[Type 6] 6s: easy-going but wound up?

[SilkRoad]

Well, this applies to me. Laid-back but also paranoid/worrying...etc. I've had good friends, who know me quite well, describe me as both.

I'm laid-back as in I don't sweat a lot - if not most - of the small stuff. Things which irritate a lot of other people, or which they're picky about, etc, just does not get to me at all. I just don't care. Or not enough to let it be a problem, or make it into one.

However, when I DO care, I care intensely and probably to a somewhat scary extent - and that includes the things that make me anxious, that I'm paranoid about and worry about. So it seems like any time on a given day, I'm usually coming across as more relaxed than average, or more wound up than average...

Do other 6s relate to this? It just seems like a bit of a paradox, is why I'm asking. Although - it does fit quite well with me being a 6 and an INFJ. I do think that one of the reasons why a lot of things don't bother me is because I know that when things DO bother me - they bother me so much that it can wreck my life. And I don't want something genuinely minor to become a big deal and have a bad effect on me...

 

[King sns]

Yeah, that's me in a nutshell. Actually, for me, I think a lot of times I come off laid back but have a ton of secret anxieties. Since a lot of them are kind of silly/ unfounded.. (or founded in something but my conclusion is really far fetched). So when I try to present my anxiety a lot of people don't realize I'm actually anxious... like REALLY anxious, half the time I'm not even really sure what I'm anxious about. So I just say things like. "I'm anxious." hahaha, it doesn't get too much sympathy, which is fine. (But secretly I can be horrified/paranoid/debilitated.) Most of the time my anxiety just causes me to withdraw into myself and just be really quiet which produces all these like- physical symptoms, (belly aches, extreme fatigue, appetite loss, rashes, gray hair, etc.) But when I carefully work through what's bothering me or resolve the problem that I care about (as you say) , (sometimes that takes hours or days or months) I become laid back again and dye my hair and drink some smoothies and stuff.

 

[Cellmold]

Yeah id say you just described me perfectly.

 

[citizen cane]

Yup, that's me.

 

[Qlip]

Yeah that's me. I've got this counterphobic thing going on with authority. If I expect problems, I wind up really tight.. and just chill, ready to unleash on them. If that doesn't get triggered, I ironically look polite and relaxed. If it does get triggered, it really throws people off guard.

I am in my element a lot of the time when the worst happens, I look capable and in charge.. because I've been planning for it. When things are going fine, my mind can start racing, and I get anxious looking for the next danger.

And yes, I get it.. I push problems that I have no control over away from my awareness, because I know ultimately I'll end up breaking down. So I can be in a tempest and look as if I'm ignorant of it.

 

[Speed Gavroche]

Yeah. 6s are like Tweety Bird, easy-going but afraid and vigilants toward danger that can happen, like a puddy tat.

 

[SilkRoad]

Thanks guys. I guess I am a fairly normal 6 then. It sort of works!

 

[highlander]

I am not laid back at all.

 

[WALMART]

I used to manage a U-Haul, we used radios. One day a radio went missing (they're easily misplaced) and an employee brought it up to me. I didn't really say anything, and he asked me if I cared. I told him if course I care, but what do you want me to do, shit one out to replace it?

Needless to say, I'm not very good at management.

 

[Orangey]

Yeah that's me. I've got this counterphobic thing going on with authority. If I expect problems, I wind up really tight.. and just chill, ready to unleash on them. If that doesn't get triggered, I ironically look polite and relaxed. If it does get triggered, it really throws people off guard.

I am in my element a lot of the time when the worst happens, I look capable and in charge.. because I've been planning for it. When things are going fine, my mind can start racing, and I get anxious looking for the next danger.

And yes, I get it.. I push problems that I have no control over away from my awareness, because I know ultimately I'll end up breaking down. So I can be in a tempest and look as if I'm ignorant of it.

I relate to this.

 

[Zarathustra]

I am not laid back at all.

Are you being serious, or joking?

You come across as very, very laid back...

 

[Such Irony]

I relate alot to the OP and I'm not even a 6 but I do have a 6 wing unless I'm mistyped.

 

[Randomnity]

I like to think I'm laid back and I am, about a lot of things that other people care about, but I'm also really non laid back about other stuff (that other people don't always care about). So yeah I guess I agree, more or less

 

[highlander]

Are you being serious, or joking?

You come across as very, very laid back...

That's funny. No, I'm not laid back at all. Pretty type A. Maybe I put on a good act.

 

[Randomnity]

That's funny. No, I'm not laid back at all. Pretty type A. Maybe I put on a good act.

haha, an INTJ saying that you're laid back is sorta like an ISTJ saying you're really disorganized.

(you don't seem particularly laid back to me, for what that's worth)

 

[violet_crown]

That's funny. No, I'm not laid back at all. Pretty type A. Maybe I put on a good act.

Hmm. I can see where Zara is coming from. You have a kind of a warm, grounded quality thats very comforting. I imagine youre perfectly capable of being a real prick if you wanted to be, but if irl youre anything like you are on the forums you probably put people at ease quite readily. Type A or not, youll just have to accept the burden of a soothing presence, highlander.

 

[SilkRoad]

That's funny. No, I'm not laid back at all. Pretty type A. Maybe I put on a good act.

Perhaps you mean that you are "not laid back" as in you're quite driven to accomplish stuff? That's a better kind of "not laid back" than just being picky and high maintenance, in my opinion

 

[Quay]

Well, this applies to me. Laid-back but also paranoid/worrying...etc. I've had good friends, who know me quite well, describe me as both.

I'm laid-back as in I don't sweat a lot - if not most - of the small stuff. Things which irritate a lot of other people, or which they're picky about, etc, just does not get to me at all. I just don't care. Or not enough to let it be a problem, or make it into one.

However, when I DO care, I care intensely and probably to a somewhat scary extent - and that includes the things that make me anxious, that I'm paranoid about and worry about. So it seems like any time on a given day, I'm usually coming across as more relaxed than average, or more wound up than average...

Do other 6s relate to this? It just seems like a bit of a paradox, is why I'm asking. Although - it does fit quite well with me being a 6 and an INFJ. I do think that one of the reasons why a lot of things don't bother me is because I know that when things DO bother me - they bother me so much that it can wreck my life. And I don't want something genuinely minor to become a big deal and have a bad effect on me...

Yes.

I've also struggled with.. if something should bother me. For instance, someone was trying to insult me by calling me an African (????), which I am kinda. I'm first-generation born American to one African parent, one American parent.

My family was very angry with the fact that the person was "insulting" me and I didn't stand up for myself. I was being too passive and laid-back for their taste. I even went as far as to get into an argument with them about how I felt about his calling me an African, and if it wasn't bothering me, what the hell was their problem?

But I'm like, I'm an African. And I'm not insulted. And that's that person's ignorant problem, not mine. There's better things to stand up for myself about, and being African is not one of them.To me, it doesn't make an ounce of sense.

Now if dude had slapped me for being an African or something, then there's a problem.

 

[ReflecTcelfeR]

I can agree to this all. I accept my 6w5 enneagram type.

 

[Santosha]

Yup. "A contradictory picture is the fingerprint for type 6"... or something to that effect.

I'm trying to think of good examples for that reflect this laid-back/wound-up thang, ones that wouldn't be typical for other types. It's hard, but they are there.
Alot of my quarkiness comes back to intuitive connections, Ne..is so blatant to me that this symbolizes that, which causes this and effects that, which connects to this and results in that, which will be responded to this way and received this way, and on. Trying to convey these abstract impressions in some reasonable, linear fashion is tiresome and maddening.. so I often drift in a state of lonely anxiousness..

To the untrained eye, I believe CP behaviors often reveal themselves in a manner that would appear laid-back, and only those very close to me know how vigilint and analytical my mind is really processing the tiniest of details. Infact, acting unfocused or unconcerned is one of the very best ways to find hickups as others let their guards down =P. How insanely paranoid that sounds! lol.

There are things I am genuinely laid back about.. but I often wonder if these things aren't simply the result of having a wider spectrum of safe-guarding parameters. I might decide to go out and get really trashed with a group of friends, allowing all kinds of unexpected and crazy events to occur and glee-fully embracing it.. but in some sense I've already made a run-through of all the possibilites and outcomes, and decided I'm okay with them.

Oh, skycake.