Jim Dale reading JK Rowling; sentence constructs using 'I' or 'You' pronouns = introversion and extraversion?

3:55 PM 3/7/11

Back to my writing addiction.

I marvel at Jim Dale, the reader who does the Harry Potter audiobooks. He makes a unique, recognizable, individual voice for each of the characters. Sometimes the voices almost match the characters' in the movies, as though perhaps he has seen the movies before doing the audio books. Cornelius Fudge sounds almost EXACTLY the same. Other times the voices are different from the movie characters'. When you listen to these audiobooks, it's hard to imagine that only one guy is sitting there alone reading this. Each character seems like a different actor speaking.

I don't know which type Jim Dale is, but he could very well be an EIE. I actually don't know and can't guess. They call that type the 'actor.' I am saying this because I really enjoy listening to him and I think he's doing a great job, even if he might be an EIE. His personality type would only matter if he and I had to have conversations with each other and make decisions together about how to deal with problems or make plans for the future. I'm saying that even though somebody might have a 'conflict' relation with you, you can still really like that person or appreciate what they do.

I am thinking about introversion and extraversion. I like the definitions I've read from socionics more than the definitions I've read from the Myers-Briggs.

Familiar old definition: Introverts are shy and quiet. Extraverts are loud and sociable.

New definition: Introverts are constantly aware of themselves being 'part of the surroundings.' Extraverts forget themselves and instead view everything and everyone as a 'separate object' disconnected from themselves.

If you use 'I' in many of your sentences, that is an introverted tendency. If you use 'you' when you talk to someone, that is an extraverted tendency. (This is my own observation, so I could be wrong. This is all my attempt to understand the functions by fitting them with something I already observed - I had already noticed that some people talk about 'you' and other people use the 'I' construct instead.) I'll give an example.

It touched me.
I felt it touching me.

Those are two different sentences. When I write sentences, I frequently use 'I sensed' rather than 'It did' sentence constructions. It didn't just do something on its own as a separate object - instead, I FELT it do what it did, or I SAW it do what it did. If I say 'I felt, I saw, I heard,' and so on, that is introverted sensing. I am here, and the other object is there, and it did something that interacted with me.

He has blond hair. (extraverted sensing)
I was looking at his hair and I noticed it was blond. (introverted sensing)

You did that. (extraverted sensing)
I just saw you doing that. (introverted sensing)

I know that I'm making my introverted sentences longer and more roundabout, but I am trying to emphasize the difference between the sentences. In the introverted world, you are always aware of your own existence, you are always there. In the extraverted world, you tend more to 'forget yourself' and pay attention to the other things around you as though you're not even there doing the sensing. Things around you just ARE that way. You're not conscious of the fact that you are still here, and you have a body, and you are sensing something.

I sometimes use the 'it did' structure, but I often use that with something small and non-threatening, like a cat. I'll say 'Alexander climbed onto the table,' because Alex didn't overwhelm me. (I miss Alex.) There is no anxiety or threatening feeling from Alex. But if a human is approaching me physically, I might tend to say 'I saw that he was right beside me,' rather than 'He was there.' I am conscious of myself, of the other person, and of our proximity to each other. These are rules of thumb but not absolute certainties. Just perhaps a tendency. The feeling of fear and anxiety and threat from something's physical presence is connected to my introverted sensing somehow.

I have been reading about the definitions of sensing, and some of it has to do with physical space and physical territory and things like how close to you somebody is. I've only been reading socionics for a few weeks so I am still adjusting to it. The definitions are much more thorough and somehow better than the definitions of the Jungian functions that I read a little bit before that.

I wrote a blog post which is still pretty popular. It's about men's long hair being rebellious or conformist. I wrote that, as of now, in the mainstream USA, men's long hair is viewed as a rebellion, but I want it to be viewed as something normal to conform with. There's a reason for this. Most of the long-haired men I see are SLEs, and that's not the personality type that I want to be with. They have a challenging, rebellious attitude when they grow their hair long. They are 'going against' society. But I want a social group where long hair is normal, and so 'cutting hair' will be viewed as rebellious and abnormal.

I'm thinking of this because I just went out to eat, and I sat in a parking lot next to a park and saw a long-haired guy walking by, and I figured he was possibly an SLE. (I know, RDL has been writing about how he figures out people's types by watching videos and interviews of them, and it's something you won't necessarily figure out from a single glance in a public place.)

I am half-listening to Jim Dale right now. Dumbledore is finally telling Harry about the reason why he has to stay with the Dursleys in order to continue his mother's protection. He's about to hear about the prophecy made by Trelawney. I'm almost at the end of the CDs. I love these CDs.

I haven't tried writing any fiction. I'd like to try, except every time I try to use my imagination, the soul murderers intervene, and they try to write the story for me instead of letting me write it. JK Rowling said that the Harry Potter character just 'walked in fully formed' into her mind while she was riding the train. Other people have said that electronic harassment happens to them while riding the trains. The Harry Potter character wasn't JK Rowling's idea - he was given to her by an attacker.

I used to write fiction when I was a teenager but I never finished the stories. They were magical fantasy stories happening in another world. Magic was almost always involved, and there was usually some kind of 'alternate universe' that people went into, and something psychological having to do with looking into your own mind, changing your mind state, and going over into the other world. I liked Freddy Krueger movies because they entered the other world through dreaming, and I often wrote stories where you couldn't tell the difference between the real world and the dream world, and where events going on in dreams became connected to events in the real world. So I would probably continue to write magical, psychological fantasy stories if I wrote fiction now. It was always very important to me that something psychological had to happen in the story, something about changing your mind or using your mind to perform some kind of magic or go to another world.

I'll post this now. I'll probably post more stuff later today - it's a writing addiction day.