Hi Auburn,

Okay, so here is my commentary on the Pi: Worldview Function article, beginning from the premise that I am either NiFe II-- or FeNi II--. For other readers, the context of this ‘exercise’ is to provide qualitative insight into these profiles by drawing from my own experience and mapping the different parts of each article onto components of my own, personal, experience.

I’ll start with the article on Pi. Hopefully I can do the article on Je next weekend. (PS. I am sharing it in this thread because I don't know where else to share it; feel free to move it to a different, possibly new, forum thread).

Global Narratives

The description of the Pi function as involved in the archiving of information streaming into the psyche is very relatable. The passive element is crucial here, as I would be more or less aware that this is going on, but incapable of turning the process into something active; I could not intervene to change certain parameters of the process. There is this constant archiving that’s taking place in a remote room, filling itself up with information and having enough autonomy to do the sorting by itself. It can actually be very stressful to try and intervene in the process, for example by trying to accelerate it, make it more detailed, or more focused on specific areas of interest. Better let it take care of itself, in a sense, because Pi actually finds everything interesting, and it is not really up to me to differ! Now I don’t know if this is indicative of Pi or specifically Ni; but the openness is really consubstantial to how Pi operates. As a historian I never had any interest in dates (could hardly remember any) or even time periods. I was always interested in process, movement, fluxes; how things evolve over the longue durée. Pi never manifests itself in me as a function of classification either, but rather as an amorphous amalgamation of content which, from time to time and often quite unexpectedly, produces flickers of hyper-synthetic insights. Quite often I get the sense that I arrived at the insights without having thought at all, which, interestingly, can even lead to a weird sense of impostor syndrome. It isn’t that I didn’t think, of course, but that I didn’t do so actively, preserving instead my resources for the excavation of the areas lighted by the flickers—when they do take place.

Philosophy and Counsel

I agree with the philosophical dimension of Pi, and experience it this way. The function is certainly very interested in “why” and “what” questions. Generally I relate to much of what is written in this section, perhaps with the exception of this sentence: “This eventually cascades into a surety of perspective and an ability to give counsel that others come to view as stable.” I have a feeling that this is more an Si thing than an Ni thing. Because of the formlessness of the Ni archiving process, and the erratic and never entirely predictable nature of the flickers of light, I never get to attain a complete surety of perspective; the only thing I feel fairly sure about, perspective-wise, is that everything’s in flux, fundamentally process rather than essence. But precisely because of this focus on flux, it is difficult (and feels artificial) to isolate a singular perspective as the sure one, because then the perspective feels essentialised, not fluid. So although I could, almost without effort, deploy my worldview to anyone in detail and in a manner that flows, and again seemingly without having to truly, actively think, I would find it strange to claim that “this is the truth”. I would see it as one of many possible perspectives on the truth, in keeping with process/perspectivism à la Nietzsche.

Steadiness and Temperance

I do experience Pi as a grounding function, the caveat being that the ground is in flux, lol. Again I suspect this is more an Ni thing than an Si thing. There is definitely a conservative element to my cognitive makeup which translates in my worldview: it seeks change but not too quickly. It will sometimes fantasise about revolutionary change but never truly implement it. One thing which may be of interest for CT is what I would describe as a peculiar phenomenon of deferral: Pi (as far as my experience is concerned) is capable of envisaging large-scale change and phasing it over a long period, so that taken as a whole, the change is never felt to be too brutal. There is a certain elasticity to this process and it manifests in time: I can sometimes predict that a certain change will take place, say, in a year or so, and it will exactly happen that way—not before, not after. It’s really quite strange. It’s like Pi is confident that it will get there, but it needs time, to allow the unfolding to take place in its own organic naturalness, always steady, neither a trickle nor a torrent.

Probabilities and Predictions

I relate to pretty much the entirety of this section. “Pi is an informant that brings a report to the chief's desk, but as a reactive function it will not make the call to take any action by itself.” So accurate, lol. I find it very hard to be in the present moment, because the past always seems to be blending into the future rather than pointing to discrete categories. My psyche stands at the confluence, which is itself always in motion. Heraclitus said: “No man steps into the same river twice, for it’s not the same river and it’s not the same man.” That kind of sums it up. As a result, the predictive tendencies of Pi, as far as I experience them, are not really something it does for fun, or even something it’s necessarily gifted at. It just does it because it’s part of its nature to do it, to envision the world as an enormous unfolding map going in both temporal directions. What others will interpret as a liking for prediction, I will just see as the way I relate to reality, as the way that is most natural for me to describe reality. Since the core substance of perception is a flux, it inevitably “spills over” into the future when that perception is described. I would agree, however, that the Pi lead won’t feel comfortable describing his perceptions openly until he feels confident that his background archiving process has solidified into a comprehensible, holistic foundation. Until that happens, he will just continue collecting information, without being in a hurry, keeping his psyche open to the flux of the world, attentive to signs of the next flicker.

• This topic was modified 4 years, 5 months ago by Ren.
• This topic was modified 4 years, 5 months ago by Ren.
• This topic was modified 4 years, 5 months ago by Ren.
• This topic was modified 4 years, 5 months ago by Ren.
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• This topic was modified 4 years, 5 months ago by Ren.
• This topic was modified 4 years, 5 months ago by Juan E. Sandoval.