Thursday, February 23, 2006

enfj

So, we were circulating a personality test at work, and it turns out I'm an ENFJ (Extraverted, Intuitive, Feeling, Judging). The description of my type is below. Do you think it sounds like me?

"ENFJs are the benevolent 'pedagogues' of humanity. They have tremendous charisma by which many are drawn into their nurturant tutelage and/or grand schemes. Many ENFJs have tremendous power to manipulate others with their phenomenal interpersonal skills and unique salesmanship. But it's usually not meant as manipulation -- ENFJs generally believe in their dreams, and see themselves as helpers and enablers, which they usually are.

ENFJs are global learners. They see the big picture. The ENFJs focus is expansive. Some can juggle an amazing number of responsibilities or projects simultaneously. Many ENFJs have tremendous entrepreneurial ability.

ENFJs are, by definition, Js, with whom we associate organization and decisiveness. But they don't resemble the SJs or even the NTJs in organization of the environment nor occasional recalcitrance. ENFJs are organized in the arena of interpersonal affairs. Their offices may or may not be cluttered, but their conclusions (reached through feelings) about people and motives are drawn much more quickly and are more resilient than those of their NFP counterparts.

ENFJs know and appreciate people. Like most NFs, (and Feelers in general), they are apt to neglect themselves and their own needs for the needs of others. They have thinner psychological boundaries than most, and are at risk for being hurt or even abused by less sensitive people. ENFJs often take on more of the burdens of others than they can bear.

TRADEMARK: "The first shall be last"
This refers to the open-door policy of ENFJs. One ENFJ colleague always welcomes me into his office regardless of his own circumstances. If another person comes to the door, he allows them to interrupt our conversation with their need. While discussing that need, the phone rings and he stops to answer it. Others drop in with a 'quick question.' I finally get up, go to my office and use the call waiting feature on the telephone. When he hangs up, I have his undivided attention!

Functional Analysis:

Extraverted Feeling
Extraverted Feeling rules the ENFJ's psyche. In the sway of this rational function, these folks are predisposed to closure in matters pertaining to people, and especially on behalf of their beloved. As extraverts, their contacts are wide ranging. Face-to-face relationships are intense, personable and warm, though they may be so infrequently achieved that intimate friendships are rare.

Introverted iNtuition
Like their INFJ cousins, ENFJs are blessed through introverted intuition with clarity of perception in the inner, unconscious world. Dominant Feeling prefers to find the silver lining in even the most beggarly perceptions of those in their expanding circle of friends and, of course, in themselves. In less balanced individuals, such mitigation of the unseemly eventually undermines the ENFJ's integrity and frequently their good name. In healthier individuals, deft use of this awareness of the inner needs and desires of others enables this astute type to win friends, influence people, and avoid compromising entanglements.
The dynamic nature of their intuition moves ENFJs from one project to another with the assurance that the next one will be perfect, or much more nearly so than the last. ENFJs are continually looking for newer and better solutions to benefit their extensive family, staff, or organization.

Extraverted Sensing
Sensing is extraverted. ENFJs can manage details, particularly those necessary to implement the prevailing vision. These data have, however, a magical flexible quality. Something to be bought can be had for a song; the same something is invaluable when it's time to sell. (We are not certain, but we suspect that such is the influence of the primary function.) This wavering of sensory perception is made possible by the weaker and less mature status with which the tertiary is endowed.

Introverted Thinking
Introverted Thinking is least apparent and most enigmatic in this type. In fact, it often appears only when summoned by Feeling. At times only in jest, but in earnest if need be, Thinking entertains as logical only those conclusions which support Feeling's values. Other scenarios can be shown invalid or at best significantly inferior. Such "Thinking in the service of Feeling" has the appearance of logic, but somehow it never quite adds up.

Introverted Thinking is frequently the focus of the spiritual quest of ENFJs. David's lengthiest psalm, 119, pays it homage. "Law," "precept," "commandment," "statute:" these essences of inner thinking are the mysteries of Deity for which this great Feeler's soul searched."

There is also a section that lists famous ENFJ's. Included among them were Johnny Depp, Oprah Winfrey, and David, King of Israel. Go figure!

Tuesday, February 21, 2006

Monday, February 20, 2006

monday morning

Every week on Monday morning we have a chapel service at work. Each department takes turns being in charge, and this morning it was Microfinance’s turn. Most of the time, departments will ask pastors to come in and speak, or a visiting field member will come in and talk about their work. Most of the Microfinance team is actually gone right now, they are in Africa checking in with the projects we have. Anyway, the few remaining people did chapel today and even though they went in a more non-traditional route, I think they did a fabulous job.

They basically did a background piece on their project, explaining what was new with the MFI division and talking about stories of things that are going on in our project countries. There were numerous slides of people who do programming overseas with us, and as we were watching I found myself being touched. There are so many incredible projects going on in this organization that are making a real difference in people’s lives, especially in microfinance. The loans that our field offices give out everyday help people be another step closer to self-sustaining, and it encourages them to feel empowered when they get the chance to pay back part or all of what they may owe. It is especially interesting, because this organization specializes in establishing microfinance in post-conflict environments that are particularly vulnerable and unstable. These are people who are in desperate need of help, whose countries have a completely demolished infrastructure and no way to provide its citizens aid.

Being here everyday and dealing with mostly administrative stuff that has very little direct impact on programming, it is easy for me to lose sight of my job and whether it is really important or not. It is so easy to think about my frustrations with go-to work, faxing this, copying that, checking this expense report, booking this plane ticket. It becomes frustrating because I don’t feel as if I am making an impact, and I feel like my resources would be better spent out in the field somewhere rather than in a headquarters environment. But when I see faces and hear stories of people who are impacted by our programming, I realize that even the most menial jobs are worth it if it can enable those results, if it can truly help make a difference in people’s lives. I know that despite my unhappiness at times, all the menial jobs I do everyday in my department frees up hours of time from other people who need to devote all of their time to programming. So, at least for today I feel happy about my job.

Friday, February 17, 2006

olympic couch potato

You would think that a sporting event like the Olympics would inspire most people to leave their homes and enjoy the great outdoors. Instead, the Olympics makes me a couch potato. I have spent so much time this week sitting in front of the television watching the Olympics. It entrances me. I am the prototype of the type of person NBC caters to in their Olympic coverage. All the heart-tugging bio pieces about this person being orphaned, or that person overcoming injury, or another person getting the gold medal in their last chance, I eat it up. I mean, how many people do you know that would actually cry watching coverage of Michelle Kwan withdrawing, or Shaun White on the medal podium. Come to think of it, how many people you know would admit to crying watching that?

Part of this stems from my belief that everyone should have the opportunity in their life to receive a standing ovation for something they did, and for something they deserve. I know from experience the overwhelming accomplishment and satisfaction you can have from that type of experience, and it makes me happy that other people can achieve that feeling.

I will say, however, that this Olympic coverage has made me much more interested in snowboarding than I was before. I have never really been into winter sports all that much, but that might be because I have such limited exposure (for example, I have never been skiing). But, watching snowboarding makes me interested in trying it.

Anyway, there isn’t much going on with me here (possibly because I have been watching the Olympics all week). I am still trying to adjust to everything. I am getting more used to being here, and feeling more comfortable at work. I am just beginning to figure out who I need to talk to to handle certain situations, so that is making things easier on me.

My boss is super quirky. He can be really random, and really funny. I just switched cubes, so we are right next to each other. It makes it easier to ask questions from him. Sometimes, though, he likes to sit and work with earplugs in to help him concentrate, so he told me yesterday if I called for him and he didn’t answer, that I should just ball up a piece of paper and through it over the wall to get his attention. Last night, right before I left for the day he started singing to himself “I’m a lumberjack and I’m ok.” And I sang back “I sleep all night and I work all day.” That really surprised him. He didn’t think someone my age would know Monty Python.

Thursday, February 16, 2006

editorial

I read this on startribune.com today. I thought it was really interesting, since you don't see alot of commentary anywhere on pro-choice feminists who are Christian. And really, who hasn't understood the calming effect that eating your body weight in chocolate has?


Everything was going swimmingly on the panel. The subject was politics and faith, and I was on stage with two priests with progressive spiritual leanings, and a moderator who is a liberal and a Catholic. We were having a discussion with the audience of 1,300 people in Washington about many of the social justice topics on which we agree -- the immorality of the federal budget, the wrongness of the president's war in Iraq. Then an older man came to the mike and raised the issue of abortion, and everyone just lost his or her mind. Or, at any rate, I did.
Maybe it was the way in which the man couched the question, which was about how we should reconcile our progressive stances on peace and justice with the "murder of a million babies every year in America." The man who asked the question was soft-spoken, neatly and casually dressed.

First Richard, a Franciscan priest, answered that this is indeed a painful issue but that it is not the only "pro-life" issue that progressives -- even Catholics -- should concern themselves with during elections. There are also the matters of capital punishment and the war in Iraq, and of HIV. Then Jim, an evangelical, spoke about the need to reduce the number of unwanted pregnancies, and the need to defuse abortion as a political issue, by welcoming prochoice and prolife supporters to the discussion, with equal respect for their positions. He spoke gently about how "morally ambiguous" the issue is.

I sat there simmering, like a samovar; nice Jesusy me. The moderator turned to me and asked quietly if I would like to respond. I did: I wanted to respond by pushing over our table.

Instead, I shook my head. I love and respect the Franciscan and the evangelical, and agree with them 90-plus percent of the time. So I did not say anything, at first.

Then, when I was asked to answer the next question, I paused, and returned to the topic of abortion. There was a loud buzzing in my head, the voice of reason that says, "You have the right to remain silent," but the voice of my conscience was insistent. I wanted to express calmly, eloquently, that prochoice people understand that there are two lives involved in an abortion -- one born (the pregnant woman) and one not (the fetus) -- but that the born person must be allowed to decide what is right.

Also, I wanted to wave a gun around, to show what a real murder looks like. This tipped me off that I should hold my tongue, until further notice. And I tried.

But then I announced that I needed to speak out on behalf of the many women present in the crowd, including myself, who had had abortions, and the women whose daughters might need one in the not-too-distant future -- people who must know that teenage girls will have abortions, whether in clinics or dirty backrooms. Women whose lives had been righted and redeemed by Roe vs. Wade. My answer was met with some applause but mostly a shocked silence.

Pall is a good word. And it did not feel good to be the cause of that pall. I knew what I was supposed to have said, as a progressive Christian: that it's all very complicated and painful, and that Jim was right in saying that the abortion rate in America is way too high for a caring and compassionate society.

But I did the only thing I could think to do: plunge on, and tell my truth. I said that this is the most intimate decision a woman makes, and she makes it all alone, in her deepest heart of hearts, sometimes with the man by whom she is pregnant, with her dearest friends or with her doctor -- but without the personal opinion of say, Tom DeLay or Karl Rove.

I said I could not believe that men committed to equality and civil rights were still challenging the basic rights of women. I thought about all the photo ops at which President Bush had signed legislation limiting abortion rights, surrounded by 10 or so white, self-righteous married men, who have forced God knows how many girlfriends into doing God knows what. I thought of the time Bush appeared on stage with children born from frozen embryos, children he calls "snowflake babies," and of the embryos themselves, which he calls the youngest and most vulnerable Americans.

And somehow, as I was answering, I got louder and maybe even more emphatic than I actually felt, and said it was not a morally ambiguous issue for me at all. I said that fetuses are not babies yet; that there was actually a real difference between proabortion people, like me, and Klaus Barbie.

Then I said that a woman's right to choose was nobody else's god damn business. This got their attention.

A cloud of misery fell over the room and the stage. Finally, Jim said something unifying enough for us to proceed -- that liberals must not treat people with opposing opinions on abortion with contempt and exclusion, partly because it's tough material, and partly because it is so critical that we win these next big elections.

It was not until the reception that I finally realized part of the problem -- no one had told me that the crowd was made up largely of Catholics.

I had flown in at dawn on a red-eye, and, in my exhaustion, had somehow missed this one tiny bit of information. I was mortified: I had to eat my body weight in chocolate just to calm myself.

But then I asked myself: Would I, should I, have given a calmer answer? Wouldn't it have been more useful and harder to dismiss me if I had sounded more reasonable, less -- what is the word -- spewy?

Maybe I could have presented my position in a less strident, divisive manner. But the questioner's use of the words "murder" and "babies" had put me on the defensive. Plus I am so confused about why we are still having to argue with patriarchal sentimentality about teeny weenie so-called babies -- some microscopic, some no bigger than the sea monkeys we used to send away for -- when real, live, already born women, many of them desperately poor, get such short shrift from the current administration.

Most women like me would much rather use our time and energy fighting to make the world safe and just and fair for the children we do have, and do love -- and for the children of New Orleans and the children of Darfur. I am old and tired and menopausal and would mostly like to be left alone: I have had my abortions, and I have had a child.

But as a Christian and a feminist, the most important message I can carry and fight for is the sacredness of each human life, and reproductive rights for all women is a crucial part of that: It is a moral necessity that we not be forced to bring children into the world for whom we cannot be responsible and adoring and present. We must not inflict life on children who will be resented; we must not inflict unwanted children on society.

During the reception, an old woman came up to me, and said, "If you hadn't spoken out, I would have spit," and then she raised her fist in the power salute. We huddled together for a while, and ate M&M's to give us strength. It was a kind of communion, for those of us who still believe that civil rights and equality and even common sense will somehow be sovereign, some day.


Anne Lamott, a novelist and essayist, wrote this article for the Los Angeles Times.

Thursday, February 09, 2006

oscars for politics

This was on Anderson Coopers blog the other day. I know the State of the Union was last week, but it is hilarious.

Oscars for politics
I was riding the Metro train to work in Washington, D.C., this morning, bleary-eyed and headachy from staying up half the night to cover the State of the Union, when a thought hit me like a football to Marcia Brady's nose: If politics has really devolved into only so much political theater, why don't we treat it that way?

Now, I know that there are plenty of Democrats and Republicans who really want to help with the serious work of the nation: Spurring the economy, supporting families, protecting our security. But these Super Bowl political events, such as the State of the Union address, are really about policy second, putting on a show first.

So I thought, let's go through all the moments of the speech and give out some awards, just like we do for movies.

Best Actor: Senator Bill Frist acting like he wasn't using every moment in front of the camera to campaign for his own presidency.

Worst Actress: Hillary Clinton trying to force a smile after President Bush invoked the name of her husband in a bid for Democratic applause.

Best Drama: Samuel Alito's agonizing struggle over whether or not to clap.

Best Direction: Mindless lockstep of Reds and Blues cheering or grousing on cue.

Best Walk-On: Louisiana Governor Kathleen Blanco...a not so subtle reminder that big problems remain in the Deep South.

Worst Walk-Off: Anti-war protestor Cindy Sheehan. She got herself into the chamber, but then got thrown out for revealing her antiwar t-shirt before the president even arrived. Talk about missing your cue.

Best Supporting Actress: Laura Bush. Who can argue?

Best Comedy: Dave Chappelle. No, he wasn't there, but it sure would have been funny.

Best Picture: OK, no kidding here. The family of Marine Staff Sergeant Dan Clay, who was killed in Iraq, displayed dignity, bravery and respect in a room full of political posturing. By far, their appearance was the most compelling moment of the night.

Anyway, we're cutting tape on this piece now and tonight we'll roll it out: Step aside Oscar, the COOPERS are coming!

Tuesday, February 07, 2006

cartoon riots

I don’t know what to think about the Muslim cartoon riots going on. My thoughts are sort of fragmented based on a few issues.

I am so thankful that no one in our country has chosen to print these cartoons. The absolute last thing our country needs at this point in its relations with the Islamic world are to have them burning our embassies over this issue.

At the core of my beliefs in human rights and freedoms are the sustaining virtues of freedom of speech and freedom of religion. All people should be able to believe what they want to believe, and say what they want to say without the worry of censorship of government or society. But I don’t believe that those freedoms mean that you are free to use them to incite hate or intolerance. Freedom comes with responsibility. To me, to have the freedom of speech does not mean that you have the right to mouth off to anyone at anytime about anything and not suffer consequences. This freedom requires you to understand how your words impact others. People need to be aware of the consequences of what they say. The Danish newspaper that started this all had a responsibility to understand that the cartoons they were printing would be condemned by believers in Islam. (To be fair, even if they did know that Islam prohibits pictures of Muhammad, and that their publication of the cartoons would be received harshly by the Muslim community, I don’t believe that ever would have imagined that Danish embassies around the world would be burned because of their choice to print these images. Who would have imagined this?)

Freedom of religion has its responsibilities too. Of course, people should be free to believe what they want to believe. Of course, people’s opinions of God and spirituality and life will be different from person to person and faith to faith. What is important when considering this freedom is to have respect for other people’s faiths, and understand that with your right to believe what you want comes with a responsibility to not force that belief onto others. I am a Christian. This faith forms the basis of my worldview and is fundamental to my identity. The freedom to be a Christian is fundamental to my life. I have many friends who are not Christians, but it is not my job to condemn them for their choices. If I chose to live my life that way, I would have missed out on so many great friends and relationships that have enriched me as a person and deepened my faith.

I also have a hard time with the riots because so many people make fun of Jesus all the time. His image is no longer considered to be strictly holy or religious, and has been used many times to market kitschy items from Urban Outfitters or used in political cartoons. I have made my peace with the fact that not everyone in the world considers Christ to be as important and sacred a figure as I do. I have made peace with the secularization of my God, so I feel like others should have to endure it as well.

This secularization can also be used as a tool to understand the world and how they view my faith. I think it is important for Christians to understand how the world views us and our faith, and that can often be revealed in a movie like “Saved” or in a political cartoon. I understand that the cartoons were outrageous, but I think that this Islamic community may need to recognize that the cartoon symbolizes how some in the world feel about their faith.

There is also another issue of great concern to discuss. Why don’t Christians react in the same way as these Muslims have when our God is defamed? Why aren’t more Christians outraged at the musical “Jesus Christ Superstar” or a Jesus Christ football bobble head (which I have seen)? Is that a failure on our part, that we are no longer impassioned for our God like others around the world are for theirs? What does it mean about the evolution of our faith? I don’t have the answer for this one, but I think it is worthy of asking.