True Confessions

September 17, 2003

I have to fess up. J.Lo and Ben have split and .. I ... don't ... care. (Gasp.)

I know I should, but I don't. I'm a moral monster who lacks proper human sentiments. I didn't care when Tom and Nicole split either. My warped sense of priorities ranks other things higher. Like Iraq. And Hurricane Isabel. And, above all, the impending Rugby World Cup.

The real reason why I don't care about Bennifer is that I'm an NF. If you're familar with the Myers-Briggs personality types, you will know what drives NFs: we are on a lifelong quest for meaning. Mercifully for Hollywood, there aren't many of us (we make up only 12% of the American population).

If Henry David Thoreau were alive today, he would care passionately about Ben and Jen. Yeah, right. I can't say for sure that he was an NF, but it's a pretty safe bet, for he too got off on meaning. Indeed, he wrote a credo for NFs:

I went to the woods because I wanted to live deliberately, to front only the essential facts of life and see if I could not learn what it had to teach, and not, when I came to die, discover that I had not lived. I did not wish to live what was not life, living is so dear; nor did I wish to practise resignation, unless it was quite necessary. I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life.

The particular NF variant that I am - INFP - makes up only 1% of the American population. Which means, basically, that I'm a freak. I knew this well before I found out I was an INFP, for I observed that most other people in the corporate world were willing to "practise resignation." I tried but failed.

When I found out I was an INFP, I felt an enormous sense of relief. OK, you're a freak, I was able to tell myself, but at least you're an authenticated, documented form of freak. It was reassuring to learn that for NFs, and especially INFPs, meaning isn't an optional extra but a biological necessity. That fortified me in my resolve to change course.