have read your article entitled “Marrying an INFP”,
see here. A MARRIAGE RELATIONSHIP IS NOT ABOUT COMING UP TO EXPECTATIONS. IT IS FUNDAMENTALLY ABOUT MEETING EACH OTHERS MOST IMPORTANT EMOTIONAL NEEDS.
WE DO NOT MARRY BAD PEOPLE. WE MARRY THE WRONG PEOPLE.
MANY PEOPLE MOVE FROM RELATIONSHIP TO RELATIONSHIP, FAILING EACH TIME BECAUSE THEY DO NOY KNOW WHAT THEIR BEST MATCH IS IE WHAT THEY SHOULD BE LOOKING FOR.
I am an INFJ man married to an ISTJ woman and have pretty much the same issues as you. There is no deep connection at a soul/emotional level. I now have 3 grown up happy daughters and am thinking of leaving my marriage as I am not happy.
I spent decades operating on the principle “if my wife and family were not happy, then I could not be happy”, so I did absolutely everything I could do to make them happy. There is joy in giving, but you have to also have your needs met to be happy. About 5 years ago, I approached my wife and said that all I want out of the rest of my life is to have a passionate love affair with my wife till the day I die. Her response was stunned silence. About 4 years ago, I approached my wife again saying I had some issues with our relationship that I would like to talk about. She told me I was being “precious”. After that, the rose coloured glasses fell off and the idealised love I had for my wife evaporated. I still loved and cared for her, but I was no longer in love.
Over the recent years, intense conflict developed between me and my wife over some family issues. This was compounded late last year (2008), when I got retrenched. I ended up in some sort of post traumatic stress disorder and accidently met an ENFJ woman and fell into an affair. Like you, this meeting of souls had a profound affect on me, it was like an “emotional dam bursting”. I had found by complete accident my “twin flame”, my EVE. It was like she was just made for me. The meeting of mind and feeling was so profound and intense, it was like we had a psychic connection.
I was however completely uncomfortable with the affair since it broke my moral code, beliefs and values. It was also unfair to the woman, her needs were never going to be adequately met. She needed a proper loving relationship 24/7. And I was deeply in love with her (and she with me). So I did the “right thing”. I broke it off, confessed the truth to my wife with a view to either fix up the relationship or break it/separate. I went to a counsellor for help, my wife would not go but agreed to wipe the slate clean and start again.
I used the relationship management approach of Dr Harley ...see website..
http://www.marriagebuilders.com/graphic/mbi3550_summary.html
This is an amazing website showing you how to have a successful marriage . Love is a behaviour and it shows what needs to happen in this regard. Essentially, the spouses have to ...
1. Remove love busters and practice the “policy of joint agreement”
2. Meet each others most important emotional needs
3. Practice the policy of undivided attention.....making sure you spend 15 hours a week together giving each other undivided attention
4. Practice radical honesty....about everything including how you feel about things your spouse does.
The upshot was , however, that I ended up doing most of the relationship management to restore the marriage. Dr Harley says that the spouse who had the affair fell out of love due at least in part to neglect etc from the other spouse. The other spouse has to do a lot of work to build the love bank units up again in the unfaithful spouse to bring them back into love. Instead, my wife claimed she was the injured party and I had to do the reparation work. She got everything she asked for. I haven’t to date.
I also believe in unconditional love ie giving without expecting something in return. This is the highest form of love as Christians say. In fact, Dr Harley says you can ask but not demand in a love relationship. Love is a free gift. Since the affair, relations with my wife have returned to a pleasant state although deep inside I have a big hole. We have sex almost every day and are pleasant companions. We fulfil again our duty to each other as spouses. We truly care for each other like old friends. IS THIS ENOUGH FOR HAPPINESS WHEN WHAT YOU NEED IS A PASSIONATE LOVE AFFAIR/DEEP CONNECTION WITH THE ONE YOU LOVE FOR THE REST OF YOUR LIFE?
But for me the deep soul/emotional connection is absent as it always has been. My wife does little that I ask for spontaneously. Synchronicity is largely absent.
I can continue with my duty oriented, caring “old friends” relationship into old age. Or seek my natural love type ie an ENFJ best fit, followed by INFJ, for a passionate, twin flame relationship for the rest of our lives. The emotional case is to exit, the business case is to stay, the ethics case is uncertain..
The ethics from my point of view is that, if you have done everything you can possibly do to make a relationship work over a very long time, and one or both spouses are unhappy, and the children have grown up and left, then there is no point in staying together. You can only make your spouse happy, if you are happy and vice versa. Its a SYMBIOTIC RELATIONSHIP. In fact, the only reason you should marry in the first place is because you can make your future spouse happy and you want to because you are in love.
Ultimately, with duty done with respect to children, if one or both of you are unhappy and no efforts can fix the situation, then you will ultimately make each other miserable by staying together. The initial pain of breakup will pass and each party will have the opportunity to seek the best partner next time.
AND THIS BEGS THE QUESTION, “WHO S THE BEST PARTNER”. Some say men often marry for looks and sex. Women for security/status/wealth.
My theory is as follows....for finding the right partner..
1. The must be physical attraction
2. There must be personality matching. It has now been shown that people who have the last 3 factors of the Myer Brigg indicator the same are natural “love types” and are happiest in a relationship. So for an INFP , their love type is ENFP best fit, them INFP. For an INFJ, their love type is an ENFJ best fit, then INFJ.
3. Next you need comparable intelligence and values alignment
4. And finally, a must, is also relationship management skills (ie as per Dr Harley approach) or capacity and willingness to develop such.
I note that you have at the bottom of your article a statement by an ENFJ saying their relationship with an ISTJ was miserable with no deep connection at all. I know quite a few ENFJs in this situation with ISTJ partners! We tend to get attracted to people who are largely opposite to us in personality, but over time, the differences become sources of conflict. Eg the J is always trying to organise and focus the Ps. The S just cannot understand the thinking of the N. For an ENFJ woman, their best fit is an INFJ man...but such men are the rarest type at 0.5% of men. So the ENFJ woman may find an ENFJ man more easily. The E vs I difference does not matter that much and in fact adds diversity. Its the last 3 factors that need to be the same for a deep connection soul mate.
It is interesting that Jesus Christ (an INFJ for sure) described marriage between a man and a woman as a soul union.....one in the sight of God. And he said that divorce was allowed by Moses because people were so hard hearted.
SOMEONE SAID THAT MOST MEN LEAD LIVES OF QUIET DESPERATION FOR ONE REASON OR ANOTHER. I DO NOT WANT TO DO THIS ANYMORE.
Anonymous INFJ Man
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