Advocate Personality

I received one of those online personality tests you take on the internet that was sent by a friend. It was a welcome intellectual activity otherwise it's either my pile of unfolded clothing or the seemingly unappealing shows on the tele.

So I took the test and it said my personality type falls under the Diplomats--Advocate.

A.  INTRODUCTION

"Treat people as if they were what they ought to be and you help them to become what they are capable of being." Johann Wolfgang Van Goethe

The Advocate personality type is very rare, making up less than one percent of the population, but they nonetheless leave their mark on the world. Advocates have an inborn sense of idealism and morality, but what sets them apart is that they are not idle dreamers. These individuals are capable of taking concrete steps to realize their goals and make a lasting positive impact.

People with this personality type tend to see helping others as their purpose in life. Advocates can often be found engaging in rescue efforts and doing charity work. However, their real passion is to get to the heart of the issue so that people need not be rescued at all.

Help Me Help You

Advocates indeed share a unique combination of traits. Though soft-spoken, they have very strong opinions and will fight tirelessly for an idea they believe in. They are decisive and strong-willed, but will rarely use that energy for personal gain.

Advocates will act with creativity, imagination, conviction, and sensitivity not to create an advantage, but to create balance. Egalitarianism and karma are very attractive ideas to Advocate personalities. These types tend to believe that nothing would help the world so much as using love and compassion to soften the hearts of tyrants.

Nothing lights up Advocates like creating a solution
that changes people’s lives.

Advocates find it easy to make connections with others. They have a talent for warm, sensitive language, speaking in human terms, rather than with pure logic and fact.

It makes sense that their friends and colleagues will come to think of them as quiet Extraverted personality types. However, they would all do well to remember that Advocates need time alone to decompress and recharge, and not to become too alarmed when they suddenly withdraw. Advocates take great care of others’ feelings, and they expect the favor to be returned – sometimes that means giving them the space they need for a few days.


 
Live to Fight Another Day

Really, though, it is most important for people with the Advocate personality type to remember to take care of themselves. The passion of their convictions is perfectly capable of carrying them past their breaking point. If their zeal gets out of hand, they can find themselves exhausted, unhealthy, and stressed.

This becomes especially apparent when Advocates find themselves up against conflict and criticism. Their sensitivity forces these personalities to do everything they can to evade these seemingly personal attacks. When the circumstances are unavoidable, however, they can fight back in highly irrational, unhelpful ways.

To Advocates, the world is a place full of inequity – but it doesn’t have to be. No other personality type is better suited to create a movement to right a wrong, no matter how big or small. Advocates just need to remember that while they’re busy taking care of the world, they need to take care of themselves, too.

B.  STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES

Advocate Strengths

• Creative – Combining a vivid imagination with a strong sense of compassion, Advocates use their creativity to resolve not technical challenges, but human ones. People with the Advocate personality type enjoy finding the perfect solution for someone they care about. This strength makes them excellent counselors and advisors.
• Insightful – Seeing through dishonesty and disingenuous motives, Advocates step past manipulation and sales tactics and into a more honest discussion. Advocate personalities see how people and events are connected. They are then able to use that insight to get to the heart of the matter.
• Inspiring and Convincing – Speaking in human terms, not technical, Advocates have a fluid, inspirational writing style that appeals to the inner idealist in their audience. Advocates can even be astonishingly good orators, speaking with warmth and passion. This is especially true if they are proud of what they are speaking for.
• Decisive – Advocates’ creativity, insight, and inspiration are able to have a real impact on the world. This is because they are able to follow through on their ideas with conviction, willpower, and the planning necessary to see complex projects through to the end. People with the Advocate personality type don’t just see the way things ought to be; they act on those insights.
• Determined and Passionate – When Advocates come to believe that something is important, they pursue that goal with a conviction and energy that can catch others off-guard. Advocates will rock the boat if they must. Not everyone likes to see this, but their passion for their chosen cause is an inseparable part of the Advocate personality.
• Altruistic – These strengths are used for good. Advocates will not engage in any actions or promote beliefs just to benefit themselves. They have strong beliefs and take the actions that they do because they are trying to advance an idea that they truly believe will make the world a better place.

Advocate Weaknesses

•  Sensitive – When someone challenges or criticizes Advocates’ principles or values, they are likely to receive an alarmingly strong response. People with the Advocate personality type are highly vulnerable to criticism and conflict. Questioning their motives is the quickest way to their bad side.
• Extremely Private – Advocates tend to present themselves as the culmination of an idea. This is partly because they believe in this idea, but also because Advocates are extremely private when it comes to their personal lives. They use this image to keep themselves from having to truly open up, even to close friends. Trusting a new friend can be even more challenging for Advocates.
• Perfectionistic – Advocate personalities are all but defined by their pursuit of ideals. While this is a wonderful quality in many ways, an ideal situation is not always possible – in politics, in business, in romance. Advocates, especially Turbulent ones, too often drop or ignore healthy and productive situations and relationships, always believing there might be a better option down the road.
• Always Need to Have a Cause – Advocate personalities get so caught up in their pursuits that any of the cumbersome tasks that come between them and their ideal vision is deeply unwelcome. Advocates like to know that they are taking concrete steps toward their goals. If routine tasks feel like they are getting in the way – or worse yet, there is no goal at all – they will feel restless and disappointed.
• Can Burn Out Easily – Their passion, impatience for routine maintenance, idealism, and extreme privacy tend to leave Advocates with few options for letting off steam. People with this personality type are likely to exhaust themselves in short order if they don’t find a way to balance their ideals with the realities of day-to-day living. 

C.  TWO TYPES OF THE ADVOCATE PERSONALITY

1. Assertive Advocate (INFJ-A)
2. Turbulent Advocate (INFJ-T)

While Assertive (INFJ-A) and Turbulent (INFJ-T) Advocates are likely to be more alike than different, their identity personality trait provides some nuanced dissimilarities between the two. It impacts the way each thinks, acts, and responds to their worlds to a significant extent.

Assertive Advocates are more likely to be confident and relaxed. Turbulent Advocates are likely to question themselves more and are ordinarily more sensitive to stressors.

Summary Differences

• Both personality types are concerned with other people, but Assertive Advocates are likely to be more hopeful, and Turbulent Advocates to focus on the difficult parts of a problem.
• Turbulent Advocates are often fueled by their worries and concerns, and these can be used to make significant progress.
• Both Assertive and Turbulent Advocates can get caught up in the drama of life, but those who are Turbulent are likely to be affected by it more.
• Stress and regret affect the Assertive Advocate individuals less, but this should not be confused with their not caring.
• Because their regrets weigh on them more, Turbulent Advocates are more likely to learn from their mistakes than Assertive Advocates.
• Assertive Advocates are less influenced by the opinions of others than Turbulent Advocates. However, paying too little or too much attention to the opinions of others carries its own difficulties.
• Assertive Advocates are more likely to want people in their lives, while Turbulent Advocates may feel they need people in their lives.

The same but different – that’s what we discover when we explore Assertive and Turbulent Identities in a single personality type. For Advocates, this means they share the same passion, the same concern for others, the same sense of order, and the same level of conviction about right and wrong.
However, it also means each personality type has a somewhat different perspective regarding the metaphorical glass. Is it half-full or half-empty? To what degree do they respond to other people and events, and to what degree do they move forward despite them? It’s all part of the journey of self-exploration.

CONCLUSION

“In the end, it’s your actions, how you respond to circumstance, that reveals your character.” Cate Blanchett 

Few personality types are as passionate and mysterious as Advocates. As someone with this personality type, your imagination and empathy make you someone who cherishes their integrity and deeply held principles. Unlike many other idealistic types, however, you are also capable of turning those ideals into plans and executing them.

Yet Advocates can be easily tripped up in areas where their idealism and determination are more of a liability than an asset. There are many areas in life where you may face challenges that, at times, can even make you question who you really are. Anything from navigating interpersonal conflicts, confronting unpleasant facts, pursuing self-realization, or finding a career path that aligns well with your inner core can cause internal frustration.