[NT] NT and neutrality towards people

[INTJMom]

I've lurked in this forum for several days now and pondered where I would jump in and contribute. This thread seems like as good a place as any as so much that has been said here strikes a chord with me.

My personal experience has been that I place people into two categories; those I care for and those I don't. For those that fall into the former category I tend to have deep and strong feelings for. I am not a demonstrative type, but I do let those people know that I will do (just about) anything for them. People that fall into the latter category I tend to treat as "appliances". That is, they are useful and necessary but I attach no emotional significance to them. That DOES NOT mean that there is no moral imperative to treat them with dignity and respect, but I don't necessarily like, or dislike them.

My particular issue is that

I agree with you about treating everyone with dignity and respect.
I certainly want others to treat me that way.

 

[Xander]

How to find out how passionate your NT is.
Cross their principles repeatedly and refuse to leave them alone (incase they try to escape and evade).

Now measure your black eye. All we need now is a chart.

Oh and NTs definitely have as much feeling as other types. My mother and sister were Fs, me and my father are Ts. It's a toss up as to who is the most explosive. It's just with my father and me there's less warning and (as I see it) less fuss made about it.

My best friends (and hopefully best men) are both Fs. I'd still not like to wager who would lose in a game of push and shove of emotional intensity. Just because I don't walk all over the place going all gooey at the knees at every baby I see doesn't mean I don't soften to a childlike enthusiasm at every dog I meet. It's horses for courses. The difference is that if I'm not interested/ focused on you then you may feel cold

 

[warick]

How to find out how passionate your NT is.
Cross their principles repeatedly and refuse to leave them alone (incase they try to escape and evade).

Now measure your black eye. All we need now is a chart.

Oh and NTs definitely have as much feeling as other types. My mother and sister were Fs, me and my father are Ts. It's a toss up as to who is the most explosive. It's just with my father and me there's less warning and (as I see it) less fuss made about it.

My best friends (and hopefully best men) are both Fs. I'd still not like to wager who would lose in a game of push and shove of emotional intensity. Just because I don't walk all over the place going all gooey at the knees at every baby I see doesn't mean I don't soften to a childlike enthusiasm at every dog I meet. It's horses for courses. The difference is that if I'm not interested/ focused on you then you may feel cold

Let's not make blanket statements here. Just because you and your father are NT's and you have a lot of feelings (whether or not you choose to express them), doesn't mean that all other NT's are gushing with emotion.

 

[Xander]

Let's not make blanket statements here. Just because you and your father are NT's and you have a lot of feelings (whether or not you choose to express them), doesn't mean that all other NT's are gushing with emotion.

Check out the flames and irritation present over at INTP Central. Then breathe, then re-read.

 

[substitute]

My best friends (and hopefully best men) are both Fs. I'd still not like to wager who would lose in a game of push and shove of emotional intensity. Just because I don't walk all over the place going all gooey at the knees at every baby I see doesn't mean I don't soften to a childlike enthusiasm at every dog cat I meet. It's horses for courses. The difference is that if I'm not interested/ focused on you then you may feel cold

I relate to this. But it swings around from time to time with me. Sometimes I've had someone I know well staring in disbelief when someone who doesn't know me says I'm not a particularly volatile person, whilst at other times I've had someone I hardly know saying to someone who knows me well, "he's a man of very firey passions", only to have them make the "wtf?" face.

I think I'm a very passionate person and a shrink called me 'choleric' on a medical report once, but that's not the same as being sentimental - I'm really not sentimental at all and can be quite ruthless. It just seems like my passions don't really 'intersect' with those of other people very much... and they're not very often directed towards individual people. The same shrink told me that he thinks my mindset is "very deeply communal" and that I barely see even myself as an individual, so in his opinion, that's why I find it hard to pick out individual people as particularly 'special', in any sense, whilst humanity in general is something I care about very passionately. Sometimes people can mistake the way I behave towards them as denoting attachment to them personally, but it's really not - I'd do the same with anyone, even a total stranger. It's not "because it's you" that I do it, but "because you exist, because you're a human". So they're both extremely special, and yet not...

Hmm...

 

[Xander]

I've always seen the NT condition as "thought and emotion aren't necessarily attached together" hence how NTs can think of death or even suicide in a quite removed and analytical manner.

 

[INTJMom]

... I think I'm a very passionate person and a shrink called me 'choleric' on a medical report once....

From what I have studied,
Choleric=NT
Melancholic=NF
Sanguine=SP
Phlegmatic=SJ

This is the system I studied before I learned about MBTI.


So the shrink was right.
(The wiki is wrong.)

 

[warick]

http://www.friesian.com/types.htm

This is a different site that makes more sense to me in where he places types. I cannot speak for the xSxx's so much because I have spent little time studying that portion, but the NT and NF line up better in my mind with melancholic and choleric.

NT= Melancholic
NF=Choleric
xSTJ=Phlegmatic
xSFJ=Phlegmatic
xSFP=Sanguine
xSTP=Sanguine

 

[Athenian200]

My best friends (and hopefully best men) are both Fs. I'd still not like to wager who would lose in a game of push and shove of emotional intensity. Just because I don't walk all over the place going all gooey at the knees at every baby I see doesn't mean I don't soften to a childlike enthusiasm at every dog I meet. It's horses for courses. The difference is that if I'm not interested/ focused on you then you may feel cold

I'm not effusive in public either, but that's because I'm an Introvert and don't want to draw attention to myself. What you're describing is more ExFx. I'm polite to anyone who speaks to me, but I don't gush in public like that over people. I'm more subdued and polite than anything else.

I relate to this. But it swings around from time to time with me. Sometimes I've had someone I know well staring in disbelief when someone who doesn't know me says I'm not a particularly volatile person, whilst at other times I've had someone I hardly know saying to someone who knows me well, "he's a man of very firey passions", only to have them make the "wtf?" face.

I think I'm a very passionate person and a shrink called me 'choleric' on a medical report once, but that's not the same as being sentimental - I'm really not sentimental at all and can be quite ruthless. It just seems like my passions don't really 'intersect' with those of other people very much... and they're not very often directed towards individual people. The same shrink told me that he thinks my mindset is "very deeply communal" and that I barely see even myself as an individual, so in his opinion, that's why I find it hard to pick out individual people as particularly 'special', in any sense, whilst humanity in general is something I care about very passionately. Sometimes people can mistake the way I behave towards them as denoting attachment to them personally, but it's really not - I'd do the same with anyone, even a total stranger. It's not "because it's you" that I do it, but "because you exist, because you're a human". So they're both extremely special, and yet not...

It's interesting that you care about humanity as a whole... I really only care about my friends and people I know personally. I'm polite to everyone, but I don't actually care about them unless I get to know them. I don't see how you could honestly care about someone until you know them. I've always found it perplexing when people said they did that. Interesting how differently two people can think.

 

[LucrativeSid]

I can relate to most of what has been said here, so I'll skip the redundancy of repeating everything.

How do you all feel about being misunderstood? Even though I'm quite different than most other people, I don't think it's a big problem. I think everything is great, but I'm still always trying to do things better.

Athenian, I can't speak for Substitute, but as it is for me, my interest in mankind as a whole is more scientific. Mankind as a whole is a huge thing. It's not personal. It's a big and fun challenge to play around with and it's fun to try to help mankind evolve.

 

[Xander]

I'm not effusive in public either, but that's because I'm an Introvert and don't want to draw attention to myself. What you're describing is more ExFx. I'm polite to anyone who speaks to me, but I don't gush in public like that over people. I'm more subdued and polite than anything else.

Not meaning to be all T about it me ducks but I can usually pick up the introverts too. It's like not gushy but more a subtle increase in the flow of an underground river. I've been made uncomfortable by more than one introverted F getting too intense for my tastes without them having to break into song.

Point taken though that classical gushy is ExFx.

 

[substitute]

I've often had trouble with people feeling far more attachment to me, in much quicker time, than I'm capable of reciprocating. It leads to all kinds of horrible situations where I know that in the end, I'm the one who'll end up being the bad guy as far as anyone else can see.

I just wish people wouldn't come on like bulldozers all the damn time. If they'd just let me be and quit pressuring me and let friendships evolve naturally at a slower pace, then I probably could attach to them eventually without realising it. But when after four months of knowing me they're saying I'm just like family to them and that I'm a special friend, and how I mean so much to them and blah blah blah, it just gives me the creeps.

Athenian was right in how amazing it is that people can see things so very differently. Like this guy who I'd only known a short time when he started complaining that he never got to go on vacation, and that he wanted to go camping but didn't know anyone who'd go with him. At the time I wanted to go camping too, but didn't have a car. It was a purely pragmatic thing for me when I suggested that if he scratch my back, I'll scratch his, so to speak.

But he took it as some kind of gesture of friendship, a sign to tell him that I really liked him and considered him a close friend, someone I wanted to go on holiday with. It wasn't quite like that - I'd have said more like "someone I don't mind going on holiday with, though anyone else, almost, would've done just as well if they had a car and weren't too annoying".

It went on like this, with neither of us realising the depth/lack of depth of feeling on each side, until one day after only about 8 months of knowing him, he did something that really pissed me off and I thought to myself, "you know, I don't think I really can deal with this guy at close quarters. He's a nice guy in small doses and I don't hate him or anything, but I think it's time to withdraw a bit from him, he's a bit of a basket case", and I tried to extricate myself from the association.

I ended up being the bad guy, as he told everyone what an asshole I was that "after all we'd been through together" I "just cut him dead" and how "our great friendship all this time" seemed to "mean nothing" to me.

The same thing happened very recently with another couple I know, who I started to see regularly purely because they wanted to start a roleplaying group, and I offered my apartment as a venue. They provided the game, I provided the hospitality and players - it was a mutual agreement that everyone benefited from. How was I to know that they thought they were getting to know me, and that they considered me a close friend "just like family", or that I "mean so much" to them? How could I have let them know that it didn't go both ways, short of returning a nice, warm and kind comment like "we don't mind doing favours for you because you're a good friend" with replies like "actually I wish you wouldn't say that, it gives me the creeps because I really wouldn't give a damn if I never saw you again"?

I think sometimes Feeling types put a lot of pressure onto Thinkers, without realising it, to pretend to feelings of attachment that they don't truly feel. And then they set themselves up for a fall when eventually that person has had enough and decides to cut their losses and run, leaving the other person feeling betrayed when really, all that's happened is their delusion has been dispelled by reality.

 

[Xander]

substitute,

Can you not be honest in your behaviour? Act as you will and bear the consequences of those actions.

I don't mean to seem like I'm making an accusation but if you have consequences to your actions then it's simple, either the consequences are enough to change what you do or not. I know for certain that you can't get far with the approach of "I'm going to be a complete git, by your definition, and I want you to be happy with it" ... well unless they really are sheep.

A way of looking at it could be that perhaps if you treated people like friends even if they are not then they'd be happier. Should you want space it's easier to ask a friend to give you this space than it is a stranger. I they do something you don't like then a friend will care a hoot a lot more than an associate.

Basically it is logical and sensible to have people as friends... lots of people. It makes life easier (okay it does involve complexity with warring factions but there no free meals). Also don't you find that life is more peaceful when people around you are happy and pleased to see you. Hell they may even get used to you and appreciate your disconnected nature.

 

[substitute]

Xander I'm not saying that I don't want anyone as friends - I've got friends who I do feel attached to and I value greatly. All I'm saying is that I don't see why I should feel obliged to think of someone as a close friend just because they seem to attach to me in record time.

I mean if you ask me there's probably equally as much wrong with a person who leeches onto someone they've only known a couple of months and starts calling them best buddies and just like family and all the rest of it, as much as there is with someone who can't attach at all.

It's kind of odd though, don't you think? I mean if John fancied Jane but Jane didn't fancy John, nobody in their right minds would suggest that Jane was morally obliged to sleep with John so as not to hurt his feelings, and nobody would suggest that Jane had some psychological problem because she found herself unable to fancy John just because he wanted her to. So I just think it's weird that when romance isn't involved there seems to be this sense of obligation that people want you to feel, that you should 'sleep' with people you don't fancy, otherwise there's something wrong with you.

I try to be as honest as I can, but it's often belated because I don't realise at the time that someone is taking what to me is very clearly a pragmatic suggestion/solution as a touching gesture of closeness. Just like it isn't clear to them all the time that when they're offering a touching gesture of closeness, I'm not realising it and taking it as a pragmatic, logistical solution.

"I want to start a roleplaying group but I haven't got the space in my room and my parents won't let me have loads of people over"
"I've got my own place, you can come round mine if you like, I've been wanting to roleplay for ages"

I don't see anywhere in there a suggestion of "because you're such a great guy and I can't think of anyone I'd rather roleplay with, it'd be a real pleasure to have you at my place cos I love you so much and you mean so much to me!"

Likewise:

"I need to get to that meeting but my babysitter's failed me again!"
"Oh well, I'll babysit for you - I need to be up your end of town about that time anyway, and it's all good experience for my career in childcare"
"Oh well, if you're sure and don't mind, thanks, that'd be grand!"

I don't see anywhere in there where I was supposed to pick up that in offering to babysit they were saying "I want to do this special favour for you as a friend because you mean so much to me and in accepting my gesture of friendship you've shown that you care about me too...."



It's not that I'm against the idea of developing closeness. I'm just against being pressured into feeling it or demonstrating it before I really do feel it. And in both the situations above I didn't find out or realise how differently things were seen from their side until I decided I wanted to distance myself from them. As far as I knew I had been honest and in distancing myself I was being honest again - not wanting to pretend. Though my 'sudden' coldness was a shock to them, their reaction to it was just as much of a shock to me!!

 

[Xander]

Dude you don't have to become a sheep to their desires and if they won't leave you alone then they don't respect you. That's different.

Either they could become someone you'd like, in which case perhaps re educate them, or they're not and in which case you should make plain your nature and let them respond to it.

I cannot see how you end up in trouble you see cause if your being you and they latch on then they probably like you. If your doing the whole NT flex/ chameleon thing then yes they've gone for an incorrect impression of you and that needs correcting.

Interesting analogy though. Perhaps you should use that? Just tell the next problem case that they're a nice person and all but your saving yourself for someone special and they just aren't your type

 

[substitute]

Also don't you find that life is more peaceful when people around you are happy and pleased to see you.

No... only when I'm also pleased to see them and happy as well!! It doesn't make me feel at all peaceful when I'm around people who are happy and pleased to see me, when I actually find them a pain in the ass 99% of the time!

(not all people, mind, just some - with most I'm fine!)

 

[Xander]

No... only when I'm also pleased to see them and happy as well!! It doesn't make me feel at all peaceful when I'm around people who are happy and pleased to see me, when I actually find them a pain in the ass 99% of the time!

(not all people, mind, just some - with most I'm fine!)

Those who you fin a pain in the ass are sometimes those who like you and want to be around you?

Carrot and the stick. Be the carrot. Teach the bunny.


Personally I find that poignant, subtle, teasing humour often corrects unwanted behaviour. Calm assertive energy. If that fails then give them a sharp tug on the leash... oh wait no that's dogs.... oh well should work.

Basically you've either got to alter the situation or put up with it. If they are annoying through being negative or similar then correct them. If they're annoying cause they're doing something which just happens not to be something you wish to be around then simply ask them to continue elsewhere.

Ref the whole backlash via the rumour mill and such, stand your ground if all you did was be yourself. You've got to project who you are sometimes for people to get it. They may not like what they get but that's their problem.

 

[Recluse]

I've often had trouble with people feeling far more attachment to me, in much quicker time, than I'm capable of reciprocating. It leads to all kinds of horrible situations where I know that in the end, I'm the one who'll end up being the bad guy as far as anyone else can see.

You are not responsible for the depth of others' disillusionment.

However, I noticed that you're typed as an Extrovert. Try smiling less.

 

[substitute]

You are not responsible for the depth of others' disillusionment.

However, I noticed that you're typed as an Extrovert. Try smiling less.

Actually, continuing on from that and what Athenian said, I was just thinking earlier that the difference between my 'communal/humanitarian' approach towards relationships with people - it's more my function in society relating to theirs, than me, on a personal level, relating to them on a personal, individual level - has often probably been what's caused misunderstandings for me.

It's often happened (and now i see it with such clarity I don't think I'm as likely to repeat it!) that someone I've met has offered to do me a favour. I've accepted it, thinking, y'know, it was just out of natural generosity - but it's not. It's a personal gesture of friendship, they wouldn't do it for anyone, they're just offering to me because they like me and want to show it, and in accepting the favour, I am, unbenownst to me, accepting their advances.

Then I offer one back, but when it's coming from me it's not a gesture of friendship. For me, it's a simple fact of logic: person X needs 1, person Y has 1 in abundance. If everyone gives their spare stuff to people who need it, everyone's happier and there's less need/want in the world, so I'll start with me. I really would do the same for anyone. It doesn't mean I like them any more than anyone else and it isn't a signal that I want to get closer to them or start hanging out more with them. But they think it is. They think I'm reciprocating the gesture they made, which itself went right over my head.

Of course, I might actually like them personally as well, but not necessarily...

It's only months or even years later, that the gulf between our two perceptions of our relationship becomes apparent - when I begin to feel as though their favours for me are controlling me, and I feel suffocated by all the time they seem to want to spend with me and baffled as to why they do, and I begin to feel uncomfortable with them telling me I mean the world to them and how they feel so close to me, because I feel nothing of the kind in return.

And I find myself with a choice of either going along with their vision of our relationship, and pledging large chunks of my free time to spend with people I might actually dislike or at least find irritating, or being the bad guy and giving them a reality check.

And eventually I just have to put some distance between us - but they feel rejected, hurt, betrayed and 'tricked'. And I get called a big old meanie, who leads people on and then cuts them dead once I've had what I wanted out of them.

Wow, I've like, seen the light... but what to do about it??

 

[ama]

I feel the same sense of detachment about a lot of my "friends" - mostly random acquaintances who are not quite socially up to par in some way. (e.g. they talk too much or are socially "off" somehow). I let them hang out with me sometimes and pretend I'm really interested in their lives and try to act really nice with them, but I don't actually care about most of these people. It's just that if I ignored them, they wouldn't have anyone else to talk to, and I don't want to make them feel bad. Then they get really clingy and want to hang out all the time.

It's like I come off as some kind of NF poor-lonely-souls magnet or something. Weird.