Even if this pair shares its introversion or extraversion, and even if both are judging and feeling, the personality differences between the EMPATHIST and LEGALIST temperaments are worth examining.
The sensing-judging partner sees life as a series of duties, commitments, responsibilities, obligations, habits, ``shoulds'' and ``shouldn'ts'', rules, procedures, schedules, facts and figures, hierarchies, rituals, and authority structures.
The intuitive-feeling mate bridles at authority, and even the implication of structure in a relationship is a bit unnerving to the autonomy-loving EMPATHIST. Relationships, feelings, ideas, causes, freedom, sentiments, passion, love: that's what EMPATHISTs are made of!
The EMPATHIST is creative and spontaneous.
The LEGALIST is traditional and organized. The EMPATHIST is spiritual and mystical.
The LEGALIST is practical and sensible. The EMPATHIST isn't, period.
The EMPATHIST thinks in terms of tomorrow and forever. The LEGALIST thinks in terms of history and today.
This is a combination which offers challenges for both parties, but these two may form a powerful team if they learn to work together and if they ever come to understand that they will never see the world through each other's eyes, and they aren't likely ever to remake each other into a carbon copy of the self!
The relative importance of WORK AND RELATIONSHIPS demands examination if the LEGALIST/EMPATHIST relationship is to be understood.
To the sensing-judging type, life and duty are synonymous. Work plays an important part in the picture.
To the intuitive-feeling type, life and relationships are synonymous. Work is certainly important, but the EMPATHIST conceives of work differently: as a gift to humanity, service, communication, art, inspiration: an act of creation to bear witness to the fact that the EMPATHIST once lived.
To the LEGALIST, work is work. You do it right and on time and you get paid for your contribution, and the well-oiled machine of society cranks on.
To the EMPATHIST, work must be meaningful: both personally fulfilling and impactful on others. Punctuality, reliability and steadiness are not basic parts of the EMPATHIST personality, although they do figure more strongly in the habits of the folks who prefer judging.
The LEGALIST sees life as a traditional script of well-defined characters. The LEGALIST believes, earnestly, that people have roles to play in life, and that each must take a part and play the role predictably, dutifully and conscientiously or the play will bomb and society won't function.
To an EMPATHIST, that view is mechanistic and deadly boring.
The EMPATHIST believes that caring and acceptance and flexibility are what's required to make the world run smoothly. EMPATHISTs don't see world crises as anything other than the multiplication of individual relationship problems. EMPATHISTs believe that love and acceptance of others can move mountains.
To a LEGALIST, that view is unsupported fiction, a nice fairy tale, but totally unrealistic. And, the LEGALIST hastens to point out, fairy tales don't make the mortgage payment!
The LEGALIST is an honest, responsible mate, who relates to the partner cooperative. FAIRNESS is an important concept to the LEGALIST mate.
If the LEGALIST is a thinker, logic is paramount in determining what is fair. If the LEGALIST is a feeler, emotions and values figure strongly in that determination. Needless to say, the EMPATHIST and the feeling LEGALIST have an easier time in a partnership than the combination when the LEGALIST is a thinker.
Commitments and obligations are taken seriously by the LEGALIST. Promises are not broken casually or capriciously. The LEGALIST is trustworthy and takes pride in that characteristic. The LEGALIST has a long memory for others' irresponsibility.
The EMPATHIST sees commitment at a more spiritual level. If the EMPATHIST is always twenty minutes late picking up the LEGALIST mate, the EMPATHIST has a hard time understanding the LEGALIST's anger and resentment.
The EMPATHIST sees the LEGALIST as hopelessly stuck in the here-and-now, unwilling to look beyond today's ``Do It'' list (with its little neat boxes for checking off the day's tasks) to the real meaning of life and love.
LEGALISTs tend to parent their EMPATHIST mates, particularly when the LEGALIST is a thinker and the EMPATHIST is a perceptive type. To listen to a conversation, you might think that nursery school is in session. The LEGALIST checks up on every ``assignment'' of the EMPATHIST's day, particularly in the financial and bill-paying realm.
For the LEGALIST, this seems necessary, because the EMPATHIST shows, again and again, that inattention to detail is a basic feature of the EMPATHIST personality, and that thinking is not a comfortable mode of functioning for this mate.
The LEGALIST knows that the EMPATHIST doesn't think that punctuality is terribly critical, in general, and the LEGALIST knows that something as boring and impersonal as bill-paying may just slip the EMPATHIST's attention until a payment is long overdue.
The LEGALIST knows that the EMPATHIST doesn't like to balance the checkbook, even though judging EMPATHISTs are more likely to force themselves to attend to such matters. The LEGALIST knows that the EMPATHIST might overdraw the account not by self-indulgence but by picking up an expensive present for the (frustrated and sometimes inappreciative) LEGALIST mate!
The thinking LEGALIST, particularly, can parent the EMPATHIST into becoming even more irresponsible, even less conscientious, since the LEGALIST isn't usually good at doling out praise and appreciation when the EMPATHIST is dutiful. (``Reward people for just doing what's sensible and right?'' hoots the LEGALIST, incredulously.)
That brings up another serious issue for the EMPATHIST/LEGALIST combination: APPRECIATION.
EMPATHISTs give it lavishly. EMPATHISTs need it desperately. And LEGALISTs just don't congratulate, appreciate, thank or otherwise acknowledge anything other than herculean accomplishment. In the EMPATHIST/LEGALIST relationship, the EMPATHIST is likely to remain needy, hungering for approval and gratitude.
When it comes to spending MONEY, LEGALISTs and EMPATHISTs have both similarities and differences.
LEGALISTs may agree with EMPATHISTs that expenditures for the home are important, and that durable, good-quality pieces should be selected, to be carefully maintained for as long as possible.
But, in general, LEGALISTs favor saving money over spending it, and there are times when the EMPATHIST will regard the LEGALIST as stingy, too conservative, and not at all giving and generous.
The LEGALIST hates to borrow, charge, or rent. The LEGALIST would rather do without. For all their idealism and periodic shunning of material needs, EMPATHISTs do tend to use money (real and potential) impulsively, buying as emotion moves them.
The LEGALIST is a bit of a pessimist, always looking for the worst to happen and conscientiously planning against that dark day. EMPATHISTs are not security-minded, as a rule, and they tend to save little as a nest egg or a rainy-day fund.
Attitudes about EDUCATION may come into conflict between the EMPATHIST and the LEGALIST.
The LEGALIST is quite practical when it comes to learning and training. The LEGALIST seeks an education in order to work, to learn a skill, to master a field of knowledge so it may be applied.
The LEGALIST studies mostly by memorization of facts, and this type is most comfortable in fields which minimize theory, extensive reading, and all but the most straight-forward kind of writing.
LEGALISTs work hard at school, finish, and apply what they've learned to earn a living.
The EMPATHIST, of course, is just the opposite. The EMPATHIST learns to learn, without much attention to whether the learning may ever be applied, whether it may ever earn an income. The EMPATHIST does not enjoy learning by memorization, but excels at theorizing, reading and writing and the more creative the topic the better.
The EMPATHIST sees life as a continuing learning and growth experience, a laboratory in which learning about humanity and learning to exercise interpersonal skills is the name of the game.
A classic interchange between an LEGALIST and an EMPATHIST mate is this:
Note: all of these predictable crises are more likely when the LEGALIST is a thinker and the EMPATHIST is a perceptive.
Follow the links below to learn more about each Mating Type.
Follow these links to learn more about how different Mating Types interact.
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