Writers and artists are notorious for being horrible salesmen, and many of them take a certain sort of secret pride in this fact. Even though it’s uncomfortable, being a “starving artist” can feel noble to creative types, and it also seems to prevent against the evil of “selling out,” something else which many writers and artists fear.
On the other hand, I’ve worked with hundreds of clients who come to me and say, “I’m so passionate about my creative work. Why can’t I make any money from it? What am I doing wrong?”
The problem is the emotional baggage that most writers and artists have around the selling process. We do tend to see the act of selling as something negative. However, the selling process itself is neutral. It’s the energy we bring to the selling process that determines whether it becomes positive or negative. Continue Reading
One of the biggest problems INFJ personality types deal with is avoidance, and many of us don’t even know that we’re doing it or how much it’s holding us back. Avoidance in INFJ personality types may show up as social anxiety, procrastination, perfectionism, shyness, and/or denial about things that need to change in our life.
One of the reasons we have such strong avoidant tendencies is because we get emotionally overwhelmed. Almost every INFJ is also a Highly Sensitive Person, and this high sensitivity extends to our emotional system as well. We are hurt easily by criticism and dragged down quickly by pessimism or any other kind of excessive negativity. We are also hyper-aware of the tone of voice and moods of others. All of these things can cause us to experience an emotional storm within ourselves. These storms are hard to weather and so, as a way to protect ourselves, most INFJ personality types avoid anything that might cause one of these storms within us.
However, there is a way to deal with emotional overwhelm for INFJs that doesn’t feed into our unhelpful avoidant tendencies. I talk about this more in the video below:
I’m teaching a new class this September called Energy and Intuition for INFJs and I’m going to be covering topics like these, and so much more. We’re going to be learning about INFJ emotions, the INFJ/empath connection, how to use INFJ intuition to navigate our frequent emotional storms, INFJ anxiety and depression, and more. If this sounds like something you need right now, be sure to sign up for my newsletter HERE to get all the updates.
This is the third and final video in this series as I get ready to launch this new class, and I’ve already gotten so many messages from INFJs letting me know that this is exactly what they need and they’re so excited to begin—and so excited to meet other INFJs. Many of us INFJs don’t know a single other INFJ and it can get really lonely. I’m hoping this class will change that for a lot of people.
If you have any questions at all, please send them to me here. I’ll be opening registration in just a couple of days, on Thurs Sep 8. I’ll see you then!
Lauren Sapala is the author of The INFJ Writer and The INFJ Revolution. You can get a free copy of her book on creative marketing for writers by signing up for her newsletter HERE.
For most INFJ personality types, intuition is something we’re born with that can be extremely strong from a young age. However, much of the time, due to family circumstances and societal conditioning, our natural intuitive abilities become blocked and then it feels difficult to access them.
One of the main things that can block an INFJ’s intuition is overthinking, and INFJ personality types—especially when stressed—are particularly prone to doing this. When we begin overthinking everything we experience the same thought loops over and over, and while it might seem like we’re trying to find a solution to whatever problem is causing us to overthink everything, in reality we’re just driving ourselves crazy and not getting anywhere at all.
This is when our natural intuition becomes blocked, because it’s almost impossible to receive any information from our intuition when we’re caught up in overthinking. There is a way to get past this though, and it’s easier than you might assume. I talk about how to quickly and easily unblock your INFJ intuition in the video below:
I’m teaching a new class this September called Energy and Intuition for INFJs and I’m going to be covering topics like these, and so much more. We’re going to be learning about INFJ psychic sensitivity (and how to use it), trouble spots for INFJs in relationships, how intuition influences the INFJ creative process, stress and self-care for INFJS, and more. If this sounds like something you need right now, be sure to sign up for my newsletter HERE to get all the updates.
I love teaching on INFJ-related topics, and I’ve worked with so many INFJs over the past ten years, so this class is a long time coming. I’m really excited about it. I think it will be the perfect accompaniment to the big life transitions that so many INFJs are going through right now.
If you have any questions at all, please send them to me here. And stay tuned for the next video in this series on “Dealing with Emotional Overwhelm as an INFJ.”
Lauren Sapala is the author of The INFJ Writer and The INFJ Revolution. You can get a free copy of her book on creative marketing for writers by signing up for her newsletter HERE.
For people who are INFJ personality types, regular life can be hard. Usually, when we’re growing up and still figuring ourselves out as young adults, we assume that life is so hard because there is something wrong with us. INFJs are extremely observant, and it’s easy for us to see all the many ways in which we don’t fit in with the groups around us. What is much more confusing though, is why we don’t fit in.
This leads most INFJ personality types to feel alone, misunderstood, rejected, or weird (and not in a good way). These negative feelings are only compounded by the fact that we are easily able to understand the personalities of others. We can quickly grasp the psychological motivations of other people, what makes them tick and why they do the things they do. Again though, we are painfully aware that other people do not grasp these things about us.
The lack of understanding from other people is also not the only thing that makes us feel so alone in the world. Most INFJs are an enigma even to themselves and this also causes us emotional pain. I talk more in-depth about this in the video below:
I’m teaching a new class this September called Energy and Intuition for INFJs and I’m going to be covering topics like these, and so much more. We’re going to be learning about the INFJ emotional system (and INFJ emotional stumbling blocks), self-image and self-worth, relationships, creativity, and finding your life purpose as an INFJ. If this sounds like something you need right now, be sure to sign up for my newsletter HERE to get all the updates.
I’ve gotten a lot of requests from people to teach a class like this for a long time, so I’m pretty excited to dive into this topic. So many INFJs needlessly suffer because they don’t fully understand how they work as a personality, or how they fit into the world. I’m creating this new class to help specifically with those very issues, so I think it will be a turning point for a lot of people.
If you have any questions at all, please send them to me here. And stay tuned for the next video in this series on “How to Unblock Your INFJ Intuition.”
Lauren Sapala is the author of The INFJ Writer and The INFJ Revolution. You can get a free copy of her book on creative marketing for writers by signing up for her newsletter HERE.
A few years ago, I was contacted by a woman who desperately wanted to write down the story of her mother’s life. She wasn’t sure if the book should be in novel form, or more like a memoir, but she knew that she wanted to bring it into being. At the time she contacted me, though, she was suffering from severe writer’s block. She had tried everything, she told me, and nothing worked. She just couldn’t get herself to write the story.
When she signed on for coaching with me, she told me she wanted to share what she had already completed on the project and asked if she could send those materials over to me. I agreed and then checked my email shortly afterward and was astounded at what she sent. Continue Reading
