Half a sentence, and it gets through. Someone who sees people by the same ethics. But each yields, then regrets it.
ISFJ × ISFJ is the Identity relation, one of the sixteen. Half a sentence, and it gets through.
Written as ISFJ × ISFJ it is the same pair. In 16Personalities terms, the Defender and the Defender.
Interesting and pleasant at first. They seem reserved, cold and distant, but one's warmth melts the ice. There is a feeling that the other reads your thoughts.
In terms of the mechanism, the "ethics that reads distance between people" in ISFJ's first position and the "force that pushes and takes" in the second sit in exactly the same positions in the other. The view you are best at, the other is best at too. So no explanation is needed, and so no new perspective comes from the other either. The strong places overlap, and do not double.
In the old observations, in identity the same elements of both act in the same positions, and a complete, painless repulsion arises. Since no words are needed, there is also nothing the other can hand you. For these two, future possibilities and practical logic are absent on both sides.
The observation says both yield on principle, regret the yielding, and harden to recover what they lost.
Where identity is most useful is in learning. If a senior of the same type has walked the same road ahead of you, their experience can be used as it is. The observations too say repeatedly that it lasts long as mentor and pupil or with a difference in age. Only when two equal ISFJs do the same thing in the same place does the repulsion described above arise.
The more you yield, the more you regret; the more you regret, the harder you become.
Living in the same house as equals is very difficult. Each imposes their own tastes, habits and standards as objectively rational. Yield, regret, recover, direct confrontation. Finally one becomes openly authoritarian and the other refuses to submit.
The empty places are the same too. The "practical logic" ISFJ wants most is what the other wants most, and neither has it. The "intuition that calculates ahead", which each produces with a little effort, takes a little effort from both. What flows in silently between duals never flowed between these two in the first place.
The same anxiety about the future creates a spiral of anxiety.
Retreating to a safe distance, they keep the distance as respect and consideration for each other. Reunions are left to chance. Easy joy brings the two closer; unexpected hardship pulls them apart.
They read your thoughts.
They see people by the same ethics.
The warmth gets through.
They impose their own standards as rational.
After yielding, they harden.
When hardship comes, they drift away.
Two colleagues felt they complemented each other and grew close; on the day both lost their jobs they recognised each other as rivals, were ashamed of the impulse, and contact lapsed. Each one's ethics forbade worrying the other, the record says.
Yielding on principle, regretting the yielding, hardening to recover it, and finally one becoming authoritarian, the observation says.
Retreating to a safe distance, reunions left to chance, joy bringing them closer and hardship pulling them apart, the record says.
PROne thing for this relation
A relation that gets through from half a sentence, so experiences needing no explanation.
This pair is the identity relation, one of the sixteen. How the relation itself arises, and how to tell it from the others, is on the relation page.
ISFJ on the left, ISFJ on the right. Each shows where the eight elements sit; lines connect the same element. Where each line starts and ends decides what happens in this relation.
Lines connect the same element in the other person's structure. 1–2 (strong) 3 (role) 4 (vulnerable) 5–6 (wanted) 7–8 (capable, indifferent)
This page is also available in Japanese: ISFJ と ISFJ の相性. Русская версия: ISFJ × ISFJ.
Pick any two of the 16 types. If you do not know the other person's type, eight questions about their behaviour will get you close.
Pick two types