I should probably address some posts that I didn't before.
As you can see, INFJs have a hard time boiling it all down to a few succinct points without doing a lot of external exploring first. I wonder if this also adds to the frustration, as it appears that while you are accommodating that need, there was not the same willingness to allow the Ne exploration needed?
Yes, in part. It's frustrating – but's it’s just that the Ne exploration doesn’t seem to be getting through to INFJs. The way [MENTION=9310]uumlau[/MENTION] puts it, this is because you’re not seeing the point of it. It seems like tangential waffle. I’d really like to know how to convey in the moment what the point of that is, so you can read it within a context you understand, but I’m not sure how. How do you convey the point of an unfolding truth?
I think one of the biggest problems for me in trying to accommodate, is that I don't really know what I think or feel right in the moment, so I have no personal story to contribute without understanding how it could be useful to you or to developing a shared story. The usefulness part helps me to narrow down what it is I'm looking for inside the tons of banker's boxes full of files littered around the landscape of my head. Without that, it feels like being asked to just empty out all of the boxes entirely, with papers fluttering out from all of the files, and as you can imagine, it's quite a job putting it all back later, so I only do it for people I know very well and even then, only when I understand why it is necessary.
Yeah, it’s tough. It’s hard for me to imagine not having a flurry of thoughts and feelings hitting you as you hear others speak. I suppose it’s just as hard for you to imagine someone not being struck with a “aha moment†in lightning clarity.
Southern Kross-- could it be that we don't want company so much as a witness? I've often thought this. I just want someone to know how I feel. I don't need to know that they felt it too, or for them to feel it with me, I just want someone to know. I just want to be heard. (I'm just tossing this out for whatever it might be worth -- I could be wrong.) So when INFJ says "Oh, bad thing happened" and INFP says "Oh! I know just how you feel! Bad thing happened to me, too! Let me tell you all about it," it seems to INFJ like INFP is changing the subject, like "Oh. Ok. Or we could talk about you, yes"? In any case, I just wanted to say that I have admired your efforts very much and feel you are a fine person.
Oh, I do get this. It makes sense. And I am aware that I need to keep my mouth shut at times and not let my ADHD-like Ne leap all over the place, tossing ideas like Chinese throwing stars. I know it sounds like making it about me – and I cringe at the thought. It’s something I’ve worked at for years, but it still doesn’t come naturally to me.
I remember in another thread realizing that I had really ended up hurting Esoteric Wench by explaining how her interaction felt to me. It never occurred to me that I was offering anything more than an impression for her to ponder and factor in. Like getting outside feedback on how your golf swing is looking or something. I think this is a fundamental difference between us. That kind of information to us is softened and neutralized by the "seems" or the "feels". It's offering information that we can't get from ourselves, and is inviting additional information from the other person to correct our perception or feeling. What I think we often overlook is that people with introverted feeling are affected by this much differently. It is invalidating them as a person and is deeply cutting.
Maybe it's too soon to talk about it, but do you have any ideas for how we can better convey useful information for understanding what's in one another's heads while not inflicting wounds unintentionally? I really, really don't want to be inadvertently doing that, but I can't always see when I am until afterwards. (I've got it that use of the words "seems" and "feels" feel just stating the same thing as fact, as well as invalidating a person's strengths, identity and striking at who they are as a person).
I think the problem is in part that your version of “seems†and “feels†isn’t quite the same as ours. You offer it by looking at the golf swing from the outside and we offer it by talking about how it feels to swing the club. If you ask about your golf swing, we answer by imagining how you’re doing it. You mean, “how does it look from the outside?†and we’re busy saying, “well, you seem to be hacking at the ball rather than focussing on playing through it. I remember when I was first learning I did the same. The way I corrected it was by imagining...â€. I can see why this seems annoying and uncalled for, when you just wanted a straight answer.
For the Fi-Te version, if we're asking about our swing, the Fe-Ti response is, "you don't seem to be following through". To this it sounds like, "you don't seem to realise the importance of following through". And I think, "I know I'm
meant to follow through. Can't you see I'm trying to and it's not working? I don't know
how I'm meant to 'follow through' ". In other words, I feel like I'm doing it but clearly I don't seem to be getting what the phrase means; so telling me to "follow through" seems to be both stating the obvious and deliberately cryptic at the same time*. For that reason, you saying "seems" doesn't really temper or allay your statement's abruptness, because I'm having separate issues with it. I realise this is pretty unfair on the other person because I'm basically demanding that they read my mind and then correct my way of thinking about the situation. This is, in some ways, why I don't like asking people to direct me how to do something, because I know they're not going to understand what I need from them.
As an aside: this is partly what I was getting at with the car analogy. I don't want other people to drive my car because they don't know about all the little issues that can affect things. They don't know about how the clutch is sticky and how 1st gear is a bit short, or how it tends to steer to the right, or how the fuel light always comes on when you drive downhill or how you need to brake a bit harder than on most cars. If I let someone else drive, they then sit there remarking on, and complaining about, all of these things that are totally obvious to me; or they almost crash because they don't notice the dodgy brakes and the tendency to steer to the right - either outcome just
drives me absolutely crazy! Why bother letting people drive my car if they aren't going to intuitively understand how it works or cope with the necessary alterations to their driving mentality? I think, "people don't
get my car, so I suppose I'm the only one who can effectively drive it."
As for how to fix it, it's hard to say. I think in the case of the Fi-Te-er needing help, you may need to ask more questions. If I'm asking for help, you may have to say, "where do you think you're going wrong?". In that case I would say, "I think I have problem with following through". And then we can talk about the issue from there.
Just as an aside - do Fi users have a filtering system for whose voices they find credible and whose they don't, or are there nuggets of truth in all if people just are willing to go looking for them? I'm confused about this.
I see nuggets of truth in just about anything but it's how people apply them that I might object to. Hitler made some great points about the way Germany was wrongly humiliated and disadvantaged at the end of WWI and how the country deserved to get its pride back. He then took this concept to ridiculously extreme ends that I in no way agree with. This doesn't make what he said wrong - it just means he has pretty crazy ideas about remedying that issue. It's compartmentalisation I guess.
I've noticed that a common theme with Fi users is that everyone's voice must be heard. Yet on the other hand, does this mean that there's no room at all for personal preference, or any filters to put it through?
Not at all. We are fine with personal preference as long as it doesn't dictate or undermine others' preferences. It's the same with opinions - having one is fine, as long as your opinion doesn't require others to agree.
Is all of the filtering done purely looking at the message without any interest in its source? What about snarkiness with each other - is that just when a value of one person gets stepped on by another somehow or is that something else? What about if a person's feeling tones are off from the message they are giving? What if you doubt their intentions, do you still see parts of their message as valid?
This are tougher questions. I will try to simplify my thoughts as best I can.
- The source/context may sway us, although in theory it shouldn't. It's like what uumlau said, if something's true to us, it should be universally true. It shouldn't matter who says it. Being swayed by context can seem like being influenced by bias. Although, we are human like everyone else in this regard - it's just something we try to avoid.
- I think the snarkiness between NFPs (if that's what you mean) is us saying, "you should know better" to one another. Of course, what one "should know" is subjective.
- When people get angry, no one's really thinking straight. That doesn't make what they're saying invalid - in fact it might make it more valid because it's less filtered by self-restraint
- If I doubt intentions, I begin to doubt everything. Example: if I think someone's just being nice to me so they can borrow something desirable I have, I'm going to not believe the nice things they said. However, I try to be careful about committing to that doubt, as I don't want to get my image of that person wrong. In such circumstances, I operate with an unspoken suspicion until I see more convincing evidence of their underhand nature. Once I commit to that doubt, it tends to stick long-term.
* I actual play a little golf now and then with my ISTP dad. I've actually had these exact problems with him trying to help me in his Ti-Fe way.
