[INTP] INTP relationship with their body

[The Unknown Essence]

As an INTP, I have a somewhat ambivalent relationship with my body. I guess this a reflection of the fact that prefer the mental realm to interaction with the physical environment as a whole.

I quite like the idea of being a disembodied consciousness (not a "brain in a vat", rather a completely incorporeal mind). Don't get me wrong, the human body is beautifully designed and has some very important uses. However it would be cool to have my mind-including both thoughts and emotions- as well as the five senses (most importantly sight and hearing) without the restrictions of a material body.

What do you think?

 

[Red Herring]

This sounds very familiar. I often don't notice my body unless it has certain needs (cold, hunger, etc.) and only once in a while zoom in on the physical part of me.

But I have recently decided that this is unhealthy and I am now trying to consciously reconnect, be nice to it and feel how the soles of my feet touch the ground. That immediately creates a connection running through the entire body from the soles to the brain. It's hard to describe. Or when I am under the shower, I try to not see it as cleaning this object under my neck but to sense how it is part of "me" (whatever "I" means).

It's not that I perceive my body as something foreign or bothersome, I actually like it, I just often forget it is there.

 

[Totenkindly]

I used to view my body as a "diving suit" that my mind wore in its explorations of the world. So I owned it, but it really wasn't identified as "me." This had pro's and con's. It did mean I had pretty amazing control over pain with my body, that I could do things without really noticing signals of exhaustion or stress from my body, etc, much as you can force a car to run even when the engine light comes on. I also could just try to ignore aspects of my body I did not like.

But over the years, I had came into a more growing acceptance of my physical body. It's not really 'separate" from me, it's part of me, and when I run it into the ground, things happen to it that impact my mind's ability to function. My body affects my mood, for good or ill. Being "in" my body has left me feeling pain much more sharply when it occurs (and being susceptible to body responses to pain), but it has also left me feeling exquisite sensations that are worth the experience to be immersed in. It's rather amazing, how sensate the body actually is. And being in my body helps me also feel like I have tangible power in the world, rather than just being floating in ether.

I think age kind of demands growing awareness of the body. Our healing processes slow down, things hurt more than they used to, aches and pains appear, and the things we could do without care when we were 20 now cause us more serious harm at twice that age and at the least distraction as the body puts out signals showing us we need to slow down.

I just see understanding the role the body plays in my identity as part of what it means to be a human being and not just a mind.

 

[Mephistopheles]

I used to view my body as a "diving suit" that my mind wore in its explorations of the world. So I owned it, but it really wasn't identified as "me." This had pro's and con's. It did mean I had pretty amazing control over pain with my body, that I could do things without really noticing signals of exhaustion or stress from my body, etc, much as you can force a car to run even when the engine light comes on. I also could just try to ignore aspects of my body I did not like.

Lol. I actually still have this point of view. I always saw me body as a tool I use rather than really something that defines me as a person. I'm also quite insensible to pain and exhaustion, f.e., I can easily run longer & faster than most people I know, not because I have more stamina, but because they run until they're exhausted - I run until I fall over because my muscles reject to work anymore. Though I'm only 18, so I'm probably a youngling in your eyes anyway.^^

 

[rav3n]

Of the two typed INTPs and third guessed INTP experienced in real life, they appeared to view their bodies as instruments to understand and finely tune, same as their minds or anything else that tweaked their interests. No idea what their enneagram types are.

I sometimes wonder about the steretype that some INTPs and others believe, where INTPs are oblivious to sensory input. Either I've known unusual INTPs or the stereotype isn't accurate.

 

[Beargryllz]

I like my body. I love my body.

 

[xisnotx]

If given the chance to "download" myself into a robot body...I'd do it in an instant. A body that doesn't hurt..doesn't sweat..doesn't need food..doesn't need to take a shower...this is what science should be working on.

That being said I do look after my body. It's not something I enjoy doing but I recognize the importance of doing it.

 

[Cat_Cloud]

I don't mind having a body, but I just wish it could take care of itself...

 

[Greta]

We go for long periods barely on speaking terms. Then it punishes me for attention.

 

[Arthur Schopenhauer]

Freaks.

 

[Emectar]

As an INTP, I have a somewhat ambivalent relationship with my body. I guess this a reflection of the fact that prefer the mental realm to interaction with the physical environment as a whole.

I quite like the idea of being a disembodied consciousness (not a "brain in a vat", rather a completely incorporeal mind). Don't get me wrong, the human body is beautifully designed and has some very important uses. However it would be cool to have my mind-including both thoughts and emotions- as well as the five senses (most importantly sight and hearing) without the restrictions of a material body.

What do you think?

I know i'm not an intp, but as far as i've heard, we ENFPs are another type that lives for the most part in its head, and can occasionally forget about that body.

For me though i find this idea upsetting, and i do feel happier when i get very physical for a while. It grounds me, and releases tension that can't be released mentally.

 

[Hera]

I find myself both attractive and annoyed by it. I'm very healthy, young, and all that jazz. That's all I care about as far as my body goes.

 

[milkyway2]

I became much more aware of it and in tune with it after doing LSD. what does this mean? I have no idea.

 

[Dillan]

I'm typically very oblivious. Very, very oblivious. I get so lost in thought and daydreams that I do sometimes forget that I have a physical presence that's constantly interacting with the world around it, that me just being somewhere is having the effect of me displacing things that might otherwise have been where ever that 'somewhere' happens to be. It's curious for me then, that at other times, I can be intensely interested in my body - or rather, how my body moves and what it can do if applied. My hobbies revolve around very limited forms of Martial Arts/Free Running and in those instances I can become obsessive about how something is performed in order to achieve the desired effect. In particular, I have an intense interest in how some Martial Arts - oriental ones spring to mind - achieve the intense power generation that they can accomplish and it's at those times that I am overtly conscious in my body. I have, on occasion, caught myself staring at my hand, or wrist or forearm or some other part of me that's needed to accomplish a certain motion for a certain reason and - it is, in these instances - that I feel my most powerful and my most vulnerable.

Most of the time I'm a total space-cadet though. |:

 

[The_World_As_Will]

What's a body?

I'm typically very oblivious. Very, very oblivious. I get so lost in thought and daydreams that I do sometimes forget that I have a physical presence that's constantly interacting with the world around it, that me just being somewhere is having the effect of me displacing things that might otherwise have been where ever that 'somewhere' happens to be.

Most of the time I'm a total space-cadet though. |:

+1 pretty much this.

 

[freeeekyyy]

I don't know about INTPs, but I know that as an INTJ, I find the idea very unappealing. I'd much prefer a body that I can control than no body at all. If I could turn pain off at will, or walk through walls, or any number of other things that would be great, but just being a consciousness without a body doesn't seem particularly attractive.

 

[Red Herring]

I don't know about INTPs, but I know that as an INTJ, I find the idea very unappealing. I'd much prefer a body that I can control than no body at all. If I could turn pain off at will, or walk through walls, or any number of other things that would be great, but just being a consciousness without a body doesn't seem particularly attractive.

Not suprising. This seems to be an INTP thing much more than an INTJ thing. Anecdotal evidence both in real life and on the forum seems to point at this: INTPs forgetting or neglecting their body and INTJs mastering and controlling it. Of course it's not black and white, but I see this trend.

 

[lowtech redneck]

it would be cool to have my mind-including both thoughts and emotions- as well as the five senses (most importantly sight and hearing) without the restrictions of a material body.

You've essentially described the dreams I remember when I wake up....

 

[quidtimeam]

I often do feel like my body has wishes of its own that I cannot control, rather than being unified with my personality.

One thing I am curious about, related to this, is obesity rates for INTPs. Most INTPs I know are extremely skinny, reflecting that indifference to sensate experience, but I am somewhat heavyset, precisely because my sensate needs feel so detached from my personality, and I will often eat too much without a sense of autonomous control over the process. Or I'll overtrain when I do exercise. It feels like my body keeps moving on its own regardless of how much I might convince myself that I've already exercised enough for the day. Anybody else have the experience of detachment manifesting as hyper-attachment to the sensory?

 

[PH.]

@quidtimeam

I do have a similar thing with eating. When I eat something I like, I just keep eating untill my stomach hurts for the rest of the day, and only then I realise I've been full for quite some time. This only occurs when I eat food I really like. In particular the texture of the food. Mostly I forget to eat though

Being able to live with just a mind has been my childs dream. I don't even want the five senses per se, I just want to think and discover how the universe and everything works. And no, you don't need the senses for that the way I envision it. It's more a... being part of everything mentally thing. I also really don't want to die. The knowledge of having a body that deteriorates frightens me. As if your body is trying to hold you back from being.