# Does indulging in Feeling lead to depression for Thinkers?



## TurranMC (Sep 15, 2009)

Interesting question proposed tonight. It seems to me that when a Thinker tries to dip into his feeling it ultimately leads to great depression for the Thinker. I know that for me personally when I try to indulge my feelings it is almost guaranteed to lead to some kind of depression so I try to discard all feeling so that this doesn't happen. Personally I can offer theories as to why this is but I'm interested in hearing your opinions on the subject.


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## Lucretius (Sep 10, 2009)

Indulging in Thinking often has led to depression for me. :frustrating:


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## Kevinaswell (May 6, 2009)

I'd agree.

There sadly isn't too much to feel good about in this world >.<

Which is probably why INFP's and similarly sensitive types got it rough. It's fucking depressing out there all over the place.

Ti let's me enjoy and bypass the bullshit and learn it.


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## WickedQueen (Jun 1, 2009)

Indulging in feeling???

Ummm....


How did you do that? 


.


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## InvisibleJim (Jun 30, 2009)

Yes, it starts off great but after a week or two you hit the angst wall of misery/reality. By then its too late. Perhaps extrovert thinkers are different. My normal range of emotions are excited/non-excited - if I start to indulge in happy or sad life quickly spirals into a troubling place. I generally opt for staying in the Rational Fortress of Solitude as a result.


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## Rourk (Feb 17, 2009)

I'm very melancholy in my outlook. I think always seeing the most negative aspects leads to depression. The grass is always greener but the current grass has a bunch of weeds and the damn lawnmower doesn't work. Of course it doesn't. Nothing ever goes right. Look at all the weeds. Great, just great. Oh wonderful, my girlfriend wants to kill herself again. These kind of thoughts all day. I don't think its feeling or thinking. I think its attitude and mindset. 

But one good thing is there is an appeal to the darker aspects of life. Like for example seeing beauty in a bunch of dead grass and weeds and wanting to take that perfect picture of it or just appreciating it.


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## oops (Aug 13, 2009)

because you cant just simply do it! 
youve been using your thikning for everything way more than feeling, so your thikning is way more advance than your thikning give it time and dont back out poosay


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## slowriot (Nov 11, 2008)

TurranMC said:


> Interesting question proposed tonight. It seems to me that when a Thinker tries to dip into his feeling it ultimately leads to great depression for the Thinker. I know that for me personally when I try to indulge my feelings it is almost guaranteed to lead to some kind of depression so I try to discard all feeling so that this doesn't happen. Personally I can offer theories as to why this is but I'm interested in hearing your opinions on the subject.


Thats the worst idea I've heard in some time.

Emotions are healthy for your body and for your state of mind eventhough it can create a melancholic mood that can create a sort of depressive state, but the use of "depressive" is only used for lack of better words. Depression and melancholic/limbic moods are two very different things. You cant use the terms in the way you do thats just silly.

I dont think there is much difference in healthy thinkers when it comes to emotions as in healthy feelers. Thinkers feel emotions and rationally use logic to judge whether it is useful or not, feelers feel emotions and rationally use feelings (if they are good or bad for you) to juge if they are useful or not. Thats the way we are different, no other. I think it would be useful to mbti if there was made a description of a healthy and unhealthy loop to each type like there is for enneagram. 

Ofcourse there is unhealthy things to be said of each type, like what makes you stressed. And I understand what you mean from an INTP perspective since we act like children when put in situations where new emotions are needed. But I dont think that is even in considered here, still I would like to point out that specifically that might as much suggest a social incompetence as to a stressed out situation where you feel imcompetent to control your emotions. And may I point out that the more that situation is put on you the better you get at handling it, the completely different scenario when it comes to depression. Where you can not stop acting like that. 

If you feel depressive and have the symptoms for depression Id advice you to see a professional rather than try to work it out through theories with no real basis in reality. (since it might be unhealthy thinking/feeling)

Edit: as most thinkers here consider themselves as enneagram 5's I'd advice you to take a look at this http://www.9types.com/epd/5.php. I personally think this is a good description of what I do in the melancholic state when I go into the unhealthy loop. (if a complete cycle is needed "Need to understand the world -> observe -> analyze -> understand the world -> Fear of being overwhelmed by the world -> detach from the world -> observe -> analyze -> understand the world -> Fear of being overwhelmed by the world -> detach from the world -> unknown.")


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## Sunless (Jul 30, 2009)

Thanks Slowriot.. I am curious though.. What is it like for _you_ when you are facing a situation that is painful and you cannot handle at the moment?


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## Blue Butterfly (Sep 19, 2009)

This is a great question. I have been wanted to ask thinkers this very question. As an INFP I do love my emotions. Of course I don't love the painful one but there are plenty of good ones to feel even in the midst of the painful one. From the post I would gather you guys have not learned to have multiple emotions at one time. Am I right?


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## Kevinaswell (May 6, 2009)

Well.

"Multiple emotions at one time."

Just kinda makes me go :O :O :O :O :O


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## Blue Butterfly (Sep 19, 2009)

Kevinaswell said:


> Well.
> 
> "Multiple emotions at one time."
> 
> Just kinda makes me go :O :O :O :O :O


Yea, I can have all kinds of emotions all at the same time. Back when I was less aware of my emotions they would get all tangled up. Now I can separate and feel each one while putting the others in the background. It is like sound. If one is in a room fill of people talking, a person can single out just one person to listen too. Sometimes I just like to feel all my emotions all at once just to see if the overall level is higher or lower. It is really fun and I learn a lot about myself by doing that.


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## Kevinaswell (May 6, 2009)

Yea I have no desire for that.

Hahaha.


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## Blue Butterfly (Sep 19, 2009)

I do have a question for the thinkers. When you are all along and not distracted with something do you kind of hear your emotions as you would hear sound in the background. Or are the emotions silent?


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## Sunless (Jul 30, 2009)

:mellow:

You have mighty powerssss

My emotions are silent. Unless its extreme anxiety or pleasure... then its like ringing in my ears and the rest of the world sounds like underwater.


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## Grey (Oct 10, 2009)

I'm not sure how 'indulging' in exploring emotions can lead to a depressive state, unless they're just so foreign, and/or invite existential thoughts that are kind of depressing on their own to begin with. I completely agree with slowriot.




> I do have a question for the thinkers. When you are all along and not distracted with something do you kind of hear your emotions as you would hear sound in the background. Or are the emotions silent?


I have to specifically pick out what I'm thinking before I can actually feel it. It sounds odd, but I suppose it falls under the 'silent' category, then.


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## Kevinaswell (May 6, 2009)

Yea. Shit either makes me feel awesome, or makes me feel like shit. 

It's awesome to feel awesome, and shitty to feel shitty, but neither feeling ever really changes anything.

Just kind of. A personal reference to what's going on in a way.


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## Blue Butterfly (Sep 19, 2009)

Kevinaswell said:


> Yea. Shit either makes me feel awesome, or makes me feel like shit.
> 
> It's awesome to feel awesome, and shitty to feel shitty, but neither feeling ever really changes anything.
> 
> Just kind of. A personal reference to what's going on in a way.


Feeling feelings to me is equal to reading a book. I learn all kind of things from both my feelings and the feelings I feel coming from other people. Oh yea, I take it you guys can feel other peoples feelings either? Am I right? Other peoples feeling are the hardest to deal with. Some people feel so rotten I just want to scream and run away from them. But some people radiate such a beauty I would spend eternity with them.


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## Grey (Oct 10, 2009)

I don't think it's as you say, being able to 'feel' what other people feel... it can be observed, though. Body language and words contribute a lot to see how someone is feeling, and people have this interesting habit of blurting out what ever happened to them that day, if you're close enough. I don't think I've ever felt the same as any other person at the same time, brought on by their feelings. I do try to alter my approach if I have to speak with them, however.


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## Verdant Hollow (Aug 25, 2009)

I agree with Turran. 

While this hasn't really happened to me much personally, I find that young thinkers especially can get depressed when they jump into the pool of emotions before they know how to swim. Our confidence and comfortability with thinking can lead us to think that we are diving when we're really drowning in emotions. So yes, indulging in feeling can make a thinker depressed.

I agree with Slowriot.

Emotions are healthy, for all types. Depriving oneself of emotional fulfillment to avoid depression is throwing out the baby with the bathwater. If you consistently tend toward depression when indulging in emotions, you probably want to seek help in resolving those issue rather than avoiding them. Emotions are beautiful and fantastic things, no one should be without them.


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## Kevinaswell (May 6, 2009)

Hurting said:


> Feeling feelings to me is equal to reading a book. I learn all kind of things from both my feelings and the feelings I feel coming from other people. Oh yea, I take it you guys can feel other peoples feelings either? Am I right? Other peoples feeling are the hardest to deal with. Some people feel so rotten I just want to scream and run away from them. But some people radiate such a beauty I would spend eternity with them.


This isn't true at all.

Other people's feelings are the only reason I feel anything at all on most days.

When they aren't mine, they are much more real somehow.


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## Kevinaswell (May 6, 2009)

And it's not so much like.....it's depressing to delve there.

It's more of just.....it CAN be depressing there. And it's LOADS easier for it to be depressing there than within our own realm of thinking.

And I don't believe this is effected by whether you're comfortable dealing with them or not, because I've spent lots of years getting used to emotions and learning about them within people (I don't think I have ANY thinker friends). 

But no matter how intense an emotion or even whether it signifies positives or negatives....it's just kinda depressing being reminded that all that negativity that people experience daily exists. For sure it's badass that people go through happy shit as well....but to a Ti it's easy to come to the conclusion that emotions reside within a world of chaos. 

And chaos is sad to a Ti.


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## Scruffy (Aug 17, 2009)

I have weird emotions, they never-ever last, that in itself is kind of depressing. The feelings themselves are usually welcomed, but are gone too fast for me to get anything out of them.


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## slowriot (Nov 11, 2008)

Sunless said:


> Thanks Slowriot.. I am curious though.. What is it like for _you_ when you are facing a situation that is painful and you cannot handle at the moment?


That depends and in what way you mean it. I'll give you them all or what I understand in the question.

When my paternal grandmother died I felt like I was going around myself, like I was viewing myself from outside, like I was in some surreal play with no actors, it made me shut out my emotions and handle the situation. I was the one that had to call my sister and tell her, plus some friends, since my dad and mother couldn't or didn't want to. It was only until the time we had to carry her out to the car taking her to the chrematorium that I fully understood what had happened and I finally cried as the car drove away. That was one way I handle tough situations, I usually shut out emotions, let things happen, help if that is needed and try to calm the situation down, then later work out the situation in my head. If I need to cry I do that, if I need to let my emotions come out I do that, but I handle them according to how helpful they are and try to find a positive thing about them that I can cling on to.

In other situations I feel like Im not in control of myself and I hate that, I want tofeel Im in control as much as possible even when its not possible. I have not had many melancholic moods as of late, but as I have said before I let the emotions be emotions, try to calm myself down, I try and figure out how I can learn or get something positive out of them. Sometimes I even try to figure out ways of not having to deal with them again, like long distance relationships, I try to tell myself how hard that was on me and the bad experience I had with that so I try not to get too emotional attached to someone of the opposite sex that lives very far away from me. As an example.

A different scenario now. If I like some girl I usually get really down because I feel like I dont have a chance with her, because I cant see her with a guy like me, because of my size (Im overweight for those who dont know). And I feel like Im no good that noone wants me and so on. My own emotions playing a trick on me since its me believing this, not necessarily what the girl feels. I know that. But still I do the same pattern over and over again. And I cant seem to break it. But still I try to find something positive I can use from it. Even if it is hard sometimes.

Hope that answers your question.

Edit: it may look like I dont really like emotions but really I do I think they are wonderful, as scruffy said they might not stay with me for as long as I liked, but they are still there. Why do you think I like ENFx's so much?


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## SeekJess (Nov 1, 2009)

I do get really depressed when I get in tune with my emotions. Because I obsess about the negative things, and it throws me into a downward spiral. Everything seems bleak, and all I want to do is start using opiates again to block out the thoughts and feelings, and just to be stone cold numb again. And it all turns to to the what if's the could of been's.. the should have beens, or I could have done this. So I don't dwell on memories, or feelings.. because all they do is drag me down, and make me hate my past. But I have managed to get control over this for the most part.. I think I have.


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## QueenieIntp (Jan 8, 2010)

(Sniff) This is currently happening to me. My feeling side is a baby. It can't walk or talk right. When it comes out I feel sooooooo stupid afterward and this causes me to want to withdraw.


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## 0 1 1 2 3 5 8 13 21 34 (Nov 22, 2009)

Sunless said:


> Thanks Slowriot.. I am curious though.. What is it like for _you_ when you are facing a situation that is painful and you cannot handle at the moment?


I usually don't take conscious note of my emotions until afterwards and will probably end up being overwhelmed, my P shadow takes over and I keep changing decisions in mid-action/sentence. If the situation is prolonged I will realize I need to get away and analyze before I make things worse. This is something that rarely happens at least.



Hurting said:


> This is a great question. I have been wanted to ask thinkers this very question. As an INFP I do love my emotions. Of course I don't love the painful one but there are plenty of good ones to feel even in the midst of the painful one. From the post I would gather you guys have not learned to have multiple emotions at one time. Am I right?


I can do that actually. Normally it's when I'm experiencing an unpleasant emotion, I tie it together with a pleasant emotion of a similar nature. Pain with pleasure. Fear with excitement. 



Hurting said:


> I do have a question for the thinkers. When you are all along and not distracted with something do you kind of hear your emotions as you would hear sound in the background. Or are the emotions silent?


Emotions can be very distracting. No, I turn them off whenever I have to focus on something. Noises from the next room, a blinking clock light, anything can distract me and it can be soo annoying. I can't even enjoy listening to music and doing something else.



Hurting said:


> Feeling feelings to me is equal to reading a book. I learn all kind of things from both my feelings and the feelings I feel coming from other people. Oh yea, I take it you guys can feel other peoples feelings either? Am I right? Other peoples feeling are the hardest to deal with. Some people feel so rotten I just want to scream and run away from them. But some people radiate such a beauty I would spend eternity with them.


By feeling other people's feelings I will assume you mean that other people's body language, tone of voice and such have the effect of stimulating your own emotions. I do this with characters from anime or movies. I can only remember a handful of times actually doing this with real subjects. My own feelings I'm very comfortable with inside my head. Other people's feelings... I don't try to push them away nor to indulge, but my natural inclination is no, some people will come to me becuase of some strength I radiate I suppose, and spill out all their problems. I will listen and perhaps make some imput, give them something to bounce their thoughts of. Maybe even offer a possible solution, but the whole time I'm analyzing their problem from an objective viewpoint. No, I help them becuase it's in my values... and becuase it's something interesting to analyze, but I do not feel empathy for them. I pay attention to what I feel over longer periods of time to determine what is important. I normally plan for situations that are only hypothetical at the time, so during actual execution I just trust the decision about how I feel which was made on how I felt before, so I don't have to stop and feel.

I don't get drained by other people's feelings at all, only having to display them myself can drain me.


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## Cookie Monster (Nov 6, 2009)

I think you bring up an interesting point. I suppose it can, if the feelings are those of depression. I tend to be a person with a melancholy and anxious heart....sometimes I wonder if it is the more I think about things that makes me depressed, or I let my thoguhts get "out of control (I tend to do that...) For example, I got horribly depressed today when I heard the news about December's unemployment numbers...almost broke down crying because I worry about what is going to happen in our future...


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## Linesky (Dec 10, 2008)

Sometimes it fascinates me, other times it scares the crap out of me when confronted with extreme variables though this has been exceptional a lot due to phases in life and a depression at a point at the time. So it's def. not normal;neutral me.
I tend to favor a balance, as I always say... And I enjoy the things I have learned that come with feelings once moving forward with it in my own ways.


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## whyerr (Jan 10, 2010)

Some people (including myself) tend to analyze feelings. But what I cannot hold back are emotions. While analyzing, something in my head shouts - *it's wrong, silly, stop it!* And emotions attack, or take defence, haha. Not sure.


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## NotSoRighteousRob (Jan 1, 2010)

most of the time if I want to feel emotional I have to intentionally manipulate my emotions. And the easiest ones to manipulate are ones of sadness, but by doing so it also gives me a sense of joy to express an emotion. I don't know if this is the norm for thinkers, but unless I make an effort to feel I just don't. It's not like I have to make an effort to avoid them, they just aren't usually there. I've gotten pretty good at experiencing different emotions, and I think it would be nice to not have to force myself to feel them.


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## Kudo Shinichi (Feb 23, 2010)

*Experience*



TurranMC said:


> Interesting question proposed tonight. It seems to me that when a Thinker tries to dip into his feeling it ultimately leads to great depression for the Thinker. I know that for me personally when I try to indulge my feelings it is almost guaranteed to lead to some kind of depression so I try to discard all feeling so that this doesn't happen. Personally I can offer theories as to why this is but I'm interested in hearing your opinions on the subject.


Thinker when indulges with feelings it's causes traumatic effect that leads to depression from my personal experience & it's hard to reverse the effect.


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## Kudo Shinichi (Feb 23, 2010)

*Thoughts*

Thinkers are use to judgemental and sensing not feeling cause judgemental and sensing was our strength whereas feeling is our weakest point in decision making.


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## Brainteaser (Jan 20, 2010)

RighteousRob said:


> most of the time if I want to feel emotional I have to intentionally manipulate my emotions. And the easiest ones to manipulate are ones of sadness, but by doing so it also gives me a sense of joy to express an emotion. I don't know if this is the norm for thinkers, but unless I make an effort to feel I just don't. It's not like I have to make an effort to avoid them, they just aren't usually there. I've gotten pretty good at experiencing different emotions, and I think it would be nice to not have to force myself to feel them.


Dido... I've found the best way for me to feel anything is to listen to music of various styles, and moods. Of course the best way for anyone is to actually experience life itself with your guard down. As scary as it sounds.


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## roxtehproxy (Sep 9, 2009)

Of course thinkers are capable of feeling emotions; you have to analyze them for what they're, and ensure you pay attention to them. It's a matter of manipulation, and using them for a higher purpose/ for good.

However, it seems when I ignore my thinking side I become depressed. Whether my thinking is linear, or logical; it doesn't matter. If there's no thinking, unwanted emotions govern my thoughts and depress me.

Might'nt be universal, but it's...totally reality, man.


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