I am absolutely thrilled at the response to this series so far! If you’re just jumping in, I suggest that you go back and read Learn About Organizing for Personality Types and How does the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator® work? for background information.

INFP stands for Introverted – Intuitive – Feeling – Perceiving.

INFP Organizing Strengths

Individuals with INFP type preferences typically use a calendar system effectively (more on that below).

INFP Organizing Challenges

People who prefer Perceiving like to live in a flexible, spontaneous way, seeking to experience life rather than control it. Detailed plans and final decisions feel confining to them – they prefer to stay open to new information and last-minute options. This preference causes INFPs to be easily distracted, and along with the Feeling preference, leads them to stop what they’re doing whenever someone wants to talk to them. In addition, they admit to having a tendency to take on more than they can handle.

INFPs indicated that they sometimes struggle with the following:

• Forgetting about social activities, birthdays, anniversaries, other special occasions, meetings, appointments, and tasks that aren’t on their “to do” list
• Prioritizing tasks and activities
• Procrastination
• Hoarding and clutter issues
• Sentimental attachment to certain objects

This anecdote shared by an INFP describes it well.

Until recently, my living room was filled (boxes, piles on floor, heaps on tables) with “pretty” pieces of wood, interesting copper do-hickeys, intriguing road finds etc., that I might, sometime in the next 20 years or maybe only in my dreams, use in a sculpture or crafts project.

I say “until recently” because recently, I was forced to have a group of people to my house. No more meeting socially in pizza places! For a long time, I’d been getting my prescribed daily exercise by leaping over the piles of “whatever” strewn over my kitchen, living room, bedroom and backroom floor; with a bit more practice, I might have become a contender for some broad jumping championship. I knew that the cats enjoyed the challenge of such leaping too, so I had no motivation to clean. When I learned that I **had** to have people over and couldn’t whine or beg my way out of it, I panicked. “Just do a little tidying,” some said, but that seemed like a month-long project of blood, sweat and tears of boredom.

Well, I did capitalize on the social taboos about sneaking peeks at others’ bedrooms. My bedroom is now bed-high with clutter, but the kitchen floor is visible in most places, except where hidden under hairballs.

Meanwhile, my car is an archeological dig, with the earliest year’s clutter at the bottom and newest junk at the top. Fortunately, I haven’t suffered the fate of one INFP, who realized that a family of mice had taken up quarters in his car (well stocked with crusty, forgotten McDonald’s wrappers), when one darted under his foot at an intersection. Me, I say that the mess “burglar proofs” my car; what cop-dodging thief is going to claw through layers of my life, in hopes of finding a diamond among the moldy scraps.

Oh yeah, amidst all this clutter are about 10 clocks, supposedly to remind me of Time. All bought with good intentions – never mind that 8 of the 10 are stopped at whatever hour, that one runs but that I’ve never bothered to push the hands 5 hours forward to the correct time, and that only one registers the real time (within a half hour’s accuracy).

I tell people that I have a high tolerance for chaos because I’m oblivious to most of my environment. Usually, I just don’t see the cobwebs or the clutter; I’m habituated to them and they become invisible -until I smell a mouse rotting *somewhere* and have to track in through the mess.

INFP Time Management Systems

INFPs have a variety of time management system preferences, encompassing both paper-based and electronic systems.

Survey respondents described their systems (in the early 2000s) as follows:

• One successfully managed her busy schedule with a PDA synced with Outlook on her work computer.
• One used a Palm Pilot for scheduling and alarms. She liked being able to print her calendar and have the entire month in front of her.
• One used a paper “when she thought of it,” sometimes recording completed tasks for reference. She occasionally used a computer calendar as well.
• One designed her own multi-ring planning system.

Learn More

For more insight into the INFP organizing style, read about Organic Freedoms on Pixies Did It.

For a broader view of the INFP personality type, check out the following resources:

• Portrait of an INFP: The Idealist
• INFP Personality (“The Mediator”)
• The INFP
• INFP in a Nutshell

Keep in mind that we are all unique, and even people sharing the same type preferences will not be the same in every way. Personality type is only one factor to consider when developing organizing solutions for your clients.

Are you an INFP?

Help others understand your personality type and organizing style by answering one or more of the following questions in the Comments:

1. What are your organizing strengths?
2. What are your organizing challenges or weaknesses?
3. What organizing strategies work well for you?
4. What are your time management strengths?
5. What are your time management challenges or weaknesses?
6. What time management strategies work well for you?
7. What type of calendar(s) do you use?

Photo © jacoblundphoto / depositphotos