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[NT] Observation Statement: NTs seem to be hard to please.
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substitute
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depends on your point of view, duh. people who think like you are easier to please, people who are very different from you are harder for you to figure out and therefore harder to know how to please them.
My ENFP brother says I'm ridiculously high maintenance and that he feels like he's walking on egg shells with me all the time, he says I'm oversensitive and aggressive. He reckons no matter how cool something is or whatever he tries to tell me about, I'll always think it's lame and be unimpressed. Similar things, but to a lesser extreme, have been said to me by a few other people in my life - all people who are very different to me. The funny thing is, that's exactly how i feel about them too.
My buddies that I hang with most (ISTP, ISTJ, ENTJ, INTJ, ESTP and INFP) say the total opposite - they say they enjoy my company because I'm easy to please, easy going, totally accepting and tolerant and they feel free to say anything they like to me and know I won't get offended or shocked. They say they like the way that they can so easily tell what I'll like and what I won't, and almost all their recommendations to me of music, movies, TV, anything else, I've loved.
To my knowledge, the type difference that makes the biggest impact on this kinda thing is the T/F divide. Vast majority of T's see me as my buddies do... the only ones who haven't throughout my life have been either confirmed F's (tested) or highly probable F's (personal assessment).
My ENFP brother says I'm ridiculously high maintenance and that he feels like he's walking on egg shells with me all the time, he says I'm oversensitive and aggressive. He reckons no matter how cool something is or whatever he tries to tell me about, I'll always think it's lame and be unimpressed. Similar things, but to a lesser extreme, have been said to me by a few other people in my life - all people who are very different to me. The funny thing is, that's exactly how i feel about them too.
My buddies that I hang with most (ISTP, ISTJ, ENTJ, INTJ, ESTP and INFP) say the total opposite - they say they enjoy my company because I'm easy to please, easy going, totally accepting and tolerant and they feel free to say anything they like to me and know I won't get offended or shocked. They say they like the way that they can so easily tell what I'll like and what I won't, and almost all their recommendations to me of music, movies, TV, anything else, I've loved.
To my knowledge, the type difference that makes the biggest impact on this kinda thing is the T/F divide. Vast majority of T's see me as my buddies do... the only ones who haven't throughout my life have been either confirmed F's (tested) or highly probable F's (personal assessment).
Tallulah
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Well said, substitute. I've found that to (mostly) be the case as well.
Another thing I'm never impressed with is overt sentimentality or the attempt at manipulating my emotions in movies, etc. And being clumsy or heavyhanded with it. This partly goes back to what Aderack was saying about "x exists! Look!" I remember rolling my eyes through the entirety of "Life is Beautiful." Yes, the Holocaust is tragic and families were affected and ripped apart by it. But I would be more emotionally affected by that just musing on that idea myself than having to watch the lead character's shenanigans in that movie. I just felt like someone was trying to yank my strings. "Look! At his brave! spirit!" Show me, from someone's unique perspective--catch me by surprise. I don't want to ever feel like, "aaaand this is the part where I cry."
I remember another movie (don't remember the title, though) about the McCarthy era and a theatre company whose play was censored/stopped because of allegations of Communism. Would have made for a good story, if the director (possibly Tim Robbins, IIRC) hadn't painted every single Senator as a cardboard cutout of a mustache-twirling villain. It was so obvious who the good guys were and who the bad guys were that you were entirely pulled out of the story. They weren't human and complex anymore. And yet, there were those in the audience that were moved by this story. They reacted exactly how the director wanted them to react. Sometimes I think people don't really care how well-done their movies are--somehow they fill in the blanks themselves and make them what they want them to be?
I will say, though, that not all movies have to be great art for me to enjoy them. And I can't really explain what makes a bad movie different from a guilty pleasure movie, and what makes completely unclever different from stupid/clever. I will laugh at a movie like Airplane all day long, because it's stupid/clever. I will usually also find Mike Myers/Will Ferrell movies hilarious.
Another thing I'm never impressed with is overt sentimentality or the attempt at manipulating my emotions in movies, etc. And being clumsy or heavyhanded with it. This partly goes back to what Aderack was saying about "x exists! Look!" I remember rolling my eyes through the entirety of "Life is Beautiful." Yes, the Holocaust is tragic and families were affected and ripped apart by it. But I would be more emotionally affected by that just musing on that idea myself than having to watch the lead character's shenanigans in that movie. I just felt like someone was trying to yank my strings. "Look! At his brave! spirit!" Show me, from someone's unique perspective--catch me by surprise. I don't want to ever feel like, "aaaand this is the part where I cry."
I remember another movie (don't remember the title, though) about the McCarthy era and a theatre company whose play was censored/stopped because of allegations of Communism. Would have made for a good story, if the director (possibly Tim Robbins, IIRC) hadn't painted every single Senator as a cardboard cutout of a mustache-twirling villain. It was so obvious who the good guys were and who the bad guys were that you were entirely pulled out of the story. They weren't human and complex anymore. And yet, there were those in the audience that were moved by this story. They reacted exactly how the director wanted them to react. Sometimes I think people don't really care how well-done their movies are--somehow they fill in the blanks themselves and make them what they want them to be?
I will say, though, that not all movies have to be great art for me to enjoy them. And I can't really explain what makes a bad movie different from a guilty pleasure movie, and what makes completely unclever different from stupid/clever. I will laugh at a movie like Airplane all day long, because it's stupid/clever. I will usually also find Mike Myers/Will Ferrell movies hilarious.
simulatedworld
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Well, in the case of the repetitive mass media, it's because most of it is designed to be consumed by a medium-intelligence Sensing-preference audience. That's just smart marketing.
(Note that I didn't say Sensing is unintelligent; just that the majority of people are Sensing and aiming for a median intelligence level is obviously going to reach the most people.)
So for John Q. Public, just changing the details is enough to make the experience compelling again, even if it's really the same story over and over.
NTs are especially prone to noticing conceptual similarities between things, so we're hard to please because we have to see something truly original in art to really give it much respect (usually.) Of course different people define originality in different ways, but if we see too many conceptual similarities between different pieces of art, we start to feel we've been gipped because there's really nothing new here but a bunch of meaningless sensory data.
(Note that I didn't say Sensing is unintelligent; just that the majority of people are Sensing and aiming for a median intelligence level is obviously going to reach the most people.)
So for John Q. Public, just changing the details is enough to make the experience compelling again, even if it's really the same story over and over.
NTs are especially prone to noticing conceptual similarities between things, so we're hard to please because we have to see something truly original in art to really give it much respect (usually.) Of course different people define originality in different ways, but if we see too many conceptual similarities between different pieces of art, we start to feel we've been gipped because there's really nothing new here but a bunch of meaningless sensory data.
Stanton Moore
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I have a theory. You may not actually know that many NT's in real life. You MAY know a lot of assholes and are just assuming they're all NT's...
murkrow
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BlackCat
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NTs aren't hard to please, you just aren't doing it right. I'd say this goes for everyone, certain things will impress certain people, what impresses an NT may be totally different than what impresses someone else.
But then again this is probably just a character trait. I know plenty of NTs... it's easy to please some, not so easy to please others. But it doesn't get in the way of interactions.
But then again this is probably just a character trait. I know plenty of NTs... it's easy to please some, not so easy to please others. But it doesn't get in the way of interactions.
Verfremdungseffekt
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Was that the one with Orson Welles' company? (Welles himself being played rather strangely?)
Tallulah
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That sounds right. I suppose I'll have to stop being lazy and look it up. It had a bunch of stars in it, seems like, though it wasn't mainstream.
Update: Can't seem to locate it on imdb. I have no idea what it's called. I thought I remembered Tim Robbins, but maybe not.
Tallulah
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ajblaise
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Whenever someone tells me they have something interesting/cool/funny/awesome to show me, I start rooting for them right away in my mind, but I can't fake interest if it turns out to be non-stimulating. Other people's excitement can rub off on me sometimes, but there needs to be something else there.
substitute
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life and the world is an experiment anyway. none of us really know what we're doing, we're all just going by what we know, doing what seems the best idea at the time, and hoping it works out.
Misty_Mountain_Rose
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I think this assessment is spot on. I was completely turned off to Stephen King many years ago because the first thing I picked up by him to read was a collection of short stories... and the first one I read was a rip off of The Cask of Amontillado. Immediately he became a 'poser' in my mind who couldn't think up anything original and I quit reading his stuff and never touched it again.
Recycling ideas is just bad art and laziness on the part of the artist. The millions and millions of re-dos for Romeo and Juliet make me nauseated, but I could read the original a hundred times over.
It takes something I've truly never thought of before or seen before to make me truly impressed.
ChocolateMoose123
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I think a lot of this is INTP's desire to play devil's advocate and the fact we almost instinctively want to resist fads, trends and general opinions. So when you're super happy about something I bet that INTP is "testing" your enthusiasm before he or she can join you in it. Sounds bizarre but it's almost a subconscious thing. It works the other way too.
ajblaise
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This is true. Especially if it's more than just one person who is promoting the idea/trend/thing. But if I really get surprised and my Ti doesn't find any errors or contradictions in it after a quick analysis, I don't have a problem with going along with it.
Tallulah
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Absolutely. This is a lot of the reason why I end up liking something waaaay after it was popular. I have to evaluate it away from the hype and see how I really feel about it. I can't like it just because everyone else does. Of course, I sometimes take this too far and hate something just because it's overhyped, regardless of how good it is.
Verfremdungseffekt
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Here's a bit of a journal post from about a month ago:
* * *
I've mostly avoided Nirvana, out of that associative thing. It was never "my" music; it always belonged to people I didn't like. Or if I did like them, they clung to it too tightly. So I didn't really have a part in that relationship.
What makes it a little stranger is I think they were the first contemporary pop act I was made aware of. That was 1993-1994, my sophomore year of high school. I listened to a couple of songs off of In Utero, and thought, well, this is different. Although the origin of this awareness was a couple of jerk-offs who I wouldn't trust alone with a cat and a can of lighter fluid, I was willing to accept their own interest as coincidence. Then, of course, the moment I began to pay attention, Kurt went and killed himself. All the noise and deification caused me to shrug and walk away.
Years later, when I was trying in earnest to figure out this music thing, I picked up Muddy Banks of the Wishkah -- there was a little hype around its release, and I figured I'd give the band another shot. And... er. It sounded like it was recorded from within a cardboard box placed outside the security doors of the theater in which the band was playing. And it wasn't exactly the most rounded selection of material. And it was overlong. Again, I could tell there was something there, but. Well, whatever.
Later, my partner had one of those creepy fetishistic things for Kurt Cobain. As people do. Which again made me keep the band at arm's distance.
Now, here we are. The last ten months I've been trying hard to become myself; to break all these ties and expectations. Make my own context.
So. Six albums, I guess, are the "canon": the three real albums, Incesticide, and the live ones. I'm starting with Mtv Unplugged, because I'm not in the mood for heavy guitars right now.
And yeah. This is legitimate.
I kind of feel like I'm claiming something that was cheated from me. Like I'm filling in a blank in my life.
* * *
So yes. If I like something, I absolutely have to like it on my own terms.
* * *
I've mostly avoided Nirvana, out of that associative thing. It was never "my" music; it always belonged to people I didn't like. Or if I did like them, they clung to it too tightly. So I didn't really have a part in that relationship.
What makes it a little stranger is I think they were the first contemporary pop act I was made aware of. That was 1993-1994, my sophomore year of high school. I listened to a couple of songs off of In Utero, and thought, well, this is different. Although the origin of this awareness was a couple of jerk-offs who I wouldn't trust alone with a cat and a can of lighter fluid, I was willing to accept their own interest as coincidence. Then, of course, the moment I began to pay attention, Kurt went and killed himself. All the noise and deification caused me to shrug and walk away.
Years later, when I was trying in earnest to figure out this music thing, I picked up Muddy Banks of the Wishkah -- there was a little hype around its release, and I figured I'd give the band another shot. And... er. It sounded like it was recorded from within a cardboard box placed outside the security doors of the theater in which the band was playing. And it wasn't exactly the most rounded selection of material. And it was overlong. Again, I could tell there was something there, but. Well, whatever.
Later, my partner had one of those creepy fetishistic things for Kurt Cobain. As people do. Which again made me keep the band at arm's distance.
Now, here we are. The last ten months I've been trying hard to become myself; to break all these ties and expectations. Make my own context.
So. Six albums, I guess, are the "canon": the three real albums, Incesticide, and the live ones. I'm starting with Mtv Unplugged, because I'm not in the mood for heavy guitars right now.
And yeah. This is legitimate.
I kind of feel like I'm claiming something that was cheated from me. Like I'm filling in a blank in my life.
* * *
So yes. If I like something, I absolutely have to like it on my own terms.
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