I think about many different things... in fact I feel I'm getting to be too introspective lately. I wish I can just let go like you do FL, but there's just way too many problems all interconnected to one another. I think of one solution, and then I couldn't help but think about how it will affect another one, then see parts that wouldn't work well... and I'm back to square one.
Anyways, the major one I have currently is this: I know I need to change myself, the question is how?
Hi Nightning,
Good to see you again. Seems like I haven't seen you much recently.
Like I said, I'm not looking to convert anyone. And the thread isn't really about whether we need to change our way of thinking or how to do that.
But what the heck. If this leads to a derailment of the thread, the mods can perhaps split it off and fashion a new thread out of it.
You're right, there are a couple of steps to progress through in order to start changing things in our lives. We have a fixed architecture to our ways of thinking, and we have devices for defending that architecture. When our architecture is threatened with new, unexpected input, we experience that threat as distress. And the distress has to be dealt with before we can input new ideas and undertake change. When I described my own changes, I left out that step: dealing with the distress that accompanies new ways of thinking and change.
You said:
...There's just way too many problems all interconnected to one another. I think of one solution, and then I couldn't help but think about how it will affect another one, then see parts that wouldn't work well... and I'm back to square one.
That, of course, is your Ni. Introverted iNtuition structures your values and thoughts as an interconnected network or framework. If you want to input a new value, the entire network has to be shifted around and reshaped. If new information and values come at you too fast, then your internal network and everything contained in it feels threatened simultaneously and you start using your Fe as a barrier to keep out new information. When that happens, the new information "feels" wrong or threatening.
At least, that's how I understand it works.
Just for contrast, the INFP's Fi works kind of the opposite. Values float around individually and separately, and there's not a real sense of connection from one to the next. But if a new idea threatens one of the values, then that value can grow in importance to the point where I perceive the attack on that value as an attack on me personally (the traditional INFP defensiveness). And if I use my Ne as a barrier to keep out new information, I end up getting haunted by a sense of impending doom. My Ne gives new information an added sense of threat.
So it's true that one needs to break down their defensive structure and learn how to deal with the distress of new or intruding ideas or information. In my case as an INFP, I handled some situations by simply taking a step back (figuratively or literally) and looking at the situation dispassionately and using a little T. Or if I made an obvious error and people laughed at me, then I learned to laugh with them instead of getting defensive. I quit holding myself to such a high standard and decided that it was acceptable to be a screw-up, if that's what it took to break out of my rut. And in the case of my Ne and the sense of impending doom, I simply learned to tune that out and treat it as self-generated static. A false signal.
So yes, that's the first step: Learn to deal with the distress of new ideas and new ways of seeing things. Learn that when a situation makes you feel distressed, it doesn't necessarily mean that the situation is dangerous to you. It may just be that your internal network of values is being challenged and you need to open up even more and welcome the challenge. Watch how other people handle a situation that would shake you up. If they accept the situation without any particular distress, then try it yourself. Shake off the distress signals, toughen up your skin, and try some new things.
It's only the first step, of course. But if you get in the habit of staying open to new things and/or looking at old things from new angles, solutions to problems will start coming easier to you.
Try out the following link. It says much the same things I mentioned above, but at more length. Instead of preserving your Ni internal network from shocks, do some work to open it up to new input and toughen it up a bit so that it can take in new information quicker and more boldly.
INFJ Personal Growth
FL
who am I kidding I dont have friend's -- that I'm in a perpetual state of apocolyptic fantasy.
