state. Stressed and unable to step back and look at the process with a calm mind, many double down and throw themselves into the fray with renewed efforts, neglecting to take care of themselves and unable to remind themselves that they have limits. In this state, unhealthy and stressed ESFJs can truly be said to “work harder, not smarter.” They will often expend themselves, undertaking joyless tasks, not because they want to, but because, to their minds, there are people relying on them and the societal obligation of the situation dictates that they, the ESFJ, should come through.
Since it typically goes against the dictates of their dominant extroverted feeling, ESFJs in this state will often have a hard time recognizing that sometimes, logically, the most ethical thing to do is to not care for someone. To let them find their own way, work through what troubles them on their own, and learn from their own mistakes. That it is sometimes only through individual trial and error that another person can have a greater sense of agency and self and foster a genuine sense of independence. Paradoxically, it is this same attitude that the ESFJ can often find so hard to apply in their interactions with others that they will also frequently need to apply to themselves in order to break the cycle of unhealthy over-commitment and self-sacrifice. To realize that they are not just a dependable instigator of all the positive things expected by others, but that they too are a unique person with unique thoughts, feelings, values, and vulnerabilities.
When allowed its due, introverted thinking is precisely the mode of cognition that helps the ESFJ to analytically consider all the variables in such situations in an impersonal manner; to try and figure out what is fair or just, and whether all the good deeds they can so easily recognize how could be carried out in a situation are constructive or worthwhile. In other words, introverted thinking can help ESFJs reason out the acceptable boundaries between themselves and others—and to be okay with the conclusions they have arrived at.
A large part of ESFJ’s path to embracing their inferior function will typically run through quietly learning to create a stronger identity outside of the social expectations of the group and to be okay with stepping back and letting go. To simply observe a situation; to watch all the variables at play in a contemplative manner; and to formulate private thoughts and opinions instead of getting engrossed in the deeds and beliefs that are expected of them. Similarly, learning to be at ease with the disagreeable facts of a matter or that some unpleasant conflict may need to linger for the time being without giving in to the temptation to dismiss or harmonize these unkind truths is one of the common ways in which the ESFJ can let their introverted thinking have its due without being blotted out by their other functions.
Accordingly, ESFJs who have learned to let their introverted thinking just linger instead of trying to stamp it out can sometimes be seen taking on an almost Socratic manner and approach to communication. Going beyond the surface-level forms of address that govern most human interaction, such ESFJs can probe beneath them while at the same time remaining the masters of such discourse. With seemingly innocuous reasoning and questioning, they are able to see the cognitive interplay of reason and emotion in others and make sure that the topics at hand are explored—seemingly in a roundabout fashion, but in reality, making sure that possibilities and challenges are examined in a valuable way before they or others commit. In this mode, they will have helped both themselves and others find a conclusion that is truly their own.