Does Our Myers-Briggs Type Impact Our Creative Process?

2/15/22

Dear friend,

I shared last week that our series on courting creativity in the Light House this month, led by member Kathryn Coneway, has me thinking in new ways about my relationship with creativity, and I'm inviting you to think about yours too.

(If you missed last week's article, you can read it here.)

That first session in Kathryn's series led to a 45-minute conversation I shared with a good friend on the phone. We got to wondering how our intuitive ("N") versus sensing ("S") differences on the Myers-Briggs type indicator might impact our experiences of the creative process.

For example, I mentioned in last week's letter that my experience of creativity often happens in a burst at the beginning of the creative process.

I sit and wait for the idea that wants to come, almost like I'm in a receptive posture. Then, once it comes, I see it all in my mind's eye, practically in its totality, from beginning to end, and I create to that picture I see in my head.

My friend's experience of creativity is different than that.

She usually needs to play with materials in her hands. Whether it's collage, painting, or even the needle arts, she's not sure what something might want to become—or even what she might like or want to do with her creativity—until she holds the materials in her hands and starts to play with them.

It was at this moment that I remembered the Myers-Briggs, and specifically how she and I are different on one of the aspects of that scale.

I'm a high "N" (intuitive), and she's a high "S" (sensing).

I recalled that the N/S distinction on the Myers-Briggs has to do with how we take in data.

If an intuitive takes in data through their inner, intuitive knowing place and a sensing person takes in data through their five senses, could our N/S type impact the way we experience the creative process?

This question has stayed with me ever since I started wondering it.

It's been a grace to hold this question because, in all honesty, I had started to judge myself for what I shared with you last week—that my relationship with creativity seems usually confined to the sparks of inspiration that happen at the beginning of the creative process, rather than all the way through.

But maybe that's how it looks for an N.

Maybe it's not a shortcoming at all.

Not something to feel ashamed about or to judge.

This is where I turn to you in this thought experiment and ask: What does your creative process look like? Does that correspond with what I've hypothesized above, about how our N/S type might impact how we experience our relationship with creativity?

I'd be curious to hear. 💕

Yours in contemplative light,
Christianne