MBTI Type: INTJ

Darcy runs into trouble, because he trusts his own insights too much. He admits that once someone loses his good opinion, it is lost forever, speaking to his unwillingness to change his mind. Leaping to a conclusion based on Mrs. Bennet’s behavior, Darcy assumes her daughter Jane is only after his best friend for his money and attempts to drive them apart. He fails to read the actual situation (her responses to him) and instead assumes he knows her intentions. Unlike Jane Austen’s ISTJ hero of Colonel Brandon, Darcy does not assume a misbehavior will create a future pattern of bad behavior. He saves his sister’s reputation and fortune, then simply shuns Wickham rather than suspect he will ruin the Bennet family with similar shenanigans. When Caroline Bingley and Lizzie invite him to join them in a turn around the room, he would rather remark on how that ruins the purpose of their walk (so he can sit and admire their fine figures). He and Lizzie banter while dancing over character and expectations. When necessary, Darcy launches into instant and perhaps precipitous action — in a culture of slow courtship, he rashly and boldly asks Lizzie to marry him. He dashes off a letter, informing her of all the many ways she was wrong in her assumptions about him, and setting the record straight. He tracks down Wickham, and forces him to marry Lydia, thereby securing the family’s reputation. Low Se impulses. He also ignores all social conventions, refusing to dance at the ball with strangers or adapt easily to his new surroundings. He seems most at home, when at home. He has a tendency to state his mind and opinions without censure, both in wit (“You can have but two objectives in walking the room, and my presence would invalidate both…”) and assessing other people (his belief that Jane is a fortune-hunter). Darcy is swift to take action in resolving both his sister’s plans to run away and in resolving the Lydia problem. He knows the social fall out this will have on the Bennet family reputations. Darcy underscores his marital proposal by listing the objections to the match. Even though Darcy is in love with Lizzie, he gives no indication of it to her in their early interactions – and so his proposal blindsides her. He complains that his emotions are strong enough to overcome his rationality and the many reasons why it is an imprudent match. His interventions are kindly meant. Darcy refuses to confide in anyone the sordid details of his potential family scandal until Lizzie asserts untruths about him – he is so upset at being misrepresented he must set things right in a letter by relating the facts (Te). Once he realizes how wrong he was, Darcy goes to great lengths to correct his mistakes.

Enneagram: 5w4 sp/sx

Darcy is the embodiment of a detached, observer personality. When invited to dance, he refuses and stands on the sidelines, watching other people. Those in the room consider him rude as a result. He only invites Lizzie to dance at a later event, when he has surveyed everyone present and made himself comfortable. At home at Pemberley, he seems like a wholly different man, because he has let down his guard in familiar surroundings (5s quickly feel drained by outside activity and feel most comfortable at home). He refuses to allow personal feelings to interfere with his advice to Bingley, showing his ability to compartmentalize his emotions. Like many 5s, the ardent force of his own emotions catches him off guard. He implies in his proposal that he has engaged in a fierce inner debate, and “against all reason” now wants her to marry him. Darcy can be elitist, condescending, disinterested in connecting with others, and distrustful of his intense feelings.