are we monsters or do still waters run deep?

#1

Hello all,
first time post.
After being recently diagnosed as an ENTJ my search for understanding has brought me here.

I’m often told I argue every point and and skip over emotional issues.
In fact I’ve been told that I’m blunt, to interested in using intelligent questioning to extract information for my benefit rather then to learn about the other person.
Obviously very gifted, but in a frightful way so it seems.

I’ve come to realise I need to ask better questions or at least take the time to ask questions for the benefit of letting others talk.
To uncover opportunities to develop I’ve been doing some work with “competing commitments”, it’s a quick way to understand what actions you take to block yourself from obtaining objectives.

That process lead me to uncover the fact that I don’t want to know how people feel about things because I don’t think I can cope in the conversation without getting to emotional myself, my fear is to have a feelings based conversation (the very idea makes me gag!)

As a quick example: a quick chat with the local fish and chip shop owner uncovered that he came very close to closing up shop a month ago when a competitor opened.
Others might have asked him how he felt.
I asked what his business plan was, what his marketing plan was and gave some advice on branding, thinking about it afterwards, I asked the questions and offered the advice because I was upset that he was in trouble, but I would have been completely uncomfortable with being the listening ear.

So to my fellow ENTJ’s here’s a very unnatural question: How do you FEEL? Do you distance yourself from hearing other peoples emotions because they are boring or because you fear your still waters will give way to a torrent of emotion you can’t control?

#2

People with a higher feeling preference make up most of the population of our world. They speak a completely different language. It’s a language of indirectness, vague suggestions that hint at what their true needs, thoughts and goals are. Since most people are expert at interpreting hints and reading between the lines in communication, they expect that everyone can do it. Unfortunately for us, ENTJs and ESTJs are least equipped to understand indirect speech, so our response isn’t what they expect and they think we’re being difficult. lol

I explained to an ENFJ friend today that I don’t easily understand hints and I don’t get my feelings hurt easily. I encouraged him to be blunt. He responded by stating he was busy and didn’t have time to chat. I soo appreciated that! He’s an awesome friend, I adore him. This was a major step forward in mutual understanding for us. At the same time, I am as careful as I can be with him to avoid directness. And I am really affectionate to him and assure him of my high respect often. (with sincerity of course!)

The weirdest part of this is that although higher feeling types can easily understand the intentions of other Feelers, they can’t seem to read me at all and they are wary of me. I hate expressing my feelings and esp in the rare instance that I am in a vulnerable position. lol But if I fail to express my feelings when a friend needs to hear it, it can become a major obstacle.

Edit: Oops sorry I meant to add that I don’t have feelings often. There’s no tide or torrent of emotion waiting for the dam to break unless a rare crisis provokes it. In that case, it can get quite bad for me. :smiley:

#3

@ Jayne:
I have learn with people who have feeling preference that anything less than a resounding YES means no. All the vaguely worded things that these people say means NO. :slight_smile:

@ Enterthejudge
Most people want me to listen when they emote. I will only do this for people who I care about who are the types that will emote and the work through whatever it is that they are going through. I would prefer not to put myself through talking about feelings which is usually unprocessed raw emotions - I hate blah, I am so fed up, blaming other people, people are jealous of them or they beating themselves up - I feel so stupid. I have feelings too. I feel all these things too, but I will move on from these feelings and reflect and think it through and come up with some way of dealing with whatever it is that I have to do. What drives me ballistic is that it most people do not get past emoting. I come across like some cold hard person with no emotions because shit has happened, but I am busy dealing with the situation and not emoting.

I know someone like this. I no longer engage with this person on this level. All it does it drives me ballistic when they start emoting with no reflection. Is this the floodgate you are talking about? I have to really control myself and the expression on my face. I feel this barrage of complete contempt and disdain for people who only want to emote to solicit sympathy from me, especially when I find out they created this mess themselves, from making stupid choices and decision. What’s even worse is they are not interested in learning from the experience.

I’ve learnt… avoid these people!