Opposites Attract! But Can They Communicate?

People often ask me what personality types are more compatible for marriage. I don’t think God created any incompatible personality types, but types with opposite personalities do have more difficulty communicating. Communication is foundational to any relationship, especially in marriage, so couples with opposite personalities need to work extra hard at communicating. It’s like they’re speaking two different languages only worse, because they don’t realize they’re speaking different languages. Fortunately, with a little insight and effort they can understand each other and actually benefit from their differences.

You've heard the saying “opposites attract” and I've seen that many times in romantic relationships. We understand and communicate more effortlessly with personalities like our own, but we tend to be romantically drawn to people with opposite preferences. There’s something mysterious that catches our imagination in personalities that are so different. The spark of romance can turn something that’s normally annoying, or even repulsive, into something exciting and admirable. But if that romantic spark dims, those differences can become more annoying and repulsive than ever.

I believe this romantic attraction to opposite preferences has a purpose. Marriage to someone with your same preferences may seem easy at first, but it can grow boring quickly. Even more troublesome is that you share the same vulnerabilities. God designed our romantic nature to draw us to people who can complete or complement us with strengths in areas where we might be weak. (Gen 2:18) Godly Personalities addresses this design, but I’d like to add some discussion here focused on mismatched marriages—people married to personality types with no natural communication connection.

The Challenge.

Let’s look at some examples. Consider a couple with opposite preferences on all 4 dichotomies: an INFP married to an ESTJ. The INFP’s dominant function is feeling judgments and he prefers to use that function privately, in his mind. His auxiliary function is intuitive perception and he likes to express that one, sharing it with others. The ESTJ’s dominant function is thinking judgment and she shares that freely. Her auxiliary function is sensing perception but she prefers to keep that activity private. So when this couple interacts he’s in the mode of exploring possibilities and making connections but she’s objectively pushing for closure and making decisions. When he talks she can’t even follow him in her private thoughts because he’s exploring concepts and theories while she’s trying to grasp concrete facts. He doesn't understand her expressed decisions because they lack the subjective values that he bases his decisions on. Any couple with all 4 preferences different will struggle with similar mismatches in the way they think and communicate, but even types with one attitude in common can be completely mismatched in their communication.

Imagine an ENTP married to an ESFJ. They both express their dominant functions, but his is intuitive perception and hers is feeling judgments. When they stop to reflect on private thoughts he switches to objective judgment while she goes into exploring factual data. They may try to share some thoughts from their auxiliary functions but they’ll still be on different wavelengths—opposite ends of different dichotomies.

This couple is likely to suffer from frequent verbal conflicts because they both like to express their dominant functions. If they were both introverts they’d suffer from the same mismatched functions, but they’d tend build silent walls instead of being in constant conflict. The INTP still prefers to express his intuitive data gathering function while the ISFJ expresses her feeling decisions, but these are auxiliary functions now instead of dominant. As introverts they are both generally private so communication may be sparse to begin with. When they do talk they tend to be on opposite dichotomies (one in perception, the other in decision making) and their spouse’s non-preferred functions within those dichotomies.

The good news is that God helps us when we're willing to persevere. More good news for these couples is that they have very complementary personalities that can work together with high levels of synergy—if they can learn to communicate with love. (Eph 4:15) (See note below for an explanation of what complementing with synergy means.)

The first key to success here is to respect each other's differences. Each must recognize that their spouse has a godly personality that is a gift from the omnipotent creator of the universe. When we respect (better yet, admire) the differences God created in our spouses we can learn from them and work with them to accomplish greater things than we can do in isolation.

S-N-F-T Communication: “Just Sniff It”.

One approach to assist in communication is to take turns with dichotomies. Develop a habit of intentional perception, then judging. In the perception phase focus on sensing (S—concrete facts) first before intuition (N—connections) and in the judging phase consider feeling (F—subjective values) before thinking (T—objective cause & effect) decisions. Moving through the mental functions in this S-N-F-T order makes sure you give all your preferences a chance to be expressed. You can remember the order with the mnemonic “SNiFf iT.” The judging functions can be reversed so that you consider thinking before feeling, but then the mnemonic becomes snit if (SNTF) which doesn't work as well as sniff it (SNFT).

The ISFJ in my third example should start SNFT conversations by deliberately expressing her Sensing function. This will take some effort because she normally keeps her sensing private and expresses her feeling decisions. During this phase the INTP needs to listen to his wife's expression first, then he can respond intuitively. This should be the easy part for him since intuitive expression is his natural preference. He needs to value his wife's sensing because that's her gift. In turn, she needs to listen carefully to his intuitive ideas because that's his gift and intuitive insights are often challenging for sensors to take in. The INTP needs to express his ideas carefully and patiently. Both partners need to be deliberate here in exploring information and possibilities without making judgments or decisions.

When both individuals are satisfied with exploring relevant information on the topic at hand they can move on to decision making. (The ISFJ will likely be more eager to move on than the INTP.) Now they can make suggestions for judgments and actions to take. During this part of the discussion they need to value each others differences again. The ISFJ will likely be quick to express her subjective opinions and push for some kind of closure. The INTP will need to make some effort to express his thinking opinions because he normally wants to keep those private. He's also likely to avoid closure by expressing multiple options. The ISFJ can push toward whatever option seems best, but she needs to allow him to eliminate options when he's not comfortable with them. If he eliminates the choice she preferred she needs to push for another option. They both need to weigh their different perspectives (T and F) as fairly as they can, maybe giving their spouse’s opinions more credit than their own.