INFJ 3w4 Characters
Dominant Introverted Intuition—strong and specific personal plans, insights, or predictions that lead them to set their ideas in motion far in advance: To be honest, the film doesn’t do a great job of showing Lawrence’s intuition constantly. It only hints at it in his total confidence he will get to places, and do specific things, even if he has no former experiences with them and no one has ever done them. Lawrence allows no one else to change his mind or dissuade him from what seems like impossible scenarios. He is open-minded in a time when most people weren’t (unconcerned with skin color, race, and creed). As an idealist, being captured, seeing people get killed, and facing the harsh realities of a life in the sand dunes almost breaks him. His philosophical statements cause others to not know what he means, and Lawrence does not try to explain himself. He often enters situations with a very fixed idea of what he wants to accomplish through them.
Auxiliary Extroverted Feeling—ease of emotional expression and shaping their actions around how their decisions affect others: He is emotionally driven, insistent on risking his life going back into the desert in search of one lost man whose camel showed up without him, rather than making the last few miles to the water hole. He believes he will find this man and come back safely, and it’s true (Ni) but he focuses on humanitarian beliefs over strategy. It deeply pains him to see people get killed, or to have to kill them himself. It anguishes him to admit he had to shoot someone, and he “enjoyed it,” because it reveals a darkness to his own nature that he failed to know about, and he finds it repugnant. Many times, Lawrence shows tolerance and understanding for people, insists on the Arabs being treated and served as equals, and even adapts to their lifestyle and way of speaking to fit in with them. They like him because he is a “reasonable” man who empathizes with others, listens to them, and works with them. He need not adopt two young men as his servants, particularly since they quote him “too much money,” but Lawrence has compassion for them and agrees to their terms without negotiation. Losing one of them in a sand pit later tears him apart inside.
Tertiary Introverted Thinking—desires to understand how systems and people work so they can better communicate or figure out how a hack that works: “Why did he have to die?” “Why did you do that?” He asks a lot of questions to understand things and is aware of how his actions and words have consequences. Although upset when his guide gets shot, Lawrence calmly speaks to his murderer, thinks about the situation they are in, and comes up with an argument that will satisfy him, as well as preys on his reputation (using Fe but also Ti). He spends a good amount of time on his own, pondering things, and trying to analyze his own thoughts, beliefs, and behaviors. When two groups are fighting about what to do with a man who deserves death, Lawrence reasons out that he must shoot him, so the two sides will not go to war against one another.
Inferior Extroverted Sensing—impulsive and hedonistic under stress, often miscalculates when they act rashly: Lawrence is impulsive when he decides to do something, and oblivious to the potential risks it involves to himself. He died riding his motorcycle at 110 miles an hour, too fast to stop safely. Then we see him putting out matches with his fingers, and he tells a friend the trick is “not to care that it hurts.” Later, he goes into the desert without water (several times), and crosses immense stretches of barren land. Because of his inability to judge the terrain, one of his servant boys wanders into a sandpit and dies.
Enneagram: 3w4
Enneagram 3—a driven, ambitious person who wants to succeed to the best of their ability: At first, I didn’t see Lawrence as a 3, and saw him as more of a 9w8, but in the second half of the film, his nature as a heart type becomes more obvious, when he goes from utter despondency after his capture and abuse (no longer caring about anything, or moving to 9) to, in the course of a single conversation, being arrogant enough to assume he can do the unachievable with no help. Someone pushes him a little to go back into the desert and finish the job, and after a brief protest, Lawrence is back to his old, confident self, convinced he can do what no other man can, and take cities, arrange peace, and reach the Arabs. He also shows a lot of 3 adaptability in how he dresses like everyone around him, adopts their behaviors, and tries to blend in with them, believing this will let him reach them. He is warm-hearted and adaptable, but can be emotionally distant and even callous, much to his own shock (“I had to shoot someone… and it disturbed me how much I enjoyed it”). Lawrence is good-natured, optimistic, and assertive in how he easily makes demands from powerful people, by believing he is their equal and treating them as such. (I suspect his 3 core is more apparent in his autobiography, where people called him “both humble and insanely arrogant.”) In various situations, he remains emotionally neutral and focuses on problem-solving rather than having an intense emotional reaction, even when a friend gets shot and killed in front of him (he keeps his head, and talks to the man responsible instead of lashing out at him).
4 wing brings in a sense that others lack their refined taste, and a longing for what they cannot achieve: Lawrence shifts back and forth between being competent and detached, and going into moody emotional spaces, full of self-loathing and contempt for his own behaviors and how inadequate they are, even if others admire them. He assumes by default he is different, so the gaze of others is meaningless to him (“So I am different and unusual? So what?”). He often withdraws to brood and shows reactivity by drawing loud attention to what he deems offensive.
