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[Ni] I just know.

hazelsees

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So...the phrase "I just know" doesn't go over very well. People usually do not tend to trust "I just know."

How can an "I just know" person learn to find the reasons they "just know"? How can s/he find facts that most types seem to dig?
And how can I learn to articulate my gut feelings? It's so hard to find words to describe what I'm feeling sometimes. At times, I make up words, but most people don't like those either.

Also, sometimes I KNOW something is going to happen a certain way and it's not ideal. Lately, I've just been holding my tongue...and is that right? To know something bad is going to happen and not to warn others? To save myself from being poo-poo'd?

It's really exhausting.
 
W

WALMART

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Surely there are communicable reasons. I'd find it odd if not, as well.


Do you have any examples?
 

Fidelia

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Ni tends to be a look down the road function. While it sometimes is inaccurate, more often than not, I think that cause and effect of certain courses of action seems more clear to Ni users than others. Part of the problem is that it takes awhile to figure it all out and decide what it is that has made you arrive at that conclusion. There are always reasons though. If it's something that involves you, I think it is important to listen to your gut because time matters. If it is something that involves other people, then it is important to be able to articulate those reasons before telling them that you think something won't work out well.
 

OrangeAppled

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This is more of a Ne-aux take on it, but perhaps helpful still...

I sometimes have the problem of "just knowing" a current, but "hidden" reality & being unable to support it with anything concrete. Because I see something happening that's not obvious to others, I can guess the next step in the pattern.

I think it's a bunch of semi-unconsciously perceived stuff being fit together in the background of my head until at once I get a whole realization. This happens for me concerning people's motives a lot. I don't consciously note body language or analyze a comment they make, etc. But one day, one small thing can trigger all this seemingly unrelated stuff to come together & give me an overview of "what's really going on".

I've gotten better at straining my brain to recall details to support my conclusion. I'll chalk this up to better Si with age. But once I do that, the details can fade out again. You know that movie Eternal Sunshine? I think Jim Carry's character is Si-dom. My mind is kind of like his as the memories are being erased, and then he's just left with this hunch that something is/was/could be. It's more like I have the hunch, then as I try to bring back the details, they sort of erase out after confirming my hunch. I'll sometimes be left with a few of the strongest details which support my hunch, which I then probably remember in an exaggerated manner. Again, I think this is an inferior use of Si.

Sometimes, I try and write stuff down as I recall it. This sounds like paranoia, now, as I type it... Let me assure you I don't record daily details in case I need to prove something later. I mean, in retrospect, I may journal some thoughts on why I feel a certain way, and whatever details I manage to pull up from memory or some other source will be listed & sorted there. On some occasions, this has actually tempered my view as once "facts" are listed & sorted, my hunches & feelings may seem less valid. I sometimes can't see the trees for the forest, then, and this can ground me so I'm better able to realize the trees are bushes & it's not a forest after all, but a thicket.

Because I am able to recall details, even if with difficulty, I've realized stuff DOES strike me in the moment, but unlike a Si type, I often don't seek to immediately connect details to anything & slowly build impressions. Instead it just kind of gets tossed into a murky pot where hunches brew, and later on, you don't know exactly went into the sauce. Dissecting it is like guessing the ingredients by final product when you have no recipe.

Sometimes I talk to another person, which in the case of Ne, helps me plot my own jumping between all those contexts so I can see how I connected the details, but consciously this time. I kind of relive my original realization in bringing the other person to the same one. It helps if they've experienced many of the concrete details I did, because then they support my foggy memory & I know I'm not paranoid.

I've had a lot of useful conversations with my ISFJ mom about stuff like this. Sometimes I get told I'm paranoid, sometimes I'm vindicated later as supporting details or even my full conclusion finally emerge as visible to others, and other times I successfully get people connect it all as I do and become aware of a reality I see.

It's also not unusual for someone else's observation to provide the "trigger" that causes me to finally realize a big picture. I think this is because their perception of something concrete is a needed support to the hunch that's been shaping up somewhere in my head, because I can push hunches down/dismiss them since I struggle to support them factually.

So carrying around a Sensor buddy in your pocket might help. Give them a notepad, and take some mental pictures yourself.
 

Thalassa

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I "just know" stuff all of the time, typically about people, and so do ESFJ friends of mine. This is not necessarily an NF trait, I don't know in what context you "just know" but if you mean in the sense of women's intuition, like knowing a guy is probably a rapist or that someone is going to flake on you, go with that feeling, you don't have to tell other people.

I know numerous, numerous women, especially, who just get bad feelings about people, based on body language, tone inflection, eye contact, any number of things; this may be connected to our sharper attention to body language, due to child care. I remember having to watch a film in high school about how women have sharper reads on people's facial expressions and feelings due to the need to interpret the needs of babies and small children.

THIS IS NOT THE SAME THING AS BEING AN MBTI N!!!

However, if you "just know" entire theories about something, that probably is an NF matter.
 

Coriolis

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How can an "I just know" person learn to find the reasons they "just know"? How can s/he find facts that most types seem to dig?
And how can I learn to articulate my gut feelings? It's so hard to find words to describe what I'm feeling sometimes. At times, I make up words, but most people don't like those either.

Also, sometimes I KNOW something is going to happen a certain way and it's not ideal. Lately, I've just been holding my tongue...and is that right? To know something bad is going to happen and not to warn others? To save myself from being poo-poo'd?
As an Ni-dom I have these perceptions routinely. I don't so much try to figure out where they come from, as use aux Te to cross-check them with the external world. Then I can offer others supporting evidence as to why what I am saying is reasonable.

As I have become older, I have learned to trust these impressions without Te vetting when necessary. As Fidelia wrote, if it just involves you, go ahead and follow them; sometimes there isn't time to do the cross-checking. When they involve others, you can weigh the benefits of speaking up vs. keeping quiet. Is shielding yourself from the doubt or ridicule of others worth risking what might happen if you don't share your insights?
 

the state i am in

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i think the experience is more about Feeling vs Thinking than N vs S. N vs S just pulls from different resources to perceive the situation with (because it utilizes different methods).

feeling is difficult to pin down. rather than seeing the particular cause of something, we see the reverberation of consequences as a huge, interwoven whole (qualitatively, across a huge range of factors that are not simply isolatable and definable-->those often imposing a pseudo-objective, impersonal, biased value structure into any process of evaluation or explanation). this is the difficulty of being values based rather than precisely rule-based. there's not a strict order of operations. it's not as linear. it's not as defined.

i find the process of responding to and digging out evidence (T tested, established factors) tiring. sometimes changing the way you ask questions to help yourself focus and create more narrowed parameters can help. other times just respecting the fact that you might need more processing time is important. especially with other people, and being upfront and clear about what you need to participate in a productive dialogue.
 

Thalassa

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i think the experience is more about Feeling vs Thinking than N vs S. N vs S just pulls from different resources to perceive the situation with (because it utilizes different methods).

feeling is difficult to pin down. rather than seeing the particular cause of something, we see the reverberation of consequences as a huge, interwoven whole (qualitatively, across a huge range of factors that are not simply isolatable and definable-->those often imposing a pseudo-objective, impersonal, biased value structure into any process of evaluation or explanation). this is the difficulty of being values based rather than precisely rule-based. there's not a strict order of operations. it's not as linear. it's not as defined.

i find the process of responding to and digging out evidence (T tested, established factors) tiring. sometimes changing the way you ask questions to help yourself focus and create more narrowed parameters can help. other times just respecting the fact that you might need more processing time is important. especially with other people, and being upfront and clear about what you need to participate in a productive dialogue.

I agree that feeling types definitely have this experience the most, and it may be more trusted (and accurate) in Feeling dominant or a type that is not F-rejecting or N-rejecting.

She also could be talking about Ni. A long, long time ago on this site, someone was talking about tertiary functions developing in the teens, and I said hey that's me! And the person was like "if you're ENFP then Ni isn't your tertiary." It was one of the first clues that Ni was my tertiary. It also would explain why on functions-style tests I early tested as INFJ (despite lack of Fe or Keirsey-esque J preferences) because of over-estimating my tertiary Ni.

I described the Ni process as I experienced it one specific day, on another site, and an INTJ said "yes, that's it, that's exactly what Ni is." It had more to do with everything tying together into a singular vision, triggered by IDKWTF; also: cathartic experience, and personalized symbols helping me on my way through making decisions in life.

"I just know" is more like a Feeling judgment, or it's related to "women's intuition" or what some people would call a psychic ability, which isn't the same thing as Jungian N.

The OP didn't elaborate, so I still don't know if she's actually talking about Ni or having one of these "bad feelings" about a person or situation and being right on the money.
 

Coriolis

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i think the experience is more about Feeling vs Thinking than N vs S. N vs S just pulls from different resources to perceive the situation with (because it utilizes different methods).
I won't underestimate the role of feeling, but feeling/thinking are judgment functions, and what the OP described (and what most responses seem to be discussing) seems much more like a perception. Would it be accurate to see it as N evaluated by F?
 

hazelsees

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Surely there are communicable reasons. I'd find it odd if not, as well.


Do you have any examples?

Sure. Different examples in different ways.

It's a little difficult to explain things without saying what I do in my job. Okay, I'll try.
Recently a co-worker spoke with a woman who was very upset because her ex-husband is trying to get custody of their child. To him, she appeared very articulate and intelligent and sane. However, someone pointed out to him that I know her and probably have some background information. There are three bits of information I have: 1. facts--public knowledge facts.
2. things that I shouldn't share and 3. my "feelings" about the woman and her situation.
My co-worker considered being an advocate for her. I had to strongly advise against it. Sure, I had some facts that I could give him, but mostly just a strong feeling that he should not support her.

Then, at times, I feel that a particular project is going to fail. These are the worst. Because with people, others usually trust my gut feelings--usually. But knowing that a project is going to turn out poorly and being unable to say why is so frustrating when people are demanding proof or facts.

Or someone's choice in a life direction...even if it's small.
 

hazelsees

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Feb 1, 2013
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INFJ
Ni tends to be a look down the road function. While it sometimes is inaccurate, more often than not, I think that cause and effect of certain courses of action seems more clear to Ni users than others. Part of the problem is that it takes awhile to figure it all out and decide what it is that has made you arrive at that conclusion. There are always reasons though. If it's something that involves you, I think it is important to listen to your gut because time matters. If it is something that involves other people, then it is important to be able to articulate those reasons before telling them that you think something won't work out well.

Fidelia, I enjoy reading your posts. You're easy to understand and express yourself so well. THAT is how I wish to be.

I agree. There are always reasons. I do not believe my feelings are psychic or anything close. It's just so difficult to figure out the tangled ball of twine that is my mind...and to pull out the threads that relate to whatever it is I'm getting a gut feeling about.
Sometimes, I think it's laziness. I never learned to exercise my brain in that way. Haven't had to. As a kid, I lived in my own little world and at the very same time participated in the external world. Which could be quite hilarious when I had a facial expression or comment that belonged internally, but came out externally.
I learned early that most people didn't listen to my feelings, so I just kept them inside and watched.
Also, I've been blessed to have a lot of freedom in my work. Until recently I've not really needed to explain the reasons for my feelings.
But now, I want to be taken seriously and I need to learn how to do this.
 

hazelsees

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Feb 1, 2013
Messages
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This is more of a Ne-aux take on it, but perhaps helpful still...

I sometimes have the problem of "just knowing" a current, but "hidden" reality & being unable to support it with anything concrete. Because I see something happening that's not obvious to others, I can guess the next step in the pattern.

I think it's a bunch of semi-unconsciously perceived stuff being fit together in the background of my head until at once I get a whole realization. This happens for me concerning people's motives a lot. I don't consciously note body language or analyze a comment they make, etc. But one day, one small thing can trigger all this seemingly unrelated stuff to come together & give me an overview of "what's really going on".

I've gotten better at straining my brain to recall details to support my conclusion. I'll chalk this up to better Si with age. But once I do that, the details can fade out again. You know that movie Eternal Sunshine? I think Jim Carry's character is Si-dom. My mind is kind of like his as the memories are being erased, and then he's just left with this hunch that something is/was/could be. It's more like I have the hunch, then as I try to bring back the details, they sort of erase out after confirming my hunch. I'll sometimes be left with a few of the strongest details which support my hunch, which I then probably remember in an exaggerated manner. Again, I think this is an inferior use of Si.

Sometimes, I try and write stuff down as I recall it. This sounds like paranoia, now, as I type it... Let me assure you I don't record daily details in case I need to prove something later. I mean, in retrospect, I may journal some thoughts on why I feel a certain way, and whatever details I manage to pull up from memory or some other source will be listed & sorted there. On some occasions, this has actually tempered my view as once "facts" are listed & sorted, my hunches & feelings may seem less valid. I sometimes can't see the trees for the forest, then, and this can ground me so I'm better able to realize the trees are bushes & it's not a forest after all, but a thicket.

Because I am able to recall details, even if with difficulty, I've realized stuff DOES strike me in the moment, but unlike a Si type, I often don't seek to immediately connect details to anything & slowly build impressions. Instead it just kind of gets tossed into a murky pot where hunches brew, and later on, you don't know exactly went into the sauce. Dissecting it is like guessing the ingredients by final product when you have no recipe.

Sometimes I talk to another person, which in the case of Ne, helps me plot my own jumping between all those contexts so I can see how I connected the details, but consciously this time. I kind of relive my original realization in bringing the other person to the same one. It helps if they've experienced many of the concrete details I did, because then they support my foggy memory & I know I'm not paranoid.

I've had a lot of useful conversations with my ISFJ mom about stuff like this. Sometimes I get told I'm paranoid, sometimes I'm vindicated later as supporting details or even my full conclusion finally emerge as visible to others, and other times I successfully get people connect it all as I do and become aware of a reality I see.

It's also not unusual for someone else's observation to provide the "trigger" that causes me to finally realize a big picture. I think this is because their perception of something concrete is a needed support to the hunch that's been shaping up somewhere in my head, because I can push hunches down/dismiss them since I struggle to support them factually.

So carrying around a Sensor buddy in your pocket might help. Give them a notepad, and take some mental pictures yourself.

This is interesting! I've read it 3 times and new stuff comes out each time.
How did you learn to get better at straining your brain?
 

hazelsees

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I "just know" stuff all of the time, typically about people, and so do ESFJ friends of mine. This is not necessarily an NF trait, I don't know in what context you "just know" but if you mean in the sense of women's intuition, like knowing a guy is probably a rapist or that someone is going to flake on you, go with that feeling, you don't have to tell other people.

I know numerous, numerous women, especially, who just get bad feelings about people, based on body language, tone inflection, eye contact, any number of things; this may be connected to our sharper attention to body language, due to child care. I remember having to watch a film in high school about how women have sharper reads on people's facial expressions and feelings due to the need to interpret the needs of babies and small children.

THIS IS NOT THE SAME THING AS BEING AN MBTI N!!!

However, if you "just know" entire theories about something, that probably is an NF matter.

I'm not sure I "just know" entire theories about things. If that is required, I'm probably not NF. :)

My sister is probably ISFP (my favorite type!) and she gets feelings too. Probably everyone does because we all use intuition and feelings afterall. My problem is articulating WHY I know something and giving facts and such to support them. It seems that people who use sensing (or thinking?) more than I, have an easier time with this. I envy that.
Thank you for your post!
 

hazelsees

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As an Ni-dom I have these perceptions routinely. I don't so much try to figure out where they come from, as use aux Te to cross-check them with the external world. Then I can offer others supporting evidence as to why what I am saying is reasonable.

As I have become older, I have learned to trust these impressions without Te vetting when necessary. As Fidelia wrote, if it just involves you, go ahead and follow them; sometimes there isn't time to do the cross-checking. When they involve others, you can weigh the benefits of speaking up vs. keeping quiet. Is shielding yourself from the doubt or ridicule of others worth risking what might happen if you don't share your insights?

Thank you! Good advice from you and Fidelia.
Unfortunately I do not believe Te is very strong in the stack of functions that I use often. Who knows? Maybe I can learn to use it.
 

hazelsees

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i think the experience is more about Feeling vs Thinking than N vs S. N vs S just pulls from different resources to perceive the situation with (because it utilizes different methods).

feeling is difficult to pin down. rather than seeing the particular cause of something, we see the reverberation of consequences as a huge, interwoven whole (qualitatively, across a huge range of factors that are not simply isolatable and definable-->those often imposing a pseudo-objective, impersonal, biased value structure into any process of evaluation or explanation). this is the difficulty of being values based rather than precisely rule-based. there's not a strict order of operations. it's not as linear. it's not as defined.


You explained this beautifully!


i find the process of responding to and digging out evidence (T tested, established factors) tiring. sometimes changing the way you ask questions to help yourself focus and create more narrowed parameters can help. other times just respecting the fact that you might need more processing time is important. especially with other people, and being upfront and clear about what you need to participate in a productive dialogue.

So maybe let others know UPFRONT that I need more processing time. Great idea.
 

Fidelia

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For me, I think Ti performs an analagous kind of analyzing/cross-checking purpose for my Ni that Orange Appled is saying Te does for her Ne. I will get a feeling about something, or even come up with a theory and then Ti refines it, structures it, comes up with supporting evidence and so on. The only frustration I have is that it is not a very quick process, as both are very detailed, introverted functions. Extroverted functions (the ones ending with an e that is) tend to paint things in broader brushstrokes and go with what works in the moment instead of worrying so much about perfecting and refining.

When I was younger, I used to feel vaguely uncomfortable about a person or a situation, but until I could verbalize why, I did not feel good about giving it strong credence (I mean, I would believe it myself, but if it involved something more public, it would be hard for me to really trust it enough to state that I felt a certain way). I have come to believe later that our unconscious self picks up on things about people like unusual communication patterns, eye contact and so on, even if it is so subtle that we don't recognize consciously that something seems odd. It's just a strange feeling that something seems different than it does when things are all right. Over time, our conscious self also starts noticing those subtleties in a way that can then be verbalized because we can express what exactly seems a little off or out of the ordinary.

I've found it frustrating in my line of work that something that seems like a clearly negative decision with extremely predictable (though not yet provable) outcomes isn't always seen by other people. I used to assume that it was just as clear to them and for whatever reason they were just ignoring it. I've found since that that is not the case. Many people truly need to see "the blood on the knife" as it were, to believe that something bad has happened. I think that Ni tends to always be anticipating results, extrapolating and trying to predict outcomes based on previous evidence, what is observed and so on. Therefore, it can result in a stronger interest in and awareness of cause and effect because that is what it focuses on most. Because I am a Ni dom, I have a strong tendency towards prevention, rather than improvising what to do once damage is done.

Definitely letting others know up front that you need more processing time is important. I don't know what your type is, but if you are a Ni user, it is an introverted function that is going to require more time than an extroverted one to sort through. Most times when I am interacting with people, my reactions to them are based on the last interaction (which I've only just processed), rather than the present one. It seems that I can't make myself process in real time. When I am pressured into making a decision before I feel like I have everything taken into account that needs to be, I always regret the decision I make.
 

Antimony

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So...the phrase "I just know" doesn't go over very well. People usually do not tend to trust "I just know."

How can an "I just know" person learn to find the reasons they "just know"? How can s/he find facts that most types seem to dig?
And how can I learn to articulate my gut feelings? It's so hard to find words to describe what I'm feeling sometimes. At times, I make up words, but most people don't like those either.

Also, sometimes I KNOW something is going to happen a certain way and it's not ideal. Lately, I've just been holding my tongue...and is that right? To know something bad is going to happen and not to warn others? To save myself from being poo-poo'd?

It's really exhausting.

It's funny you post this, because I was just having a discussion about Ni today and just "knowing."

I tend to just "know" but there is normally a spark for it. I see the reason, although sometimes it is unconscious. So even when it appears I just "know" something out of nowhere, there was some teeny tiny trigger.

The INFJs I know tend to use Ti to help reason it out (though sometimes it backfires, because in my experience, a lot of people with Ni see only one possibility, so their logic for why only this possibility could be is often flawed).

I may be uselessly discussing Ni when you really use Ne, so correct me if I'm wrong in my assertion.
 

King sns

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I always envied this trait in people.. occasionally I get things right, but a lot of the times it's "I guess, I think, possibly"... and tend to guess like 10 options and hope that one of them is correct. I think this annoys others in a different way.
 

hazelsees

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Usually, no.

I'm not sure if you were able to read the entire thread, but I'm asking for help, not complaining that people just believe me, Mane. I realize that it's MY problem for not expressing myself well OR not being able to find reasons and facts. It is rare that I share the things I "just know" anymore, because I've learned that it doesn't go over well and I'm not taken seriously...and then that leads to me feeling bad about myself. So...I'm trying to learn. I would appreciate any advice. :)
 
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