[NT] Making emotions go away

[Bardsandwarriors]

remove the causes by changing my negative beliefs and adopting a philosophical attitude.

This jumps out at me. Are your negative beliefs (about yourself) causing the crying sessions in the toilet?

Or do you think it is something coming from other people?

 

[greenfairy]

This jumps out at me. Are your negative beliefs (about yourself) causing the crying sessions in the toilet?

Or do you think it is something coming from other people?

Yes, it's entirely me (although I could blame my parents, but ultimately I have responsibility for my own thoughts). And I know it's irrational. They're not conscious beliefs, although in the grip of emotion it's hard for me to see that they aren't true. I guess everything comes to perfectionism- because if I fail, then I can't be self sufficient, which means I'm not competent, which means I'm dependent on others, which means I wouldn't survive in the natural environment, which means my genes are inferior. Haha it sounds kind of funny when I put it like that, but that's kind of what goes through my head.

 

[Istbkleta]

if I fail, then I can't be self sufficient, which means I'm not competent, which means I'm dependent on others, which means I wouldn't survive in the natural environment, which means my genes are inferior

This is so cute! It sounds exactly like a little, cute, childish Ti. I wonder what ISTPs would say about this. Do u think that might be interesting enough to ask?

 

[Coriolis]

Ah, so you must not have a lot of negative judgment about yourself. Sometimes paranoia will say "and if these things are true, then this worse thing is true, etc...which means I'm a failure, which means I am bad/worthless."

I have negative judgments, but they are mostly productive, showing me something I need to improve on or do better at.

 

[Bardsandwarriors]

Yes, it's entirely me (although I could blame my parents, but ultimately I have responsibility for my own thoughts). And I know it's irrational. They're not conscious beliefs, although in the grip of emotion it's hard for me to see that they aren't true. I guess everything comes to perfectionism- because if I fail, then

etc

Bingo Parents pushing you to do everything perfectly?

Yet your reaction is an emotional one, wanting their approval, not wanting to be criticised.

If you've left home and you are growing up, you don't need their approval now, and you don't have to be perfect. You only have to do your best, and keep improving. That's the best anyone can ask, of anyone.

 

[Bardsandwarriors]

PS. That's not a platitude. It's a fact. Tell yourself that, in the toilet.

 

[greenfairy]

This is so cute! It sounds exactly like a little, cute, childish Ti. I wonder what ISTPs would say about this. Do u think that might be interesting enough to ask?

Haha. So Ti overreacting and causing problems, along with Ni generating dreadful possibilities- why ISTP's?

I have negative judgments, but they are mostly productive, showing me something I need to improve on or do better at.

Which means they're rational. Lucky.

etc

Bingo Parents pushing you to do everything perfectly?

Yet your reaction is an emotional one, wanting their approval, not wanting to be criticised.

If you've left home and you are growing up, you don't need their approval now, and you don't have to be perfect. You only have to do your best, and keep improving. That's the best anyone can ask, of anyone.

Yeah yeah, true. I do need to tell myself this over and over.

And even if I was incompetent at a lot of things and temporarily dependent, it wouldn't do any good to beat myself up over it and have low self esteem. I've been telling myself this over and over, but it still hasn't sunk in. But I've had more success at work since adopting a more positive attitude.

 

[Bardsandwarriors]

Yeah yeah, true. I do need to tell myself this over and over.

And even if I was incompetent at a lot of things and temporarily dependent, it wouldn't do any good to beat myself up over it and have low self esteem. I've been telling myself this over and over, but it still hasn't sunk in. But I've had more success at work since adopting a more positive attitude.

Humans are social animals. Hardly anyone who ever lived would survive alone in the natural world. As a social animal, you only have to fit into a social niche where you function well and are appreciated. That's why people pay you money!

In terms of functions, I'm not sure how this plays out. I'm here to learn this stuff. but - maybe your Ti isn't properly taking account of the social nature of life?

Anyhow, you asked for NT replies. So I'm kind of out of place here, and I'd better let the rationals back in.

 

[greenfairy]

Humans are social animals. Hardly anyone who ever lived would survive alone in the natural world. As a social animal, you only have to fit into a social niche where you function well and are appreciated. That's why people pay you money!

In terms of functions, I'm not sure how this plays out. I'm here to learn this stuff. but - maybe your Ti isn't properly taking account of the social nature of life?

Anyhow, you asked for NT replies. So I'm kind of out of place here, and I'd better let the rationals back in.

Np; I wasn't saying only NT's, I just specified them because I thought they would have the niftiest tricks for temporary functionality. Perhaps it's just something you;re born with though. Or maybe the NF's would do it better, because they're used to accepting their feelings and stuff.

 

[WALMART]

Haha. So Ti overreacting and causing problems, along with Ni generating dreadful possibilities- why ISTP's?

'Cause we are 1337 at maintaining composure, and the ultimate wielders of Ti.

 

[Bardsandwarriors]

Np; I wasn't saying only NT's, I just specified them because I thought they would have the niftiest tricks for temporary functionality. Perhaps it's just something you;re born with though. Or maybe the NF's would do it better, because they're used to accepting their feelings and stuff.

Yeah, both methods work, apparently; although not being an NT, I am eternally skeptical of the NT route. It's probably just me. But I liked what INTP said:

deal with the causes of your emotions

And what jontherobot said:

Like a cheetah, you're built for it or you're not.

I guess conscious development over a long period of time might work. Or drugs.

Only you can know whether suppressing the emotion is gonna work for you. It might lead to a whole load of other issues which you're not prepared for. As my answers from the NF angle might. So use em all and let us know what happens.

What I suspect is happening is that you have these issues in your head which need resolving, but they are being precipitated by some combination of ahem "difficult" customers who for some reason that you also need to figure out, are hitting your buttons.

kyuuei has an interesting solution: join the army first, so you can get used to being in danger ALL THE TIME and not care. It sounds like an antidote, a catharsis, for NF-ness. Then, when you've developed that method of dealing with stuff, go back to being a waitress

 

[greenfairy]

Only you can know whether suppressing the emotion is gonna work for you. It might lead to a whole load of other issues which you're not prepared for. As my answers from the NF angle might. So use em all and let us know what happens.

I've done the suppressing thing all my life, so the NF thing is what I need to do- like what was said earlier. Then when they come up they won't feel so uncontrollable; like a stream rather than a river. I thought I still needed to at those times when I should be doing something else, but maybe I always need to do the NF thing after all.

What I suspect is happening is that you have these issues in your head which need resolving, but they are being precipitated by some combination of ahem "difficult" customers who for some reason that you also need to figure out, are hitting your buttons.

No the customers aren't actually the problem. I'm just a perfectionist.

kyuuei has an interesting solution: join the army first, so you can get used to being in danger ALL THE TIME and not care. It sounds like an antidote, a catharsis, for NF-ness. Then, when you've developed that method of dealing with stuff, go back to being a waitress

That's a good point; when the things I'm afraid of actually happen, they don't seem so terrible.

 

[Bardsandwarriors]

No the customers aren't actually the problem. I'm just a perfectionist.

That's a good point; when the things I'm afraid of actually happen, they don't seem so terrible.

Fair enough. Wanting to do your job well is fine. Perhaps the perfectionism does come from parents pushing you, or from your own need to advance in life, or from being aware of other staff or managers watching. But perhaps you need to give yourself some leeway for errors, and stand back a little when things aren't going right, because that will get better results overall, and you'll keep going.

 

[greenfairy]

Fair enough. Wanting to do your job well is fine. Perhaps the perfectionism does come from parents pushing you, or from your own need to advance in life, or from being aware of other staff or managers watching. But perhaps you need to give yourself some leeway for errors, and stand back a little when things aren't going right, because that will get better results overall, and you'll keep going.

True.

 

[Coriolis]

Np; I wasn't saying only NT's, I just specified them because I thought they would have the niftiest tricks for temporary functionality. Perhaps it's just something you;re born with though. Or maybe the NF's would do it better, because they're used to accepting their feelings and stuff.

Some people are indeed born with a natural facility with or tendency for distancing themselves from emotions. I suspect it is a skill anyone can learn, though.

I've done the suppressing thing all my life, so the NF thing is what I need to do- like what was said earlier.

Might this be part of why you thought you were NT?

deal with the causes of your emotions

This points to an important distinction. I find it much easier and more productive to deal with the causes of my emotions, than focusing on the emotions themselves.

 

[Siúil a Rúin]

It is important to remember that either strong avoidance or fixation on something can make it more formidable than it needs to be. I approach negative emotions like I approach physical ailments. There have even been times I've called in sick over an anxiety attack. By seeing it as just a natural process in my mind and body it gives it less power and can help negative emotions dissipate rather than escalate.

 

[greenfairy]

Might this be part of why you thought you were NT?

Definitely, and I tried to tell people this. It's not that I suppressed all emotions; I just got the idea that negative emotion --> instability/unpredictability --> possible irrationality and dangerousness --> possible insanity or inability to deal with the world --> weakness and vulnerability --> not surviving. So I tried to do all I could to be stable, rational, and empowered at all times, i.e. a control freak over my mind and inner world.

Some people are indeed born with a natural facility with or tendency for distancing themselves from emotions. I suspect it is a skill anyone can learn, though.

Yeah I don't know how. I associate anger with empowerment, so it has a tendency to take control over my mind because I have the illusion that I'm going somewhere productive with it. But in reality it is only a motivation for finding a rational solution to things, not a rational means to finding a solution. Sadness is something I avoid by focusing on reality, so when I feel it acutely it seems as though it is reality, and so takes over my mind for the moment. I have to use my mind to overpower it and realize that it's not.

This points to an important distinction. I find it much easier and more productive to deal with the causes of my emotions, than focusing on the emotions themselves.

I.e. recognizing the untrue perceptions of reality, identifying the situation I want to change, and why and how I want to change it, then taking steps in that direction. Yes, I agree. The focusing on the emotion part comes in figuring all that out; my conscious mind has to have a dialogue with my unconscious mind. Also it's energy that needs to be released and channeled, and so it can't be bottled up or else it'll explode in inappropriate ways.

It is important to remember that either strong avoidance or fixation on something can make it more formidable than it needs to be. I approach negative emotions like I approach physical ailments. There have even been times I've called in sick over an anxiety attack. By seeing it as just a natural process in my mind and body it gives it less power and can help negative emotions dissipate rather than escalate.

That's an interesting way of looking at it.

 

[INTP]

I.e. recognizing the untrue perceptions of reality, identifying the situation I want to change, and why and how I want to change it, then taking steps in that direction. Yes, I agree. The focusing on the emotion part comes in figuring all that out; my conscious mind has to have a dialogue with my unconscious mind. Also it's energy that needs to be released and channeled, and so it can't be bottled up or else it'll explode in inappropriate ways.

personally i think that what you feel inside is just as true than what you perceive outside, in the end its the inner world that matters, not the external, when it comes to your reactions towards things in external world. i mean the causes of your emotions are inside, not outside. take some buddhist monk for an extreme example who sets himself in fire and burns to death while meditating as a protest and is able to ignore the pain that comes from the outside to his body, its a matter of his inner reactions to his skin burning, not about his skin burning. the trigger might come from outside, but how you deal with the triggers, are dictated by what is inside. so i dont think that your perceptions are untrue, even tho they might not be in line with the external world, they are just subjective. so its your attitude towards external things that need to change if its causing you troubles and to change this attitude, you need to work with your inner unconscious world(like you mentioned with the dialogue between your conscious and unconscious mind). for example, you might get strong negative emotions when you see an drug addict, the emotional response to this is true, even tho it might be overly strong because your dad was an heroin addict and killed himself with it, leaving you alone with your mom when you were 15. this naturally would had bean a traumatic thing to you and created a very strong complex about drugs, even if you would consciously think that "he was an idiot and deserved to die, because he was abusing me and my mom when he was on drugs and he was stupid enough to do drugs, so he is better off dead". now when you see some drug addict, its this complex that gets activated and causes you emotional troubles. i dont think that focusing on the emotions will help you with this, because emotions are the product of the problem, not the problem itself. if you smell gas in your apartment, it doesent help you if you keep smelling the gas, it helps you to find out where the gas leak is, so that you can stop it. and yes, the energy from those complexes(feeling toned associations around a common theme) needs to be released, by differentiating(/separating/channeling) different associations with the common theme. because if one thing gets associated to the complex, the whole complex gets triggered, like with my example with a drug complex, drugs are the common theme in it and the emotional associations to your dad gets easily triggered when something triggers the complex, as they are associated unconsciously in a feeling(not in analytical) level to each others. what i think would help in removing these unwanted feeling associations that cause you trouble, would be to create an analytical aspect to these things, so that they wouldnt be purely feeling toned associations, but those different aspects could be differentiated by giving them thinking aspect also. you have an tert Ti and tert is what works as the mediator between inferior and dom functions and inferior is what works as the doorway for unconscious materials. so asking, why, how etc questions about the causes of disturbing emotions and trying to figure out the answer that way might help a lot.

 

[greenfairy]

personally i think that what you feel inside is just as true than what you perceive outside, in the end its the inner world that matters, not the external, when it comes to your reactions towards things in external world. i mean the causes of your emotions are inside, not outside. take some buddhist monk for an extreme example who sets himself in fire and burns to death while meditating as a protest and is able to ignore the pain that comes from the outside to his body, its a matter of his inner reactions to his skin burning, not about his skin burning. the trigger might come from outside, but how you deal with the triggers, are dictated by what is inside. so i dont think that your perceptions are untrue, even tho they might not be in line with the external world, they are just subjective. so its your attitude towards external things that need to change if its causing you troubles and to change this attitude, you need to work with your inner unconscious world(like you mentioned with the dialogue between your conscious and unconscious mind). for example, you might get strong negative emotions when you see an drug addict, the emotional response to this is true, even tho it might be overly strong because your dad was an heroin addict and killed himself with it, leaving you alone with your mom when you were 15. this naturally would had bean a traumatic thing to you and created a very strong complex about drugs, even if you would consciously think that "he was an idiot and deserved to die, because he was abusing me and my mom when he was on drugs and he was stupid enough to do drugs, so he is better off dead". now when you see some drug addict, its this complex that gets activated and causes you emotional troubles. i dont think that focusing on the emotions will help you with this, because emotions are the product of the problem, not the problem itself. if you smell gas in your apartment, it doesent help you if you keep smelling the gas, it helps you to find out where the gas leak is, so that you can stop it. and yes, the energy from those complexes(feeling toned associations around a common theme) needs to be released, by differentiating(/separating/channeling) different associations with the common theme. because if one thing gets associated to the complex, the whole complex gets triggered, like with my example with a drug complex, drugs are the common theme in it and the emotional associations to your dad gets easily triggered when something triggers the complex, as they are associated unconsciously in a feeling(not in analytical) level to each others. what i think would help in removing these unwanted feeling associations that cause you trouble, would be to create an analytical aspect to these things, so that they wouldnt be purely feeling toned associations, but those different aspects could be differentiated by giving them thinking aspect also. you have an tert Ti and tert is what works as the mediator between inferior and dom functions and inferior is what works as the doorway for unconscious materials. so asking, why, how etc questions about the causes of disturbing emotions and trying to figure out the answer that way might help a lot.

I don't entirely know what you mean about differentiating and creating mental associations, but it sounds like a good idea.

 

[COLORATURA]

I'm posting this thread here because NT's are supposed to mostly not be emotional, or at least usually have good control over their emotions. If I'm wrong about this, please correct.

Anyhow, as I've mentioned, emotions other than happiness and such tend to cause me problems. I have a pretty good handle on anger now, even though it's not perfect, but being upset is hard to deal with. I'm particularly concerned with being emotional at work or in public, or when I have something important to do. I saw a question on some test which asked if you can easily put your emotions aside in order to do your job, and I have to say no. If I feel really anxious, stressed, or upset, the emotions don't go away simply by telling myself they're inappropriate at the time. If I feel like crying it's impossible to stop myself. I've cried at work twice, and I tried my hardest not to.

My preferred strategy is to just not get emotional. Most things don't upset me. I get upset over issues, and 2 in particular- if something happens which tells me I'm incompetent or if I feel like I am deprived of something. Really sad events upset me, so I avoid them. Unfortunately school and work are related to my sense of competence, so I am frequently stressed about school and have a tendency to get upset if I make a mistake at work.

Lately I've been making myself relax and meditate more, and what I discovered is that if I sit still and don't have distractions, I have an underlying sense of panic. I wonder if this panic is there all the time and I just don't notice it.

Anyway; panic, stress, anxiety, etc., sadness, loneliness, and whatever feelings are associated with lack and incompetence really interfere with my ability to do my job and schoolwork sometimes, and I'd really like it if there was some trick to being able to effectively ignore them long enough to get things done.

I wondered what the experience of NT's is in particular with regard to dealing with emotions at inopportune times, and how you do it.

I may be a little late with my reply, and I don't have time to read all the others...BUT...
The way we INTP's tend to ignore feelings is not necessarily a good thing. I have read in several places we have the least amount of coping resources available of all the types. We still have feelings, and they still affect us, we just usually rationalize them & ignore them if they don't make sense. I don't know about all the other INTP's, but this usually causes for me a HUGE overload of ignored emotions that eventually build up & explode. The explosion usually comes at a time of stress & then here comes that inferior Fe person that we hate.

Anyhow, on the practical side of things, have you tried cutting out sugar (& white things in general) & maybe cut back on the caffeine? Even something simple like that can help with mood swings BIG TIME. Also, like the others said exercise is always a good idea.

One other thing I used to tell my ex-hubs a lot (INFJ) was to try & put himself in the shoes of someone else & try to imagine all the possibilities of what they may be going through that caused them to react to you in a negative manner. The possibilities are endless. It's best when others cause you distress to realize that all you can do is control yourself. Although, this may not contribute much to your stress, but I am assuming it does...you being INFJ & all.