Sensor/Intuitive divide

[@vondelpete]

I certainly know that feeling of when you’re surrounded by sensors! Although those days are mainly behind me haha, I have dropped of them (apart from the odd ISFP/ISFJ). The positive thing about them is that feeling of groundedness from time to time though. Sometimes it can help the brain slow down. Fortunately the world is flooded with them 😅 so I prefer being on the lookout for fellow intuitives to make life feel less lonely, at least in general.

[@radishraven9]

Yes haha i love sensors but it's not hard finding them 😂

[@kithigginson4649]

It's likely that without intuitives envisioning other possibilities and pushing the boundaries, sensors may not have as much to be grateful for.

[@radishraven9]

Yeah true, but they don't see that 😕

[@shoomin1]

Glad I've been assigned to the intuitive faction! So I can eat the whole pie and tell sensors I've only baked a slice of pie for pancake elephants and share some with other intuitives. Your comparisons and on-the-fly metaphors were on point 😂

[@radishraven9]

Yeah you're welcome to our intuitive pie party! 😁😊

[@gorvo31]

Hey Ingrid, Nice to hear about the goodreads...yes, surrounded by all those books and where to start....🙃 That's lovely that you have that kind of extended family. I understand that well though...the schism between our sense of possibility and some who are more sensory based viewing it "as it is"...we can even be considered quite naive for questioning certain things...It does seem indeed that ISFJs are more accepting and sympathetic, if a bit bemused/gently amused by our type....there's one for sure that I've known for years who has a certain idealism, though a more practical grounding than I, so there's that balance there...plus the shared SI thing in the respective ways. 🙂 Making peace with knowing we're probably not meant to be understood by all has been helping (I'm finding) though. It's difficult of course in interpersonal relationships, though freeing in knowing at the least you're being true to yourself. 🙂-Carm

[@radishraven9]

Hi! Thanks! I love my "extended family" but it is a lot of sensors. I don't need to be understood at all times, but it is always nice when i am 🙂

[@cindyc]

Sensors definitely need extreme detail. My immediate family were all sensors. We definitely see the entire constellation with very few of the stars. They see the individual stars, but it takes a ton of stars before they recognize the constellation.

[@radishraven9]

Oh yeah that's exactly it, that's a great metaphor! ☺️

[@MichelleMy_Unwell]

Chatting with sensors 😂 Si is the most difficult for me...just the full play-by-play of everything they did in full detail. I'm better with Se because there's an element of surprise. If you're not a sensor it can be exhausting, but I agree, the world is full of sensors so we have to play their little game haha

[@radishraven9]

Hmm yeah interesting, for me I'm more ok with Si since it is familiar and in my stack, but Se is cool but kind of scary 😱😂

[@TheresaPrimus-b2k]

Sounds like a gifted amongst neurotypicals (people of average intelligence). What you describe is exactly the way I and many „fellow-nerds“ feel, when being interacting with them. You are longing for that in depth conversation, a profound understanding of each other and that your conversation partner also apprechiates deep insights and abstract thinking, but with some people it just never happens. Instead you are constantly confronted with the fact, that they miss something, lack something and don’t even recognize. And while you are trying to come up with an acceptable theory, struggeling to navigate these situations and failing to find them as enriching as most people do, you move on wondering and maybe suffering. But you have already named the discernible difference between the gifted and the „normal thinker“. Many people are sensors aka neurotypicals and just very few are intuitives aka neurodivergent people. And I know, that the stereotypical view of giftedness has something unpleasant to it, unfortunately especially for those, who are affected. Somehow the common definition seems to be misleading and the word intelligence is currently rather referred to people that are either successful and part of the „elite“, musically or sportwise talented, brilliant in maths or have archieved anything else we consider worth of our attention. But the reality vastly differs from that. The average gifted person doesn’t equal these clichees at all, but is rather invisible at first glance. We mostly look like „normal“ folks (even if not perceived like that), have been going to normal schools (even if that felt like the living hell) and work in normal jobs (even your plumber could be a genius). The difference is, that we have another way of thinking, feeling and perceiving. Therefore we might from the outside appear like a regular human with ordinary speaking and thinking function, but having an inner world, that only the fewest will be able to grasp. So given the fact that there are big differences in the way our brain is wired, the way we process sensory information and the way we feel, as a conclusion, there will never be that kind of desired, profound connection between the sensors (neurotypicals) and the intuitive ones (gifted people). This is one of the hard truths that we will have to accept. Some, or rather many, are not made to see the bigger picture. They are not made to care about things to which they can’t relate personally, things, that are beyond their focus and comprehension. They are not born to be interested in innovation, seeing things from multiple perspectives or having this internal drive to want to make the world a better place and help others etc. Therefore there is a disconnection or, to put it in a more appealing way, a natural protection- for both parties. As they might not be made to be our soulmates, we are probably also not made to be theirs. So not only we are annoyed when neurotypicals naturally struggle with things that don’t fit into their horizont or when they don’t speak our language. They are also lost when they don‘t know what we are talking about and why our thoughts are the way they are. They then show you this by trying to avoid the idea you may have presented (from defending their viewpoint as if this was the only valid thing and every word you say could be a dangerous offense, to ignoring your opinion completely), coming back to their mental playground (where you are not invited) and leaving you and your compassion behind. And our herd of elephants 😄

[@radishraven9]

Hi, thank you for your long comment! I don't really know if i believe in the concept of giftedness, which is a pretty american concept. I would say that i'm neurodivergent though and that i have issues with neurotypicals and have better understanding for other neurodivergent people. Now if neurodivergence is a medical diagnosis is debatable, but it does imply that the brain developed differently, rather than "getting a gift" which implies that it is given by God. And thanks, you're invited to the elephant pancake party 🐘🐘🐘