so i'm a thinker and part of being a thinker is processing things after the fact (which i have been doing this morning and want to share but currently have no one within talking distance so i type instead to get it out). its just the nature of who i am and i'm learning to accept that. it helps that i don't have too many feelers around me. too many feelers and i get claustrophobic. last year i lived in very close quarters with three feelers.
now you must understand that my experience with feelers before this time was not positive.
i was engaged to a feeler...and he disguised himself as a thinker and manipulated me with it all the time..one of the biggest reasons why i could not be with him.
at the same time as that relationship was going on, i had a 'friendship' with a girl on campus who was an extreme feeler like manic depressive no joke and she used me for all her stability...*shudders*
looking back on previous friendships with girls, i always attracted the unstable 'feeler' b.c i was so intensely logical, especially as a child, very black and white. i provided stability which meant that i also got used a lot. there is one specific friend from grade school and another from middle school that i can remember. After both incidences i abandoned them/they switched schools and i went back to my thinking ways. in high school there were a couple of girls in our group that were feelers and of course i got caught up in that drama too.
Needless to say i have hardly ever (i won't say never b.c my best friend from high school is a feeler and we are still close) had a good experience with a feeler, especially an intense one.
Therefore in college after my engagement was broken off i swore off feelers for good and my friends in college are all thinkers before feelers and i love them all for it. it means that there is no danger of them using me for stability. there is no danger of them saying things rashly that they don't really mean but that i take as fact b.c i react as a thinker and that i then spend hours trying to process and fit into the paradigm of that person which of course it doesn't fit b.c they didn't really mean it. My friends place a lot of value on thought in their regular lives as well as their faith and that provided me with a better way to connect with my faith in college. High school I was always taught to connect through my emotions and since my emotions are not my natural inclination, my faith never was either. At the same time in college I also learned to hold others' thoughts apart from my own and not take them personally when they conflicted. And when they did share emotion, I took it as a privilege to be hearing them and never took them personally because it was not seen as an intrusion on my life b.c they only did it when absolutely necessary and i trusted that. then i graduated....
and i ended with three feelers for roommates in an area slightly larger than three college dorm rooms put together. oh, and i went to china (which i loved) for a month with a feeler who didn't do squat b.c he couldn't get over his emotions and actually deal with the situation (which i despised). needless to say, i was suffocated.
*these statements are said in retrospect. remember: i don't process well in the moment b.c i am a thinker and when you are a thinker among feelers (or vice versa), it is like trying to communicate in a foreign language.*
the situation, things said, handled, etc. especially in the beginning of the year reminded me WAAAAY too much of David and the friend i had in college. and while i had thought i had dealt with a lot of those negative emotions towards them, which i had towards them directly, i had not dealt with the negative emotions towards feelers, particularly strong feelers and those who cover it up with intellectualism. someone who covers it up with intellectualism confuses me even more because especially after college, i associate intellectualism with thinkers, not feelers. i forget that feelers can be intellectuals who can make their feelings sound like intellectual statements which i then try to plug into my logic and get all confused because of course they are feelings, not necessarily rational.
Qualification: while feelings are not my natural form of communication/reaction, they are something i have learned are very important to me, thus making me passionate and sensitive about things that i really care about. And instead of numbing them as many thinkers do in order to avoid them, i have actually come to value them more than thoughts because i have thoughts about many things, but i do not have feelings about many. It helps me to sort out what really means something to me, even as i am aware that emotions often lie, but they serve as a signal that something important is going on and needs to be addressed.
now if you take the process above and apply it to feelers, well it just doesn't work. again another reason why i was confused most of the year and couldn't understand things. also when feelings are being thrown about to and fro it makes it very difficult for me to figure out what my own feelings are. unlike my thoughts which i have learned how to hold onto no matter what is going on around me, i am not that strong in feelings. so it was a wonder i survived at all with any emotions of my own and i definitely couldn't figure out what i wanted in life b.c i had all of these other emotions from others i was trying to process. it was just too much noise so to speak. finally, it made it very difficult to connect with at least two of the people i lived with b.c it was like speaking two different languages and in speaking a foreign language, especially when not fluent, it is extremely exhausting to try and connect with people on a real level and it just becomes easier to not. therefore, i felt more lonely last year b.c while i lived with people i couldn't connect with them, and i was so exhausted from trying to connect and not succeeding that i didn't have any energy to connect with anyone else. This year i live by myself and have to work to connect but i also have room to breathe.
BUT in amongst all of this confusion, God also brought me a positive example of a feeler, Dorie Voyles :). While she is a feeler hardcore, i don't feel in danger of being used or being lashed out at and she taught me a lot about emotions and valuing them. She also helped me to get over my fear of feelers, or at least make me more aware of why i want to run away when a feeler starts to cry. And that it is possible to communicate across those lines and it does not have to be utterly exhausting. It can actually be appreciated.
One final thing. a concept, point of understanding.
being a thinker does not mean one doesn't have feelings but just that it is easier to communicate and relate to life through logic instead of emotion. the opposite is true for feelers.
because of this, whichever one we are not often is the one we value more/have heightened sense of because it is unusual, foreign. therefore, we have one of two choices. we can ignore and subdue our weaker sense because it is foreign and uncomfortable or we can value it because it is unusual and can reveal new and hidden dimensions about ourselves.
none of us are one-dimensional
