For the first year in awhile, I've been relatively happy with the progress I've made. A lot of vices have fallen by the wayside.

I attribute this largely to moving away from trying to analyse everything through a MBTI lens.

When it comes to this topic, l now see most of the benefit I gained came from reading Jung's original Psychological Types. I have a lot of respect for this book and still enthusiastically recommend it.

It's probably the best tool to foster self-development I've ever found.

However, most of the material I consumed from the MBTI community was largely detrimental.

Constantly I found myself jumping through mental hurdles to try and fit things with others and myself in their type framework, despite the glaring errors and contradictions.

When someone would express themselves I kept seeing myself and many others on here meet them with a boxed off analysis based purely about what they thought about their type.

It begun feeling like a pernicious little mind virus, partly why I took a period off earlier this year.

Whilst I experienced the value in the theory Jung laid down, stress testing the MBTI framework would constantly lead to disappointment as I couldn't adequately find it in reality.

I could never get it to sit right. Whether that be with others or even myself.

I'm not even saying it's wrong, if others can use it perfectly fine then kudos to them. I'm sure people here will think "it's because you're a feeler".

It doesn't matter, at the end of the day I just think can I ground this framework consistently to help me navigate the world?

The answer for me is not really, and I just want that to be transparent. Especially as I will still reference MBTI here, but just let it be known it's in a very different vein.

I have done away with a lot of the delusion I had around it.

Thinking in terms of Jung's theory was very valuable, but putting everything into a sixteen type model like MBTI or the eight function archetype model - not so much.

Some can trick themselves with excuses for their inconsistencies utilising it but I can't.

It's also very hard to deny all the incongruent typing amongst even supposed authorities. At a certain point, it just looks ridiculous.

Even Beebe who created the archetype model thinks Jung isn't an INFJ.

I won't start on the typings of Youtubers.

This might be a tad unpopular as MBTI is loved in these parts, but I created this thread as it's important I be transparent and honest about my experiences as I have tweeted a lot about the subject in the past and I've done so in ways I definitely wouldn't now.

There's a lot going on today and people are yearning for a better understanding of themselves and I don't want to mislead others who may potentially get caught up in it detrimentally like I now realise I did.