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[NT] Asking for help

Gen

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NT's are supposed to be autonomous so I suspect most will say they hate asking for help. But how much? Can you ask your family for help if you need it? Things like, I need a ride, a co-signer, a babysitter, a small loan... stuff like that.

How is your family about helping each other? I think this may make a difference. My family is so ridiculously independent and autonomous (even though everyone needs help) that I can't bring myself to ask for a freaking tissue when I sneeze! That's an exaggeration... anyway...

Thoughts?
 

Totenkindly

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You're allowed to ask anyone for anything you'd like. Interdependence is a hallmark of family and community.

Part of autonomy is giving others the opportunity to accept or refuse your request, however. Where families go wrong is for punishing/shaming each other for asking for something, or else feeling obligated to give anyone what they want if they do ask. Now there is bondage involved, rather than freedom.

A mature relationship provides total freedom for people to ask and for people to be refused if necessary, without shame or ridicule.

(Personally, I hate to ask for things, and I used to hate being asked. I sort of had to work through all that, however, and realize good relationships weren't as messed up as those in my family had been; and I feel a lot better about the mature reciprocal relationships.)

PS. Please don't ask me for money, I'm not giving you any.
 

miked277

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w/ my family, asking for help and how i feel about it depends on how i've treated them recently. for example, occasionallly i can be hard to reach and more or less intentionally ignore them... after doing that i feel like a big jerk asking for their help. if i feel i'm owed one, i generally don't mind asking.

as for people in general, yeah i have a basic attitude of "i can do this myself" so outside of tasks that obviously need a a group to complete i try to do it myself first before asking for help.

or if i just have zero interest in the task or zero expertise, i ask for help readily.
 

MerkW

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Yes, I generally dislike asking for help.

My father is similar in this regard, taking it to very extreme. He could very well be an INTJ who acts somewhat impulsively and is stressed out and thus uses Se quite a bit. He could also be an very organized ISTP with a rather strong Te. For whatever reason, asking for help is almost a phobia for him.
 

Magic Poriferan

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I think I have somewhat of a hang-up asking for help.
I don't think it's anything too strong, though.
 
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Maverick

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I only ask for help as a last resort if all other options failed.
 

INTJMom

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NT's are supposed to be autonomous so I suspect most will say they hate asking for help. But how much? Can you ask your family for help if you need it? Things like, I need a ride, a co-signer, a babysitter, a small loan... stuff like that.

How is your family about helping each other? I think this may make a difference. My family is so ridiculously independent and autonomous (even though everyone needs help) that I can't bring myself to ask for a freaking tissue when I sneeze! That's an exaggeration... anyway...

Thoughts?
I used to feel bad to ask anyone to do anything for me. It took me a long time to learn how. I didn't think I was important enough or significant enough or love-able enough to deserve anything. I couldn't even ask my husband to do things that would "please" me.

Jesus taught that when a person does a good deed, they get treasure in Heaven. Now I think, if I ask someone to do something for me, I'm giving them the opportunity to get treasure in Heaven, so I don't feel bad about it. St. Paul also taught that whatever good you do for someone, God will do for you. So whether I am doing the good deed or receiving the good deed, I am sure that it will all work out in the end.

I learned to think this way because as Jennifer pointer out, it's important for humans to rely on each other. It's not good for us to be an island unto ourselves.
 

substitute

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My family's like yours Gen, in that regard.

I'm actually fairly free with asking 'logistical' help, though only the kind where I can't do things myself, like if I need someone with an HGV licence to drive a truck for me cos I haven't got one, but I always compensate people in some way that we both agree to.

It's personal, emotional help I simply cannot bring myself to ask for.

As a Franciscan I have a motto to keep to: "ask nothing, refuse nothing". It means I don't ask anyone for anything, but I accept anything and everything that's offered to me. Even if it's not something i need, if I accept it anyway then I'm a) giving that person a chance to give and b) I can give it away to someone else who wants it.
 

Gen

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I'm actually fairly free with asking 'logistical' help, though only the kind where I can't do things myself, like if I need someone with an HGV licence to drive a truck for me cos I haven't got one, but I always compensate people in some way that we both agree to.

It's personal, emotional help I simply cannot bring myself to ask for.

I had a really hard time even asking my uncle to help me move a mattress. Which he couldn't do and I had to rent a truck to do it without him.

Emotional? Ha. We don't talk about our feelings in our family. Ever.
 

The_Liquid_Laser

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I really really hate to ask for help. I know I take this to an irrational level. Somebody help me!!! :sad: ;)
 

substitute

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I had a really hard time even asking my uncle to help me move a mattress. Which he couldn't do and I had to rent a truck to do it without him.

Emotional? Ha. We don't talk about our feelings in our family. Ever.

Yeah, actually my family are the last ones I ever ask for help, mainly cos experience shows they never give it!!

I've a pretty large sorta surrogate family though in my close and even not so close friends, and they're much more ...helpful! :)

I've learned to ask them for help more often because I've learned that they can often actually feel offended by my not doing so - they feel sorta insulted, as though I'm suggesting that I think of them as the sorts of people who are so selfish and stingey and self-absorbed that they'd refuse a friend some help when it isn't much trouble for them. And I've also learned that, with NICE people, they don't actually like watching their friends struggle along on their own, and actually want and appreciate being given the chance to help.
 

INTJMom

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...And I've also learned that, with NICE people, they don't actually like watching their friends struggle along on their own, and actually want and appreciate being given the chance to help.
Exactly.
 

runvardh

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Some of us who are not NTs also have issues requesting aid...
 

cascadeco

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Yeah, actually my family are the last ones I ever ask for help, mainly cos experience shows they never give it!!

And I've also learned that, with NICE people, they don't actually like watching their friends struggle along on their own, and actually want and appreciate being given the chance to help.

Oh, true with my family. I always brace myself when I need my parents or my brother to provide assistance for me, because it's *always* some sort of imposition on them. They're annoyed, they wonder why I can't find someone else to do it, they wonder why I need the help, and I end up feeling bad because I need help.....ug. So I only ask them when I've exhausted all other resources. And it's not even that often that I ask for help anyway!

It took me a long time to realize that this in fact isn't 'normal' (well, nothing is normal, but anyway...) -- that in fact there was a whole world of other people who love to help out, who are NICE and accommodating, who actually aren't imposed upon and don't guilt you and make you feel bad for asking, but who instead take pleasure in helping others.....
 

runvardh

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Oh, true with my family. I always brace myself when I need my parents or my brother to provide assistance for me, because it's *always* some sort of imposition on them. They're annoyed, they wonder why I can't find someone else to do it, they wonder why I need the help, and I end up feeling bad because I need help.....ug. So I only ask them when I've exhausted all other resources. And it's not even that often that I ask for help anyway!

It took me a long time to realize that this in fact isn't 'normal' (well, nothing is normal, but anyway...) -- that in fact there was a whole world of other people who love to help out, who are NICE and accommodating, who actually aren't imposed upon and don't guilt you and make you feel bad for asking, but who instead take pleasure in helping others.....

I had the opposite of your family and I still have trouble asking the nice people for help ^^;;
 

cascadeco

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Hmmm..I wouldn't know your reason for being reluctant to ask for help. It's only relatively recently that I've 'discovered' it's ok to need help (and again, that friends LIKE helping), but I am still sometimes reluctant because I automatically think I'll be imposing on the person, or am a nuisance or bother, or am causing the other person issues with their schedule/life and I don't want to complicate things for them by asking for their time.
 

FDG

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For me, it goes like this: I have no problem asking for help if I'm one on one with the person, or talking with him-her over some means of communication etc.

However I don't like to contact a person purposefully in order just to ask for help. It also depends on the way help is given; for example if I'm trying to solve a problem "help" can many times be just brainstorming to get ideas out loud.
 

runvardh

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actually never mind, my mother was useless for help 50% of the time anyway just from how off in her own stuff she was. I found it easier to do things on my own than watch my mother make a mess of it when she got around to it and then me having to fix it anyway.
 

substitute

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Oh, true with my family. I always brace myself when I need my parents or my brother to provide assistance for me, because it's *always* some sort of imposition on them. ...

Well with my family it's not that, they don't begrudge you asking. They just never, ever help. They always claim they can't do it, they haven't the time/resources/whatever. Like my mom one time, when I was about to be evicted onto the street with my kids, said we couldn't sleep at her house because she just didn't have the space. Even though she had two spare rooms. See, she wanted to redecorate them very soon, so it was a shame I couldn't be evicted at a more convenient time for her, but hey...

It took me a long time to realize that this in fact isn't 'normal' (well, nothing is normal, but anyway...) -- that in fact there was a whole world of other people who love to help out, who are NICE and accommodating, who actually aren't imposed upon and don't guilt you and make you feel bad for asking, but who instead take pleasure in helping others.....

Yes, exactly. IOW, I discovered that I wasn't actually a sucker or a stupidly naive idiot that held people up to ridiculously high standards and demanded too much of people, as my family maintain. I discovered it was actually they who are extremely mean and selfish and lazy, and that most people are not like that, and in the outside world, people like me are known as 'nice people'!!

actually never mind, my mother was useless for help 50% of the time anyway just from how off in her own stuff she was. I found it easier to do things on my own than watch my mother make a mess of it when she got around to it and then me having to fix it anyway.

Amen to that... if my mother ever did help me, it was always "help" in inverted commas!! She's so damn unreliable that the only thing you can rely on her for is to break her word and let you down every single time!!!
 
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