Personality Cafe banner

ENTP Fives: I have questions!

[ENTP] 
887 views 8 replies 7 participants last post by  tanstaafl28 
#1 ·
It's apparently very common for ENTPs to be 7s. Fives, not typically so. As someone driven to the very edge of frustration being stuck between 5 and 7, I'd like some clarity on the enigma of the extraverted 5 - firsthand from the people I understand the best.

1) Fives are conservative with their energy and time. In your experience, how has this played out against the ENTP playfulness and eagerness to try different ideas in practice?

2) Fives are conservative with their energy and time. How has this played out against ENTP's need for social interaction? (A few extravert 5's have previously made the distinction of "social extravert" and "cognitive extravert," the latter being a more exclusive and specific form of extraversion. Is this a useful distinction to you?)

3) Fives like to have a strong degree of expertise on that one area they know masterfully. How does that work with the ENTP's "jack of all trades, master of none" tendency to juggle many fields without deep mastery?

Also feel free to discuss any aspect of the ENTP 5 experience! :kitteh:
 
#3 ·
I am 8w7 ENTP, but I think I am actually leaving a long period of disintegration from 8 to 5.

Basically, I found that my current friends circle was boring, completely locked myself inside my flat and learnt programming. I progressively opened myself back starting with my INTP friends and other geeks.

Now I progressively get back to events where more and more ppl are present. I am still not the life of the party. I hope I ll go back to 8 soon enough :/
 
#4 · (Edited)
@saltana : Well, my dear, since you've got so few replies thus far, I'll give you a dozen replies' worth. I hope you wore pretty undies, because you're in for a reaming.

Energy, time, and resources.


As you say, Fives are known to be conservative, almost reclusive. ENTPs are known to be gregarious. I must have found a good balance, because I rarely sense any conflict. Being a whole person beyond the conflict of definitions such as "5w6" or "ENTP", that shouldn't be surprising. Typology is an illusion, after all. That quasi-nugget being said, belonging to those two groups still has telltale signs.

First off, I usually finish my "social sorties" before I even notice that I'm tired. Not until I'm walking away do I notice I'm knackered. Second, it does happen that I run out of fuel while I'm with people, and that sure is a sea-change. It's like someone decimates my Speech Skill and my conversation options get halved. Imagine a Bioware game HUD where suddenly the only choices are "I see." and "I have to go." From what I surmise, people will think I'm in a mood, but fact is that I'm of the same mood, I've just lost the motivation to carry the larger share of the conversation. I know, consciously, that I'd usually have something to say, I just don't know anymore what that would be. "Why are you so silent? Are you okay?" "Yeah. But I should go."

How does it specifically and practically affect my playfulness? I don't know, I'd like to think I'm pretty playful. I doubt there's really any friction between these traits. It's like saying, "You love good food, but you also prefer smaller portions, how do you do that?"

Cognitive extraversion, or is it social?

How cognitively extraverted am I? Hella. Social extravert, too, without company I kind of languish. But here's the kicker, the big secret. All the behaviour and motivation implicit in what Jungians call Extraverted Feeling, corresponds to the kind of social behaviour we assimilate through classical conditioning. That is to say, the behaviour we observe(consistently & over time) will increase social standing, undermine rivals, and strengthen bonds with our in-group - we absorb and put into this mental construct that we continuously gauge ourselves and others against. SFJs are the extremes here.

My point is, once you really understand that, it's relatively easy to shed the counter-productive(yet automatic) social behaviour and social needs, and replace with something a bit more sustainable. Facebook/instagram likes, Tumblr shares, quantity/quality sexual partners, laughs for our jokes, and right down to gossip, criticism, and judgment. Some more healthy, some less. My need for socialising is often a need for validation and assurance. I've simply become economical about what signs I take seriously. I don't even have Facebook.

As a Fe-user, you need more validation from your in-group than others. With a little work, you can be smart about it, though. I'm needy as hell, we all are. How we get our fix is actually up to us, though.

Hehehe... God damn, it seriously just dawned on me. How do you recognise a Five ENTP? It's the one dismantling her own social behaviour and assembling a more efficient substitution. That's actually fairly epiphanic.


Jacks-of-all-trades


From my experience with ENTPs, we are drawn to specific knowledge with general applicability. Theoretical concepts are useful if they are recognisable in many explicit forms in the world we live in. Engineering is fun, because we recognise the physics and principles of construction in everything around us, from martial arts to baking cakes. Leonardo da Vinci saw mathematics in all he could observe, and similarly the great Niccolo Machiavelli felt the currents of power move the same way in every court he visited.

Find me a politician who's deeper into realpolitik than Machiavelli or a physicist that dwarfs Feynman. They were true specialists, and their secret was to find something you have a knack for, and develop the keen powers of observation needed to recognise that something in everything around you. No field of study can get boring if you are able to discover new sides to it all the time.
 
#5 ·
1) Fives are conservative with their energy and time. In your experience, how has this played out against the ENTP playfulness and eagerness to try different ideas in practice?
Conservative with energy to me means lazy. I don't think I'm conservative with time. This plays out so that I keep procrastinating until it' impossible to procrastinate any more, then I start and usually enjoy what ever it is I was trying to avoid.

2) Fives are conservative with their energy and time. How has this played out against ENTP's need for social interaction? (A few extravert 5's have previously made the distinction of "social extravert" and "cognitive extravert," the latter being a more exclusive and specific form of extraversion. Is this a useful distinction to you?)
Same here, laziness. I'm not very often proactive to meet up with people, let alone organize events. I don't have a need to stay in touch. I tend to asume things will be the same between us even if we haven't seen for years. Or I guess I do keep in touch but just in my head, thinking that me thinking about someone regularly is almost the same as actually talking with them or writing them a letter... Once I get to see people, I enjoy the social interaction. If it goes on for more than 24 hrs, I do like to spend some time alone in between.

Cognitive extraversion is maybe more internal, more profound extraversion. I would definitely distinct the two.

I was under the impression that ENTP's in general tend to, despite of the E, be a bit aloof and self-sustained, and sometimes forget that we actually need to interact with the outside world to stay fueled. I feel I'm like that; if I was left alone, I'd probably be happy just as well but eventually hibernate to death. If I'm alone, I hardly ever feel the urge to get out and see people, it feels like a lot of work at first and it is so cozy not having things to do. But again, once I get going, I'm usually really happy and feeling the positive buzz. I just never long for a new buzz once it's gone.

3) Fives like to have a strong degree of expertise on that one area they know masterfully. How does that work with the ENTP's "jack of all trades, master of none" tendency to juggle many fields without deep mastery?
I have a few fields where I think I have a strong expertise, but I leave them every now and then, sometimes for years. It's not too difficult to get back on track after a break, the basic structure of that field is in my head, I just need to remind myself of a few details. I think I can juggle many fields without deep mastery, maybe google around and get an idea of what the point is and then elaborate intuitively. But these other fields I seldom get back to, and if I do, I need to start from close to zero again.
 
#6 ·
Finally! Insight! Thank you guys. Still a bit fuzzy on how I fit into this...Any other ENTP 5's, please add your thoughts!

Conservative with energy to me means lazy. I don't think I'm conservative with time. This plays out so that I keep procrastinating until it' impossible to procrastinate any more, then I start and usually enjoy what ever it is I was trying to avoid.
Okay, so pretend you're offered some new experience, an unnecessary but interesting risk to take with a project, a travel route/destination different from the usual, a friend who suggests some shared activity - I would personally shy away from this experience, because I don't want to invest too much of my energy or time that I could use to do other things in something like this. From your post, it seems like this is a 5 thing... but as someone who identified as an ENTP 7 for so long, it's a bit muddled.
 
#7 ·
I would also stay away from soc-int offers, if it wasnt for my alter ego saying dont be that NO guy. I think I can quickly change my flow from being passive to active. I consider myself an E5 when not much is to be gained from social stimulation, otherwise I try to have as much fun as possible in social interactions, being the craziest guy at a party. I was never the guy who needed much socializing, a year I spent my time playing video games and studying the next I was interacting with others for at least an hour per day trying to understand people while having fun. Maybe that is why I cant relate with myself being either extraverted or introverted. I think I am trying to be the fun guy in most social interactions, getting feedback when I express my way of carelessness and being at the center of attention is what I enjoy the most.
Though I am a bit stoic sometimes, I try to not feed of others, staying neutral when life gives you something and nothing. I tend to avoid having future goals that impact my emotions. I seek the drive of inspiration to come from my soul and not from others and when always reminding myself others dont matter, what they feel should be unimportant to me. Being blessed not having to work is something I take for granted that is why I can afford being so grounded in my procrastinating behaviour.

Though people do consider me an "artist" having excellent talents in observing and drawing, I can see that they dont understand I learned it just for the fun of experimenting how far I can come. Giving my time so others can say: "good job you really have rare talent, here is 500$ for your painting", feels unworthy.
 
#9 ·
It's apparently very common for ENTPs to be 7s. Fives, not typically so. As someone driven to the very edge of frustration being stuck between 5 and 7, I'd like some clarity on the enigma of the extraverted 5 - firsthand from the people I understand the best.
1) Fives are conservative with their energy and time. In your experience, how has this played out against the ENTP playfulness and eagerness to try different ideas in practice?
I'm a 5w6 So/Sx 584, ENTP. I think I'm kind of cyclical, like the tides. I move in and I recede in a sort of rhythmic fashion. I can be enthusiastic and playful and then I go hide for a while and think up new schemes. Then I come back out to test them out. Then I go back and refine them some more. I suspect being a 5w6 (counterphobic) being So/Sx, and having my line-of-connection to 8 reinforced as my trifix, all tend to make me a little more comfortable putting myself "out there" than most fives.

2) Fives are conservative with their energy and time. How has this played out against ENTP's need for social interaction? (A few extravert 5's have previously made the distinction of "social extravert" and "cognitive extravert," the latter being a more exclusive and specific form of extraversion. Is this a useful distinction to you?)
I tend to enjoy all my interactions, but then I also like to spend some intense alone time analyzing them. I was never terribly shy. I could be the center of a group discussion, or get up in front of a crowd with minimal anxiety. I just tend to carefully choose the moments when I wish to stand out, and when I wish to remain more in the shadows. I rather prefer that people underestimate me. Then I can experience the joys of surprising them by rising to the occasion. I admit that I don't always know where my boundaries are. I sometimes discover quite by accident that I've over-extended myself and I experience that very "fivish" desire to withdraw, lest I become overwhelmed.

3) Fives like to have a strong degree of expertise on that one area they know masterfully. How does that work with the ENTP's "jack of all trades, master of none" tendency to juggle many fields without deep mastery?
While I am a knowledge generalist across a broad range of subjects. The area in which I consistently show mastery is always technical. Over the course of 25 years, I've been a technician of one sort or another. I seem to intuitively grasp the complexities of interconnected systems very well.

I think for me, it's a matter of feeling like I have the choice of just how involved I want to be. As long as I feel comfortable that I can withdraw whenever I choose, I will generally allow myself to engage more fully. When the obligations begin to pile up and I feel like my power to choose my level of involvement is eroding, I start to get uncomfortable. I may even get a little grouchy.
 
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Top