"Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." Paul to the persecuted at Philippi (2:5-11)

13 July 2011

On Meyers-Briggs and Marriage

Young idealistic couples planning to get married, listen up. Sit down together and take the Meyers-Briggs and find out which one of you is a J (Judging) and which is a P (Perceiving). And if you're both J's, more power to you. But if you both happen to be P's, draw straws or vote or play Rock, Paper, Scissors and decide which one of you is going to be the J in the household. Somebody needs to be a grownup.

J's for those of you who don't know the MBTI language, are those bizarre people who keep their desks clean, finish what they start, show up on time for things and can work with a plan. P's are the rest of us. The aimless mental wanderers of the world. One of my friends is noted for saying "J's get more done, P's have more fun."

My household is what it looks like when two P's have children. Dinner time is a prime example. It is currently 5:30 PM and all the good little J mommies are making dinner for their happy little families. If I'm in the kitchen at 5:30,I'm as likely to be making play-dough as dinner... with every pot and pan and dish out and dirty, because it seemed like a good idea at the moment. Dinner gets made when someone gets hungry and makes it. Sometimes that's not until 8:00 or so, when we realize its an hour until theoretical bedtime and we ought to feed our kids. Bedtime doesn't usually happen at bedtime either, because that's when we realize they haven't done their music practices and so bedtime comes after that.

Sometimes dinner simply consists of me asking when my husband walks in the door: "What did you bring me?" And if that's groceries or pre-prepared, I'm cool with that.

My husband, theoretically, is the short-straw, the elected J of the family. He pays the bills and does the requisite griping about how I leave everything scattered about on "every flat surface in the house." Not true, the ceilings are perfectly clear. But his J-fu is not nearly as strong as my P-fu. I overcome his attempts to organize.

Not sure if this all has any point... P's don't need a point. But it was what I was thinking about at 5:30 with the kitchen torn up, non-dinner food in the oven, the husband coming in the door with a grocery bag of something, and an evening playdate in a hour. Maybe we'll eat something. Or maybe dinner IS banana bread.

Who cares, I drew the long straw.

3 comments:

  1. "all the good little J mommies are making dinner for their happy little families."

    - shut up!.... What? *shuffles thawing meat and other spaghetti makings behind her back*

    If it's worth anything, I didn't intuit what I was going to make until approximately 40 minutes ago....that counts for something right?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hey, my ceilings are perfectly clear, too!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I'm the P in our marriage, and my wife is the J. Unfortunately, it's been fun for me, and frustration for her, since my ways have tended to dominate.

    ReplyDelete