[Fi] A Question About Fi

[skylights]

reflect, i think you brought up an interesting point. Fi for me is a "whole body" experience. i often think of it as being an "ocean inside" - visceral would be a good way to describe it. it's almost like a sensation of energy, an atmosphere, that permeates my being. this may be amplified by the generalizing tendencies of Ne.

it's usually very nice, and helpful, but it can be utterly annoying when i don't want to deal with those feelings. it's like i have to figure out how to calm the raging storm before i can do anything particularly productive. even small things, like my SO being annoyed at me, make it hard to operate. but that's only in terms of me - if someone else is freaking out, or if there is some kind of emergency situation, i can be totally calm and directive, because i can handle things outside of myself with Te.

as an ENFP, when i defend my views, it's very Te in nature. empirical evidence, basically, that supports Fi points. it's a bit "backwards" i suppose, in the sense that i reason with Fi and work towards rationalization with Te. people who use Ti can be very helpful in terms of catching my logic gaps before they begin. i don't think i would be nearly as rational as i am if it hadn't been for my INTP dad.

What keeps you from describing all the aspects of a point? Do you feel as if you'll bore people with all of your connections, or is it that you don't trust the connections you've made?

this may have been more directed towards IFPs, but we'd be here for years Te would get hella bored.

 

[BAJ]

I like the word you used... "visceral". It brought to mind a question. Are "F"'s more in-tune with their body, more specifically the lower gutteral region where as "T" are primarily seen focusing on the brain. I think theirs an unconscious notion that NF's follow their "hearts", but could it be more of a, like you said, visceral. You listen to, or pay attention to how you physically feel and reject those things from your values. Is that why toxic reactions towards conflict occur?

In this, I'd like to go into vipassana, but that is sort of a different topic.

What keeps you from describing all the aspects of a point? Do you feel as if you'll bore people with all of your connections, or is it that you don't trust the connections you've made?

Once someone disagreed with me that a certain road was curved. I showed him with a map.

Yet, from myself, I can try to answer this again. I trust what I believe now, but at a different stage my life or with different precursor sequences, I might believe as they do. Therefore, loving them is like not loving myself or an aspect of myself or my own history...

"But for grace, there go I"

I used to argue, but I do not much now. Some arguments have no point because they cannot be proved. They believe one thing and you believe another, and argument will not help.

I'll give you another example. I'm a biologist of fish. A religious minister asked me why fish jump. Well they confuse pressure waves with a predator, but I suggested maybe sometimes they do it for "joy." This minister told me, "Animals do not have feelings! Only man is uniquely created by God to have a soul."

There's no POINT arguing with that. You'll never convince some who believes the Bible is spoken by God, and he went to seminary where he was taught that "animals don't have feelings."

But later, this minister person got a dog. And his wife had to work, and he was alone with the dog. He cared for the dog. Then he changed his opinion about animals believing at least one animal experienced emotional states. I cannot make him experience something like that through argument.

Oh I could try to argue it! I could provide him with photos of facial expressions of chimps, and have him read Jane Goodall books. I could explain it. However, none of it would be accepted, and he would consider it an attack to something in the core of his being...his faith. It would accomplish nothing, and it would ruin my relationship with him. What would be the point of arguing with him about it?

Perhaps you could provide an example (like I did here), and I could maybe tell you how I'd react. It would sort of depend on what type of person I'm talking to, and all kinds of factors. It would depend upon the situation.

 

[uumlau]

Fi

 

[neptunesnet]

This reminded me of another post I made in a different thread. How do you go about defending your views when they are called into question by other people? How do you go about convincing someone you're right? Do you depend on the strenght of emotion to flow into the person and a revelation occurs from there?

Depends. Appealing to emotion works sometimes, but other times taking only that route feels manipulative and cheap, so I tend to give hypotheticals and analogies or just solid stats (if I can remember them). Usually both, or all three. It's much more difficult to get someone to "be more compassionate," which is usually where the conviction of my argument is coming from, but I have to provide an evidence-based or logically consistent argument with people who aren't moved by Feeling rationale.