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[NF] The Case of Nunki

Polaris

AKA Nunki
Joined
Apr 7, 2009
Messages
2,529
MBTI Type
INFJ
Enneagram
451
Instinctual Variant
sp/sx
I could easily write a post oozing with melodrama, and that's just what I did a few days ago to top off my birthday in a positive light. I felt sedate enough the next morning, however, to realize that I wasn't conducting business in a manner that was healthy for me or anyone else. I still realize that, and because I do, I'm going to approach things in a way this time that I hope will not force me to delete anything.

Quite simply, I have a problem. I can gain no satisfaction from the social world; people leave me indifferent, and every instant of indifference only teaches me to further reduce my efforts. I might start out friendly and warm, divulging things about myself and learning everything I could hope (but don't really care) to know about someone. This charade of friendliness is my genuine effort to forge a connection with people; I don't feel it, but I want to and I'm trying to. I can't, though. I'm impotent, almost in the same way as people who are sexually impotent; I can't rise to the occasion, I can only pretend. And as I fail, again and again, even that surface warmth gives way until all I can muster is a shallow politeness. This continued failure to connect with people has taught me to stop trying in the first place. What efforts I do make may be efforts, but I write them off in advance; they're failures before they even get off the ground.

This isn't the case of someone who wants to bury himself in a hole and never be seen again. I'm not a hermit, at least not by choice. I want to love people and I want to be involved, and not only do I want this, but I want it more than anything; it, and it alone, is my reason for living, the thing my every goal revolves around, and because it's so far out of reach, I'm finding it hard to justify myself. Each day my motivation to live, breathe and struggle is trickling away; I keep asking myself how I'm going to survive the rest of these human years, and the only answer I can come up with is that I must do it.

The one thing that keeps me going is pain, the pain of what I want but can't and won't have. Even when I fall in love with someone, madly, deeply and foolishly, even when I can find a person who lights up the whole world so that I can care about others as a means of basking in that light, that love is only a magnified pain, an intensified hopelessness.

It's hard to say why I'm writing this. I feel like I need hope, inspiration, anything, because I can't shoulder this burden even though I will and must.

P.S. I assume this is the appropriate section, since I'm an NF and this is a personal thread.
 

Polaris

AKA Nunki
Joined
Apr 7, 2009
Messages
2,529
MBTI Type
INFJ
Enneagram
451
Instinctual Variant
sp/sx
This has been stewing in my head for the past hour, and I've come to a conclusion: involvement is not something that happens to you, it's something that you create. I'm surrounded, insofar as a hermit can be, with people who are or could easily prove interesting, and the only thing that prevents me from turning that to my advantage is my unwillingness to do so. I said above that I make genuine attempts to reach out to people, but I said that in bad faith. Every time I communicate with someone, I don a thick mask and wish I could put on an even thicker one. In the first place I wish to hide the person I am on the inside, and in the second place I wish to hide the person I am on the outside. Together these wishes contribute to a type of communication that doesn't aim at conveying anything but at holding people at a distance. Of course, all along I've been hoping that someone, particularly a love interest, would come along and sweep me off my feet so that I wouldn't know how I got there. And that was ludicrous, for I've done so much to prevent it that I won't merely have to climb out of a hole but scale a Mt. Everest.

The question is, where do I go from here? For one thing, I have to stop withdrawing from people. I was very tempted to do so after starting this topic--I was ashamed at revealing so much--and that type of shame is exactly what I need to learn how to face. Even now, I feel ashamed of what I'm writing; I'm well aware that many of the few who read this will feel embarrassed at how naked I've made myself, and I also know that I'm going to feel just as naked as I appear. It's obscene, really, there's no other word for it; but it's also one of the few baby steps I'm able to take right now.

The other thing I need to do, aside from make genuine attempts at communication, is turn this body to my advantage. I'm never going to be pretty or handsome, I'm never going to have a nice voice, and there are a million other inadequacies my body will suffer. I can still get nice clothes, though, and I can still conceal some of my flaws with makeup. It will not get me nearly far enough, but it will improve my lot.

The question is whether I can do it. Right now I feel weak, apathetic, almost physically ill; only the faintest strength remains in me, and building up a momentum with it and carrying myself forward will prove nearly impossible.
 

BlackCat

Shaman
Joined
Nov 19, 2008
Messages
7,038
MBTI Type
ESFP
Enneagram
9w8
Instinctual Variant
sx/sp
I hate it when feel that way energy wise... today was one of those days. What I usually do is drink caffeine! Caffeine and sugar and sweets... meh @ side effects. Just don't abuse it.

I honestly just put this post here as a placeholder to remind me to post my full thoughts later. It would have been pretty lame to not respond to you in full.
 

BlackCat

Shaman
Joined
Nov 19, 2008
Messages
7,038
MBTI Type
ESFP
Enneagram
9w8
Instinctual Variant
sx/sp
I think that you are facing the troubles of being a social last in the enneagram... I am like this too. I rarely gain satisfaction from interacting with people. It scares me how much I interact over the internet versus real life. It scares me how I just moved and don't have a social life, and how I could honestly care less about that fact. I would say that I don't really bond with 95% of people... I just don't "feel" it. The only people who I really bond with have similar interests to me. Which is why I'm here. I want to bond with people too, but I am always disappointed with real life.

Not socializing is depressing though. I want friends, but apart of me just doesn't care. Where I used to live, I only really had two people close to me, with a few acquaintances I would hang out with. This is all you really need (as a social last) in my opinion. I felt overwhelmed by constantly hanging out with two people, so it was fine with me (constantly to me meaning once or twice a week). I stay in contact with these people and mentally I just don't feel any different.

So I feel you... but what I would suggest for you is to hang out with these people anyways. Maybe some interest will spark in you after the psychological distance is closer; in fact I bet you will become more interested in them as people when you get closer. But as you say... this has failed you before. I don't know what to tell you. Just stay in contact... it's worth it. People are worth it.

As for having no energy, along with supplements I would suggest taking a walk or jog every day. It takes a bit to actually get to doing it, but a 15 to 20 minute walk will do wonders for the rest of your day when it comes to energy. It gets your blood flowing. Personally, it helps me think.

I think that you deserve to be happy, Nunki. I've always thought that you were a cool dude.
 

Polaris

AKA Nunki
Joined
Apr 7, 2009
Messages
2,529
MBTI Type
INFJ
Enneagram
451
Instinctual Variant
sp/sx
I find that it's easy, at least for me, to fall into a state of using this forum as a kind of journal; often enough, I come here and record my thoughts without expecting or even wanting the pages to speak back. Yet it's clear that there's something more to it, because if all I cared to do was set down my thoughts, I could just as easily start a real journal. So yes, I'm here to bond with people, too, although my attempts so far have been halfhearted and prone to sabotage.

Regarding your advice to hang out with people in spite of my initial aloofness, I think it's a sound suggestion, but it isn't something I've had much opportunity to put into a practice. The one person I see in the flesh on a regular basis is my mother, and while we get along all right, we don't really have anything to discuss.

I think what I need is someone with whom I share a hobby or other activity that can be, and normally is done with other people. It's usually that type of thing--a social obligation or pass time--that allows people to make and maintain friendships. When I consider that the last time I had access to anything like that was when I was in high school, it's no surprise that I feel so disconnected and unable to forge bonds (not to downplay my self-consciousness, which is another huge factor).

I do suffer from low physical energy, but I was referring to energy in a spiritual sense when I said that. I do think that exercise is a good idea, though, and I've been trying to get more of it lately. It doesn't work miracles, due to a food intolerance I deal with every day, but I have been feeling better physically, and that has made it easier to lift my mood.

Thank you for that compliment, and as it happens, I can return it since you're one of the individuals who sprang to mind when I said that are interesting people all around.
 
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