How to be a good intp, and not socially awkward?

[giumbai]

Actually it’s easy you just need to understand that most people don’t think like you, for them your complicated thoughts are unimaginably hard for them to comprehend, even when you think that you are getting close on making them understand an idea it’s actually not, they are almost there but the is a small difference that in their brain just can’t process all the information. So for a test for you to try is this, go and try to explain some idea to a friend and analyse him see if he understands, most of them might not, some may understand, or not? Think of it, after that ask them to repeat in other words what did they understood and you may find out that there still some mismatching in what they are saying whit what you just explained.

 

[BigApplePi]

Excellent Q.

Actually it’s easy you just need to understand that most people don’t think like you, for them your complicated thoughts are unimaginably hard for them to comprehend

I'm not sure INTPs thoughts are so complicated as they are unfinished. If you find yourself complicated, try a top-down approach, whether you are being social or not. I tend to forget that and get bogged down in details.

 

[WALKYRIA]

MMMhhh.... Don't try to be a good one... We are too good to be merely "good"...
Personaly, one of the main reason I won't ever be good is that I dn't fit the general consensus of what's good( to be socially fit? nooo, bullshit...). Bcoz whats good today will be bad tomorrow. I just live and embrace the irrationality and chaos of life in society and the irrationality of human beings included myself; It's dumb to think that we are rational beings. False. We are beings driven by emotions, by pleasure, by sex drive, by intuitions and instincts... So quit being a good INTP

 

[giumbai]

MMMhhh.... Don't try to be a good one... We are too good to be merely "good"...
Personaly, one of the main reason I won't ever be good is that I dn't fit the general consensus of what's good( to be socially fit? nooo, bullshit...). Bcoz whats good today will be bad tomorrow. I just live and embrace the irrationality and chaos of life in society and the irrationality of human beings included myself; It's dumb to think that we are rational beings. False. We are beings driven by emotions, by pleasure, by sex drive, by intuitions and instincts... So quit being a good INTP

I like the way you think , this was for those who kept asking that question on the forums :P

 

[Helvete]

MMMhhh.... Don't try to be a good one... We are too good to be merely "good"...
Personaly, one of the main reason I won't ever be good is that I dn't fit the general consensus of what's good( to be socially fit? nooo, bullshit...). Bcoz whats good today will be bad tomorrow. I just live and embrace the irrationality and chaos of life in society and the irrationality of human beings included myself; It's dumb to think that we are rational beings. False. We are beings driven by emotions, by pleasure, by sex drive, by intuitions and instincts... So quit being a good INTP

What a horrible post. How are we too good to be good, when good is now on a scale measuring how good something is? It is still good and hasn't changed. But the fact there is a general consensus of good and a choice to deviate from that means good is only an opinion; which is meaningless.

Good is meaningless. Be yourself and form your own opinions. Be shit, or a twat, or a necrophiliac and just because you may break social norms or opinions makes room to argue that what you're doing is good, for whatever reason (or belief) you can think of to back it up with, as it's just another perspective.

 

[John_Mann]

To be socially acceptable you must dumb down. First Rule.

With men you must talk about sports. You can use all your analyzing skills with that. Try to predict future results, etc...

With women talk about astrology or\and cheap mysticism. Use MBTI definitions but name it with Zodiac terms.

Never debate. Always agree. Always smile. If you want to be social you must not have strong opinions, just follow the opinions around you.

Keep in mind you must have fun doing that, it's a game.

Practice that until you reach a natural mode and not a .exe compiler.

 

[BigApplePi]

Lol.

 

[Pyropyro]

@WALKYRIA : You're not a walking Id. Don't degrade yourself.

@John_Mann : Dumbing one's self down DOES NOT make one socially acceptable. Been there done that. People will know if you're dumbing yourself down and you can't hide what you really are forever anyways.

@ OP : That's a rather poor outlook of your fellow people. They have different mental processes compared to ours but that doesn't mean that they can't handle information like we do.

@ Helvete : Being comfortable in one's own skin does great wonders in reducing social awkwardness.

 

[peoplesuck]

This is saying being socially awkward is bad, and not being socially awkward makes you a good intp. How did you come to this conclusion? and bad/good in what way?

 

[John_Mann]

Dumbing down is never mention "quantum", "natural selection", "celeratis".

Remember: Smile. Sports. Zodiac.

 

[Duxwing]

Be authentic and find accepting people.

-Duxwing

 

[doncarlzone]

Dumbing down is never mention "quantum", "natural selection", "celeratis".

Remember: Smile. Sports. Zodiac.

Did you read a Richard Dawkins book while watching BBC Horizon when you suddenly felt this sense of superiority? Who do you hang around with? Chimps?

On topic, caring less can potentially create authenticity while being too speculative will have the opposite effect.

 

[Perfectly Normal Beast]

hi john, i am a pisces

 

[Pyropyro]

hi john, i am a pisces

Oh no you're not. You're a Felis. (Yes, there's a cat constellation).

 

[Perfectly Normal Beast]

Oh no you're not. You're a Felis. (Yes, there's a cat constellation).

cool i didn't know that. i'm now officially felis, i will eat pisces for breakfast.

still, it's a bit cerebral of you to have known that and so now i don't like you

 

[Pyropyro]

cool i didn't know that. i'm now officially felis, i will eat pisces for breakfast.

I do like Ophiuchus more though. Wrestling a giant snake in the sky looks kickass.

still, it's a bit cerebral of you to have known that and so now i don't like you

[bimgx=100]http://facebookemoticons.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/smiley-sad.png[/bimgx]

 

[Helvete]

Dumbing down is never mention "quantum", "natural selection", "celeratis".

Remember: Smile. Sports. Zodiac.

I think anyone I know would think I'd be a boring obnoxious twat if I only talked about these topics placidly.

I much prefer talking about penis size and shopping. I am a social wizard.

Edit: You do have a point with being readily agreeable. Be sure not to over do it though as you can be seen as very shallow and people will start to dislike you. Keep a good mix of agreeing and disagreeing.

 

[Hadoblado]

@OP
For someone to understand you the info must be communicated. Have you been as critical of your own ability to communicate as you have of your listener's ability to understand? Because the two posts I've read of yours have been pretty damn average. Maybe I should just assume you stupid.

 

[giumbai]

To be socially acceptable you must dumb down. First Rule.

With men you must talk about sports. You can use all your analyzing skills with that. Try to predict future results, etc...

With women talk about astrology or\and cheap mysticism. Use MBTI definitions but name it with Zodiac terms.

Never debate. Always agree. Always smile. If you want to be social you must not have strong opinions, just follow the opinions around you.

Keep in mind you must have fun doing that, it's a game.

Practice that until you reach a natural mode and not a .exe compiler.

I must say, never debate is something hard to do ), when i where reading your post i just start luffing, because every time time i start to discuss something with my friends they go like why do you care so much, why do you get upset about those kind of things, and I just go like: WTF? I'm not even near to be upset we are just sharing ideas ); and they really take it personal, like you have a problem with them and so on.
With sports is a lot of research to do, I kinda get bored with it. Of course i found other shortcuts like after i do a bang up job being social in a group, i just leave, so that the situation should not get occurred because i can't maintain that artificial form of socialization. They will even thing that you are very cool for leaving this way, it's kinda fun

 

[giumbai]

This is saying being socially awkward is bad, and not being socially awkward makes you a good intp. How did you come to this conclusion? and bad/good in what way?

good intp = normal socialization skills
normal = psychologically average
I did not wanted to undermine the nature of INTP. I just saw a lot of post on the internet not especially this forum where most wanted to know how to not be social awkward. Of course is a bit more complicated then what I've said.

To actually integrate in the society like an extroverted, you really need to make an effort, you need to change a lot, i personally worked on it for years, because i didn't knew about other people being like me, and now i'm really doing a great job on integrating, but sometimes i still go and isolate myself from other, just tu recharge my batteries.

 

[WALKYRIA]

I socialize pretty well and the more I grow up, the better it becomes; so in a sense I'm a good INTP.
Yet; it is relative because I find myself incapable of relating to people in certain forced situations such as : school; work environment; ... All Te and Fe dominant environments.
I'm the most handicapped when I have to socialize with authoritative figures such as bosses or parents... otherwise I'm pretty socially competent when I have energy to do that.
so yeah, context matters when it comes to socialization... My guess is that we should actually split the concept of socialization into many since purpose of socialization changes.

What I must admit is that socialization in an unknown environment is rather hard for me... I need to trust first.

 

[TBerg]

I have learned that meditation and trying to really feel my emotions can work wonders in preparing me for social interaction. It allows me to be less self-conscious and more focused on my psychological processing of the situation at hand, allowing me to express myself more sincerely, with less baggage and greater emotional complexity. I like to try to find the little nugget of goodness within each social interaction and try with effort to make that nugget bigger. There is nothing in this world that will last, so we might as well let the goodness overwhelm the badness when we can. I also like trying to find wisecracks to use in each particular situation, if it is appropriate, so that people can also see the other side of me. I hope my wisecracks serve more to illuminate and begin more creative thought patterns that will allow us to get to better places in life. Both cannabis and nutmeg cut down on the emotions that bring more havoc to my life, as well. I would recommend moderate intake of each after making sure that our intentions are good for ingesting them. They are psychotropic compounds that deserve respect, and their positive effects depend upon our positive intentions and acts of positive will.

 

[giumbai]

I socialize pretty well and the more I grow up, the better it becomes; so in a sense I'm a good INTP.
Yet; it is relative because I find myself incapable of relating to people in certain forced situations such as : school; work environment; ... All Te and Fe dominant environments.
I'm the most handicapped when I have to socialize with authoritative figures such as bosses or parents... otherwise I'm pretty socially competent when I have energy to do that.
so yeah, context matters when it comes to socialization... My guess is that we should actually split the concept of socialization into many since purpose of socialization changes.

What I must admit is that socialization in an unknown environment is rather hard for me... I need to trust first.

I totally agree with you, i can relate extremely well with what you said. And i believe that we should really make thread about socialization and the strings attached to it, and split it as you said, but i don't don't think I'm the most qualified for this, so this is like an open invitation for wants to do so!

 

[Valentas]

Personally, I think that socializing can be intellectual. What exactly stops you from going to local meetup on certain topics? Really great place to speak about things every participant cares about.

However, if you approach random person then conversation will start dumb. It's just natural. After that, you talk more serious stuff and then when you become buddies, you can indulge into more intelligent stuff. At least that's how it went in my life. I had plenty of conversations with a couple of roommates and several friends ranging from physics to chemistry. The problem is that most logical discussions seemed to attract males not females. There was only one girl we talked about some math in physics but she is a weird person and I like her for that :}

Overall, I'm not a guy who likes to talk much. When there's a dialog I let other person to expand more and the like me for that. People love you when you listen attentively and you'll be seen as great communicator if you can do that. I love it when people not only listens to me but follows up with intelligent questions which shows that they care.

 

[BigApplePi]

Personally, I think that socializing can be intellectual. What exactly stops you from going to local meetup on certain topics? Really great place to speak about things every participant cares about.

If one can't meetup there they can meetup here.

However, if you approach random person then conversation will start dumb. It's just natural. After that, you talk more serious stuff and then when you become buddies, you can indulge into more intelligent stuff.

Comment: You are you, but if you approached a rose would you talk about the same thing as if you approached a stream or a bull?

Overall, I'm not a guy who likes to talk much. When there's a dialog I let other person to expand more and the like me for that.

If I want to say something, do I say it to a wall? My dog? Or do I wait and see what the other person is like? I don't know the answer to this.

People love you when you listen attentively and you'll be seen as great communicator if you can do that.

You can keep silent, nod your head occasionally and get this credit.

I love it when people not only listens to me but follows up with intelligent questions which shows that they care.

Yes. We should be so lucky!

 

[J-man]

All you have to do is redefine "good" and "not socially awkward" so that they both describe you.

 

[Koosy]

Actually it’s easy

It’s easy

easy

.... No...
Stopped reading instantly when I saw that word.

 

[somfoolishfoole]

I only read a few of the posts, but I feel I should comment here because I am an INTP that has suceeded in becoming sociable. I was the most shy person you ever met until like age 17. Now I have recently been described by 2 different people as a "social butterfly"

step 1: start with appearance. I know, we don't care about appearance, but really put in some effort and become the most attractive version of yourself, this shows self confidence and makes people respond better to you and improves your self esteem and all sorts of good things all in a positive feedback loop. START WITH YOUR APPEARANCE. Sounds like bulshit, it works.

step 2: the next key is in understanding Ne well enough to capitolize on it's socialising capabilities. crazyness, whimsicalness, fun (stupid) ideas. alcohol helps.

step 3: alcohol. become an alcoholic (I'm exagerating of course), alcohol makes you 10X more awesome in social situations. don't go clubbing, you can't cope and you hate it. go to house parties. house parties are great.

step 4: finding people that you deeply connect with is hard, stop trying. instead, make millions of superficial connections and stay in contact with them. find people you can tolerate and make a point of doing things with them. drinks or rock climbing or bowling or whatever, you don't have to enjoy the time spent with them, you just have to pretend to enjoy it and stick ur finger in a lot of pies (so to speak). lots of connections with friends means lots of social opportunities.

step 5: always say yes. if a friend invites you out and you say no, they might try once more, maaaaybe twice if they like you. after that if you still say no, they don't bother contacting you again.

step 6: learn to do that Fe stuff. fake it till you make it. pretend to care about people, lie to urself even. lie to urself and tell yourself that you care about ur friends mums operation, because friends like you alot more ALOT MORE when you make even tiiiny gestures that you give a shit about them as a person because MOST PEOPLE IN THIS WORLD don't care about other peoples lives. BE the guy who DOES care and people will like you alot.

conclusion or something: I am definatly an INTP and I was DEFINATLY shy as hellllll. more shy than anyone that I knew. and now I am absolutly comfortable socialising and I have lot's of friends. take my advice. it works (if I conveyed my experience accuratly). if you try it and it's not working, feel free to message me, I'd love you help you improve your socializing skills (awwww sheeit there's that Fe caring about you)

 

[Pyropyro]

step 1: start with appearance. I know, we don't care about appearance, but really put in some effort and become the most attractive version of yourself, this shows self confidence and makes people respond better to you and improves your self esteem and all sorts of good things all in a positive feedback loop. START WITH YOUR APPEARANCE. Sounds like bulshit, it works.

Agree.

step 2: the next key is in understanding Ne well enough to capitolize on it's socialising capabilities. crazyness, whimsicalness, fun (stupid) ideas. alcohol helps.

Agree

step 3: alcohol. become an alcoholic (I'm exagerating of course), alcohol makes you 10X more awesome in social situations. don't go clubbing, you can't cope and you hate it. go to house parties. house parties are great.

Depends on your culture. There are some cultures that are more open to alcohol than others.

step 4: finding people that you deeply connect with is hard, stop trying. instead, make millions of superficial connections and stay in contact with them. find people you can tolerate and make a point of doing things with them. drinks or rock climbing or bowling or whatever, you don't have to enjoy the time spent with them, you just have to pretend to enjoy it and stick ur finger in a lot of pies (so to speak). lots of connections with friends means lots of social opportunities.

NO. You need good and loyal friends if you want to succeed in life. I prefer having people that is ready to figuratively smack my face if I start some self-destructing behavior.

step 5: always say yes. if a friend invites you out and you say no, they might try once more, maaaaybe twice if they like you. after that if you still say no, they don't bother contacting you again.

NO. You need to establish your personal boundaries. Saying yes all the time will become a problem later in your life especially in your career.

step 6: learn to do that Fe stuff. fake it till you make it. pretend to care about people, lie to urself even. lie to urself and tell yourself that you care about ur friends mums operation, because friends like you alot more ALOT MORE when you make even tiiiny gestures that you give a shit about them as a person because MOST PEOPLE IN THIS WORLD don't care about other peoples lives. BE the guy who DOES care and people will like you alot.

Slightly agree. Fe work is awesome but it should always be under the control of Ti and Ne.

 

[somfoolishfoole]

step 3:
yes, I overlooked this. My culture is all pissheads.

step 4: I didn't clarify the end goal of this. by sticking your finger in lots of pies, you will eventually find a pie you like. the superficial connections are tools to finding people you like. us intp's don't relate well to many people. it's a numbers game, play the numbers.

step 5: I don't mean say yes to everything. I mean say yes to every invitation to specifically an outing.

step 6: yes. step 6 is definatly a last step once you feel like you have mastered step 1-5. Fe is hard. find an enfj and have many sex with them, develop closeness, and steal their brain.

 

[Evel]

Some friends and acquitances, even classmates have pointed out that sometimes I just ramdomly leave them talking and go away. Do you think I care? NO. If I do, it's probably bc I found something better to do! Lel. HUMANS.

 

[Klavierr]

I'm still incredibly socially awkward at times, but the way I found best to start working on it was to use all that intuition and logical thinking to start to memorize people's emotional patterns to certain events. Say something like A, people react like B because of C reasons. I have awful ADHD, so I was at one point very impulsive, and gave no measurement of what others reactions would be if I said something. Now, I think carefully about what I have to say, especially if I don't want negative/strange reactions.

It's gettin' there. Now I need to work on the hardest thing- looking others in the eye enough.

 

[giumbai]

There's a Chanel o you tube named SoulPancake that will explain some of the most social interaction, scientifically.

 

[Cavallier]

Actually it’s easy you just need to understand that most people don’t think like you, for them your complicated thoughts are unimaginably hard for them to comprehend, even when you think that you are getting close on making them understand an idea it’s actually not, they are almost there but the is a small difference that in their brain just can’t process all the information. So for a test for you to try is this, go and try to explain some idea to a friend and analyze him see if he understands, most of them might not, some may understand, or not? Think of it, after that ask them to repeat in other words what did they understood and you may find out that there still some mismatching in what they are saying whit what you just explained.

Hmmm...Two things spring to mind here:

First, language is an inexact science. It is fluid and flexible. Words mean different things to different people. Trying to explain a concept to someone involves you sorting out and stringing together words that to you mean one thing and to another means something different. Given all sorts of innumerable variables including life experiences, context, emotional state of the listener and the speaker, and of course depth of subtext extended between both people. Whole conversations can be had without saying a word after all and we often don't even realize it.

Second, it would be a very boring world if I explained a complex idea to someone and they simply said, "Cool. I understand you. Let's go out for some curry now". The interplay of two people misunderstanding each other is important in broadening your own understanding of that concept. When someone does not understand what I am trying to explain I come up with new ways of explaining the idea. They reiterate what they think I'm saying. I explain in a slightly different way. In this way we inch towards true understanding.

Now, obviously this only works if you both want to actually converse with one another. Which brings me to the following comment...

Never debate. Always agree. Always smile. If you want to be social you must not have strong opinions, just follow the opinions around you.

Yeah, you could do that or you could find a better class of friend.

It is hard to find somebody willing to go down the conversational rabbit hole with you. They don't want to put energy into it. Age helps with that. Teens are often so wrapped up in a culture of getting laid, being pretty/handsome, being popular and making lots of friends. Even the ones who might otherwise have vibrant sparkling minds end up en mired in the social trench wars of being a teenager. I'm not being dismissive of younger adults. It's just hard to see the tree for the forest sometimes in that world. I went to high school in a very small town full of very conservative kids who culturally were anti-intellectual and xenophobic. I became depressed to the point of being suicidal at the thought of never leaving the place. My councilor, the blind and stupid woman that she was, convinced me I could not go to college. To this day the thought of being doomed to stay in that place makes me shudder with disgust. It was a very dark time in my life.

Once I was out of high school and went to university I found a greater diversity of people. New people who did not understand my ideas but at least wanted to talk about them. Then it was not a matter of being a less socially awkward INTP. No, it was more about finding people with similar interests. The social awkwardness faded with time.

I could keep going but this'll turn into a book if I keep it up.

 

[giumbai]

Nice post, sorry for the for the problems that you encountered as a teen, I believe that those kind of experiences makes us who we are and helps to evolve our personalities.

 

[WhatTheFunction]

1. Stop pretending that you're so intelligent people won't understand you.

2. Get a job that forces you to make small talk. I needed a job so I worked part-time at Office Depot as a cashier. Needless to say I hated the job but towards the end I was much better at chit-chat and pretending to be happy.

3. Really focus on number 1 internally and do your best to apply number 2.

4. Practice, practice, practice.

 

[nearfantastica]

Nobody ever said being awkward is a bad thing. Lots of people are awkward, and most definitely not just INTPs. I think once you embrace it, and at least attempt to be outgoing around people, you get more comfortable with the inevitably of your social ineptitude.

Personally, I've always found awkward people strangely charming. I mean, it's all a matter of perspective. I often laugh at my social awkwardness - it's a good coping method.

 

[Ex-User (8886)]

ESTPs are very soccialy skilled. I noticed:
-always hear what other people say
-agree with most things (but not with something you really disagree)
-don't be too serious
-I don't know what it mean, but be open to others

 

[King_Be_Us]

1. Stop pretending that you're so intelligent people won't understand you.

2. Get a job that forces you to make small talk. I needed a job so I worked part-time at Office Depot as a cashier. Needless to say I hated the job but towards the end I was much better at chit-chat and pretending to be happy.

3. Really focus on number 1 internally and do your best to apply number 2.

4. Practice, practice, practice.

Be aware of what job and social setting they require...

Big job with lots of employees? Chances are they won't be your "friends."
Medium job with medium employees? Clicks will form, but ultimately, you don't have to pretend to be as happy.
Small job with small employees? Prepare to be part of their social circle, and you canceling plans because it won't fit your schedule.

This is really for the person who made the original post, but WhattheFunction, this is EXACTLY how I operate at my job. Many Kudos.

 

[Just Me]

1. Stop pretending that you're so intelligent people won't understand you.

2. Get a job that forces you to make small talk. I needed a job so I worked part-time at Office Depot as a cashier. Needless to say I hated the job but towards the end I was much better at chit-chat and pretending to be happy.

3. Really focus on number 1 internally and do your best to apply number 2.

4. Practice, practice, practice.

Odd. I was about to give pretty much the same advice and I also worked at an Office Depot. I primarily did freight, but as you know everyone has to interact with customers and run registers.