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[ENTP] Memories of ENTP childhood

guesswho

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Joined
Jul 9, 2010
Messages
1,977
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ENTP
When I was a kid I would virtually live inside my head...i don't remember causing any trouble in the kindergarden or school.

I remember I had these toy soldiers, and I'd play with them, organize them in 2 small armies and start a war lol (wars were constantly on TV)

My grandfather would tell me stories of world war 2, I remember he used to cry sometimes when he told them, I'd always listen.

I'd often go outside of the city with my grandfather, he'd work on the vineyard and I'd just wonder around looking at all the trees, bugs and flowers, it was so awesome, the diversity of nature.

I had this glass, when I looked trough it, the whole word would look different, the lights were stronger , and the shapes of stuff would fade, me and a few friends would look trough it at night.

This was when I was in the kindergarden.

In school I had 2 intj friends. Actually I know one of them was 100% INTJ, he told me computers are his life when he was like 12, and then later when he was 16 he said that he only believes in science, I thought that was a very dorky thing to say considering a girl was present lol.

The other guy was insanely smart, I think he was intj too, because he would come up with answers at math, but not know exactly how he came up with them, often he would do 50% of the problem, and then come up with the answer not realizing that he had just skipped the other 50% of the problem. I never understood how anybody could solve something and not be able to explain how he solved it. I guess that's Ni.

I didn't talk much, it was annoying to focus on stuff, I also didn't analize stuff much, didn't really care what was going on around me, I'd just daydream.

I would ride my bike really long distances, never actually wanting to stop, but not on the main roads in the city, outside of it, on the hills.

I'd organize expeditions with lots of people, going really far, just for the sake of exploring.

My INTJ friend would make his arm fart in school, and thought it was cool.

He also put a condom on his head and blew in it till it got really big lol. Imagine a dork with a condom on his head.

I'd say nothing, and not pay much attention to what others were saying.

Anyway, the point of the thread is to share stuff to see what we had in common, how similar was our behavior. There's a thread for ENTJs I guess we could make one for every type.
 

Emectar

New member
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May 17, 2010
Messages
149
MBTI Type
ENFP
I know i'm not an ENTP but a lot of that did sound familiar. It's very nicely written by the way haha, it would be a great memoir.

I lived very much inside my head when i was a kid too, i daydreamed constantly, and also showed a lot of introverted tendencies. I also had two really close friends and kept to myself otherwise. One was an INTJ and extremely smart and competitive with me, and the other was probably an ENTP and really similar to me.

I changed quite a bit as i got older only coming out of my head and becoming extraverted around 7th grade. Did you have a similar change?
 

guesswho

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Jul 9, 2010
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I made a jail break out of my head when I was like 15 and that was it.
 

Scorquendo

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Dec 8, 2009
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58
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INTP
I am an INTP, but as a kid, I was more EN-T/F-J/P:

-In first grade, I defiantly did not want to watch Pocahontas, citing that we ought to see Michael Mann's 1995 film, "Heat," instead, and that Rated G films "sucked." I remember getting in trouble for that.

-In Kindergarten, I tried to direct plays with other kids my age. That went well...

-Throughout elementary, I had an affinity for building/designing things from legos, sand, and tree branches. I remember trying to make a Las Vegas Hotel with legos in 3rd grade, lol.

-I always took charge of a group and made sure everything went accordingly, even to a point of doing everybody's work and giving them credit because I did not trust them.

-Whenever I went on a swing-set, I would close my eyes and almost always visualize 10-20 years from that point looking back at that moment, citing that I should never forget it as I got older.

-I always aced math and english classes and my teachers were impressed with my vocabulary and obscure commentary.

-When we played basketball, I would direct my teammates to actual "plays" I looked up.

-I played chess a lot.

I'm sure there's more, but remembering all this is starting to make me sad that it's gone.
 

funkadelik

good hair
Joined
Jan 10, 2011
Messages
1,614
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lmao
Well, considering the memory of my life is spotty, I'll do my best...

- I spent most of my childhood in my imagination and in my head. I was super social and often my report card said, "must refrain from unnecessary talking" on it, however I was also really spacey and often took my interaction with people for granted (I mostly thought people were just convenient comets in the atmosphere of my imaginary world). I wasn't really well versed in how to be socially appropriate and I can recall very often being a bit "too much" for most people (but not caring all that much cause I was far too busy in my own head and there were far too many other people out there).

- I was incredibly precocious and never tired of showing off my intellect and abilities and telling people things I had recently learned (with no concern about coming across as a know-it-all). I was also kind of bossy and could be really hell-bent on getting things my own way. My mother (a single mum) and I bashed heads for pretty much the first 8 years of my life. But she taught me the value of compromise through it all.

- I taught myself to read, which is a fact my mother never tires of remembering, which is pretty sweet, really (I had some help from Hooked on Phonics, so I don't actually know if I can claim to this, though).

- Another story from my mother was one of when I was a toddler and she took me to the carnival and I was on this fire truck ride where you sat in a fire truck that was in a corral with a bunch of other fire trucks and they all went around and around and you were able to honk little horns and flash little lights by pressing buttons inside your fire truck. Anyway, she says that all the other kids were honking their horns and flashing their lights and squealing with joy and whatnot, but I was just sitting there staring at the ride (the central movement mechanism) and looking around and underneath the car with a puzzled look on my face, I guess trying to figure out how it worked.

- I spent a lot a lot of time in the library and the librarian kind of became my best friend. She even took me out to lunch sometimes. I loved it there and I especially loved the books that had puzzles in them.

- I loved making forts as much as I liked playing in them. I'd build these really elaborate forts, each one better than the last to withstand the most serious of attacks.

- Most of my friends were boys. I was a serious tomboy. Other than that, most of my friends were adults (but I think this was a being an only child thing).

- I loved turning over rocks and looking at all the stuff living underneath them. I remember being fascinated by the fact that it seemed like a whole other world so separate from my own.

- I remember the moment I read that water is made up of two hydrogen molecule and one oxygen molecule and it blew my mind. Kind of jump-started my love affair with science.
 

Tamske

Writing...
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Oct 22, 2009
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1,764
MBTI Type
ENTP
My very first dated memory: my sister made a crown for my third birthday. She used a sort of special ruler and I was more interested in the ruler than in the cake or the crown or anything else. I wanted to be old and smart enough to use such a ruler too. This has been repeated with things like a periodic system :)

I loved to create things: cut, paste, paint,... and made sorts of (very mini) minigolf courses in the sand. When classmates came to play I tried to get them into fantastic role-plays, the subject of which depended on the classmate's taste. With one of them, we invented a town called "Mad Town" where everything was totally crazy and impossible, eg. toilets grew in trees and you had to climb the tree if you needed to go. I also didn't want my mum to read a story before bedtime - I wanted her to TELL one, which meant to invent one on the spot together with me. This storytelling I tried to maintain as long as possible, that was one of the reasons I didn't want to grow up. Others came later eg. I was not interested in politics but I felt it my duty to vote responsibly, so I just didn't want to turn 18. I DID want to get smarter and stronger, by the way, and able to use the oven and become as good at drawing as my ten year older sister.

I had a happy youth. During high school I was an outsider and had some difficulties because of puberty. I combatted them with inventing stories in which I was the popular one. Also I wanted to find my "true self"... until I realized I actually DIDN'T want to lose time on that while there were stars to look at and more stories to invent :)
 

Amethyst

¡MI TORTA!
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May 9, 2010
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2,191
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ESTP
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7w8
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so/sx
I would think that when I was older (maybe from like 8-12) I was probably ENTP, but for certain I was 100% N. And I can relate to a lot of what was posted above.

-I never understood why the kids around me would rather paint their nails or do each others' hair or play soccer, and why they wouldn't want to play pretend things like turning the tire swing into a space saucer or pretending to be Pokemon/Digimon etc. I did find some friends who did, but they were pretty close-knit to themselves as they all lived in the same neighborhood, and I didn't.

-Because of this, I was sort of the kid that everyone made fun of. You know, the jokes like 'Haha what if you touched *insert gross outcast kids name* that would be sooo gross! They're so weird' Every class has one. It was me. I didn't think I was gross or weird, but I think other kids thought that of me because I was SO out of it.

-I was really good with school, unless the class I had was very strict or the teacher just generally gave me an incredibly hard time (for whatever reason, this was always a math class). My math teachers (after 2nd grade) would think I was extremely immature, and even though I would do my work well, I always got bad marks because of my behaviour, or just because the teacher disliked me so much.

- I got in some trouble a lot. I think I was a T when I was around that age, because I know there were several accounts where if the teacher wasn't consistent in their logic, I would call them out on it in a snarky clever way and try to 'go around' the teachers rules or demands, or whatever was inconsistent. They would either agree with me at that point, which in that case I'd let them go of it, or I'd give them an even harder time because I thought they were being unfair. I also beat up kids for my own self-defense...but at one point I beat up a friend because she upset me for whatever reason which I don't remember. I still feel bad about it. :(

- The only people I remember ever getting along with were the boys, and the girls who thought a lot like I did...but I started growing apart from the girls because they got into those things that I couldn't understand, like the makeup and stuff.

-I loathed girly things. I was the biggest tomboy. I just thought all that girl crap was a waste of time, and that I'd rather do something physical or at least something I can use my creativity with rather than doing mundane tasks that girls enjoyed doing. :laugh:

-I still sort of think that painting nails/makeup/hair stuff are mundane tasks that I'd rather not do, but I have to. :(

- I also taught myself how to read right before my second birthday. I always thought it was weird that other kids in kindergarten and 1st grade couldn't read...I just didn't understand what was so hard about it. :shrug:

- I absolutely loved drawing and coloring. I remember a teacher tried to beat out the doodling out of me (obviously that can never be done) because she thought it was distracting to the class (gave her a hard time with that statement, as no one was really being 'distracted' by what I was doing...god was she stupid) I ended up getting a good grade in the class (As on all the work, C for the paying attention grade) but if the teacher had more than half of a brain she could see that I did well maybe because I did pay attention, I just have to multi-task in order to. I didn't know that then, but I know that when I doodle during a lecture today, I can look at the doodle for future reference and remember what the professor was talking about. It's 'my way' of taking notes. :D

-Also, I'm pretty sure that most of my time was spent drawing and doodling whatever popped up in my head.

- I also remember most of the teachers that gave me a hard time (aka math :dry: ) it was mostly because they were stupid and I could sense it from them, or that they just got super pissed off with my disorganization. But I don't even think it was disorganization, it was more like 'I'm too stuck in my own head to even notice that I own a bookbag'.

- I LOVED playing with puppets, and we would make puppet shows. And I don't really remember much else from my childhood, as most of it was in my own head and not being involved with my surroundings.
 

Tamske

Writing...
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Oct 22, 2009
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ENTP
-I was really good with school, unless the class I had was very strict or the teacher just generally gave me an incredibly hard time (for whatever reason, this was always a math class). My math teachers (after 2nd grade) would think I was extremely immature, and even though I would do my work well, I always got bad marks because of my behaviour, or just because the teacher disliked me so much.
Same, but for me it was always the Dutch (mother language) class... I never understood why you still had to learn Dutch even if you knew all of grammar and spelling. Reading books? That's something you do for pleasure! Discussing about them? Bullshit. Style?? That's a matter of taste, and my taste was for fantasy, science fiction and action, not for symbolic things.
Maths was okay, there was no stupid matter of taste in that. You could concentrate on being right without having to worry about what the teacher wants.
-I still sort of think that painting nails/makeup/hair stuff are mundane tasks that I'd rather not do, but I have to. :(
I turned 30 yesterday and I still don't use makeup (except on very rare occasions) and my hair is between 2 cm and 5 cm long; washed twice a week, combed if somebody with a bigger Se than mine makes remarks about it.

- I also taught myself how to read right before my second birthday. I always thought it was weird that other kids in kindergarten and 1st grade couldn't read...I just didn't understand what was so hard about it. :shrug:
I didn't teach myself, but I could read quite early too. My mother was a teacher in first grade and was only too happy to answer my questions about those funny letters. I never understood that whole fuss about words with one syllable. If you can read one syllable, you can read the next one too and put it together, no?

I also doodled in lessons, but in my case my teachers were right. I didn't distract others (and they never told me that either), but I did distract myself. I had to take real ordinary notes too. They didn't stop my doodling, I did it myself - I found out writing stories during the lesson was still a lot more fun :doh: And by that time (I was in university when I started to write) I was able to keep two sheets of paper on my desk and switch to paying attention and taking ordinary notes whenever necessary. Most of the university lessons were (more than) difficult enough for me not needing the writing distraction to keep me from falling asleep, but some of them...
 

Amethyst

¡MI TORTA!
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May 9, 2010
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ESTP
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Maths was okay, there was no stupid matter of taste in that. You could concentrate on being right without having to worry about what the teacher wants.
I was always interested in the subject because of that, but the teachers would call me out on the silliest stuff, like sitting up straight, not looking around the room so much (another way I learned was looking at all those colorful posters in the classroom and then just generally out the window) and of course, doodling. I think a lot of it was political (some times my parents and the teacher wouldn't really see eye to eye, and I'd be the one paying the consequences. Recently in high school and college, math seemed to be a lot easier (if I just did the work I could've gotten A's) but I basically didn't do any work for those classes, which was a big mistake.

I didn't teach myself, but I could read quite early too. My mother was a teacher in first grade and was only too happy to answer my questions about those funny letters. I never understood that whole fuss about words with one syllable. If you can read one syllable, you can read the next one too and put it together, no?

I also doodled in lessons, but in my case my teachers were right. I didn't distract others (and they never told me that either), but I did distract myself. I had to take real ordinary notes too. They didn't stop my doodling, I did it myself - I found out writing stories during the lesson was still a lot more fun :doh: And by that time (I was in university when I started to write) I was able to keep two sheets of paper on my desk and switch to paying attention and taking ordinary notes whenever necessary. Most of the university lessons were (more than) difficult enough for me not needing the writing distraction to keep me from falling asleep, but some of them...

Haha yeah, college seems to make it harder and harder to be able to get distracted by other things, but mostly because the material being taught and who's teaching it can be interesting. I've only had two or three college courses like that though...the other ones I would just try to doodle as much as I could (even if I didn't feel like it) so it wouldn't feel like I was in that class...Or if it was big enough, and the professor is monotone enough, I can just sleep.
 
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