MBTI Series: INTJ & work-life balance

My apologies for such a long break in writing about MBTI Types.  Maybe you can deduce what type I might be due to my extremely long silence period. ;-)  In continuation of the MBTI posts I'm going to focus on one aspect about each personality, which I think is a way to define that type.  Remember that the MBTI is not about pointing fingers, but about acknowledging your own personal strengths and weaknesses and how those fit with the other 15 types.

INTJ
One thing that INTJs may struggle with is work-life balance.  This is actually a very common problem for many counselors and others in a helping profession because we all want to change the world and "save" everyone.  It can be even more difficult when you add in a perfectionistic personality, too.

One quality of INTJs is the focus on idealism.  This mainly stems from the NT combination in the personality.  You might hear yourself saying or thinking things like, "But it SHOULD be this way!"  INTJs tend to get so rapped up in what things should be that they forget about the positives of what things are.  Now, don't get me wrong I still see value in idealism, but I also think if we can harness it into action, instead of just complaining, that so many good things could result from their idealism.

MBTI Disclaimer
Remember that MBTI celebrates diversity and even if you don't think you're an INTJ, you may still identify with this quality of idealism.

Work-Life Balance

Here is a sample wheel of life with categories which all play a part in work-life balance.  Note that they're divided equally, but in actuality everyone's wheel will look differently. See an example at http://www.dilw.ie/the-wheel-of-life-could-you-be-happier/. The sections included on this wheel are merely suggestions and I want you to note that every section proposed may not relate to you.  I do like how they've sectioned it out into multiple categories, unlike other graphs you may only see broad categories, like leisure which could encompass multiple sections.  Check out this work-life balance calculator from the CNN website which you can tally what your average week looks like.

Put it into Action

Now, here is my concern for INTJs and work-life balance... Due to the idealism factor and also many INTJs thrive to be experts in what they do, they will over commit themselves to different tasks at work, volunteer activities, and other responsibilities.  This over commitment can lead to an unbalance because of their desire to be perfect and be the expert in everything they do, thus creating an even bigger unbalance in their life.

My suggestion for INTJs is to reduce the number of activities in your life and be experts in those, while allowing others to be experts in other fields.  I know it's tempting to overhear someone talking about what they've done and not want to break into "anything you can do I can do better," but please for your health and happiness and challenge you to refrain.