[ENFP] ENFP's in Love with the World

[Waffle]

I love the world. I have nothing but optimism and joy when it comes to the subject of people. Sure, there are bad people in the world, but everyone has the potential to be a great person. Everyone has the choice to do the right thing at some point in their lives, and I always expected them to take it... especially if someone is hurt.


Yesterday I was riding my bike to school, and it's fairly icy everywhere, especially for my part of the country. My bike slipped out from under me, and my phone went flying from my pocket to ten feet away splattering in to pieces. I landed right on to my elbow. As it contacted with cement there was a faint "Craaaaack". I couldn't get up from the ice and pain. I screamed "HELP ME, SOMEONE PLEASE HELP ME. MY ARM IS HURT. HELP, PLEASE."
I know it seems stupid, but I turned slightly and looked a woman who was with her kids in the face. They were twenty minutes early for the elementary school I have to pass every morning. She looked me in my teary face and kept casually walking away. Several more people saw me screaming for 5 minutes and just kept on their merry way, even though I was crying and begging for help. I finally got myself up, and had to walk for another 20 minutes holding my bike and my backpack until I got to school and finally got some help. I was sent home, where I found out what I knew which was that I had a fracture in my elbow. It wasn't so much the injury that distressed me as much as my view on the world had been shaken. I was raised that if you see someone crying and begging for help you either get help or run over and help immediately, and I have been in situations where I have done just that. These people looked me in the face and kept going. I'm scared to leave my house today, in case something else happens and no one is there to help me. An ENFP friend of mine faced discrimination that challenged his normally idealistic view on the world and destroyed him for a day. He was sobbing so much that we had to call his dad to come get him because he wouldn't even lift his head off the table in the Principal's office.



Sorry for the TL;DR but it's a fairly disturbing moment in my life. Have you ENFP's (Or any other personality type for that matter) had an event happen that shook your ideas of the world that surrounds you? Did you find it temporarily debilitating? Do ENFPs in particular have a tendency to overreact or is it called for/ do we have a tendency to be over-idealistic?

 

[Malkavia]

I love the world. A lot. I cant get over people, I love to people watch. But I want to do more than just watch them I want to know them.

It's an incredibly idealistic view, but its how I feel.

On the other hand, from a series of unfortunate events I have very low standards of humanity. I think people are greedy and selfish but that doesnt stop with my obsession with them. So yes, because you have an idealistic view of the world you have to watch out because that idealism can become negativity.

 

[Queen Kat]

I feel indifferent about the world. I see it as a 500 feet large ball of Play Doh. It's been made to deform, but it's pretty hard to do all on your own.

 

[sculpting]

I heard a story much like yours waffle.

One of my best friend's husbands was riding his motorcycle in his neighborhood. It is very hilly. It is also the wealthiest part of town, quite exclusive. He rounded a turn and fell and was drug under the bike for about twenty feet and then just lay there. For about ten minutes cars just drove past him-sometimes they would slow down and look.

Finally a landscaping crew stopped. These guys were mexican immigrants, spoke no english, and were sweaty and tired from working all day and were riding in the back of a truck. They stopped, helped him and washed him off a bit and gave him some water, loaded his bike in their trailer and took him home. He spent a day in the hospital getting the road rash patched up.

I experienced something like this in grad school to a lesser degree. My battery died on my car in rush hour traffic. It was dusk in a very busy area and was dangerous as cars coming from around them bend could not see my car. It was in the very wealthy town of Ann Arbor. Nobody would stop to help, but one women did stop and tell me I should turn my hazards on. Right... Finally a grubby old group of guys in a beaten up work truck stopped to help. The jumped my car and followed me to Sears to make sure the car made it.

 

[Tofu562]

america. gotta love it.

 

[Thalassa]

I love the world. I have nothing but optimism and joy when it comes to the subject of people. Sure, there are bad people in the world, but everyone has the potential to be a great person. Everyone has the choice to do the right thing at some point in their lives, and I always expected them to take it... especially if someone is hurt.


Yesterday I was riding my bike to school, and it's fairly icy everywhere, especially for my part of the country. My bike slipped out from under me, and my phone went flying from my pocket to ten feet away splattering in to pieces. I landed right on to my elbow. As it contacted with cement there was a faint "Craaaaack". I couldn't get up from the ice and pain. I screamed "HELP ME, SOMEONE PLEASE HELP ME. MY ARM IS HURT. HELP, PLEASE."
I know it seems stupid, but I turned slightly and looked a woman who was with her kids in the face. They were twenty minutes early for the elementary school I have to pass every morning. She looked me in my teary face and kept casually walking away. Several more people saw me screaming for 5 minutes and just kept on their merry way, even though I was crying and begging for help. I finally got myself up, and had to walk for another 20 minutes holding my bike and my backpack until I got to school and finally got some help. I was sent home, where I found out what I knew which was that I had a fracture in my elbow. It wasn't so much the injury that distressed me as much as my view on the world had been shaken. I was raised that if you see someone crying and begging for help you either get help or run over and help immediately, and I have been in situations where I have done just that. These people looked me in the face and kept going. I'm scared to leave my house today, in case something else happens and no one is there to help me. An ENFP friend of mine faced discrimination that challenged his normally idealistic view on the world and destroyed him for a day. He was sobbing so much that we had to call his dad to come get him because he wouldn't even lift his head off the table in the Principal's office.



Sorry for the TL;DR but it's a fairly disturbing moment in my life. Have you ENFP's (Or any other personality type for that matter) had an event happen that shook your ideas of the world that surrounds you? Did you find it temporarily debilitating? Do ENFPs in particular have a tendency to overreact or is it called for/ do we have a tendency to be over-idealistic?

I'm sorry that happened to you. There are still good people in the world, unfortunately none of them were around to help you.

I was disillusioned like that about two months after moving to L.A. in my early twenties. It's horrible at first, but ultimately it's good for you. Eventually you'll make peace with it. I think it's an important step in maturity. Sure, sometimes I'd love to go back and see the world as idealistically as I did when I was a teenager, but it's just not that way. I went through some personal hell at first confronting the darkness of it, but now I've come full circle and made some kind of peace with it. It takes time.

 

[the state i am in]

america. gotta love it.

what is it that makes america like this?

we have 2 feet of snow, and businesses still feel the need to be open. i feel like everyone is more obsessed with the pressure to perform, to compete in the job market, to make money, to move on up, that deadlines are too important, that you are already eating in a car twice a week (not me, but other people), that you barely have the time to do what you need to do let alone want to do, that you have to be selfish, miserly, etc.

it's your purpose or someone else's, your success or someone elses', bc someone's gonna be there union-breaking, caving in for a quick reward, accepting that lowly job, etc. it's every man, woman, and child for himself.

it took me a long time to realize the greatest cities are pretty much synonymous with the greatest biggest grandest markets. other than that, it's just home.

 

[nomadic]

I have pretty low expectations.

I thought a guy was really really nice, just because he told me as he was driving by that my left turn blinkers was on. lolz

i've had things returned to me that i lost before though... that was pretty cool. i think that makes me do the same if i find lost stuff.

never been injured lying on the road somewhere though. i would hate to have my life hang in the balance of the whim of a stranger passing by... eek

im pretty sure i would stop and help an elderly person or a little kid though. but yeah, if i saw someone my age in trouble, i would probably just drive by.... unless they were like about to die, then i'd probably call 911 or something

 

[ergophobe]

Waffle - I'm so sorry about what happened. I hope you're feeling better!

Yes, I completely agree. We have this idealistic view of the world, humanity in particular. It's regularly shaken up and somehow we can get up, dust ourselves off and still think that, whatever it was, was an exception to the rule...I don't know if it is but I find myself needing to believe that in order to be.

I think I have selective memory about people too. I remember the times myriad people stopped and offered to help me with my car when the tow tuck was already on its way. A bus driver even stopped twice with a full bus, both ways on his route, to offer help. So many passengers got out too.

I've had enough negative experiences too, of course, but somehow when thinking of the world, the above situation rules my worldview instead of the one below.

The most disappointing has been the lack of support showed by someone in a position of authority where there was SO much evidence for the case I was making, including witnesses of the act the discrimination. There was something so fundamentally wrong about not being supported by another woman, in a position of power, in a situation women face every day that it still makes me so mad when I think about it.

Also, believing that everyone and everything has the potential for great success and we may just be the ones to serve as catalysts doesn't help, does it?

 

[Skyward]

I wouldn't put it past myself to not stop, only because I would be in a shock and wouldn't know what to do. Like: 'Oh God, how do I help this person? I dont know! What if I mess up and they die because of my mishandling??'

Things like that. Otherwise I would feel too much like a shitbag if I didn't help the person.

 

[BerberElla]

Yes, I completely agree. We have this idealistic view of the world, humanity in particular. It's regularly shaken up and somehow we can get up, dust ourselves off and still think that, whatever it was, was an exception to the rule...I don't know if it is but I find myself needing to believe that in order to be.

For myself I was like this more in the past, than nowadays. These days it takes me more than a jump up and dust off, sometimes it takes weeks to pick me back up, and to be able to drum that optimism back into me.

The more that idealistic worldview is shattered, the harder each brush off becomes.

I used to think that badness was an exception to the rule, yet now I believe that goodness is the exception, and I look out for it, and treasure those very few and far between moments, in which I come across it.

 

[ergophobe]

The more that idealistic worldview is shattered, the harder each brush off becomes.

I used to think that badness was an exception to the rule, yet now I believe that goodness is the exception, and I look out for it, and treasure those very few and far between moments, in which I come across it.

Well said, Berb. I think this is true - I'd identify as a more cautious idealist now than before (hope springs eternal). I think in times of stress, I find a need to hold on to that rose-colored image more. At most other times, I find caution comforting because being hurt or disappointed as a result of our own, voluntary, naivete really loses its charm after a while, doesn't it?
and

Is it possible to have an idealistic view of humanity as a whole and yet try and develop a cautious approach to individual interactions? I wonder.

 

[Thalassa]

I have pretty low expectations.

I thought a guy was really really nice, just because he told me as he was driving by that my left turn blinkers was on. lolz

i've had things returned to me that i lost before though... that was pretty cool. i think that makes me do the same if i find lost stuff.

never been injured lying on the road somewhere though. i would hate to have my life hang in the balance of the whim of a stranger passing by... eek

im pretty sure i would stop and help an elderly person or a little kid though. but yeah, if i saw someone my age in trouble, i would probably just drive by.... unless they were like about to die, then i'd probably call 911 or something

Are you sure you're an enfp?

 

[Thalassa]

Well said, Berb. I think this is true - I'd identify as a more cautious idealist now than before (hope springs eternal). I think in times of stress, I find a need to hold on to that rose-colored image more. At most other times, I find caution comforting because being hurt or disappointed as a result of our own, voluntary, naivete really loses its charm after a while, doesn't it?
and

Is it possible to have an idealistic view of humanity as a whole and yet try and develop a cautious approach to individual interactions? I wonder.

I think I was happy in my teenage delusion, but the older I became and the more I tried to force my idealism on reality, the more depressed I was.

I'm actually much happier since I've accepted that people are...well, people. People have always been people, and my love of history has clued me in to the fact that the world is not just recently going to hell in a handbasket, but in fact, people have always been quite nasty to one another.

I'm a fan of murder mystery novels and horror movies. I make for a strange idealist, but...

For me, the thing is to accept the darkness of humanity. My idealism comes in when I think that I must be the change I want to see in the world i.e. instead of expecting it from others, I instead will be the person who helps the stranger on the side of the road. It also helped me to move from larger urban areas (L.A., Vegas) back to a small town in the South. At least I can nurture my little dreams a little easier there, as there is more of a normative factor of community where I presently reside.

 

[nomadic]

Are you sure you're an enfp?

do u stop by all accidents on the freeway? dunno about you, but I just look.

i mean, if there was flames, and someone lying on the ground bleeding, i'd stop. But in general, no, I'd just look.

i mean, i do teach an SAT class for low income kids in South Central LA. but thats a different motivation altogether.

 

[Laurie]

Sorry for the TL;DR but it's a fairly disturbing moment in my life. Have you ENFP's (Or any other personality type for that matter) had an event happen that shook your ideas of the world that surrounds you? Did you find it temporarily debilitating? Do ENFPs in particular have a tendency to overreact or is it called for/ do we have a tendency to be over-idealistic?

Yes, I have had that happen. I still wonder if I just attract the wrong kind of people around me or if my currently jaded form is more appropriate. I often think "what if..."

 

[Thalassa]

do u stop by all accidents on the freeway? dunno about you, but I just look.

i mean, if there was flames, and someone lying on the ground bleeding, i'd stop. But in general, no, I'd just look.

Well, you live in L.A. which is an entirely different kettle of fish. I would assuredly call 911 if I saw a bad accident, but you probably see fender benders every day. I lived in L.A. for about a year.

If I saw someone lying on the ground though, as in the OP, yes I would help them no matter their age. You said you probably wouldn't help someone your age - that's what I'm trying to clarify here. This isn't just about car accidents.

 

[nomadic]

Well, you live in L.A. which is an entirely different kettle of fish. I would assuredly call 911 if I saw a bad accident, but you probably see fender benders every day. I lived in L.A. for about a year.

If I saw someone lying on the ground though, as in the OP, yes I would help them no matter their age. You said you probably wouldn't help someone your age - that's what I'm trying to clarify here. This isn't just about car accidents.

i mean, say Im walking across the intersection, I see an elderly person trip and fall, I see a little kid trip and fall, YES I would help them. Without a doubt.

But somoene my age, who just tripped and fell? come on, he's big enough to make it on his own. if its a fine woman? well, I'd probably do the same, just to be fair to the guy my age. lolz

Of course if you live in a small city, small town, then its a different story. You're not gonna act the same in both settings. I'd probably be very disturbed if I was in a small town, and I saw people I KNEW walk by and not help me.

 

[Thalassa]

i mean, say Im walking across the intersection, I see an elderly person trip and fall, I see a little kid trip and fall, YES I would help them.

But somoene my age, who just tripped and fell? come on, he's big enough to make it on his own. if its a fine woman? well, I'd probably do the same, just to be fair to the guy my age. lolz

She was crying and screaming help me. And, yes, no matter a person's age if I see them take a tumble I at least ask "are you okay?" unless they obviously don't need assistence.

 

[nomadic]

She was crying and screaming help me. And, yes, no matter a person's age if I see them take a tumble I at least ask "are you okay?" unless they obviously don't need assistence.

i mean sheesh. If im walking by and yeah, be like "R u okay?". if im driving by, probably not.

people don't really scream in LA about anything. So yeah i guess in that situation i'd probably see whats up.

i mean, i remember the other day, i saw this dood fall off his bike, it looked funny as heck, i just said " Ay, you alright man?" as i drove by haha. he looked embarassed.

jeez what happened to you? u said something happened to u in la...