Keirsey

All Idealists (NFs) share the following core characteristics:

Idealists are enthusiastic, they trust their intuition, yearn for romance, seek their true self, prize meaningful relationships, and dream of attaining wisdom.
Idealists pride themselves on being loving, kindhearted, and authentic.
Idealists tend to be giving, trusting, spiritual, and they are focused on personal journeys and human potentials.
Idealists make intense mates, nurturing parents, and inspirational leaders.
Idealists, as a temperament, are passionately concerned with personal growth and development. Idealists strive to discover who they are and how they can become their best possible self -- always this quest for self-knowledge and self-improvement drives their imagination. And they want to help others make the journey. Idealists are naturally drawn to working with people, and whether in education or counseling, in social services or personnel work, in journalism or the ministry, they are gifted at helping others find their way in life, often inspiring them to grow as individuals and to fulfill their potentials.
Idealists are sure that friendly cooperation is the best way for people to achieve their goals. Conflict and confrontation upset them because they seem to put up angry barriers between people. Idealists dream of creating harmonious, even caring personal relations, and they have a unique talent for helping people get along with each other and work together for the good of all. Such interpersonal harmony might be a romantic ideal, but then Idealists are incurable romantics who prefer to focus on what might be, rather than what is. The real, practical world is only a starting place for Idealists; they believe that life is filled with possibilities waiting to be realized, rich with meanings calling out to be understood. This idea of a mystical or spiritual dimension to life, the "not visible" or the "not yet" that can only be known through intuition or by a leap of faith, is far more important to Idealists than the world of material things.

Highly ethical in their actions, Idealists hold themselves to a strict standard of personal integrity. They must be true to themselves and to others, and they can be quite hard on themselves when they are dishonest, or when they are false or insincere. More often, however, Idealists are the very soul of kindness. Particularly in their personal relationships, Idealists are without question filled with love and good will. They believe in giving of themselves to help others; they cherish a few warm, sensitive friendships; they strive for a special rapport with their children; and in marriage they wish to find a "soulmate," someone with whom they can bond emotionally and spiritually, sharing their deepest feelings and their complex inner worlds.

Idealists are relatively rare, making up no more than 15 to 20 percent of the population. But their ability to inspire people with their enthusiasm and their idealism has given them influence far beyond their numbers.

Princess Diana, Joan Baez, Albert Schweitzer, Bill Moyers, Eleanor Roosevelt, Mohandas Gandhi, Mikhael Gorbachev, and Oprah Winfrey are examples of Idealists.

A full description of the Idealist is in People Patterns or Please Understand Me II

Idealist Portrait of the Champion (ENFP)
Like the other Idealists, Champions are rather rare, say two or three percent of the population, but even more than the others they consider intense emotional experiences as being vital to a full life. Champions have a wide range and variety of emotions, and a great passion for novelty. They see life as an exciting drama, pregnant with possibilities for both good and evil, and they want to experience all the meaningful events and fascinating people in the world. The most outgoing of the Idealists, Champions often can't wait to tell others of their extraordinary experiences. Champions can be tireless in talking with others, like fountains that bubble and splash, spilling over their own words to get it all out. And usually this is not simple storytelling; Champions often speak (or write) in the hope of revealing some truth about human experience, or of motivating others with their powerful convictions. Their strong drive to speak out on issues and events, along with their boundless enthusiasm and natural talent with language, makes them the most vivacious and inspiring of all the types.

Fiercely individualistic, Champions strive toward a kind of personal authenticity, and this intention always to be themselves is usually quite attractive to others. At the same time, Champions have outstanding intuitive powers and can tell what is going on inside of others, reading hidden emotions and giving special significance to words or actions. In fact, Champions are constantly scanning the social environment, and no intriguing character or silent motive is likely to escape their attention. Far more than the other Idealists, Champions are keen and probing observers of the people around them, and are capable of intense concentration on another individual. Their attention is rarely passive or casual. On the contrary, Champions tend to be extra sensitive and alert, always ready for emergencies, always on the lookout for what's possible.

Champions are good with people and usually have a wide range of personal relationships. They are warm and full of energy with their friends. They are likable and at ease with colleagues, and handle their employees or students with great skill. They are good in public and on the telephone, and are so spontaneous and dramatic that others love to be in their company. Champions are positive, exuberant people, and often their confidence in the goodness of life and of human nature makes good things happen.

Joan Baez, Phil Donahue, Paul Robeson, Bill Moyer, Elizibeth Cady Stanton, Joeseph Campbell, Edith Wharton, Sargent Shriver, Charles Dickens, and Upton Sinclair are examples of Idealist Champions

Full descriptions of the Champion and the Idealists are in People Patterns and Please

Movie Preview: Revolutionary Road

It's 3 a.m. on a crowd-clogged New York City street and 
 Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet have spent the past few hours trying to fall in love. So far, they've come up just short of true romance. The point of diminishing returns is drawing dangerously close on the set of Revolutionary Road, where the Titanic stars are struggling with an important party scene in which they must meet, connect, and set themselves up for a life of misery together.

In an effort to stoke passions, director Sam Mendes (Jarhead), Winslet's real-life husband, has been cranking up the volume on a Dean Martin ballad each time they launch into the scene. After 13 takes, with patience running on fumes, someone cues up the music again — only this time a practical joker has replaced Dino with Celine Dion's ''My Heart Will Go On,'' the syrupy but strangely stirring anthem from Titanic. Suddenly, it's as if someone pressed the pause button. Everyone freezes for a good five seconds. And then, without saying a word, DiCaprio wraps Winslet in his arms, she spreads hers, and they re-create the iconic hood-ornament image that was wallpapered all over the planet 11 years ago. The 300 or so extras and onlookers explode into applause, juicing the stars enough to nail the scene on the next take.

Titanic fans will have to take their kicks where they can get them. Because anyone looking for a happily-ever-after reunion won't exactly find it in Revolutionary Road. This romantic moment is a rare pit stop in the dark journey the actors take as Frank and April Wheeler, two former free spirits who marry, have kids, move to the burbs, and find themselves fighting, bed-hopping, and living on autopilot until they embark on a misbegotten plan to cure their malaise by moving to Paris. The cautionary tale, based on Richard Yates' celebrated 1961 novel, is full of big ideas that question the viability of the American dream. It's also a tough commercial sell that's going to require a mighty blast of Oscar heat to succeed, especially at a time when audiences are increasingly looking to escape their troubles at the multiplex, not be thrust into someone else's. ''This is a much more detailed, sophisticated love story than Titanic,'' says Mendes. ''It's about two people who land in their 30s and think, 'This isn't what I wanted at all. How did I get here?'''

Winslet, 32, had been hungry to explore different sides of her relationship with DiCaprio, with whom she has remained phone-call-in-the-middle-of-the-night close since Titanic. ''We knew that if we were going to do something again, it had to be something big and emotional,'' says the actress, who fell in love with Yates' book years ago and became the project's driving force. ''Revolutionary Road is so painful and beautiful to read, simply because of the brutality of the honesty that Frank and April end up experiencing together.'' For all the couple endures — epic Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?-like brawls, bad parenting, DIY abortion — Revolutionary Road is now regarded as an unsung classic of domestic anomie in the tradition of John Updike and Raymond Carver. Since it first appeared, the novel has had many Hollywood suitors, from director John Frankenheimer (who decided to make The Manchurian Candidate instead) to producer Albert S. Ruddy (The Godfather) to actor Patrick O'Neal (Under Siege) — each of whom tried and failed to come up with a viable screenplay that was true to the book but wouldn't leave moviegoers reaching for the cyanide as they left the theater.

What the project needed was a force-of-nature advocate like Winslet. Even so, it took the actress more than two years to coax Mendes and DiCaprio to come aboard. ''When I heard about it, I thought, 'Well, I've done a movie about American suburbia,''' recalls Mendes, who made his directing debut with 1999's Oscar-sweeping American Beauty. He worried he'd be repeating himself — until he started working with screenwriter Justin Haythe (The Clearing) to capture the story's tender and toxic central relationship. To nab DiCaprio, Winslet resorted to subterfuge. In March 2007, while they were both in L.A. to attend the Oscars, she arranged to have a drink with DiCaprio, who had finally plowed through the script Winslet had been badgering him to read. But instead of showing up herself, she sent Mendes alone to discuss his vision for the film...and seal the deal. ''Leo and I have such a history together and I couldn't imagine not being able to apply that to this story and these characters,'' says Winslet. ''So I played this very clever cat-and-mouse game to get my husband and then my best friend involved.''

DiCaprio was interested in venturing into uncharted terrain: playing a husband and a father. But mostly he saw this as a chance 
 to reconnect with an old pal. ''I looked at it almost like doing a play,'' says the actor, 33. ''It was one of those situations where it just focused on these two characters, the degradation of their marriage, and who they think they are. I just thought, Wouldn't it be a wonderful experience to do it with Kate?''

As it turned out, the answer was, Not exactly. Portraying a marriage under siege was an emotional meat grinder that left everybody feeling a little bruised. ''I think Leo was surprised by the intensity of it,'' says Mendes, referring to the character's increasingly remote and disloyal ways. ''But he totally got it and ultimately embraced the part's a--hole qualities quite readily.'' The shoot proved exhausting for both stars. ''By the end Leo had lost 10 pounds and was completely spent,'' Winslet says. ''And I felt completely bled dry.''

But if anyone can turn adversity into ardor, it's these two survivors of Titanic's notoriously grueling nine-month shoot. ''I hadn't realized how much my chemistry with him since Titanic would still stick,'' says Winslet. ''It's great to discover we can just slip right into it, like muscle memory.'' Still, the comfort evaporated for the actress when it came to filming passionate love scenes as her husband watched from behind the camera. ''I just kept saying, 'This is too f---ing weird,''' recalls Winslet. ''And Leo was like, 'Oh, get over it.' And I'm going, 'Yeah, a little reminder: You're my best friend. He's my husband. This is a bit weird.''' But Mendes was surprisingly Zen about the experience. ''I will admit it was quite bizarre to direct my wife in how to make love,'' recalls the director. ''But it's difficult whether you're married to a person or not.''

In fact, Winslet is still reeling from the 
 experience of paving Revolutionary Road with her most intimate relationships, both on camera and off. ''It was almost as though 
 we just had a car crash and our car had rolled five times down a hill,'' she says in one breathless burst, ''and then we walked out completely unscathed going, 'Wow, f--- me, we're alive!'''

Why Guys Dump Girls They Dig

The Timing Is Off
Chances are, you've had at least one breakup that left you wondering, "What just happened?" The guy dug you, you dug him, and the whole thing felt destined for a fabulous future -- at least the foreseeable one. Then, out of nowhere, he bailed on the relationship. So what went wrong? The sad dating truth is, maybe nothing. Here are five completely ridiculous reasons guys kick you to the curb. Warning: For the most part, it ain't pretty.Single women get serious when they meet the right man. Single men get serious with whomever we happen to be dating when we're finally ready to settle down. That means after every other aspect of our life is in order -- whether it's finishing grad school, finally pulling down a good-size paycheck, owning a car outright -- or when our friends start dropping like flies (that's guyspeak for getting married).

But if you catch a guy before he hits that magical stage of his life, then he's liable to bolt -- like Patrick, 28, who dumped Bridgett after two years, then got engaged to the next girl he dated after only 10 months. "When I was with Bridgett, all of my friends were single and I was still an intern with nothing going on in my career. So every time she'd bring up our future together, it felt like she was jumping the gun," he says. "I didn't break up with her because she was wrong for me. I ended it because I didn't want to commit to anyone right then. But by the time I met Elizabeth, I was in a settling-down frame of mind."

We're Not Finished Playing the Field

Single men are natural-born one-uppers. If there's a possibility of upgrading what we already have for something better (that'll make our friends drool), we say, bring it on! So we wind up always wondering if you're really as good as it gets. (I know, scumbag mentality.) "Whenever I meet a new attractive woman, I consider what it would be like to date her, even if I have a girlfriend at the time," says Andy, 30. "The grass is always greener. No matter how great his current girl is, a guy doesn't want to feel like he's missing out."

In addition to our opportunistic tendencies, most guys feel compelled to put as many relationship conquests under their belts as possible. "I admit it -- I know the exact number of girls I've dated, no mental calculation required," says Dan, 29. "That's how aware I am of how many notches I have. And I'd never commit until I felt like I'd experienced enough different women." Every guy's definition of enough is different, so there's a chance he wrote you off just because you didn't come late enough on his own personal hit list. The moral of the story: Until we grow up, mark everything off our checklists or have too many friends convince us that we can't do better than you, the flight risk is real.

We're Fixated on the Worst-Case Scenario

From the times you chastise us for leaving a wet towel on the bed to those nights you rip through a pint of fudge ripple without stopping to breathe, we file each incident in a mental folder labeled "Evidence She'll Change for the Worse." We flip through that file whenever we're trying to decide if we want to hang on to the relationship. Blame our married friends who took the plunge before us, but many single men are hyperaware of what could go wrong down the road. Even if we're crazy
flag certain things that might be a harbinger of bad things to come. "I've seen it happen to too many of my friends," says Elliot, 29. "All they do is complain about how the romance takes a total nosedive after they get serious with a girl. So sometimes, even if the woman I'm dating is gorgeous, I freak out and bail."

We're in Like, Not in Love

It's harsh but true. In fact, it's probably the most common reason we bolt. Just because a guy likes you a lot isn't a guarantee that it will evolve into love. And we're surprisingly intuitive when it comes to figuring out a girl's potential on this front. "I stayed with one woman for two years because we had fun together and she never pushed the issue, but I knew the minute I met her that she wasn't The One," says David, 30.

So why do we invest any time in a relationship that we know will ultimately end? Because we're able to live in the moment for a while and chalk it up to a good experience. But once you show that you're way more into us than we are into you, we'll dump you out of guilt. "I dated this girl for about a year, but as soon as she started using the L word, I had to end it," recalls Jay, 29. "It was hard. I cared about her and didn't want to hurt her. But I knew that if I stuck around, she'd have been happier at first but miserable later on. After all, she deserved to be with someone who loved her as much as she loved me."

We're Too into You

Just when you thought it was all bad news, here's a hard-to-fess-up admission: Guys are protective of their emotions. Translation: We're scared of being hurt. So, if we start to feel like we're getting into a situation where we'll be destroyed if you dump us, we might launch a preemptive strike and yank the plug first. For Gary, 27, showing his girlfriend of two years the exit felt like the only choice. "She was the first girl I was serious with, and I didn't like letting someone have that much power over me. I was starting to feel emotionally needy, and that was uncomfortable for me," he recalls. "So I ditched her to save myself!"

Sounds crazy, but cut us some slack. Think about how vulnerable and paranoid you feel when you're nuts about a guy, and realize that we go through the same thing with girls we really like. But our friends aren't as good at helping us get over an ex as yours are, plus being openly heartbroken makes us look like wusses. Nope, it's better to act like a winner before you turn us into a loser, which is when our natural self-preservation may come into play. Before the real humiliation and pain assail us like a plague, ending the relationship seems like a good option.

Are You About to Be Jilted?
His cell phone is always off. He might be spending time with someone he doesn't want you to know about... or he just doesn't want to make himself available.
He's reluctant to make plans. If he hems and haws about committing to anything -- even if it's in the semi-near future -- he's thinking about making a break for it.
He's meaner. The passive-aggressive breakup is a guy standby. Some men intentionally turn into whiners to make sure you break up with them.
He's distant. He doesn't want to feel connected to you -- or he's getting his needs filled somewhere else.