[SJ] SJ's: When You're Lost in Thought, What Are You Thinking About?

[strychnine]

Do you ever wonder if heaven will be everything you've experienced here, only better? And what 'better' might mean? If there's such thing as truer colors than there are here, and what that might look like? Is it possible to hear color?

Heaven, yes, I think about stuff like that regularly.

Do you think about the influence that art/music has over mankind, and whether it makes them better people? Can hearing a variation in a scale of musical notes really influence morality?
Do you wonder if there's something inherent in you that prevents you from being as good as some other MBTI type?

No and no. Similar things, yes, but not those specifically.

Do you come up with a methodical plan for improving who you are in some way? Like, promising yourself you'll study for an hour every day for the next five years, and then calculate whether that's enough of a chunk in a life to make a difference?

This seems like a very Te activity to me, do you think it is?
I surely don't do that though. If I plan to improve myself it will be a more general thing. I won't set out times for it, etc, probably less methodical than what you are describing there.

I tend to do a little bit of what everyone is saying. When I'm alone with my thoughts I tend to think very creatively, I suppose "daydreaming" is the appropriate word, where I come up with intricate stories or places and play them out in my mind.

Me too, I'm a compulsive daydreamer!

I also think about tasks that I have to accomplish in the context of time. I reflect a lot on myself or others in my life, either trying to figure out certain problems or analyzing scenarios.

I am also addicted to solving problems. I think I get a high from the chase. Seriously... I get depressed without a problem to chew on.


I also do the tangential mental conversations...all the time.

The one thing I don't do that others have said they do, is mentally prioritize/schedule activities. I have to write it down or I forget. Scheduling also seems Te to me...probably why I suck at it.

P.S. I am fairly certain of my type now, so this is most likely ok to take seriously .

 

[raz]

The one thing I don't do that others have said they do, is mentally prioritize/schedule activities. I have to write it down or I forget. Scheduling also seems Te to me...probably why I suck at it.

It just depends on how you look at it. I mean, there's low level planning, like day to day tasks. Te looks at it from a different perspective than an FJ, who would view plans as a mean of creating order. To a Te user, it's about utilizing resources efficiently, creating a logical course of action with an end goal in mind, and accomplishment.

Take for instance, I get in a car in the morning, it has a quarter of a tank of gas. I'm driving all day. I have to return the car at the quarter tank. How much gas should I put in the car for the day? Look at the distance driven, different amounts of gas you could put in and how much mileage you receive. All of that is logical analysis that includes planning. It's overkill for that type of situation but it's for example sake.

To a Te user, it's not planning. It's not structure. It's strategy. It's why I sometimes dislike walking into Staples or something with an aisle of organizers. It turns the art of executive level organization and planning into a learned centralized skill. To me, organization isn't an external skill. It's a mental process. It's much more personal and ingrained.

 

[wildcat]

I definitely don't wonder stuff like this. The deepest questions I ponder are about religion - anything else, the Sensor part of my brain will shut it down.

Although sometimes I do ponder art and society, just when I want to figure out what the "point" of art is. But that doesn't happen all that often.

No, because I'm 100% sure that no type is better than any other. We all balance each other out for a reason, and we're all needed in order for society to function, in my opinion.

Absolutely yes to the bolded, but no to the rest. I'll often plan that sort of thing out (i.e. fixing something I regularly do wrong), but I won't think so far ahead.

Examples of what's going on in my brain when I'm zoned out:
- Crap, I've got to catch the bus to get to my haircut at 3...
- That was embarrassing! Why did I do that?!?
- I hope my test goes well...
- What the hell is that thing doing there? Someone ought to fix that.
- That billboard is awesome! I've gotta tell my friend about that - she'd love it.
- *taking someone's recent quote and going on an Ne-ish hypothetical continued conversation in my mind*
- *singing along to a song in my head*
- *reliving a memory or movie/TV scene*

Donna Cecilia said morality influences art.
Do you agree?

 

[Gerbah]

Donna Cecilia said morality influences art.
Do you agree?

I don't think it does in an absolute way, in the sense that the two are inseparable. I think it's a cultural thing. There was a time when, for example, literature in the West was expected to have a good moral influence on the reader. Now the culture is different and art is more individualistic.

 

[Gerbah]

I need to learn more about how to live in the moment.

This is what I am trying to do more of these days. I am actually actively trying not to get lost in thought. I can fall in the trap of magnifying things in my mind and then thinking way too much about it and making it more complicated than it is, when I would have a more accurate handle on things if I just experienced the moment more without analysing it. I think it would also help me to be less moody and sensitive

 

[Donna Cecilia]

When I said that morality influences art, I was standing in the artist´s shoes.

From the artist perspective, you can see many different reactions.

The first one is to defend and praise the morality of the culture they live in. The first group you find here are those who do so because they fully identify with it. You will find lots of examples of that in the European Literature from the Middle Ages, or the poems by José Martí (Cuban writer, supporter of Fidel Castro, and the "Cuban Revolution")

The other group that make a defense of an era morality is made up by those who choose self-censorship. It is the path chosen by artists who don´t agree with all of their society´s moral norms, but keep themselves from creating any pieces that can start conflict with them. Taking into account both their fear of punishment, or the fact that their art is the only thing they can do for a living. Think of those artist who had no choice but to stay in their countries during a dictatorship regime. At least in my own country, not all of them had the chance to go into exile.

The second approach is to react against the society´s moral norms. I strongly reccomend this movie which perfectly depicts this choice:

The War Symphonies: Shostakovich Against Stalin (1997)

 

[strychnine]

It just depends on how you look at it. I mean, there's low level planning, like day to day tasks. Te looks at it from a different perspective than an FJ, who would view plans as a mean of creating order.

Day-to-day tasks is low level?!- I find it hard, get drained planning it out...weak Te maybe.
Out of curiosity, do you plan day to day tasks? Write them down? etc.
As a means of creating order- I plan basically so I don't forget tests and such at university. I don't plan outside of when I absolutely have to.

To a Te user, it's about utilizing resources efficiently, creating a logical course of action with an end goal in mind, and accomplishment.

This sounds very "driven".

Take for instance, I get in a car in the morning, it has a quarter of a tank of gas. I'm driving all day. I have to return the car at the quarter tank. How much gas should I put in the car for the day? Look at the distance driven, different amounts of gas you could put in and how much mileage you receive. All of that is logical analysis that includes planning. It's overkill for that type of situation but it's for example sake.

To a Te user, it's not planning. It's not structure. It's strategy. It's why I sometimes dislike walking into Staples or something with an aisle of organizers. It turns the art of executive level organization and planning into a learned centralized skill. To me, organization isn't an external skill. It's a mental process. It's much more personal and ingrained.

Woah. This is great, raz, so thank you.
People can learn to organize, but weak Te is weak Te- they will never be as good as you or other high Te users, right? You are naturally inclined to use it well.

 

[coconut]

Do you ever wonder if heaven will be everything you've experienced here, only better? And what 'better' might mean? If there's such thing as truer colors than there are here, and what that might look like? Is it possible to hear color?
Do you think about the influence that art/music has over mankind, and whether it makes them better people? Can hearing a variation in a scale of musical notes really influence morality?
Do you wonder if there's something inherent in you that prevents you from being as good as some other MBTI type?
Do you come up with a methodical plan for improving who you are in some way? Like, promising yourself you'll study for an hour every day for the next five years, and then calculate whether that's enough of a chunk in a life to make a difference?

Come on, everyone really thinks about these things when they're zoned out, right?

I meant, "everyone really thinks about things like these when they're zoned out, right?"

I don't understand why people are responding to each and every example; I didn't mean -- "do you think of these exact things?" I meant, "is this the type of thing you think about when you zone out?" I expected answers like, "yes," or "no," or "pretty much" or "not even close."

I'm . . . baffled.

 

[strychnine]

I meant, "everyone really thinks about things like these when they're zoned out, right?"

I don't understand why people are responding to each and every example; I didn't mean -- "do you think of these exact things?" I meant, "is this the type of thing you think about when you zone out?" I expected answers like, "yes," or "no," or "pretty much" or "not even close."

I'm . . . baffled.

I got the gist of what you were saying, I thought you wanted specific examples. I'm sorry.

I'd have to say, "pretty much".

 

[coconut]

I got the gist of what you were saying, I thought you wanted specific examples. I'm sorry.

I'd have to say, "pretty much".

Thanks.

 

[strychnine]

Something else, though: Ime, the SJs here are vastly different from the ones I know IRL. "Lost in your head" is a foreign term to the ESJs I know, and one of the ISTJs. (The other one has INTJ traits, so he might not even be an ISTJ)

 

[raz]

Day-to-day tasks is low level?!- I find it hard, get drained planning it out...weak Te maybe.
Out of curiosity, do you plan day to day tasks? Write them down? etc.
As a means of creating order- I plan basically so I don't forget tests and such at university. I don't plan outside of when I absolutely have to.



This sounds very "driven".



Woah. This is great, raz, so thank you.
People can learn to organize, but weak Te is weak Te- they will never be as good as you or other high Te users, right? You are naturally inclined to use it well.

I organize day to day tasks, in my head and in an organizer. I don't resort to an organizer until it reaches the point of being necessary. I used to use an organizer where I could just write notes for each day. I didn't want to write appointments and be confined to times. I wanted to jot down things relevant to each day. However, now I use my phone to set appointments and to do lists for each day. Especially once I start school and get a second job, I'll be using the calendar on my phone a lot more.

When I think organization, I think categorizing things by their use. Is something information? Is it a task? Is it an appointment? That's just for planning though. Outward organization is taking a multitude of tasks and dividing it into levels, a step by step sequence. For instance, the steps to cleaning a room. Which part of cleaning should be done first? Which parts build on other parts?

When I said day to day tasks being low level, I meant that everyday tasks that everyone does are things shoved into a to do list. When I think higher level planning, I go back to strategy. I think strategy defines Te much better than structure or organization. I have an end goal in mind and my objective is to find the best way to that end goal.

Another example is how I've treated working on my phone. I put a new version of the operating system on it every few days trying custom builds. Doing something that often means the configuration process will be repeated each time. So, I created backups of system files, folders that can be directly copied, backups of settings. As I reconfigure the phone, each part of the process requires another part, so each one as to be done in order, and I have created a process mentally that reinstalls each part as it's able to.

That's extremely simplified, but that whole process is a sequential list of tasks. That's an example though of Si and Te working together. Te is creating the structured plan, taking note of the external rules and cause and effect, while Si is taking the information, categorizing and sequencing it. This is the easiest example of Si and Te I can think of working together. It's when you're creating a list of tasks mentally while adhering to the requirements of the environment, how it will react to each task finished, and how you must sequence your tasks for optimal efficiency.

 

[strychnine]

...
That's extremely simplified, but that whole process is a sequential list of tasks. That's an example though of Si and Te working together. Te is creating the structured plan, taking note of the external rules and cause and effect, while Si is taking the information, categorizing and sequencing it. This is the easiest example of Si and Te I can think of working together. It's when you're creating a list of tasks mentally while adhering to the requirements of the environment, how it will react to each task finished, and how you must sequence your tasks for optimal efficiency.

Thanks again raz. This is a great explanation, I'm learning a lot here.

 

[raz]

Thanks again raz. This is a great explanation, I'm learning a lot here.

Now if you could just teach me how to appreciate Fe more. My logic tears down Fe related actions in seconds. I rely more on my own sense of right and wrong than external relationship-based rules that Fe puts in place. Those two combined makes me find something wrong with Fe-related actions as soon as it happens.

 

[strychnine]

Now if you could just teach me how to appreciate Fe more. My logic tears down Fe related actions in seconds. I rely more on my own sense of right and wrong than external relationship-based rules that Fe puts in place. Those two combined makes me find something wrong with Fe-related actions as soon as it happens.

I'll give it a shot, but feel free to ask for clarification. (I just realized that what's below is more of an "explanation", I don't know how to teach you to appreciate it, though.)

As an example... I can be a social "chameleon". I can blend into a wide variety of social situations by speaking/dressing/behaving accordingly, etc. But at the end of the day I still have my preferences and what not, so I don't necessarily adopt the acting/character as my own, I just pretend for a time, as means to an end (getting along with people).

It's not logical, though, which is why your Te tears down the actions. My Ti is probably stronger than my Fe. I notice the contradictions within my own behaviours too. (I am very internally conflicted. Oh well.)

Also I can pick up vibes and "read people", but I think a lot of people esp. Fs can do that.