INxJ or Ni users: do you create fantasy melodrama?

[Usehername]

That's not normal?!
Did you make a contingency plan for what to do when the shark attacks you?
Were you stalked by a shark the last time you went SCUBA diving?

1. I live with a vocal and close-minded ISFJ. She reminds me regularly my brain is not normal/focused on things that matter.
2. Absolutely! Dozens of contingency plans!
3. No.

I think about things like this all the time. And I try to picture the exact facial expressions, screams, sensations, rushing thoughts. When I engage my imagination like that, I often get a physical reaction.

(I often do this with serious injury or death )

I also do this when I'm imagining telling someone something that would surprise them -- I try to paint the details of their reaction in my mind, including what it would feel like to be them.

I get the physical reactions too! (Actually, details were included in my first version of the post before Haight made me question things and delete a sentence or two.)

 

[INTJMom]

My problem is, when I have thought like that, it feels like a premonition and I become afraid that it will really happen, which then sometimes prevents me from venturing forward.

Last year, we planned a family outing to the mountains. I kept having recurring thoughts about being attacked by four escaped convicts. We went, and nothing bad happened.

 

[INTJMom]

Developing contingency plans!! That's what we INTJs are for!! Woo-hoo!

 

[nightning]

Agree with Mom there. It's absolutely normal for me to do that. When I was younger, I used to imagine putting myself into plots from books. Nowadays I think mostly about awesome tragic things that can happen in great details... like what will happen if I fall out the window from the 4th floor lab. The giddiness of the fall, whipping against the tree branches, hitting the concrete below and rolling etc.

Your ISFJ roommate needs to be more imaginative.

 

[edcoaching]

Agree with Mom there. It's absolutely normal for me to do that. When I was younger, I used to imagine putting myself into plots from books. Nowadays I think mostly about awesome tragic things that can happen in great details... like what will happen if I fall out the window from the 4th floor lab. The giddiness of the fall, whipping against the tree branches, hitting the concrete below and rolling etc.

Your ISFJ roommate needs to be more imaginative.

I was in a roomful of Ni's at a type conference and once one person admitted to childhood fantasies of being a French Resistance fighter (he's in New Zealand) the rest of the room started sharing the fantasies they enacted over and over. I still use mine occasionally, from a childhood favorite book, to fall asleep when my mind simply won't turn off. As for imagining myself in situations...how else do people think through things, anyway. perfectly normal and sensible preparation for reality...

 

[INTJMom]

1. I live with a vocal and close-minded ISFJ. She reminds me regularly my brain is not normal/focused on things that matter.
...

On a completely different note:
I had an ISFJ best friend and she was a very mild person who wouldn't judge anyone.
She was so patient and accepting.
I can't imagine her being the way you describe.
I knew an ISFJ man also, who wouldn't behave that way either.
How sure are you of her type?
Just sayin'...

 

[Usehername]

On a completely different note:
I had an ISFJ best friend and she was a very mild person who wouldn't judge anyone.
She was so patient and accepting.
I can't imagine her being the way you describe.
I knew an ISFJ man also, who wouldn't behave that way either.
How sure are you of her type?
Just sayin'...

100%. The only way I could be wrong (which I'm not) is if she was an eSFJ. But she's not--she's an ISFJ.

 

[INTJMom]

Ah. Maybe it's her enneagram that makes her aggressive like that.

 

[Usehername]

Ah. Maybe it's her enneagram that makes her aggressive like that.

Type is not correlated to unhealthy world views.

 

[INTJMom]

Well, just for the record. I think she's wrong about your mind.
It works just the way it's supposed to!
There's absolutely nothing wrong with it at all!

 

[Kyrielle]

I constantly do stuff like this. Most of the time it's just interpersonal interactions, but when my real life gets a little boring, this is what I'm doing in my head.

Please tell me other Ni users do this too.

I do. It's perfectly normal. I think other people do it to, but perhaps not with the same "enthusiasm" as Ni folks.

And even if we are messed up, I'd rather be this than not this.

 

[Venom]

I dont think thats healthy Ni. Its one thing to write crazy stories, its quite another to have anxious and fearful day dreams.
Ni can be used for much more positive uses, IMO (you may not agree).


I will admit that I used to have "hero's journey" fantasies ... complete with my own inner soundtrack that comes from nowhere (yes, almost entirely original 'music'). Sometimes revolutions and map expansion occupy my imagination. My imagination in the sense of stories almost feels dead . now I use my N for mostly intellectual or humorous purposes... I guess we all grow up someday.

 

[Travo7]

I do both the daydreaming and people-creating as well. The latter I do especially if I'm arguing opposing sides of any given subject.

 

[edcoaching]

I dont think thats healthy Ni. Its one thing to write crazy stories, its quite another to have anxious and fearful day dreams.
Ni can be used for much more positive uses, IMO (you may not agree).


I will admit that I used to have "hero's journey" fantasies ... complete with my own inner soundtrack that comes from nowhere (yes, almost entirely original 'music'). Sometimes revolutions and map expansion occupy my imagination. My imagination in the sense of stories almost feels dead . now I use my N for mostly intellectual or humorous purposes... I guess we all grow up someday.

Well, that shows the wisdom of Peter Pan, perhaps. You're right that fantasy is overboard if it halts productive living. On the other hand it can add a lot of fun. I know my life is under control when I have time to work on my fantasy book for children (6 chapters drafted...none during the last 4 years. ).

 

[Ishida]

Yeah, but it's more me being shot or stabbed, and the reaction the world would have. Or encountering an opponent.(This is where I make plan A's and Plan B's..) Usually I prefer my more fantasy oriented daydreams. Has anyone imagined their own funeral?

 

[nightning]

I do both the daydreaming and people-creating as well. The latter I do especially if I'm arguing opposing sides of any given subject.

character creation is lots of fun. I used to keep imaginary friends. We had deep discussions inside my head... like the possible existence of vampires and werewolves, whether transmission by bites and transformation etc is possible.

Yeah, but it's more me being shot or stabbed, and the reaction the world would have. Or encountering an opponent.(This is where I make plan A's and Plan B's..) Usually I prefer my more fantasy oriented daydreams. Has anyone imagined their own funeral?

Funny... I just had a discussion with another grad student in the lab about some Japanese businesses have their employees enact their own funeral... He told me besides the funeral ceremony... they also get sealed inside a coffin for about 5-10 minutes in which they're suppose to reflect at the time of their "death" regarding to themselves and the quality of their work.

Yes... don't ask how we managed to get into that topic.

 

[lane777]

So I have this little bit of a problem with my daydreaming. I'll illustrate it with the latest example, but it's really just representative of things that happen all the time in my head. (I'm wondering if it's just because I need to engage my Ni and life these past few weeks has been uneventful.)

I moved back in with my parents this fall; my dad wants to try to go to Cuba as a last family vacation during Christmas break (my sister will be home from another university for Christmas, it's unlikely I'll be living with them next year...). The last family vacation we went away for a few years ago involved SCUBA Diving.
My Ni takes this information (the potential of going away for Christmas break) and clearly decides that I'm going to go diving, enjoying myself on a coral reef, and an 8 foot bull shark will prey after me, because I'm always the smallest diver in the group. Then when the shark tastes me and drags me for a second like a rag doll (engulfing my tank so that I only get bit across my stomach and legs), blood leaking everywhere in the salty water, he realizes I'm not tasty food, and is scared away by the hissing air tank because he punctured it.
At this point, I am bloody and he cracked a few of my ribs as well, and I can't shoot up to the surface because I'm far enough below that I'd "get bent" (the different pressure underwater changes the size of the air molecules in your circulatory system, so you have to go up very slowly and equalize or else face potentially lethal consequences).

So I had like a day of envisioning exactly how it would feel to encounter the shark, and envisioning exactly the stress involved with hearing him puncture my tank; then I envision how to react to the multitude of ways my dad and brother and fellow divers would react to the situation and figure out how to get their "octopus" (secondary breathing mouthpiece in case a fellow diver experiences problems with their breathing apparatus and you suck the same tank through different tubes). All the while, I'm training my brain to constantly blow the air that remains in my lungs out. (As soon as you stop moving air when diving, you're in huge trouble.)

I constantly do stuff like this. Most of the time it's just interpersonal interactions, but when my real life gets a little boring, this is what I'm doing in my head.

Please tell me other Ni users do this too.

Woah can I ever relate. I'll daydream at night so intensely that it will keep me up for 2 hours until I get a headache from lack of sleep. It's rediculous.

But I love it.

 

[Uytuun]

Woah can I ever relate. I'll daydream at night so intensely that it will keep me up for 2 hours until I get a headache from lack of sleep. It's rediculous.

But I love it.

Yup, but I do it in the morning too - headache included.

 

[Yazoo]

I have a whole situation dramedy in my head, with fully developed characters and locations. It's about five people living in the same apartment building. When I'm a bit bored or on my way home from work or something, I 'tune in' and create episodes. I even know the order in which these episodes should be shown and the soundtrack - I actually have a songlist on my iPod designed for this 'show'.

Okay, now I sound like a lunatic; I can't believe I'm admitting this on a public forum. Oh, well, none of you know who I am!