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[NT] Defining Moments in the making of an NT.

TaylorS

Aspie Idealist
Joined
Aug 6, 2007
Messages
365
MBTI Type
INFP
Enneagram
972
Instinctual Variant
so/sp
I was one of those pesky, annoying kids that always went "Why? Why? WHY?" about everything, and got in trouble a lot for it I was considered the most voracious reader of non-fiction books from the library of my small, rural school ever (to the pure delight of the librarian). I was a so-so student, though because of my ADD and because class was boring since I already knew most of the stuff.
 

Veneti

New member
Joined
Aug 19, 2007
Messages
264
MBTI Type
XNTX
Have you ever had a defining moment that defined you as an NT?

For example, was there any book or conversation that really sparked your imagination like no other?

Or was there a defining moment that caused you to be interested in science, philosophy, journalism ect...?

If so could you share what the event was and the effect it had on you?

I am interested in defining moments in people's lives and I was curious what that would look like for an NT.

I guess retrospectively looking back it was the concept in maths that the 9x tables were just really the 10 times tables less one of the multipliers.

After that, well, I guess as a kid aged 9 cutting out Stockmarket tables to analyse the various mathematics and understanding P/E ratio's yields and so forth... Oh, that was after I first started trading in stamps with my school friends... I memorised the value of every mint and used stamp ever issued (In my home country at the time) and therefore always profited on any trade, even more interesting I was concerned about every trade improving the total portfolio of wealth of my stamp collection.

Worst issue in life has been assuming everyone is analytical and therefore all their actions are concious decisions... wrong move with blondes thats for sure.. did and still do baffle me.

Its great being an INTJ though, so many Eureka's in life.... biggest problem is finding intelligent people to talk with!!
 

amber_rk

New member
Joined
Aug 18, 2007
Messages
11
MBTI Type
INTJ
I catched snails in my free time and kept them in a jar.
I even tried to get them married because I wanted to see them have kids.

Plus, once I caught two locusts (one small, one big) and one of them disappeared. I was so sure that one ate the other (because that's what they do when they mate) and was really excited about what happened(it was like seeing something come true).
 

Economica

Dhampyr
Joined
Apr 23, 2007
Messages
2,054
MBTI Type
INTJ
Worst issue in life has been assuming everyone is analytical and therefore all their actions are concious decisions... wrong move with blondes thats for sure.. did and still do baffle me.

For all our wits, there's an ESTJ (I think) who's out-thunk us on that one: Link
 

Usehername

On a mission
Joined
May 30, 2007
Messages
3,794
Apparently when I was really young, I would argue with my mother every single night about going to bed.

Mom: You're tired. It's bedtime.
Me: How do you know I'm tired.
Mom: I can look at you and see.
Me: No. How do you know?
Mom: I can tell. Now go to bed.
Me: But why do I look tired?! (Likely looking for something to change for tomorrow night so that I could stay up later.)

After many exasperating nights of me agonizingly asking WHY!, it eventually caused my mother to come up with this:

Mom: When you close your eyes, a number appears on your eyelids ranging from 1-10. If it's 1, it means you're fully refreshed and ready to play in the morning. If it's 7, you better brush your teeth but there's still time for a bedtime story, but if it's 9... whoa, you better get to bed before you hit 10!!

And I believed her. So I ended up going to her all the time and closing my eyes, asking for a numerical quantification of exactly how tired I was. I believed her for a lot longer than I should have.
 

htb

New member
Joined
May 14, 2007
Messages
1,505
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INTJ
Enneagram
1w9
Many years ago my preschool teacher reported that, when the class was following her in a song, I not only sang different words but when called out, cheerfully asserted that the teacher was incorrect.
 

Veneti

New member
Joined
Aug 19, 2007
Messages
264
MBTI Type
XNTX
Actually another defining moment of a NT is as a child starting school and having the teacher making us all endlessly practice our hand writing...

And I say, "what is the purpose of writing, we should be learning something like maths". or me squaring up with the teacher and saying "You only think you're right because you're taller than me". (There's always a train of logic).

Or how about as a 4 year old, taking a bite out of one of my mothers home make cookies (that was still on the tray just having come out of the oven).... and then with an incredible leap of logic to cover my tracks.... I duly took a bite out of ALL the cookies (The perfect crime)... pity parents are smarter than I took them for... lol lol...

The first defining moment was probably my first day at school.

I didn't like the class bully so I smacked him out. I ended up sitting outside on the bench feeling a bit sorry for myself and thinking "They don't realise that if I am the top then they won't get bullied, yet I'm in trouble, its not fair".
 
Last edited:

ygolo

My termites win
Joined
Aug 6, 2007
Messages
5,988
I don't have too many memories of when I was younger than about 8 years old.

A few of the memories before 8 years old are:

There was annoyance over the numbers eleven, twelve and thirteen, and fifteen(less so with this one). I thought they should be "oneteen", "twoteen", "threeteen", and "fiveteen".

There were a lot of other pattern inconsistencies I didn't like--apparantely to the amusement of my extended family. I think I remember these because they've become family anecdotes.

I also remember learning to tie my shoes without anyone teaching me. I watched how someone tied up present they were giving someone and copied that way for my shoes. When I got older, I found out I don't do it "right", but I still tie my shoes the same way I taught myself.

This is also true for a lot of things I learned on my own without anyone "teaching" me the "right" way.

The earliest NT moment I remember clearly was when I was eight years old and read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe and being annoyed at the professor's "Logic Lesson". I was thinking there is no way Lucy always tells the truth, and that Edmund always lies, and if we take away the "always" part the professor's lesson falls apart. How likely the thing that Edmund and Lucy are describing (existence/nonexistence of a wardrobe to another world) HAS to play a big role. I didn't realize at the time that my annoyance was due to a vague understanding of Bayes' Rule.
 

Ghost of the dead horse

filling some space
Joined
Sep 7, 2007
Messages
3,553
MBTI Type
ENTJ
I think it was when I was perhaps about 10-12. We subscribed to 2 newspapers, most of which I read every morning. I started to become angry at the popularistic, simplistic left-wing style of the other newspaper whereas the other, a bit right-wing, had more accurate insight and took an educated person's view on the world. I asked my mom and dad why people read the first newspaper, when it has everything so wrong. I remember mom telling me that it had a much greater number of subscribers.
I was astounded and I realized that most people liked things being told for them in a simple, appealing way, corners cut, and they wouldn't understand the position of authority or someone who is trying to look at the society from an expert point of view. I noticed I was different from most of the adults in that regard.

I didn't voice out my views very eloquently. I remember saying something like "people are so dumb!"
 

Metamorphosis

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May 9, 2007
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3,474
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INTJ
There was annoyance over the numbers eleven, twelve and thirteen, and fifteen(less so with this one). I thought they should be "oneteen", "twoteen", "threeteen", and "fiveteen".

That makes two of us. :yes:
 

FDG

pathwise dependent
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Aug 13, 2007
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5,903
MBTI Type
ENTJ
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7w8
I remember when I started playing soccer when I was 8 or 9, I suddenly understood how much better that was in comparison to the science books I was devouring before, and dedicated myself to it.
 

substitute

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May 27, 2007
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4,601
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ENTP
I wrote this a while ago, and it seems to pretty much, on reflection, describe the process of becoming ENTP...

It's kind of funny really, considering that I spent most of my life in Pinocchio mode - well, I still kind of am in a way. I mean, I never could and still never can, really, show a face of myself to the world that was anything like authentic; I've spent most of my life faking it, constantly evaluating and re-evaluating what's expected or wanted or needed of me in the particular moment and adapting and flexing and making a dozen micro-adjustments per second in order to be what I must.

It only recently (in the scheme of my life, say, 4 years ago) began to occur to me that being authentic was an option. Of course - my life as a female taught me that being myself resulted in punishment and pain of one kind or another. And even now, though I can be more honestly myself with people in that they see me as what I am (male), there's still always the deception in that they think I was born the way they see me now, and short of carrying a sign round my neck or announcing it (thereby opening myself wide to real prejudice that will affect my children), there's not much I can do about that.

Perhaps that general pattern of doing my best to 'get it right' all my life with what I considered the most important thing of all - just fitting in, being accepted, being liked and being useful - and failing, has undermined any confidence in my ability to perform, or get it right. Maybe that's what makes me clam up when someone walks in the room when I'm singing: having lived my entire life in a state of feeling as though there was some hand-out that everyone got and which I missed; I was at a disadvantage before the contest even began.

Yes... life is a contest with rules made up by people you can never see and who keep changing them; it's a constant effort to jump through hoops that the people holding them move just as you're in mid-air jumping towards them. The only chance I have is to be as adaptable as possible, to think on the fly, to keep my eye out for any change, any clue, cue or pattern, no matter how minute, to enable me to make the last-minute adjustment that'll save me from the black eye or the cold shoulder. I can't afford to wallow in feelings and emotions, because that's when I'll be caught with my pants down; I must stay focused on the task, whilst simulatenously juggling all the many variables.

I live a perpetual state of unicycling across a tight-rope, trying to make progress while being pushed back by a grizzly bear, balancing an egg on a spoon in my mouth and a beachball on my head whilst juggling ten flaming torches, chased by a hungry lion. With no safety net. Failure is not an option. But I've become so used to it that it's easy to me, and I get bored all the time... and would you believe, find myself looking always for bigger challenges...
 

warick

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Oct 16, 2007
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79
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INTJ
I don't remember any actual events that led me to or caused me to become an NT.

I recall being very bored at the simplicity of school. I taught myself to read before kindergarten, and I would get frustrated when other kids in the advanced reading class with me could barely read. Also I would read during classes at school, the teachers thought I was part deaf because I was so enthralled I wouldn't hear them call my name. I also read encyclopedias and dictionaries just because there is so much interesting information. Other kids were reading R.L. Stine (Goosebumps), I was reading Edgar Allen Poe or Michael Crichton.
 

ps646566

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Oct 23, 2007
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32
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INTJ
I don't really believe in defining moments. But one or two memorable ones have been when I first saw quotes from Albert Einstein (*) which hit the nail on the head to an exquisite degree, for example :-

"The universe is not only stranger then we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine."

"Only two things are infinite : the universe, and human stupidity. And I am not sure about the former."

(*) Surely the doyen of all geniuses. For me some of the others in the premier league would be :- Isaac Newton, Leonardo, Michaelangelo, Mozart, Beethoven, Winston Churchill.
 

Richard0612

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Aug 6, 2008
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30
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ENTP
Nothing really stands out for me as definitive, but I do remember reading nearly all the non-fiction books in my primary school library (I think I was about 6 or 7) and not reading the books that people of my age were 'expected' to (i.e. the 'Magic Key' series etc.). This made my reception (I think that equates to kindergarten in the US) teacher think that there was something wrong with me, and I was sent to see the headteacher who 'recommended' (read: made me) read 'normal' fiction books and write reviews on them. This continued until they felt that I was 'fixed'.

Later on, in around year 6 the school 'social welfare officer' (can't remember the exact title) asked to see me with my mum to find out why I preferred the company of adults and/or liked being alone with a book. I told the truth: that most of my classmates wouldn't understand what I was talking about, and that I valued my personal space. They said that I 'thought too much of myself'. My mum agreed with me, and thought that I was better off doing what I wanted to, as long as it didn't affect anyone else.
 

Simplexity

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Jul 15, 2008
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1,741
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Basically always getting into "logical" debates from a very early age whenever I got in trouble. I also picked up languages pretty quickly and would always prefer the company of adults who had something to teach me, or science books about whatever fascinated me at the time. I would say one of the defining moments though was when I was about six or seven and decided that it would be fun to read my dads computer programming books and start making little programs of my own.
 

Enyo

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Aug 9, 2008
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443
MBTI Type
xNTJ
It was a gradual progression, I think.

I was lucky enough to be naturally smart and analytical.

The hardness kind of set in as I realized that not everyone was as smart as me. And set in even more as I got teased for being smart.

So, first it was the N. Then the T. Then the J. And the I has become more predominant throughout the years as I see the point in trying to interact less and less often.
 

Uytuun

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Apr 19, 2008
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1,633
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nnnn
It was a natural thing...IN first, my own world, books etc., then came the questioning and correcting of the teachers. It's never left.
 
T

ThatGirl

Guest
Well it all started when I was a little girl. I first knew I was an NT when I could remember birth and had the thought that my mother could have been more efficient in the process and that I could have done a better job. Later I pulled out all my baby teeth so I could get money from the tooth fairy to buy a pack of gum.
 

murkrow

Branded with Satan
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Jul 19, 2008
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1,635
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INTJ
Defining moments...

I can't think of anyone else I know who's been as widely known, as widely respected and also as widely despised.
 
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