Look, I'd really appreciate some responses to this situation from other INFPers. I'm not looking for therapy, or to be told to get over it, because this isn't a rant or a whinge. It's a common experience for me, but it stumps me every time, and I figure I need to find a way of responding to it and resolving my feelings.
I've spent the weekend doing a hands-on writing workshop. Yeah, I felt brave signing up for it, because it involved a) strangers and b) putting my creativity out on the table and having people make comments and suggestions on it. For me, the anxiety is always about being misperceived - and guess what ?! ...
So, the weekend went well, for the most part; I felt I'd found some rapport with the tutor (small group, lots of banter from almost everyone) and had been an active participant in a lot of funny discussions. Most of the laughs - please don't think me conceited, but it's a relevant comment - where due to things I'd said. And the tutor was talking to me directly much of the item, and on occasion even asked me for my comments on stuff she'd just said. I thought I was home free. Then, late Sunday afternoon, we're doing an exercise that I just couldn't get into. No big deal; it's parting of stretching your abilities. So I was sitting re-reading what I had done, contemplating how I could maybe do it differently, while everyone else was scribbling furiously, and the teacher does this exaggerated sigh and says "So what's wrong with you?!" I smiled and said "Oh, nothing's wrong, I'm just struggling a bit getting my head around this exercise." So she calls a halt and goes round the room, getting people to read their pieces, and she comes to me last and says "Okay, Mr Doom and Gloom, read us what you think is so terrible!" I started to say "I'm not gloomy, I ..." and she cut me off with "Just read it" in what sound like weary-sarcastic tone. So I read what I'd written, and she says to the class "Who thought that was good?" and every single person put their hand up, and then she turned to me and said "See, you're not as dreadful as you think you are! That was stupendous! Are you seeing all the hands up?!"
I got so confused, because I hadn't been thinking I was dreadful at all - nothing like it - and so I was left wondering what prompted her to respond this way, and feeling embarrassed at the unwanted/undeserved attention, and slightly resenting the implicit compliment because nobody else got one and it now sounds like I was fishing for one and I can't help feeling the whole sequence was more about her being grandiose to put herself back in the power seat (she'd been clearly floundering with the workshop since lunch that day). And I'm feeling embarrassed for all the other people being put on the spot and having to put their hands up like they were forced labour having to please their captors.
The rest of the workshop is a bit foggy to me - it was nearly over at that point anyway - because I was a bit distracted, but when even the tutor finally recognised she'd run out of puff and called it quits, I packed up my stuff and then went over to the tutor to say hooroo and thank you (more out of a sense of duty than appreciation at that point), and I was contemplating saying - in as friendly a manner as I could muster - that I hadn't been gloomy or doubtful, I'd just had a lapse of concentration getting my head around that one exercise - when out of nowhere she says, "Life doesn't have to be so serious, you know; try to cheer up," and just walks off to speak to someone else. She didn't seem angry or to have attitude particularly, but I felt like I'd been dumped on, because i really couldn't (and still can't) see where that had come from. Her tone seemed friendly, but it's still a friggin' condescending thing to say, especially when it's not in any way related to what the workshop was about.
So all the way home, it's bugging me. I wasn't pissed off or sulking, just ... well, confused, mostly. Why would she say something like that? And it's frightening how common that feeling is for me. And, if I've read some of these forum threads accurately, for most other INFPers as well.
But I don't know what to do with it, when it does happen. Even if that tutor hadn't just walked away, I have *no idea* what I would have said to her; when I replay the scene in my mind and try to imagine ways I could have dealt with it, most of them don't turn out very well or productively. I can't see what I could have said to her, because I have absolutely no idea why she said what she said to me in the first place.
But it's such a bummer. Like I said, I'm not sulking or anything like that, but when I think back over the workshop, it's those two interactions that dominate my memory and perception of the weekend, and make it all feel a bit weird.
So I'd really welcome feedback or observations. What do you do when this sort of thing happens? How do you get it out of your head? When people treat you in a way that seems to make no sense at all, or doesn't match your reality as far as you can tell, how do you respond to them constructively? How do you bring things back on track?
I've spent the weekend doing a hands-on writing workshop. Yeah, I felt brave signing up for it, because it involved a) strangers and b) putting my creativity out on the table and having people make comments and suggestions on it. For me, the anxiety is always about being misperceived - and guess what ?! ...
So, the weekend went well, for the most part; I felt I'd found some rapport with the tutor (small group, lots of banter from almost everyone) and had been an active participant in a lot of funny discussions. Most of the laughs - please don't think me conceited, but it's a relevant comment - where due to things I'd said. And the tutor was talking to me directly much of the item, and on occasion even asked me for my comments on stuff she'd just said. I thought I was home free. Then, late Sunday afternoon, we're doing an exercise that I just couldn't get into. No big deal; it's parting of stretching your abilities. So I was sitting re-reading what I had done, contemplating how I could maybe do it differently, while everyone else was scribbling furiously, and the teacher does this exaggerated sigh and says "So what's wrong with you?!" I smiled and said "Oh, nothing's wrong, I'm just struggling a bit getting my head around this exercise." So she calls a halt and goes round the room, getting people to read their pieces, and she comes to me last and says "Okay, Mr Doom and Gloom, read us what you think is so terrible!" I started to say "I'm not gloomy, I ..." and she cut me off with "Just read it" in what sound like weary-sarcastic tone. So I read what I'd written, and she says to the class "Who thought that was good?" and every single person put their hand up, and then she turned to me and said "See, you're not as dreadful as you think you are! That was stupendous! Are you seeing all the hands up?!"
I got so confused, because I hadn't been thinking I was dreadful at all - nothing like it - and so I was left wondering what prompted her to respond this way, and feeling embarrassed at the unwanted/undeserved attention, and slightly resenting the implicit compliment because nobody else got one and it now sounds like I was fishing for one and I can't help feeling the whole sequence was more about her being grandiose to put herself back in the power seat (she'd been clearly floundering with the workshop since lunch that day). And I'm feeling embarrassed for all the other people being put on the spot and having to put their hands up like they were forced labour having to please their captors.
The rest of the workshop is a bit foggy to me - it was nearly over at that point anyway - because I was a bit distracted, but when even the tutor finally recognised she'd run out of puff and called it quits, I packed up my stuff and then went over to the tutor to say hooroo and thank you (more out of a sense of duty than appreciation at that point), and I was contemplating saying - in as friendly a manner as I could muster - that I hadn't been gloomy or doubtful, I'd just had a lapse of concentration getting my head around that one exercise - when out of nowhere she says, "Life doesn't have to be so serious, you know; try to cheer up," and just walks off to speak to someone else. She didn't seem angry or to have attitude particularly, but I felt like I'd been dumped on, because i really couldn't (and still can't) see where that had come from. Her tone seemed friendly, but it's still a friggin' condescending thing to say, especially when it's not in any way related to what the workshop was about.
So all the way home, it's bugging me. I wasn't pissed off or sulking, just ... well, confused, mostly. Why would she say something like that? And it's frightening how common that feeling is for me. And, if I've read some of these forum threads accurately, for most other INFPers as well.
But I don't know what to do with it, when it does happen. Even if that tutor hadn't just walked away, I have *no idea* what I would have said to her; when I replay the scene in my mind and try to imagine ways I could have dealt with it, most of them don't turn out very well or productively. I can't see what I could have said to her, because I have absolutely no idea why she said what she said to me in the first place.
But it's such a bummer. Like I said, I'm not sulking or anything like that, but when I think back over the workshop, it's those two interactions that dominate my memory and perception of the weekend, and make it all feel a bit weird.
So I'd really welcome feedback or observations. What do you do when this sort of thing happens? How do you get it out of your head? When people treat you in a way that seems to make no sense at all, or doesn't match your reality as far as you can tell, how do you respond to them constructively? How do you bring things back on track?