(The Myers-Briggs personality typology divides human personalities into one of 16 types. Exploring your type can give helpful insights into how you relate with the world. My type, represented by the traits Introverting, iNtuiting, Thinking, and Perceiving (or INTP for short) is sometimes called The Architect. It is one of the less numerous types. When I was young, I would have loved to hear from older INTPs. It might have helped me understand how my life was unfolding. For this reason, I've launched this blog series. As an INTP firmly entrenched in middle age, perhaps a few of my thoughts may help other INTPs make sense of their sometimes challenging life experience.)
Welcome to the first of what will hopefully become a series of articles wrestling with the nature of INTP-dom. (I could say INTP-ness, but that sounds somehow naughty.) When I read conversations posted among INTPs, I notice a curious and common undercurrent. Sometimes it's the outright subject of the conversation, and sometimes it hovers just beneath. It's an undercurrent of feeling disconnected, different, and isolated from others.
I've also noticed that analyzing and understanding the source of this particular problem seems to be elusive for INTPs. Although we define ourselves by our ability to apply logic and structure to understand and navigate the world, this problem seems to hide just beyond our perception. Every time we get close to grasping it, it slips through our fingers. In fact, we have a hard time even successfully defining the boundaries of the problem, much less discovering the ultimate solution.
Never one to shy away from the hard topics, I'm going to begin my INTP series with an exploration of this conundrum. How does our INTP nature react with the personalities of others in a way that leads us to feel this odd, hard-to-define isolation?
First of all, you'll notice I said feel. As we know, the entire subject of feelings is a squirrely topic for INTPs. The introverted feeling cognitive function is in the shadow position for us. That's the ability to build a clear, persistent sense of who we are as people based on how we feel about ourselves. We are driven by thinking rather than feeling. For example, if our understanding of the world leads us to the conclusion that we are an X kind of person, then that means we're an X kind of person. Our feelings will then follow that decision. If later, we gain evidence that we are a Y kind of person, then we are a Y kind of person, and our feelings will follow again. It's that easy to change our self-identity. We don't have the natural ability to "just know" the kind of person we are. We look for evidence of who we are, then make a decision based our analysis. This process can be dangerous, however, if jarring, paradigm-changing evidence hits us too often. Our lives can be turned upside down by it. There certainly can be value in having a strong emotional anchor to us through storms and rough water. As INTPs, we can get blown onto the rocks.
Because our own emotions are suspect and we minimize their importance, we fail to understand the importance, influence, and changeability of emotions in others. Our extroverting feeling function is in the inferior position, so it develops last. Basically, when we're young, our rationality bullies our emotions into a tightly controlled box, and when they erupt, they're frightening, exaggerated, and uncontrolled. As we age, however, we can build up our feeling skills. It's a painful, uncomfortable process, but slowly we can learn from mistakes and observations about ourselves and others. After years of struggling yet maintaining a fierce effort to analyze and understand, I now feel that at the age of 41, I can offer some potential insights into where we fit in the social landscape. These are kinds of insights I would have liked to have available to me when I was a young INTP.
The Hardest Feeling for Anyone to Quantify: Feeling "Normal"
The most difficult kind of self-awareness is understanding exactly what constitutes "normal" in our daily existence. For example, you don't really think about the many nuances of breathing. It just comes naturally most of the time. You only become aware of breathing when it is not normal. That's when stronger feelings are evoked, and you have a biologically-programmed reason to remember. For example, you remember being short of breath, you remember choking, but you don't remember the last five minutes of breathing right now.
Biologically, we remember the horrible things the most, the great things second, and the "normal" things least of all. Actually, it's an effective method of survival. First rule: don't get hurt or killed. Second rule: get the good stuff and enjoy it. Third Rule: do all the boring stuff in between. The challenge is digging out of the mental complacency of normal to make sharp observations. It's easy to see the friction points. It's hard to deconstruct the nuances of each step when you're flying on autopilot.
"Breathing" for an INTP
When an INTP wakes up to a new day and walks out the front door, what is the INTP revved up to do? What's our "thing?" What do we do like breathing?
Some personality types are honed, practiced, and pumped up to enforce the RULES. They're the Guardians. Some are eager to see what the day brings and find opportunities to have a GREAT TIME. They're the Artisans. Some are primed to reach out with their hearts and find MEANING IN THE WORLD. They're the Idealists. INTPs, on the other hand, are one of the Rational types. INTPs are primed, practiced, and ready to identify, analyze, understand, and then predict the workings of the world.
It's an internal, individualized, mental process. Basically, the INTP spends every day gathering information and fitting it into a sweeping, growing, and universal body of understanding of…everything. It could be cloud formations, what makes wind, traffic patterns, cooking styles, kangaroos, bad breath, brain chemistry, overgrown toenails, politics, arguments, star formation, how grass grows, or whether you need to put cream on that weird rash. The topics, however, are less important than the process itself. If we observe X situation undergoing Y action causing Z result, we remember that. If we observe it again, we remember we've seen the same evidence twice. If we observe it a third time, we may decide that we have discovered a potential Truth (that is, something we believe to be true until new information suggests that it requires modification). Each Truth becomes a predictor. If we observe X situation undergoing Y action again, then we can expect the Z result. If we are correct in predicting Z, then we really start feeling awesome. That feels right. That feels normal.
When we have amassed enough Truths to predict a lot of things, we begin to get noticed by the people around us. We begin to seem insightful, wise, and almost psychic at times. When I was young, I could often predict a person's entire point after hearing the first few words of their sentence. When I would answer their question or react to their point correctly, their jaw would drop. The prediction was the result of the sum of my knowledge of the person, my knowledge of prior conversations, what just happened that might have sparked a certain thought in their head, and the verbal cues pointing to where the conversation is about to go. Again, a successful prediction equates with understanding, and that feels good to an INTP.
This drive to amass information, form structures, and predict the world permeates everything an INTP does. To many people, what I just explained sounds exhausting at best, or pathological at worst. But if you're an INTP, I trust this process happens like breathing. You might not even be aware that you're doing it. This process is the way we make sense of the world and find our place within it. It makes us feel at ease, controlled, and calm.
The Handy-Dandy INTP Supercalifragilistic Encyclopedia
So, in a way, an INTP is handed a huge, blank encyclopedia at birth, and the INTP's life is spent filling it up. And not from beginning to end. All sorts of points will be hit in the middle, and the knowledge spreads out from there. If you're really lucky, by the end of your life, most of the empty spaces will be filled in.
Each day, the INTP walks around with this encyclopedia always at hand, always ready to record a new insight, make a revision, or use it to predict what is likely about to happen. It can also be whipped out at parties to spark interesting conversation or to twist it into humor. INTPs can be charming and charismatic, providing endless entertainment for those who love trivia, philosophy, or other off-the-wall conversation.
Did you hear that word I slipped in there INTPs?
Entertainment.
Yeah, I said it. If you have a decently-sized encyclopedia, you probably know what I'm talking about all too well. But feeling like the entertainment can piss you off after a while. It's divisive. When you go to see a show, there's an audience and a stage, and those two groups of people don't mix. The audience just wants their laughs when they want them, then go home. It's the Nirvana effect: here we are now, entertain us.
INTPs use charm and humor and conversation as a tactics to draw people closer and to have social interaction. If you're older, you've probably learned by now that, in the end, it doesn't work. We fail to gain the closeness we're craving. Instead, we're directed to exit stage door left when the show is over.
Yet, we use our encyclopedias this way because we really don't know what else to do. It's our way of feeling out other people. Are they interested in what's going on in our heads? Are they interested in our observations and understandings? Do they have similar thoughts? Can I help them with what I've learned? Can they help me?
Humor can be a very powerful tool in reaching out. It often requires intelligence. It's an indicator. Does the other person get it? Can they follow the humor? Can they reciprocate? That's the plan, at least. But when the attempt doesn't click, that's when we're either rejected as a geek/freak, or we get hired as the entertainment. For those of you who have been the night's feature presentation, it can be cool. But another part of you says FUCK THAT. If you're going to be used and dismissed, the least they can do is pay you well for it. Am I right?
Hello? Is Anybody Out There Hearing Me?
So why do we have this recurring feeling that we're not jiving with people? Why is it hard to get close to someone? And why is it that once we do seem to get close, it tends to erode and disintegrate?
On the one hand, the reason is terribly simple. What is not simple is the subtle mental and emotional chemistry that goes on within us that results in those hard-to-navigate feelings. After all, no person makes us feel anything. We are the reason we feel something. All feelings come from within us. The other person is just the target that we are hanging our emotions onto. We can just as easily hang them on someone else.
So, let's turn back to what is normal for an INTP. That is where the problem lies. We may not even realize we're toiling away at our encyclopedias. We just do it. And like all people, we innately assume that everyone thinks and does the same things we do. Why would we believe any differently? We all follow the golden rule: if we treat others how we want to be treated, they will reciprocate. Right?
No. Unfortunately, they often don't.
They are following the golden rule also, but their version of it. They often want something fundamentally different. As you try to provide one thing, they are hoping to receive something else, and vice versa.
INTP's are well under 2% of the population. If you are INTP female, you are well under 1% of the population. Even our close rational cousins, the INTJs, feel somewhat alien when we interact with them. INTJs do not share our Perceiving function, and, therefore, they can create their mental constructs in a vacuum. They tend to think it first, then go about putting their theories into practice in the world. INTPs do it in the opposite direction. They observe and analyze the world first, then go back and create constructs based on what we observed.
I'll Show You Mine If You Show Me Yours
Here you are, an INTP happily working away on your encyclopedia and figuring out the world. So, what do we ultimately want from other people?
You see it coming, right?
We want to share the experience of writing our encyclopedias. Want to share pages, compare notes, help others predict and avoid bad stuff and mistakes, and get others' insights so we can avoid some bad stuff ourselves (especially icky emotional badness). That way, we don't have learn everything the hard way. We can share the load in a grand community striving to understand the nature of the universe. We feel connected to people when they seem like they might have a similar encyclopedia. We feel love when the overlap seems especially potent. How do we know? When we want to talk with a person more, more, more. Then, it happens. Someone starts to care for us. They actually want to be around us and talk and share things. MISSION ACCOMPLISHED! Right??
Wrong again. (I know I’m being hard on you.)
At first, when this seeming compatibility happens, it feels AMAZING. We have finally found an encyclopedia co-author. It's so much more fun to tear into the world with a partner-in-crime. But wait a minute. Little clinkers start happening. Maybe they don't want to talk so much anymore. Maybe their eagerness wears off, and they are happy to put their encyclopedia on the shelf. You think, WTF? This person cares and wants to be with me, but why? What is still fueling the person's interest? Why can't we share encyclopedias anymore?
Well, you have made a mistake in your assumption and you don't know it yet. Another person will care for you for their reasons, not yours, and the two may be very, very different. Here is the source of the INTP undercurrent. It's the subtle confusion that arises when someone wants to be with us, or we want to be with them, and yet they aren't really jiving on the encyclopedia level. A rational craves a mindmate, and here's an example of what that means. You can put an insanely gorgeous woman in front of me, and, of course, I'll feel desire. For a long time, I thought I would desire her because she was beautiful, but I've learned that's not true. Everyone likes what we find beautiful, that's no secret, but it's just a start. Without realizing it on a conscious level, I would fantasize that her beauty is an indication that her mind is going to match that attractiveness. If she hasn't opened her mouth yet, the fantasy can grow. If she never opens her mouth, that fantasy can become a false truth. She can remain utterly amazing forever. However, if she does open her mouth, or I can observe her actions, something often happens. If her mind turns out to be a turn-off, the attraction will evaporate, regardless of her beauty. Honestly. The sad truth is that I don't think there's a double-bagger solution for anti-mindmates. It's not something that can be ignored. (I should note that the reverse is also true. Mind connections can spark desire regardless of a person's appearance.)
The Final Solution
Once an INTP discovers the shocking truth that other people think very differently than we do and are driven by very different motivations, the INTP then turns the overall desire to analyze and understand the world onto to the inner workings of people themselves. However, people are irrational, chaotic, and unpredictable, right? Not logical at all! Every theory we make about them seems to fall apart. Every safe path we chart through them leads to swamps and disasters. The traumas mount. And the failures. You might even decide to take your ball and go home. But it's just against human nature to enjoy isolation. You keep limping back and trying to connect again.
If you're stuck in this cycle, then I have an important insight for you.
Ready for it?
People, in fact, are entirely logical, rational, and predictable.
No, no, I'm not smoking something. The human condition is indeed extraordinarily complex and challenging to tackle, but as you well know, hard doesn't mean impossible. Hard just means hard, and what makes it the toughest for us is the element of emotion.
Here are the unnatural things that we INTPs have to learn to do in order to better understand people: (1) give adequate weight to the motivating power of emotion in other people (and ourselves) and (2) understand the roots of that emotion. We stomp down emotion and will always choose a logical answer over an emotional one. Most of the other personality types are not that way, however. Until we successfully deconstruct the power of emotion (including how it still affects us despite our efforts to kill it), we have little hope of successfully navigating emotions in others. We will not be able to understand what the actions of other people mean and how to predict them.
But that process, my friends, will need to be a topic for another day.
(If you're an INTP and find this article helpful and you have a another topic of interest in the wide world of INTP-dom, let me know. I'd be happy to frame a future article on your question.)
Other Articles
Chapter 2 - Overload
40 comments:
at fist i was like: man, are you serious?
at second... i was thinking about finding time to read your words, because they surely will be interesting.
i also did a simplified test, found here:http://www.personalitypathways.com/type_inventory.html
and found that i was inspector, that is ISTJ.
alright, i clawed my way through, with pleasure, i must say :) all these lines.
thank you for sharing and the great simile of gathering an ecyclopedia.
it is also an important observation that while we acknowledge the variety of people around us, we hardly recognize that different people tend to think along different patterns.
at the same time you are right about logic and predictibility. i doubt you could have come to a different solution, could you? :)
i mean everything must fit into a system, a pattern and you have seemed to find it.
I suppose it a good thing to find a definition to hang on the side of whatever box you're in but personally I think that beyond a certain age you either decide to stay in your safely constructed ideation or move on to another.
I have great emotion and passion for people but I prefer to be left alone or to say it another way in most cases I prefer my own company without wondering or worrying whether people find me acceptable or not. In my own thinking I find that the not is more often than the do. but *shrug* I don't care, I live, I breathe, I make my way through the day as it unfolds before me, then I sleep.
ISTP
I'm an ENTJ - The Executive I believe is the moniker put on that. I remember reading stuff on this about 15 years ago and being frightened at how close it described me!
I think if memory serves we'd be the ideal matched couple!
INFJ?!?! hmmmm
You are a man after my own heart. Personality placement tests intrigued me when I was a young man, but since I found they serve no useful purpose other than conversation pieces, I drifted away … My mate is the same personality type as I am; we are in the 1% category of the population. My type calls for achieving the end result, no matter what means or methods must be attained to complete the task. Recently, four months ago, I entered the online community in search of ‘something’. And, when this ‘thing’ never surfaced, I bailed from the blogosphere and settled into my comfort zone of things familiar to me – things that work. I have several WIPs which entertain me, and I have committed to finishing ‘another’ book only to be read by my family, mate and counterpart exclusively. A memento, a keepsake, a family heirloom is what I will create. Never have I had the slightest notion to publish, nor ever will. But, there’s one thing that I do have – a fantastic story. Yes, I am an INTJ and rationale is my master. “Whatever works – whatever it takes!”
INTJ here. And reading about myself helped me immensely in understanding why I was the way I was - especially at work. Sending same to my boss gave him quite the chuckle. I am well known there for my INTJ traits.
Szelsofa, yes, this post is a bit long. ;) It tops out over 3,000 words. However, I wanted to do right by this topic. And yes, the article itself is very much an INTP creation.
Walking Man, I suppose of all our particular situations will greatly affect how we see our social situation. I do think that INTPs are a group that tends to feel a problem interacting in a fulfilling way. These issues are subtle, though. I should stress that people are far more alike than they are different. But the differences do matter.
Futheron, I read a bit about the INTP-ENTJ match-up, and it does make sense to me! I think that introverted thinking and extroverted thinking could be very complementary.
Lee, that's a fine idealist temperment that I know quite a bit about. :) Aine is an INFJ.
Jackie, your experience makes a lot of sense to me. I also think that the additional skills you've learned with age really show. I daresay that you would have presented differently and had different positions on these topics when you were a young adult.
Sarah, I'm always glad to hear when Myers-Briggs has been helpful for someone! There is a theory that Jung, whose theories Myers-Briggs was based on, was an INTP. The typology system itself appeals to me!
I always enjoy Myers-Briggs discussions...I'm always fascinated about how accurate they are. I have been and continue to be an INFJ, although some of my tendencies are context-specific (meaning that I think my "professor" identity is a little different from my INFJ nature).
word verification: reway
I think examining one's Myers-Briggs type is empowering...being able to identify one's strengths and weaknesses is the first step to maximizing what we do well and shoring up what we don't.
Thanks!
Great article. Wish it were higher on Google hits.
Precie, I agree about the empowerment. A great deal of strife in our lives is from miscommunication and the failure to understand the differences in the each other think. Myers-Briggs helps to cut through that confusion.
Anonymous, I'm glad you found it! The article is getting better footing on Google. With a good number of key words, it comes up on the first page of results. Thanks for reading it! Hopefully, a few folks will link to it.
Fantastic post. The encyclopedia analogy captures the INTP mindset, as does the use of humor as a conversational test -- or, I guess I really mean, it captures mine.
Anon, I was hoping to strike a chord with other INTPs. :) Thank you for letting me know! It's quite a journey, isn't it?
I am an INTP female. It has been a relief to find people of similar mind and thought as sometimes I have felt very disconnected and disjointed from those around me - especially other females. Thank you for this post.
Teri, it must be especially confusing to grow up an INTP female. Our first bonds with peers are mostly same sex friends. At least boys in U.S. culture aren't supposed to be very emotional, so the difference is not so stark at first. But it does gnaw just the same. My younger daughter is an INT, I think. We'll see about P/T later. Right now, people find her interesting. But as I myself know, interesting isn't the same thing as connected.
I hope you find a place that you can understand and feel happiness in. (A grand wish, I know.)
I absolutely love your article!
As a 26 yo female INTP, I definitely struggle with this sense of disconnect in my relationships -there always seems to be a lack of something that leaves me feeling empty....even with my best and closest of friends. The reality is that at the end of the day, my best and closest of friends hardly ever feel that best or close. The only friendship I've had that lent some sense of relief to this was with another fellow INTP.
You're example with the INTP encyclopedia is so great!...and really helped to finally identify not what is missing, but why and how it is missing.
My question is: Now that we understand why this happens, is it something that we can actually change?
Since we base our sense of self and belonging in our understanding of that around us, we inevitably are led to believe that we don't truly fit in with those around us....because, well... the fact is that we really are different. And even if in reality it turned out that we actually aren't, it wouldn't matter because we would still see ourselves that way.
This dynamic isn't ever going to change- people aren't going to magically start being more INTP, and we aren't going to stop realizing the disconnect the creates for us. So, if this is our reality then aren't we ultimately doomed a life filled with underwhelming relationships?
Is there a way that we can stop seeing ourselves as different....or perhaps learn to not feel empty because of that difference?
Any thoughts?
Jenni, great to hear from you!
The very first step in gaining any ground on feeling less isolated is understanding the forces behind the problem itself. Without that understanding, the possibilities for miscommunication, tangents, wild goose chases, and red herrings are almost infinite. People miscommunicate all the time. It's the rule, not the exception. It's as if you try to hand someone an apple and they think you're showing them the cool new watch on your wrist.
That said. When I was your age, I wasn't really seeing the problem clearly. I knew I was different, but I thought that if I worked hard enough, delved into people enough, searched far enough, I would find the connections I wanted so much. Unfortunately, all it did was cement my difference all the more firmly. The isolation only got more sharp.
I do have some thoughts to offer you. Try to be very aware of when you feel good with people you spend time with. Maybe you like going out and having a drink with Jane and venting about the world. Maybe you like playing chess with Tom or debating philosopy. Maybe someone has strong feelings for you for a reason that you don't really value the same way, but there are nevertheless times that you truly enjoy being with them. Begin to focus on these times and associate them with the individuals. Those things are good and should be valued. And it's okay to value them even if the rest of the interactions with the person are underwhelming. You can even limit your interaction with those people to those times and stop trying to dig things out of them that aren't there. It's a mosaic approach--accepting a myriad of good things from life as a whole, rather than trying to get the whole from any one person. Also, try to see yourself as the best friend you can have. Try to see sharing as not essential. (A tall order, I know.)
Honestly, while this approach yields helpful results, it has a downside too. It tends to polarize your world. Rather than having this hope that you are going to find the right people or cut through the noise with people you already know, it puts the good things in one pile and the emptiness in another. In any given moment, you are in one condition or the other. Being on the empty side feels worse. That's the price you pay for enhancing and valuing the good. However, if there enough good, your life will have a nicer glow to it that feels good even when you're on the empty side.
I don't have an elegant solution yet for all. No grand unifying theory. But maybe that's our nature. Maybe, in the end, the hunger and the search are the most burning desires that we want to share with someone else.
Thank you for this post. I bookmarked it several days ago and have read it more than once. It puts into words so perfectly what I have really been struggling with.
I am a 39 y.o. woman who is very INTP. I have always struggled so much with my inability to connect with people. I grew up very isolated with atrocious social skills and in my early to mid thirties really studied and analyzed how to interact with people (socialize the INTP way! ). I have made a real effort to get out more and meet people but the last year or two it has become very clear to me that there is just something missing. I am thinking about what I am doing when I am interacting with someone and not feeling it in the moment the way most ( I almost put "normal") people do.
After about a year of almost hermitude besides work and family, I am trying to be more social but with a lowered expectation of what I can achieve.
I like many aspects of the way my brain works. I am always interested in the world and get such pleasure out of observing patterns and figuring out things but I have sometimes wondered why the difficulty connecting with others couldn't have been paired with the ability to switch off loneliness.
Tamala, I'm no stranger to what you're feeling. I've put a huge amount of effort in trying to step outside of my natural perspective as an INTP and to escape some of the traps that INTP-ness sets for us. But that said, I wouldn't trade being an INTP. I feel like it's a real gift. Anyway, I wrote this post not only to share some of those insights, but to let other INTPs out there know that they aren't alone. I get the sense that my post gave you some solace, which is wonderful. People are landing on this post. People are searching for "INTP isolation" on Google, etc. So again, you're far from alone.
I would offer some of the same thoughts I gave to Jenni above regarding rolling back some of that loneliness. You're right. Just because we're INTPs doesn't mean that we don't feel just as much as others. INTP doesn't erase emotions. Try to really be aware of those small moments when you enjoy someone's company. I can't solve the million dollar question for you, because I still struggle with it myself, but the discrete moments of happiness do add up. The pieces of frienship and comraderie do mean something important (even if our rationality wants to pick away at them and de-value them). And in the end, there ARE INTPs out there that feel the same way. At least there is solace that we aren't crazy or defective. ;) Stay strong.
thank you for articulating this experience. I have had many conversations with entp and infjs on this subject and their insights have been quite valuable. wirh an s mother and an n father i understoodthe many of these dichotomies long before i found myers briggs. MB really helped be understand the disconnect I felt with other N's. to be an emotional introvert and a conceptual extrovert is tricky. I have fed my need for discourse by trying to surround myself with other N's that can give me some of their available "server time". they have limited tolerance for our exploration but will join us on occasion. I would like to find a community of intps to occasionally explore ideas in greater depth and without the attendant niceties of my other social relationships. while I'm dreaming I'd like a few of those participants to have natural art/ humanities leanings. am I the world's only non sci intp?
Anon, tricky indeed. That word fits well.
I think our particular brand of energy/intensity *is* our social nicety. It's grinding when it's absent and bonding when it's there. As for non-science INTPs, I know what you mean. When I was young, I was very sparked by science. Now, I value art and expression even more highly. This blog embodies that side of my brain.
Great article; thank you. I identify with the INTP profile, and had always thought my introversion explained this "disconnection". As I came to understand the functions better, I found myself psychoanalyzing my colleagues, and realized I was actually searching for another NT to connect with, and with whom I could share stimulating conversations.
But through the careful observation of others, I have also become more aware of communication styles. I have learned a lot about myself simply by reflecting on interactions and discussions with an ISFP (opposite functional preferences). She marvels at how composed I am after emotional stressors like criticism or the death of a patient (we are nurses), and thinks it is a good thing, as she believes she is overly sensitive. On the other hand, I recognize that I am lacking her sensitivity and awareness of other people's emotions, and therefore, come across cool and occasionally blunt.
In order to connect with others, we need to be able to understand them and communicate well; look carefully at their S/N and F/T dynamics (what kind of information they are interested in and how they process and judge this information). This may even lead to personal growth as we strengthen our least preferred functions to support our dominant ones.
I look forward to your subsequent posts!
Get out of my head! ...wait really please don't. This concise description (yes I said concise) says so much! I'm a 36 y/o female INTP and only learned about MBTI a year and a half ago. I wish I knew about this a long time ago! Even at my current age, your blog seems highly relevant because in some ways I feel I am just now developing myself instead of trying to be like everyone else.
This is wonderful. :D
It's interesting how much of that I related to.
I can also spot what differences I have since I was an INFP for a while and have relatively strong feeling stuff.
Lani D, I feel like the basic nature of our differences aren't as stark as we tend to think. It's like being right-handed or left-handed. On the surface, a right hand is totally different than a left hand, but we still have that non-dominant hand and use it. An F person is just using a internal, visceral process to orient to the world, while a T is using abstractions. We just build abstractions in the extreme and use them to (attempt to) understand everything. Including psychoanalyzing coworkers when we don't seem to naturally relate to them. :)
Anon, it's nice to have someone in your head, no? :) It's a big, gorgeous place, but it sure would be nice to have some neighbors.
MBTI helped me a great deal too. I wish I learned about it when I was in my late teens or early twenties. There was always an undercurrent of feeling out of phase.
Gabi, sometimes we do seem to drift. However, I trust that a solid dominance will come into focus for you. Your F could be stronger than most T-types, but still ultimately be less than your T function. Or vice versa.
It never fails to astonish me how the MBTI is precise. The more I read about INTP's way of thinking and lifestyle, the more I see how they are similar to me, a fellow INTP. Great article.
Thanks so much for this post! I'm a 20 year old INTP male and I really can identify with the disconnect when making friends. Started a new job recently and making friends there was EXACTLY like how you described about the encyclopedia sharing.
Btw is it an INTP thing to prefer making friends with a specific gender? I find I make friends with females a whole lot easier (unless the guys are geeky and I can connect with them on an intellectual/geeky level). Or is it just an INTP guy thing like my ego prevents me from acknowledging to other guys that I don't know everything (i.e. my encyclopedia is not complete yet and I need them to fill in some of the blanks)?
You, author, really did a nice job getting through some things we know and then a unique thought -- possibly even a solution regarding relationships that I was slowly coming to (I'm 40 now), but you articulated.
We spend so much time avoiding, , trying to extract and ignore those pesty emotions. If we instead focused on using our problem-solving skills to predict and rationalize the emotions of others, we'd find them less challenging and disconcerting.
It helped to learn that my ESFP boyfriend has no hope of ever understanding me, so it's up to me to figure out his emotions and maximise them.
That's what I got from it.
As a 23 year old INTP facing most of these issues, I want to give you my sincere thanks for publishing this in a way that us INTPs get. I'll be taking pointers from this, and hopefully be able to interact a little more proficiently with the entity known as "people". :)
Anon and Joel, I think I responded to your comments in my later post. If not, my apologies! BTW, Joel, I think INTP males are easier on women because there are other ways they want to be around them. It's easier to form friendships, because there is a different dynamic and different expection. Also, rationals are drawn to feeling types. Problems grow over the long term, however. We still ultimate yearn for a mindmate.
Anon, I think that's what I've turned my energy to. Instead of seeing humans and the world as two separate sets of problems, I've turned my mental processes to deconstructing myself and others. The articles reflect some of that process.
x01660, you're very welcome. :) I too wish that there weren't so many stark differences between people. I guess that's what makes it interesting, though.
I, too, am an INTP (although I am becoming increasingly bored with Myers-Briggs). Even the style of writing here resonated with me more than usual.
You hit the nail square on the head here, especially with regard to getting a hunch that we are sometimes used as entertainment. Very frustrating. Want to flip tables.
Good to get a sense of comradery. Looking forward to future posts.
Hmm. It seems that halfway through my post, I switched to a more condensed manner of speaking. Then reverted back to right last blerb. Then flopped again to comment on reversal.
Also, what you said about compiling a sort of encyclopedia and the desire to collaborate with others resonated strong for me as well. While my life has so far been relatively uneventful and painless, I have a pretty good idea of what are good and bad ideas. It's like I gain experience vicariously (such-and-such a course of action, inasmuch as I have observed it, never works, and I shall therefore avoid it). Certainly saves a lot of trouble, not having to experience everything firsthand myself.
41-year-old female. As I read this, I felt completely, utterly understood. Other INTP descriptions haven't quite matched up, yet you described me to a T. And so when you turned to other people and relationships, I waited for the inevitable conclusion (which I have come to as I aged)... and waited... and then the article ended!
Here is my inevitable conclusion: what makes other people feel good ends up being the same thing that makes us feel good: positive attention. We all want someone paying attention to what we like, and then GIVING it to us. Two things in particular make us fail at relationships: 1. We enjoy a really different type of attention from what other people enjoy, so we often fail disastrously at figuring out what motivates them (this is where your article seems to be going at the end). Similarly, they usually fail at pleasing us. 2. Many of us are so completely self-centered, even if we do figure out what people want, we forget to DO it. As a result, many people don't like us and don't bother doing what we want.
Everything in this article is about me: how I think, what I want, what helps me to do this weird thing called "feeling." That's a pretty self-centered approach (and maybe why the article resonates so well). Through introspection, I know a lot about myself, and have identified a lot of patterns about myself; therefore, I am one of the most interesting things in the world! If your desired outcome is to "understand what the actions of other people mean and how to predict them" (i.e. make them more interesting to you), then that's only the first 10% of the story. We can't stop with "oh! now I understand why he wants that silly thing!" We have to take the next step and actually GIVE them the silly thing. Over and over, despite being bored with it. We have to sacrifice our own desire to do what makes us feel good (think, understand, find new stuff to understand), and take a moment to do something that makes someone else feel good.
This can be boring and tedious (especially if there's no sexual motivation). But it leads not only to being able to keep people around long enough to understand them, but also to some weird other feelings, like connectedness and mutual caring. Weird, pleasurable, and... interesting.
To be fair: I haven't read your blog - I got to this article from a link. I look forward to reading more of your insights, and realized that you may well have addressed my thoughts in other writings!
The Generalist, one of the things that has struck me is how resonant I feel with all the INTP commenters. I didn't flinch at all with your shift to a more condensed style. I get it! As for being the entertainment, I do agree that the dead-end road of being the entertainment is pretty grinding.
Anon #1, first, that's very gratifying to hear that you felt understood here more than usual. If nothing else is gained, that's a major accomplishment on both sides.
I would argue that understanding our own motivations, and those of others, is a huge hurdle to overcome. It's worth more than 10%. I've found that it's rarely attempted or successfully done by other types. Which leads me to my ultimate take on your points. On the one hand, I agree with them completely. Once we have the information, we need to execute. Over and over. But that's a one-sided equation. Where is the reciprocation? We can't be the paternal/maternal ones solely responsible for making relationships work. That's where the long grind can get very long indeed. In my second article on overload (and my soon to be completed third on relationships), I freely admit that I don't have the grand unifying theory on how to be happy as an INTP. I do have some imperfect improvements to suggest. Those will increase happiness, yes. But will we achieve the nirvana we're unconsciously driven to achieve? I honestly don't know. We might be too alone for that.
Anon #2, you're certainly welcome to explore the creative anchor of this blog, but it's not required! I'm just happy that you landed here at all. Welcome!
Just wanted to contribute a few thoughts about the internal emotional world of the INTP as only bourne of my own experience and natrual inclinations.
Upon inspection and identification with the Jungian description of INTP, I find that too often we are described as being devoid of emotion or emotionally cold which isn't true in the least bit.
I think that emotions of empathy or compassion are (if evoked) easier to sit with as they do not require introspection and are more so the result of external factors. This also stimulates the "cascade of thought" to troubleshoot the problem that caused said trouble for the the one who initiates an empathetic emotional response, so humanitarian fields such as nursing can be suitable as it demands problem solving through empathy. It also demands adequate people skills which is a separate entity I care not delve into here.
As for more personal emotional tormoil or what not, I think when younger it was of an ability to not identify with or recognize an emotional response evoked by the external world, so the idea of this "function" being "underdeveloped" perfectly describes this. The lack of emotional maintenance over time will take it's toll, I suppose, and will surface eventually most likely during major life transitions that force one to be introspective. Probably introspection is also underdeveloped as these relms are filled with thought. This also makes it difficult to identify what it is you are "feeling" firstly, which, then incampacitates expression. I think sometimes our feelings are somewhat like inanimate objects that sort of creates an essence that is very hard to identify. The inability to explain this to others is like feeling trapped inside your head with no way to escape. Perhaps writing is a way to personify these inanimate objects as the use of metaphor can express that which you cannot logically discern and certainly cannot explain.
Meanwhile, during the process of "feeling" especially if it becomes taxing or draining to do so, the most natural way to "deal" is the same mechanism as removed emotions; troubleshooting. This can become a dire quest, for in order to solve the problem, you must first identify why you are in said emotional state. If you never once were very introspective, and years later experience some sort of crisis, you are forced to sift through the years and psychoanalyze...yourself, comparative to a chicken running in circles with it's head cut off. Literally, when the head is cut off the whole system wobbles in some disorderly, chaotic fashion because you are left with these emotions to have to identify and then solve, because I do believe that emotions can properly be solved.
This is long, sorry.
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