Do you ever just KNOW something? You don’t know how you know, but you know, for sure. Sometimes it’s that someone is lying to you. Sometimes it’s that the person standing in front of you, who you have just met, is not a decent human being. Sometimes it’s that something bad is going to happen to someone you love.
You try to ignore the feeling at times. You try to rationalize it or explain it away. Sometimes when you don’t like what it is telling you, you blame it on anxiety.
More times than not that little feeling is right. It might take an hour or a day or a year, but that thing that you just knew instantly turned out to be spot on.
INFJs have this amazing superpower called intuition. It’s kinda hard to explain to anyone who doesn’t have it because it seems almost unreal. It’s something that you see in movies from superheroes, not in normal people. Though it’s hard to explain it is very real for those of us who experience it every day.
What is INFJ Intuition?
Google defines it as: “The ability to understand something immediately, without the need for conscious reasoning. A thing that one knows or considers likely from instinctive feeling rather than conscious reasoning.”
That’s why you just know. It doesn’t come from anything that you are doing consciously. It works in the background of your brain, without you knowing what’s going on. Your brain collects a bunch of information about the people around you. Everything from their appearance, energy, tone of voice, facial reactions, and body language. Then your superpowered brain puts all of this information together instantly to give you a feeling about this person.
Kinda cool, huh?
But also kinda creepy at times, especially when you get a bad feeling about someone that everyone else adores. This can cause some tricky situations.
Let’s look at some fun facts about the INFJ intuition.
1. You’re basically psychic
Ok, let’s start with the obvious. INFJs are not psychic, well… most aren’t. But it does feel like that sometimes. Sometimes we get flashes of things that will happen in the future and then deja vu when they actually do happen. Part of this is because we are constantly thinking about the future and running different scenarios in our heads of things that could happen.
Sometimes we are spot on and astonished by how accurate we are at these predictions.
Sometimes we are blown away by the fact the NO ONE else saw THAT THING coming! Like, how could you not?!?
2. You can’t control it
INFJ intuition works in the background of our brains. It’s not something that we can control or actively use. It’s just happening all of the time. Sometimes we get feelings about people or things that will happen, but not always. We generally cannot just look at a person and get a feeling. It’s not like that. They just come and go when they want to and we are just the messengers.
3. You can improve it
You can’t control it, but you can improve it. The more you use it, the better it gets. It’s like a muscle. If you don’t use it at all, you lose it.
How do you use it? You pay attention to those little feelings that you get. You listen to that voice in your head that keeps bringing the same thing up over and over again, no matter how hard you try to ignore it.
You can’t will the feelings to happen, but you can keep an eye out for them and entertain them when you have them.
4. It’s astonishingly correct
The more that you learn into those feelings and pay attention to them, the more you will see how correct they are. It’s not always readily apparent. Sometimes you have to wait days or even years, but it will happen.
5. It feels different for different people
I’ve spoken to different INFJs who explain it differently, probably because it’s just so hard to put into words.
You can also get different feelings in different situations from different people. Sometimes it's a feeling about energy. Sometimes it’s a flash that is a prediction of the future. It can also be just a thought that turns out to be real as well. It can come at you from all different directions.
6. It can cause discord with your friends and family
As INFJs our first instinct is to look out for those around us. So, when we get a feeling about something or someone, we want to tell those around us to help them, to keep them safe or warn them about something unsavory. But they don’t always respond to these warnings as we would like.
Not everyone believes in our intuition the way that we do, especially people with sensing personalities who don’t experience life the same way that we do. When you share your feelings with them they may question everything about what you are saying. They want hard facts about the situation and all that you can tell them is you have a feeling. It’s a good way to start an argument.
7. It’s best kept to yourself at times
I’ve learned over the years that it’s best to keep most of my intuitive feelings to myself. Most people don’t understand or believe what I am saying, so I let them be. They don’t have to understand or believe. I know what I know and I have seen proof enough to be confident in my own intuition.
I no longer feel the need to prove myself to anyone or try to make them believe my superpower. It’s enough for me to know and to use it to help them without them necessarily knowing about it.
8. It takes a lot of energy
Even though your intuition works in the background it still takes a lot of energy. Your mind is working without you knowing it really. When you are actively paying attention to it you are using both energy and thinking power. The whole process can be very draining, especially when you get a bad feeling from someone. In those cases, you will automatically be on high alert when they are around and looking for more reasons to prove your feeling one way or the other. It’s important to monitor this energy usage and make sure that it’s not taking everything from you.
Conclusion
Intuition is a difficult thing to describe because it sounds supernatural. It is to a point, but it’s certainly not the same as being claircognizant or clairvoyant. It’s really somewhere in between.
When used correctly it’s a wonderful superpower to possess. I’m so grateful for mine and thankful that it is always there to point me in the right direction.
Learn more about your INFJ personality now!
