In many circles the INTP male/INFJ female match is referred to as The Golden Pair, the single most compatible and passionate relationship match that could occur when considering relationships from an MBTI perspective. There’s over 230 match combinations. If you throw in gender there is even more. You could rank all these matches worst to best…at the bottom of the list you’ll have XXXPs matched with XXXPs of similar type. As you get closer to the top you’ll see XXXJs matched with XXXPs. In the top 40 or so you’ll start finding XNXPs/XNXJ mates and XXTPs/EXTJs. But at the very very top is The Golden Pair… an INTP male with an INFJ female.

I think any INFJ or INTP who has been in a mature relationship with the other will agree it’s a great pairing. We make up for each other’s weaknesses in ways that are smooth and inspiring. We encourage each other’s strengths in ways that are fun and engaging. These are not the easiest relationships to get off the ground, hence the emphasis on maturity and experience. But seasoned INFJs and INTPs (or ENTPs) will have a blast together.

I dated a fe INFJs. Jennifer, my last INFJ partner moved once she got a job in the bay area.  It was a short lived relationship, roughly 6 months. Her and I are still good friends and I’m very fond of her. I’ve been in a longer relationship with another INFJ, and that one in particular, is still my favorite relationship I’ve ever had, by a good margin. Two of my closest friends are INFJs and the friendships have very similar dynamics to the romances. Just like I constantly crush on INFJs (and NJs in general), INFJs often find themselves crushing on INTPs (and NPs in general). It’s a natural attraction.

For those people who only know MBTI as the four letters, I’m going to get my hands a little more dirty in this post and talk about functions. We all have 8 but we have 4 primary functions that drive most of our behavior so I’ll focus on those. Think of these functions as weapons we use to conquer our day to day. We learn our primary function early and are pretty proficient with it by the end of childhood.  We pick up the second one as children and start honing that. Late teens our tertiary function starts getting some air time and we learn our way around our inferior function in our 20s (hopefully). If we are lucky, by the time we are 30, we at least know how to swing our fourth function and hit something. Sadly, some people never get use to their third and fourth functions and this causes problems. We don’t always get to pick what function we use in a situation. It’s just put in our hands and then we are shoved into battle.  If you are a 35 year old INFJ with some shitty extroverted sensing (Se), you’re probably doomed to relationship drama for the rest of your life. Seriously, growth and development are about those later functions and it’s one of the primary reasons INFJ and INTP do so well together.

Our functional stacks are very complimentary. If one person is psychic about things and people (INFJ Introverted Intuition or Ni) and the other is psychic about systems (INTP Extroverted Intuition or Ne), basically, together we are psychic about…like EVERYTHING. Our Intuition functions play very well together because of this. Attraction occurs often with NJs and NPs because of the Ni-Ne interaction. It’s like two people illuminating two sides of the same object. INFJs and INTPs in particular, are really into people and their authenticity so we tend to appreciate this wholeness more than other types (this is a consequence of shared Fe).

We both share extraverted feeling (Fe) but INFJ is much more adept at it then INTP. INTP’s Fe is childlike since we picked it up last. This means these relationships get super playful when INTP opens up their Fe. They are also super deep because the opposite is happening with Introverted Thinking (Ti) . Expect conversations to happen on your couch or in your bed that are worthy of being dictated into a book.

As long as our weaknesses are kept in check things are pretty dope.

For INFJ:

Se can cause a lot of problems in less developed INFJ’s. Their perfectionism and idealism can blind them to what’s good for them or cause them to focus on the ideals of a situation that is very obviously bad for them. An INFJ who hasn’t learned to shift their ideals with new philosophies and information can have a pretty shitty time

Underdeveloped INFJ: I grew up thinking I should date a 6ft tall doctor with 6 pack abs – so I’m going to stay in this shitty relationship with a 6ft tall doctor with 6 pack abs. It’s my ideal!

Ideals will always drive an INFJ. It’s who they are and it makes a lot of things about them great (especially for an aloof INTP). But like is true for fire, you can cook with it or you can burn your house down. INTP’s are great at keeping these ideals from blinding the INFJ. We introduce new info in a way that makes shifting these ideals fulfilling . This is because our strong Ti bolsters INFJ’s milder Ti, but unlike with other matches, the way it happens is engaging. Why? Because an Ti-Ne and Ni-Ti interaction is like a mad tea party with Yoda, Rumi, Einstein and Mozart, except it’s not tea in the cups it’s fucking whiskey. Hell yes. INFJs now using fire to make herself a juicy ribeye…medium rare…not to burn down the new satin curtains in the living room.

For INTP:

Fe can cause a lot of problems for underdeveloped INTP’s. We’re fucking retarded when our Fe comes to the front of our decision making. I mean seriously, we are RETARDED. Or we’re just retarded in general with not using Fe at all.

“wait what? I shouldn’t have told that guy his ideas were dumb and would never work?”…. “But it’s the truth. I just saved him a bunch of time! He can go work on something useful now. He should be thanking me! Why does the world think I’m an asshole?!?”

Again, enter Yoda, Rumi, and this time Starlord for an engaging tea party…this time with tequila. Here, INFJ’s excellent Fe helps develop our own and it happens in a way that makes sense for us. It happens in a way that makes us feel good. It happens in a way that makes us excited to go try out our new Fe skills.

“Hi guy with dumb ideas. You want to develop a machine that does what? wow, that’s super cool. You are so creative. You should write a science FICTION novel about that. I bet it would be super exciting!! I would read it!”

*INTP walks away feeling awesome…“Hell yes. I Fe’d the shit outta that.”

This mutual weakness bolstering works because personal growth is one of the biggest values for an INFJ and an INTP. The bolstering creates a feed-forward cycle and it’s irresistible to not feel giddy about it once it does get rolling.

INFJ’s love learning from people and growing their intuitive and intellectual arsenal, but they particularly like sharing this experience with others and they get very happy when they get to display what they’ve learned to someone(Ni-Ti promotes the learning and Fe-Se promotes the sharing). INTP’s are perfect matches for this. We love to teach and we love to learn by watching other people, not by being taught by other people. So when an INFJ is hanging on our every word about something we are excited about or after asking us something about whatever they’re trying to master… it’s awesome. When INFJ comes up to us and is like “dude, I just learned the shit out of this. check it out!” We actually WANT to check it out and it’s fun. We also love to learn and grow. INTP are curious as fuck and probably get fulfillment from learning for different reasons but as a pair this deep need gets met for both partners. INTPs are less likely to want to share this experience with others but it’s impossible not to fall into the fold with an INFJ because of those awesome tea parties. The learning and growth I went through when I dated my ex-INFJ was one of the best experiences I’ve had. I remember when we were breaking up we were sitting on a ledge of one of the buildings we worked at on campus.

“This is going to be so hard. I learn so much from you..about everything.”
“You think this isn’t true for me? You are my favorite teacher and my favorite lover in a single person. I’m just as scared as you.”

The thing we were mourning the most was losing our teacher.

Besides the mutual mentorship, we connect on a lot of other things. We communicate in the same language of abstract philosophies and hardline logic. Our Fe’s (once INTP’s get comfortable with theirs) interact playfully, like children. Totally in the moment and giddy and feel-good. INTP’s mischievousness and quirks are exciting to the INFJ. INFJ’s support and encouragement completely fill a gap that’s in desperate need of filling for INTP’s.

On sex: it was the first time I’d understood the hooplah about emotional connections and sex. I mean it made sense in theory but now I really understand. The experience is in another post.

The J and P balance each other. INFJ gets the adventure she always fantasizes about but is too anxious or guilt-ridden or responsible to initiate. INTP will drag her into his adventures, at first maybe reluctantly, but eventually she’ll be laughing her ass off and as time goes on she’ll realize how much she likes the leadership from the INTP in this regard. She NEEDS the push.

INTPs will get held accountable for NOT initiating or working on his fantasies. The INFJ perfectionism gets transferred. INFJs are super hard on themselves, wanting to reach their best potential, in their work, in their development, in their parenting, in EVERYTHING. Ok, So maybe INTP can’t be 6 foot tall but he can have 6 pack abs and INFJ will push him the same way she pushes herself. INTPs NEED this.

If there is an initial attraction, and the INFJ’s Se doesn’t write off the INTP due to some silly ideal and the INTP’s Fe doesn’t make him come off as a complete and utter douchebag…expect sparks. These attractions are hard to shake once they get off the ground. And if they get off the ground and both partners are committed to nurturing the relationship expect fireworks.

A pretty accurate representation I found on the internet: