[Calvin]

You're intuitive cousin here. I know several ISTPs, and they seem really nice, but for some reason I can't seem to connect with them. They tell a joke, and I think it's hilarious. I tell a joke, and they stare at me blankly. They smile, I smile back. I smile, and they give me a confused look. What am I doing wrong?

 

[Aquc]

Presumably they don't find your jokes funny. We also only tend to smile unintentionally, we don't fake them, so them not responding to you isn't surprising. Other than that you asked an extremely open question, which isn't approved of, asked for an answer having given no where near enough information, and it should be "your" instead of "you're" in your initial sentance.

If you want a better answer then give us details so we can actually find where the answer lies, and make the question a hell of a lot more specific.

 

[Brown93]

and it should be "your" instead of "you're" in your initial sentence.

.

Never thought i'd see an INTP make a mistake like that.

 

[Calvin]

Never thought i'd see an INTP make a mistake like that.

This made me laugh out loud. I make those kinds of mistakes constantly, especially when I'm daydreaming. Little details just aren't important to me.

 

[DevilishGrin]

Stop trying so hard.

 

[Calvin]

To be more specific, the ISTPs that I know seem annoyed by my very presence, (similar to when an insane person enters the room) and I can't understand what I have to do to earn their respect. Being more agreeable doesn't work, being myself REALLY doesn't work, and keeping quiet just offends them. I thought there was a chance that it might be connected to MBTI, so that's why I came here.

 

[Aquc]

And have these ISTPs told you that you annoy them? How do you know keeping quiet offends them?

 

[DevilishGrin]

To be more specific, the ISTPs that I know seem annoyed by my very presence, (similar to when an insane person enters the room) and I can't understand what I have to do to earn their respect. Being more agreeable doesn't work, being myself REALLY doesn't work, and keeping quiet just offends them. I thought there was a chance that it might be connected to MBTI, so that's why I came here.

I am not good at typing people, but some peoples presence just pisses me off... It might be as simple as that. Keeping quiet is probably not offending them, I am going to bet you are misreading that. We don't get offended, especially by quiet... If you seem insincere at all, we pick up on that right away, game over.

Do you appear crazy when you walk into a room? I avoid crazy also

 

[thunder]

You're intuitive cousin here. I know several ISTPs, and they seem really nice, but for some reason I can't seem to connect with them. They tell a joke, and I think it's hilarious. I tell a joke, and they stare at me blankly. They smile, I smile back. I smile, and they give me a confused look. What am I doing wrong?

As much as I know you were being serious, this post was just amusing to me.

Answer: probably nothing, but unless given more information...

To echo @Aquc and @DevilishGrin, keeping quiet doesn't usually offend us...even if it helps us ignore you so we can focus on whatever we'd prefer to focus on.

 

[Calvin]

That's a relief. I'll just keep my trap shut from now on, that's not so hard.

 

[Splash Shin]

Might be a sense of humor thing, or how you carry yourself.

 

[FearsomeCritter]

Oi, relax.

I actually quite like INTPs myself. I tend to get along with them in general. They're quite nice people usually. The only thing is that in long term friendships I have a hard time trusting the specific ones i know, but that has very little to do with immediate interaction or first contact.

My sense of humor tends to be dark and... Wry... To say the very least. I can reach into other forms of humor for others' sake, but tend not to find it so humorous myself. But just because someone doesn't find your humor funny doesn't mean they dislike you. *shrugs*

A whole lot of us are just very easy going and laid back.

 

[Poko]

I like INTPs, fun people to spend time with when I'm recovering from being in crowded places. There are a few people I would react similarly to the way I have interpreted your ISTP friend's reaction to you.

ESFJ, though I'm not sure if it has anything to do with type or just the way she presence herself. As time went on and I got to know her more, the little things she does annoys me and it builds up until I build a complete image of her personality that is made up of little things that bugs me. As soon as I built that image, my interaction with her changed unintentionally along with how I thought of her.

I get annoyed more easily when she talks. Yes, just when she talks. She does not speak English sentences in a coherent way, almost every other word there's a pause or she completely skips over a word. She speaks too fast and too much which makes it even more difficult to understand what she's trying to say. I didn't mind for the first months I knew her, I can usually fill in the gaps and figure out what she's saying, but she's forcing me to put in more effort to interact with her, completely killing my mental supply of fuel. She gets mad when I can't understand what she's trying to say. She puts on this ridiculous pouting face when I ask her to be more clear and gives me a huge attitude. I can't stand that, I absolutely hate that. I'm simply trying to understand what she's trying to tell me and she gives me an attitude. She's rude but takes pride in how polite she is. She's extremely pushy and bossy and refuses to take "no" as an answer. Again, I didn't mind in the first few months because I figured that's just who she is. She got more and more pushy and more selfish as she got to know me and friends. I can't confront her because she always gives me an attitude and the "I don't feel like arguing" statement.

From all that, my attitude towards her changed. I wanted to spend less and less time with her (normal). I give her death stares more often than anyone else, I have an obviously annoyed voice when I talk to her even though it's completely unintentional. I make it extremely obvious when I'm right about something that I was right and she was wrong. She's always telling me there isn't a way to do something when I do it the exact same ways she said wouldn't work. I do much less favors for her than anyone else and look down on her more than anyone else.

Honestly, she's extremely draining to have around, but good company once every few weeks. She's helpful and there are some good points to her so that's why I keep her around.

Though this is just my experience with one particular person that may or may not be similar to your situation.
In your situation, I would imagine that there are little things you do that that annoys him and it builds up.

 

[Calvin]

Thanks guys, these posts are really enlightening

 

[petitpèlerin]

Since you asked, ENTPs and INTPs have a special way of irritating me. I think it's Ne that irritates me but in xNFPs I find it mostly endearing while in xNTPs it just rubs me the wrong way, unless their Fe is developed enough to balance their Ti so that they act according to the appropriateness of a situation rather than talking excessively about their own thoughts. This may not be something you do, and it may not be what the ISTPs you know find challenging in you; I just wanted to share my own experience, since you asked.

 

[musician_enigma]

Sorry, I laughed.

Hm... from my perspective, it takes patience and persistance to get close to me. I'm constantly observing, taking mental notes, never initiating social exchanges. Just be your genuine self, I know, I tend to see right through people. Oh, and unless we share common interests, there is no connection. Most people never learn anything about me, besides my personality. I get along with almost anyone though, so my aquantances are from everywhere.

If you tell me a joke, I'll laugh, even if I don't get it. I'm always laughing when I get the chance (my "fake" ones sound genuine), just don't ask me to explain your joke. It defeats the purpose of avoiding awkwardness (and annoys me, "why the hell do you need an explanation? Move on", said through a smile and chuckle). Sometimes I won't laugh (bad mood perhaps), don't take offense.

Smiling at me, probably wouldn't get much of a response (unless we've established friendship). I'd only think, "why is this person smiling at me?" and by time I've decided to smile back it's too late so I don't bother.

My advice to you, relax. Don't read into an ISTP so much, focus on the way you present yourself (stop being so inconsistent, stop strategizing, stop trying to please them, just be yourself). ISTPs are not judging you, and you're not gonna fool them.

 

[VioletEvergarden]

I can't understand what I have to do to earn their respect.

There's your problem. Don't TRY and earn their respect. It comes off as being fake.


You just be yourself and either they will like you, or they won't.

 

[Mysterion]

INTP = theoretical
ISTP = practical

 

[Smerc]

The only INTP i know (for sure) is my little brother and we generally get along fine. There are times where he annoys the hell out of me, but there's thirteen years between us, so it's probably more of an age thing than a personality thing.

From experience i find him a little too lost in his head, too invested in the opinions of others. He's more interested in reading/watching videos about something than actually experiencing it (would rather watch a youtube video of something playing a video game than actually play it. I really really don't understand.) Other than that he's got a wonderfully sarcastic sense of humour and he is pretty quick intellectually when it matters. We also share the same lack of organization/motivation, which annoys me sometimes but mostly because i see it in myself and want better for him.

On meeting new people though... it takes a lot of effort to get into my group of friends. I'm not exclusive or anything, just generally lazy about adding to it. On the joke thing... When i don't know how to react/don't have anything clever to add/am caught off guard i sometimes react by looking at staring blankly or laughing awkwardly. And i get paranoid when people smile at me so i give them an awkward confused smile. Or sometimes i do it on purpose because i think it's funny (i totally rock the awkward confused look). Maybe something similar is happening?

 

[StephMC]

I can't imagine that if you're making a genuine effort to be friendly, regardless of any other traits you might posess, that an ISTP would just be annoyed by your presence. We typically appreciate good intentions, even if we don't agree with the implementation. But it's possible you are mistaken that ISTPs are annoyed by your presense. It doesn't help that I, personally, have a bitchy resting face (which may or may not be common in ISTPS roud:

But yeah, I'll echo @Aquc when he said it's hard for us to force a laugh if we don't find something funny. However, I have adapted the habit of just smiling politely instead if a joke isn't funny to me. It's better than nothing, right?

Also, for the record, there's only a few traits a person could posess to make me annoyed by their very presense: attention seeking, bragging, narcissism, and/or just an overall bad attitude (essentially, all the in-your-face, external bad traits). Other than that, if I don't like a person or maybe just don't like certain behaviors, I can usually keep that to myself.

P.S. As an ISTP that has had Ne'ers around all my life, I love NTPs.