Written by Catherine Rains
One of my favorite counseling strategies for helping a student with a slight score is to have them live a full day in each dichotomy. For instance, if they have a slight score for Extraversion/Introversion, I would have them read a thorough description for Extraversion (preferably in the Introduction to Type® booklet) and then ask them to live a full day exhibiting all the behaviors of this preference. I later have them do the same thing for Introversion, and again, live a full day behaving as this preference. Afterwards, I have them come back to debrief the experience and ask them: 1) which one was easier to do 2) which took little thought to accomplish 3) and which one did they have to put a lot of concentration into. Obviously the one that took little energy or thought would usually be their true preference.
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I like this idea! But I have a question: what does it look like to "live" N for a day? I worked with someone with a slight N score and I would like to implement this excellent idea at our next meeting, but my own dominant N makes this one a little hard for me to figure out. How does a person spend a day being "imaginative and verbally creative" when he or she isn't clear about this preference?
ReplyDeleteGreat question! Here is Catherine’s suggestion for your question:
ReplyDeleteSuggest that she have the student read the description of N and S in ITT first. Then on the N day, they want to focus on finding the meaning and possibility behind everything, rather than just seeing the facts of what they see in front of them. Looking at the descriptions of N and S will help this be more concrete. If they are an N, this will be second nature. She can also try giving the student a very complicated picture to look at for 15 seconds. Then ask the student to tell her about it. The N’s will USUALLY come up with a story behind whatever facts they saw.