What's it like to be a Feeler?

[fleurdujour]

Okay, help us Ts out. From an INTP perspective, I may feel things internally, but I'm usually detached from my emotions, and they generally don't get taken into account when I argue or make a decision. I may rely on my intuition, or my "gut" feeling about something, but it won't necessarily be a "feeling" as I suspect F people would feel them. If I feel something strongly, I always try to take a step back so my logic won't get clouded by my subjective feelings.

So here's what I want to know (inspired by the Mock Emotions thread):

1) When you talk about feelings/emotions, how do you experience them?
2) Do you always go on your feelings? Do you feel that your emotions are "trustworthy?" Do you ever feel like your view of a situation is clouded by your personal feelings?
3) How does the feeling translate into action?
4) Anything else you feel like sharing. I'm just a T, so I'm not even sure how to word all this in F language.

You don't have to answer each individual question, as I probably repeated myself. Just give us an idea of what it's like to be F in this crazy world.

For me it's sort of the opposite, I am always striving to make sure I'm not toooo matter of fact (hurting people's confidence or offending them--but that's not to say I won't fervently argue something I feel strongly about).

"To be an F in this crazy world" is priceless (helps navigate the craziness in a way and make sense of some of it), while equally painful and draining No, but seriously, probably the hardest thing if we're talking about bad aspects of it, is also worrying that someone is not going to take you seriously and/or value whatever you're saying (especially if it's something more logic-based), which I find happens frequently.

I don't necessarily talk about feelings/emotions a whole lot. But I do experience them very deeply, in a way that transcends words (which is probably, why I don't directly talk about them much and doing so can be very hard for me, despite my F).

I don't always make decisions or actions based on my feelings (sometimes employ strict logic), but mostly do go on feelings in the end in the sense that I generally won't or will do something based off of how it will make me feel in doing it or after doing it (but that could be IxFJ--the thinking it through ahead of time employment of feeling?). And no, I don't feel like my view of anything is clouded by my personal feelings because a) I value myself and my actions based upon how they relate to my inner self and b) because I do try to be subjective in the sense that I see ALL sides of everything because of feeling (imagine how it would relate to anyone and everyone or anyone and everything) and c) because my view of a situation is wholly dependent upon how I feel about that situation, so my personal feelings are essential, rather than supplemental

"I'm just a T, so I'm not even sure how to word all this in F language. " That's okay--I'm an F and don't really know how to word it either!

 

[Samurai Drifter]

I'm an INTP. Nonetheless, sometimes I think I'm quite close to the F side. I wonder how my answers will stack up against others here.

1) When you talk about feelings/emotions, how do you experience them?
I never talk about my feelings. It's not as though I don't have them. Sometimes I have very strong emotions. I also care about other people's feelings, to the extent I'm able to understand them. I just don't consider them valid criteria for decision making, and they generally don't play a part in my thought processes.

2) Do you always go on your feelings? Do you feel that your emotions are "trustworthy?" Do you ever feel like your view of a situation is clouded by your personal feelings?
When I experience strong emotions, I always make sure to take a step back from them and analyze. No matter how I feel now,what will the most advantageous outcome be? What will work the best? Most importantly, what's true and what's false?

3) How does the feeling translate into action?
On occasions when my emotions win out, I have no idea how to control them and usually they end up causing a big problem. I act very irrationally and regret it later. When I go by what I feel I end up in a situation I regret.

4) Anything else you feel like sharing. I'm just a T, so I'm not even sure how to word all this in F language.
Noted. My girlfriend (a fellow INTP) and I were having this discussion yesterday so I googled possible related discussions.

 

[SillySapienne]

The curse of caring

Is both knowing and feeling

The truth about life.

 

[Serendipity]

1) When you talk about feelings/emotions, how do you experience them?
2) Do you always go on your feelings? Do you feel that your emotions are "trustworthy?" Do you ever feel like your view of a situation is clouded by your personal feelings?
3) How does the feeling translate into action?
4) Anything else you feel like sharing. I'm just a T, so I'm not even sure how to word all this in F language.

(1) It all depends on what I feel at the moment and even if the emotion is rightfully "mine".
Love as an example: A bright shining sun that keeps on staying in the sky until my flesh is but nothing but coal left outside to be thrown around in the wind. Hate I haven't felt much of in my life. I think I've hated someone once and only for a brief period. (read 5 seconds). It felt as if I turned stone cold, every vein seemed to breath fire and ice at the same time and my mind was deadlocked in possibilities for a plan to drag that person down to the feeling I felt. As if I couldn't sit straight neither lie down and it felt like something that pulled me deep under life's existence.
As Love and hate are concepts and not really in depth explicit emotions... I didn't wish to go deep into what I feel of every part. Might end up in too much text and I don't feel like it at the moment.

In the beginning, I wasn't orderly setup and thought came before feel. As it did, I have done the most grave things in my time. From pushing someone to almost suicide to having others fall in love with the thought of me and been treated like shit. ARGH. I can't even understand how I could do such a thing. It was as if my thoughts didn't add value in anything. Just what matter could do with matter if presented perfectly in order.
I felt shallow and hollow. And I even began feeling bored. So to the extent that I found several ways to kill myself... and tried. Silly reason. (Unhealthy xNFP)

Well, uh.. 2?



Wait. I'll finish this reply later. I think I need to go to bed.
And I'm not "here" enough to answer as I want to.

 

[Mole]

see like, you were asking questions about feeling in a very logical way. the whole thing about me, or us, is that we really do just "listen to our hearts". i know a lot of times i just feel a certain way and i don't know why. i can usually figure it out if i want to and then it will make sense.

Feelings are like an image.

An image is real but has no intrinsic meaning of its own.

You can demonstrate this by writing different texts under the image. And each text will give the image a different meaning.

And so we can say that feelings just are. And it is only afterwards that we can ascribe meaning to feelings.

But what is most interesting is that we can choose what meaning to give to any feeling. In other words, feeling and meaning are separate and independent.

 

[EJCC]

This is a really interesting thread. What a cool idea!

I was wondering (and maybe someone's brought this up already) if anybody here besides me thinks that, in a way, Ts are more emotional than Fs? Based on what (little) I've read here, it seems as if Fs really accept their emotions, and are very comfortable with them, and so don't really... I guess... react to them as much? Whereas Ts have a tendency to seem all-or-nothing emotionally... What do you guys think?

 

[BlackCat]

It seems pretty true EJCC.

 

[Thursday]

EJCC - exactly
Which is why i love thinking women
They are so explosive - no matter the emotion
to wit,
when the feeling becomes so strong and is foreign enough for them not to be able to handle it......hell yeah

 

[BlackCat]

EJCC - exactly
Which is why i love thinking women
They are so explosive - no matter the emotion
to wit,
when the feeling becomes so strong and is foreign enough for them not to be able to handle it......hell yeah

Spot on.

 

[527468]

Do you guys always (try to) do the right things? Whatever that is in your world.

 

[Costrin]

This is a really interesting thread. What a cool idea!

I was wondering (and maybe someone's brought this up already) if anybody here besides me thinks that, in a way, Ts are more emotional than Fs? Based on what (little) I've read here, it seems as if Fs really accept their emotions, and are very comfortable with them, and so don't really... I guess... react to them as much? Whereas Ts have a tendency to seem all-or-nothing emotionally... What do you guys think?

Not true for me.

 

[Thursday]

Do you guys always (try to) do the right things? Whatever that is in your world.

That issue is on a level of maturity
Not Feeler

 

[mortabunt]

I rarely get emotions that are positive.

 

[Tiltyred]

Feeling for me is physical. I feel everything in my body before it even hits my head. When a person is talking to me, I feel everything they're saying. Sometimes this is funny if they're a strong T, because they'll be speaking dispassionately of something that I holler about when I hear it, and sometimes when I'm all outraged on their behalf, they're like. Oh, you know, yeah, actually. When someone else is talking, I am watching the movie of what they're saying in my mind and I'm feeling it along with them.

I cried at work once when my boss stopped by my desk and I asked him why he was angry and he told me. It destabilized me and I burst into tears. He thought (because he's a T) that I was crying because I thought he had yelled at me. I knew he was not yelling at me, he was just yelling.

I turned down an invitation to the opera because beautiful music makes me cry. The person said what if it's not a sad story? I said it has nothing whatsoever to do with the story. The intensity of the music blows my circuits.

For me, that's why everything is personal. It impacts me physically. You don't get more personal than that.

I put myself in the other person's position automatically. But this extends even to the physical world, like, I was looking out the window and two birds took flight, and my stomach lurched like I was flying and I felt it when they lifted up. So everything makes feeling. Everything. Smells, colors, tones of voice, qualities of light, everything gives me a physical feeling, some chemical surge.

I like what was said above about ideals. Ideals are what hold me steady. For example, if you come to me telling me about some dumb-ass thing you did to yourself that's made you miserable, I feel your regret, maybe shame, misery, maybe trapped feeling, whatever else you bring, and I acknowledge it for you/with you. T might say, "Well, you brought it on yourself." F says, "And blaming doesn't help anything." What's the most important thing? The ideal is Do no harm. I try to do what will cause the least amount of negative feeling in the long run.

Unfortunately being so attuned all the time makes me seem insensitive sometimes because I have to really pick and choose what I'm going to address and how far I am going to go with it, who I'm going to let in and who I have to exclude or they will literally make me sick.

When I hear a story with a hole in it, my intuition says "glitch! glitch! glitch!" and I file it away. I know there is something hidden in that spot. I wait until the story comes out. It always does if you give it time. It's not my story so I don't force the telling of it. I wait for the other person to let it unfold, but I do note along the way when something doesn't feel right about what I'm being presented with. It's not about me showing that I'm smart and I can see a hole, though. It's about going through a journey with someone else and letting them know they're not alone. Hearing a story with a hole in it feels like you're walking along and all of a sudden your foot does not make contact with the ground when you put it down. What emerges when that spot is revealed tells me a lot about the person -- the things you hide are as important as the things you show.

Yes, I always trust my feelings. That's why I have them.

As much as possible, I don't show them, because I don't want to impose.

Feelings do lead to thoughts but they don't always have to for me to realize truth from them. With maturity and practice, I know when I feel certain things, it means something. Also with maturity and practice, I hold off a beat or two before I act on what I feel. If it's true, it will still be true tomorrow. Sometimes I will wait until what I feel materializes. Sometimes, though, I don't. Especially with negative emotion, I try to hold it up to an ideal. That keeps me from acting out my revenge fantasies.