Your personality is like an inner stage where the eight “characters” of the functions interact.
Jungian Analyst John Beebe created an 8 function model that assigns archetypes to each of these eight functions.
Understanding the underlying archetype of the cognitive functions in your personality type will make it easier to improve your relationship with your self and with others.
The first four functions constitute a person’s conscious psychology, per Carl Jung. Even if some of the mental processes are still unconscious, they have the potential to become conscious over time.
Functions 5-8 are the shadow functions and are the same functions as the first four, but the opposite attitude, and are mostly unconscious. These functions carry the repressed aspects of the first four functions.
Jung believed that both attitudes were implicit in each function because a function works in a cycle, starting from and returning to the preferred attitude. So the 8 function model is consistent with what Jung taught.
Here is an infographic I made of how Beebe describes the eight archetypes. Note how the shadow functions also have positive qualities:
