Early Retirement Extreme Forums

Firing another one off the cuff. What if you framed your personality type in the context of a disorder instead of simply an approximate description of how you operate?

In other words what advice would you give in order to round out some of the more negative/undesirable aspects of your type (or a type you find particularly annoying).

For example I always come up INTP. I've found the following alleviates some of my symptoms.

Social/out going spouse (ESFP), forces me to interact with the world and others more than spend time in my own head.

Outdoor activities, especially hiking strips life down to the naked essentials and forces me to focus on the experience of living rather than the abstract idea of it.

Exercise as a milder form of the above, having the physical take center stage plants me firmly in the present.

Lastly, probably most controversial, is household chores/maintenance after smoking a bowl. I get lost in the work, feel at one with the rhythm of the universe.

What is ordered?

In other words what advice would you give in order to round out some of the more negative/undesirable aspects of your type (or a type you find particularly annoying).

The same advice I would give to anyone who is looking to change any aspect of themselves. Do the thing that makes you most uncomfortable, that is also tolerable. More practice at this will broaden your spectrum of tolerable discomfort.

MBTI is just a set of preferences. Understanding one's preferences is vital to building a life that is comfortable and allows growth. However, once that safe haven of lifestyle is built, growth is limited, because few uncomfortable aspects are going to force growth.

Leaving that safe haven, and doing what does not come naturally is the fastest way to broaden that range of not comfortable, but also not painful experiences. And always remember that the safe haven is there for a purpose. Retreat to process change in an unthreatening environment. Just as resting after lifting is vital to growth, so resting after growth experiences is vital.

Or, that's what I tell myself, anyway.

@riggerjack

Well said! Is this a place of comfort or discomfort for you then? Both?

@daylen

Not sure, maybe ask Eunomia?

Stability of society is on a different level. A "disordered" individual could even contribute by engaging in creative destruction that allows society to exist; the part must die for the whole to survive.

Ordering requires rules and rules are constructed. The line between sick and healthy is arbituary.

daylen wrote: ↑

Sat Aug 18, 2018 6:22 pm

The line between sick and healthy is arbituary.

Fascinating statement.

So one who is sick, and one who is healthy are the same? A first place marathon runner, and a person on hospice? Same?

Not edge cases, and the edge cases are what people like to talk about.

@daylen

Arbitrary

"based on random choice or personal whim, rather than any reason or system"

If the line is truly arbitrary, as you say, then who is to determine where the edge of it lies? If we are to have edge cases, then we must have an existing standard of what constitutes healthy and sick for it to be the edge of.

Am I missing something? Not being a smart ass, just looking for clarification on your position.

Arbitrary in the sense that there is never any agreed-upon rule to differentiate between sick and healthy unless two or more agents contruct one to use in a limited context. We are dealing morality and complex systems here. Any reason or system still has to make assumptions that not all agents share.

If you were an ant, what is a good day?

The problem with morality is that it depends on the level you are talking about. Good or bad for what?

daylen wrote: ↑

Sat Aug 18, 2018 7:26 pm

Arbitrary in the sense that there is never any agreed-upon rule to differentiate between sick and healthy unless two or more agents contruct one to use in a limited context.

So by arbitrary you mean not-unanimous? So sick and well are not to do with natural processes, but rather with the degree of consensus?

Natural is just the agreed-upon reality. Science minimizes error by reconciling several observations from multiple agents.

@daylen

So natural processes like child birth, sickness, death, digestion, flatulence etc only exist because of a general consensus that they exist?

They can exist to you. When people communicate, meaning is derived from language as opposed to experience.

@daylen

So language is dervied from something else than experience and reality, the two are not related?

All language is derived from experience. When communicating an agent cannot derive meaning from another agents experience (directly).

Edited after your edit haha.

So natural processes like I described above, say death of the body for example, are too abstract for language to express from one person to another? In other words the symbol of the thing is inadequate to describe the thing itself? And because of that inability, the concept of the death of the body, is up for debate? Maybe avoidable?

That is why I put directly there (the logic is a little fuzzy there I admit). Language only conveys the meaning that is triggered in one agent when another agent communicates a symbolic representation of their experience.

Whether something is up for debate depends on the agents involved. Everything is up to debate for the whole of humanity due to the imperfect mapping of language onto experience.

@daylen

Ya I responded before you put that in there lol. I understand where you are coming from, in that language is a crude tool, and an aproximation of meaning. I think where we differ is that I think it is adequate at expressing the basics, and that it deals with real things. Sickness, death, birth, all exist outside of semantics. They happen to us as creatures moving through time and space, subject to entropy and decay, whether we like it or not.

"You can avoid reality, but you cannot avoid the consequences of avoiding reality."

I never disagreed with any of that.