• You are currently viewing our forum as a guest, which gives you limited access to view most discussions and access our other features. By joining our free community, you will have access to additional post topics, communicate privately with other members (PM), view blogs, respond to polls, upload content, and access many other special features. Registration is fast, simple and absolutely free, so please join our community today! Just click here to register. You should turn your Ad Blocker off for this site or certain features may not work properly. If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact us by clicking here.

[MBTI General] SPs, do you have any advice for an NF on how to better enjoy the "now"?

TheEmeraldCanopy

New member
Joined
Jan 4, 2009
Messages
280
MBTI Type
INFP
Enneagram
4w3
As an INFP, I find myself daydreaming very often rather than just appreciating what is actually going on at the time.

Any tips on how to better live in the moment and appreciate the present?


I'd love to better develop my sensing side, as well as learn how to better see from and understand my Sensor friends' perspectives.
 
Last edited:

ChocolateMoose123

New member
Joined
Oct 4, 2008
Messages
5,278
Instinctual Variant
sx/sp
The moment you are aware that you're daydreaming. Stop and ask yourself what you are touching, seeing, tasting, hearing and smelling. Savor it. Just take it in.
 

Sunny Ghost

New member
Joined
May 28, 2010
Messages
2,396
couldn't tell ya... cause i'm a bit sporadic. one moment i'm at home daydreaming and then next i suddenly burst out of my chair and take off like the wind.

sometimes... when i'm at home or even someone else's home... i just sort of look around a lot. i don't necessarily "note" what i'm looking at. i just sort of have this sense of what needs to go where, and what colors work well together, and where placing of items or furniture should be. so i always want to decorate or move things around for people. i have a natural knack for interior decorating which my friends who visit always compliment me for. when i'm outside, i just sort of watch the clouds move. i don't think about what why the clouds are there, or the cycle of water or any of that stuff... but rather watch the wind carry it along. notice the smoothness and the lines and the shadows. i really enjoy watching clouds on a windy/cloudy day or night. it's incredibly relaxing. i sometimes just look at objects and notice lines and shadows, tracing it over and over with my eyes. which often gives me the urge to draw it. on beautiful summer days, i can't help but take in all the green. something about the intensity of nature's colors just overwhelm me. it sounds silly, and no i don't cry about it. but it definitely fills me and puts a smile on my face. if i'm walking down a street, i take in the smells of flowers or food being carried in the air. or the coolness of the wind. when i'm hanging out with friends, i can be pretty quiet... and often times i set myself outside of the current conversation or whatever is happening and just think to myself... this is great. if this isn't what life is about, then i don't know what is.
 

Walking Tourist

it's tea time!
Joined
Nov 11, 2008
Messages
1,452
MBTI Type
esfp
Enneagram
7
When you take a walk, bring a camera with you and take pictures! You have to look at your environment if you're going to get the best shots!!!
 

Jeffster

veteran attention whore
Joined
Jun 7, 2008
Messages
6,743
MBTI Type
ESFP
Enneagram
7w6
Instinctual Variant
sx
I think you're better off enjoying who you are than trying to be more like someone else. :)
 

miss fortune

not to be trusted
Joined
Oct 4, 2007
Messages
20,589
Enneagram
827
Instinctual Variant
sp/so
you'll never change that part of you that's compelled to daydream, but you CAN work on your Se some so that you actually get more pleasure out of the things that surround you in the present! :)

Try this... next time you're out in the back yard or a park just flop on the grass... feel the breeze on your face and the heat of the sun, notice how the grass feels- is it prickly and dry or cool and pliant? Close your eyes for a moment and listen... what do you hear? are there children playing, birds singing, cars going by in the distance, an airplane overhead... what's going on around you that you can perceive with your ears alone? and then breathe in... do you smell the grass? is someone grilling? how about the dirt... can you smell it?

Just work on noticing things and appreciating them... take little steps and it will get easier. It isn't as natural for you, but you can learn to do it better :)
 

Halla74

Artisan Conquerer
Joined
Jan 20, 2009
Messages
6,898
MBTI Type
ESTP
Enneagram
7w8
Instinctual Variant
sx/so
Something I have noticed in alot of my NF friends is the tendency for things to never quite be "good enough" and I have wondered at times if that is the genesis of them being "out in space" (aka daydreaming).

I think there is alot to be said for people being able to improve their outlook on life via planning, implementing, and finishing simple objectives.

For instance, plan to build a garden. Pick a small patch of your yard where there's good sunlight. Take the "BEFORE" picture. Take a spade (shovel) and dig out the perimeter shape of the garden's shape. Then dig out the interior. Go to Home Depot or Wal Mart and buy a few bags of Top Soil, Organic Mushroom Compost, and a bag of Cow Manure, each of whcih as about $2. Then buy whatever plants you wish to grow, or flowers, or both, again all of these are usually under $2. For about $50 you can buy the kit for a great little garden. Go home and plant that stuff, water it, and take an "AFTER" picture. VOILA!!! You now have a garden!

Why does this help being in the here and now? You planned something. You went out and made it happen. That it the complete opposite of daydreaming!

Also, it gives you an opportunity to keep in the here and now as you get to water the plants each morning, and then watch them grow, and then eat them! (Or put them in a vase if you decided on a flower garden).

Here's photos of a butterfly garden I put in at the fronty of my house with my daughter, when she was recovering from a sickness earlier this year, and needed something to do to keep her mind off things:
20100530053.jpg


20100530057.jpg


Here's a bed of random plants I planted in my backyard to jazz it up a bit. There are lillies, a small azalea bush, caladiums, ferns, and some other random flowering plants I bought:
20100530067.jpg


Give it a shot, it's fun! :cheese:
 

Rebe

New member
Joined
Nov 15, 2009
Messages
1,431
MBTI Type
INFP
Enneagram
4sop
i was totally going to ask them this question too!!! just yesterday. :yes: well, actually, i was going to phrase mine more like 'how do you suggest NFs and NTs have more fun'
 

miss fortune

not to be trusted
Joined
Oct 4, 2007
Messages
20,589
Enneagram
827
Instinctual Variant
sp/so
i was totally going to ask them this question too!!! just yesterday. :yes: well, actually, i was going to phrase mine more like 'how do you suggest NFs and NTs have more fun'

once upon a time I made this post to address that issue... :)
 

missfixit

New member
Joined
May 11, 2010
Messages
15
MBTI Type
ISTP
paint something!

paint the walls, the floors, the furniture, or maybe dye your hair. Get some new makeup. Or earrings. Color color color :cheese:

This is what I do, at least, when I've sat around for a while and I'm tired of daydreaming.
 
Joined
Jul 3, 2008
Messages
1,858
MBTI Type
INFP
Enneagram
54
Instinctual Variant
so/sp
I feel like I can using my sensing function well enough (at least to drive, not burn my hands while cooking, etc.), but the interest in expanding on that just isn't there. Even if it were possible, I feel far too wedded to my oftentimes nightmarish inner life to know the value - like trying to use out-of-country currency - though I'll hold on to them if they turn up.

On daydreaming, I don't subscribe to the notion that you just flip a switch to turn it on, nor the reverse/do I romanticize it. Whatever it is, it's always there, distorting my every perception, smearing, slowing, inverting, making this that but not at the same moment, living the unreal. Not surprisingly, "always" and "never" are absent from my verbal vocabulary.

It's strange though, having such a powerful reality function/memory with a deeply innate, unconscious desire to experience unreal states, that shake and/or annihilate my inner life so as to absorb knowledge/'wisdom" that might help me grow into a more aware, tolerant, and openminded human being.
 

Clonester

New member
Joined
Jul 5, 2009
Messages
480
MBTI Type
ENFP
you'll never change that part of you that's compelled to daydream, but you CAN work on your Se some so that you actually get more pleasure out of the things that surround you in the present! :)

Try this... next time you're out in the back yard or a park just flop on the grass... feel the breeze on your face and the heat of the sun, notice how the grass feels- is it prickly and dry or cool and pliant? Close your eyes for a moment and listen... what do you hear? are there children playing, birds singing, cars going by in the distance, an airplane overhead... what's going on around you that you can perceive with your ears alone? and then breathe in... do you smell the grass? is someone grilling? how about the dirt... can you smell it?

Just work on noticing things and appreciating them... take little steps and it will get easier. It isn't as natural for you, but you can learn to do it better :)

I like these suggestions! I try and do this sometimes but it's so hard! But very relaxing and worth the effort.
 

Sunny Ghost

New member
Joined
May 28, 2010
Messages
2,396
I feel like I can using my sensing function well enough (at least to drive, not burn my hands while cooking, etc.), but the interest in expanding on that just isn't there. Even if it were possible, I feel far too wedded to my oftentimes nightmarish inner life to know the value - like trying to use out-of-country currency - though I'll hold on to them if they turn up.

On daydreaming, I don't subscribe to the notion that you just flip a switch to turn it on, nor the reverse/do I romanticize it. Whatever it is, it's always there, distorting my every perception, smearing, slowing, inverting, making this that but not at the same moment, living the unreal. Not surprisingly, "always" and "never" are absent from my verbal vocabulary.

It's strange though, having such a powerful reality function/memory with a deeply innate, unconscious desire to experience unreal states, that shake and/or annihilate my inner life so as to absorb knowledge/'wisdom" that might help me grow into a more aware, tolerant, and openminded human being.

i've been really trying hard to understand the difference between sp and nf. when first introduced to the mbti, i thought i was an infp and i always felt inbetween S and N. i think the difference might be that i first rely on my senses and then through what i actual see, feel, touch, etc., i'll go off into my imagination.
 

Poki

New member
Joined
Dec 4, 2008
Messages
10,436
MBTI Type
STP
Instinctual Variant
sx/so
I like these suggestions! I try and do this sometimes but it's so hard! But very relaxing and worth the effort.

This is what confuses me, how is it hard? I was at my grandparents house the other day and was tired of the busy and the people so I went out to the garage layed on the cool concrete with the door open and just layed their looking at the sky listening to the things around me I do get lost in thought at times, but I am always pulled back into the breeze, the sounds, etc. Just relaxing.

Find someone you like to talk to, not intense, just in a relaxing way, find a shade tree with grass and lay their observing everything around you while you talk.
 

Jeffster

veteran attention whore
Joined
Jun 7, 2008
Messages
6,743
MBTI Type
ESFP
Enneagram
7w6
Instinctual Variant
sx
i've been really trying hard to understand the difference between sp and nf. when first introduced to the mbti, i thought i was an infp and i always felt inbetween S and N. i think the difference might be that i first rely on my senses and then through what i actual see, feel, touch, etc., i'll go off into my imagination.

That's why I like the way Keirsey boils it down to words and tools.

SPs are concrete word users, i.e. talk more about real things - people, places, events, what things look like, sound like, smell like, taste like, etc. NFs are abstract word users, talk more about concepts, feelings, "what if" questions, how things can be changed or what they can become.

SPs are utilitarian/adaptive when it comes to tools and behavior. Do what works, use what you have, whether or not it meets with everybody's approval or traditions. NFs are cooperative. Try to keep everybody happy and consider everybody's background and feelings on everything. Even if something is fun, don't do it if it might offend somebody.

Obviously, everyone uses both concrete and abstract words, as well as acts both adaptive and cooperative with tools, but everybody has natural preferences one way or the other, and in this sense, SPs and NFs are temperamentally opposite.

Hope that helps in your understanding. :)
 

Sunny Ghost

New member
Joined
May 28, 2010
Messages
2,396
That's why I like the way Keirsey boils it down to words and tools.

SPs are concrete word users, i.e. talk more about real things - people, places, events, what things look like, sound like, smell like, taste like, etc. NFs are abstract word users, talk more about concepts, feelings, "what if" questions, how things can be changed or what they can become.

SPs are utilitarian/adaptive when it comes to tools and behavior. Do what works, use what you have, whether or not it meets with everybody's approval or traditions. NFs are cooperative. Try to keep everybody happy and consider everybody's background and feelings on everything. Even if something is fun, don't do it if it might offend somebody.

Obviously, everyone uses both concrete and abstract words, as well as acts both adaptive and cooperative with tools, but everybody has natural preferences one way or the other, and in this sense, SPs and NFs are temperamentally opposite.

Hope that helps in your understanding. :)
Yes! :yes:
Thank you! From what I had been gathering recently, SP's seemed to be described as completely unimaginative. Which made absolute no sense to me, as we're the artistic & creative ones! But, I think I'm finally beginning to understand the differences a little better. I was trying to pay attention to my own thought processes today as I went for a walk, and I did notice I start with concrete things and then move into the realm of imagination based upon that.

This might call for a different thread, or an already existing thread I'll have to search out, but I still want to understand the NF mind a bit more.
 

Rebe

New member
Joined
Nov 15, 2009
Messages
1,431
MBTI Type
INFP
Enneagram
4sop
- never pass up an opportunity to try something new- be it fire roasted chicken hearts or buying a knife from a black market arms dealer- you never know when such an opportunity may present itself again and you don't want to be 90 years old and regretting that you never tried it!

:yes: Okay...something new...even if it's weird like roasted chicken hearts :shock:

Yeah, I have a hard time just enjoying the moment. I always either drift to the past and be sadden by it or drift to the future, which usually brightens me up. But I am seldom here, most everything to me is either past or future. In a way, I am envious of the kids my age because they know how to enjoy themselves and not worry. I worry and think too much, I ponder about things too much. While I like that in myself overall, I'd like to have some Se fun too. But for that to happen, I have to tie that with Fi or Ne somehow. The thing about being Fi dominant is that I need to satisfy that first, otherwise everything is just dreary and gray. :coffee:
 

KDude

New member
Joined
Jan 26, 2010
Messages
8,243
Try Se things by yourself or with someone you really trust then :) That way Fi doesn't get hampered by some social situation or whatnot.

Or maybe I should just ask what you consider "Se fun"? Does it require socializing?
 
Top