[thehigher]

Past 3 years or so..... I've felt ...... it's complicated. But..... I don't use my feelings as much..... I question them.... constantly..... I deeply question their validity. I don't question them as much as I used to..... but I still use logic to tell me that. Like I know logically feelings have value and they have reliable things to say. But actually FEELING that.... I still haven't achieved yet. It's like I'm learning to be INFP all over again. I've used Te for such a long time to be the ultimate decider in decisions. I know that when I ignore my feelings..... my Fi to be specific...... and I rely on logic..... the feelings turn negative..... like a child who wants attention. BECAUSE the Fi is negative..... I rely more on Te...... which ridicules Fi for being negative and reinforces my dependence on Te.

I know this. I know this with my head.... but not with my heart. I've forgot how to use my heart. In so doing my feelings have flat lined and I no longer know what I feel...... I do but I don't..... it's filtered through the logic detector. I have become a very stressed.... very serious...... very dependent on control individual. I am disoriented..... forgotten how to function like a normally do. It's been years since i trusted my feelings to guide my life. Their negativity after I ignored them.... scares me...... I am afraid of going back to that..... though I know it is not a rational fear because the only reason they were negative was because in fact distrusted them..... at least I think.... I hope...... see what I mean? Right there. I distrusted my feeling/intuition. I don't trust myself. That's my problem.

My closest friends get annoyed at me because I also say "I don't know" when they ask me why I think something or why I am feeling some way. Because I don't know if it is logical. What.... the fuckkkk. They SHOULD be annoyed because obviously my feelings are not logical..... BUT they are right.... in that they are my feelings and I feel this way.

I think after past experiences/friends/girlfriends my past has come to let me believe that logic in fact is better than feeling. Undoing that paradigm within me is hard..... it's hard to do with my head... and ever harder to do with my heart. But that's where the truth lies. That's what I am looking for.... my heart.

 

[saturnbug]

For the past few year I have been strongly associating with a lot of T's. When I'm around them, I have to use a lot of logic and rationality around them to prove if something is valid. Only recently have I discovered that it is not truly in me to decide everything in my life based on pure logic. I have strong intuitions and feeling that are in fact NOT logical. It's a long process, trying to break out of old habits like that. But I'm just trying to be the most authentic version of myself, and I will never be happy if I keep on with this facade of rationality and reason guiding my every decision. And sometimes you can rationalize feelings, and try to make people understand how and why you feel a certain way, but sometimes you can't. Not everything can be explained, no matter how much I'd like to believe it.

I hope this helped in some way, and I hope that you figure out how you're going to approach this.

 

[Goosefish]

I don't use my feelings as much..... I question them.... constantly..... I deeply question their validity.

For a while, whenever I felt something, I would decide that it didn't exist and ignore it. I decided that feelings didn't exist and that I wasn't going to let them control me. They weren't real. They resulted from a misinterpretation of chemicals or hunger or exhaustion.

I don't think I have developed my Te yet, but I think Si dominated my writing (all perceptions, no judgments, I would list a lot of details and expect whoever read them to decide what they meant). I've spent a lot of my life foolishly questioning my dependencies (I can live without joy, I can live without food, I can live without other people, I can live without feelings).

Sometime last spring, I started to want to feel something again. But, like you, I'd forgotten how to use my heart. I think it started with fighting that little voice in my head that said, "it's not real," whenever I felt something. "It's real to me, and that makes it real," is my usual response. At some point, I cried alone for the first time in years (I generally can only cry with close family--maybe because I feel safe with them). Then, I accepted a feeling that I've been fighting my entire life, and after that, everything got better. "It is real. I am not crazy. Even if it isn't real, it is real to me. Even if it isn't real, I'm happier when I think that it is."

they are my feelings and I feel this way

Keep saying that. If you can argue against the logical voice in your head, your feelings will come back naturally, maybe slowly, maybe tentatively. Let them come back. Your heart has always been there; you have only been denying it.

BECAUSE the Fi is negative

Fi can be positive too. Below is a description I like and that makes sense to me. A member of this forum posted the link in a thread one time and I bookmarked it.

Introverted Feeling

Developed Fi naturally leads people to favor mercy or forgiveness for people who have done heinous acts--anything from theft to murder to genocide--acts that, under the ordinary laws that make a society manageable (see Extraverted Thinking), would usually merit their imprisonment or execution. From a developed Fi perspective, the criminal is still a living soul, still unique and precious despite whatever he may have done. If we walked in his moccasins for a while, maybe we could see it his way. Without condoning his crimes, maybe we could see how we ourselves could have done the same things under similar circumstances. This use of empathy as one's ultimate anchor of orientation leads to a resolute non-judgementalness. First empathize--find something in your own heart that lets you see how someone could feel and act the way he did--and then you will probably find that you no longer feel hatred or a desire for retribution.

Stop doubting. Be confident. I hope this helps!

 

[Acey]

I use Fi all the time.. and most of my feelings are still negative feelings. I think you might have started using Te because of the negativity u felt with Fi?

I think the dilemma you are facing is choosing between the lesser of the two evils. I'm not sure what to suggest to you because i'm trying to find my head and rip out my heart

 

[MasterAnders]

Why not use both logic and feeling in balance with one another? Both are important to live a healthy life; neither one is evil unless it inhibits the healthy use of the other.

 

[faeriegal713]

*hugs* I am sorry to hear you've been struggling with this for so long. I wish I could give you advice or suggestions, but I'm struggling with something similar, though not so long term. I recently turned off my emotions intentionally because I don't have to deal with them. I'm very much so afraid that I won't be able to turn them back on when I want them, but I'll cross that bridge when I come to it. The funny thing is that I'm still aware of my emotions, but it's more like being aware of the reaction my brain is feeling to the chemicals being released and that I'm only aware of that. I'm not conscious of the intensity, the validity, or even the reasoning for most of the emotions. The only ones I can "feel" with any knowledge of the fact that they are indeed my own emotions are the more negative emotions, primarily depression and anger, and even those I shove off to the side because they are not useful to me.

I know that some of the steps I can and will use to try to open myself back up to them is exercise (which really is actually thinking time while allowing myself to feel my body and thus get more in tune with it), actually allowing myself to remember and experience my spirituality and the religion that I casually claim as mine, and taking the time to go out to nature and hike and climb and sit and listen and feel. That is where I'm most alive and I know it is where I will be most likely to be willing to allow myself to experience my life and love and hope and fear and pain and anger and sadness etc. again.

I hope you have things like that which you can turn to, which, if I remember correctly from reading previous posts of yours, you have/had safe places to go? I may be remembering someone else though, or just you suggesting that to others who have had trouble with feeling okay enough to feel/vent/experience _________.

Good luck and please know that you have support and love from many, many people, even those who don't actually know you. *hugs*

 

[thehigher]

I use Fi all the time.. and most of my feelings are still negative feelings. I think you might have started using Te because of the negativity u felt with Fi?

I think the dilemma you are facing is choosing between the lesser of the two evils. I'm not sure what to suggest to you because i'm trying to find my head and rip out my heart

well.... I use Fi all the time too..... but filter the answers through Te. I downplay the orginal conclusion. I distrusted Fi because it wasn't objectively correct. But it IS subjectively correct..... but it hurt me that my feelings didn't hold water. That I couldn't trust them. I know I can.... if I go all in. Not tip toe around in Fi. Fi is almost like God in the bible. You have to give yourself fully.... in order to receive it. or maybe it isn't like God..... maybe God is real in that sense..... but that's besides the point. Point is I think in order to reap the good parts of Fi I have to trust it.....

It's an intuition.... could be wrong of course.... but I always say that. But subjectively..... I do think it's true..... for me..... i won't claim anything for anyone else.

 

[thehigher]

Why not use both logic and feeling in balance with one another? Both are important to live a healthy life; neither one is evil unless it inhibits the healthy use of the other.

That's what I try to do..... but .... for me ....... it's unnatural..... trying to control myself in that sense....... I think healthy behavior for me..... is like an engine. I feel like I am an engine that works fine..... if I just let it be. But I feel like ...... trying to balance logic and feelings..... and take control of who I am.... because it makes logical sense....... is taking apart my engine because it doesn't look like THAT engine over there. Does this make sense? Again ... could be wrong...

 

[MasterAnders]

That's what I try to do..... but .... for me ....... it's unnatural..... trying to control myself in that sense....... I think healthy behavior for me..... is like an engine. I feel like I am an engine that works fine..... if I just let it be. But I feel like ...... trying to balance logic and feelings..... and take control of who I am.... because it makes logical sense....... is taking apart my engine because it doesn't look like THAT engine over there. Does this make sense? Again ... could be wrong...

Mmmmmmmmm....so you're saying you don't want to behave in a way that's unnatural to you, but you're dissatisfied because right now it's difficult for you naturally to trust your feelings?

 

[Raichan]

Stop overthinking and just feel!!

 

[susurration]

Past 3 years or so..... I've felt ...... it's complicated. But..... I don't use my feelings as much..... I question them.... constantly..... I deeply question their validity. I don't question them as much as I used to..... but I still use logic to tell me that. Like I know logically feelings have value and they have reliable things to say. But actually FEELING that.... I still haven't achieved yet. It's like I'm learning to be INFP all over again. I've used Te for such a long time to be the ultimate decider in decisions. I know that when I ignore my feelings..... my Fi to be specific...... and I rely on logic..... the feelings turn negative..... like a child who wants attention. BECAUSE the Fi is negative..... I rely more on Te...... which ridicules Fi for being negative and reinforces my dependence on Te.

I know this. I know this with my head.... but not with my heart. I've forgot how to use my heart. In so doing my feelings have flat lined and I no longer know what I feel...... I do but I don't..... it's filtered through the logic detector. I have become a very stressed.... very serious...... very dependent on control individual. I am disoriented..... forgotten how to function like a normally do. It's been years since i trusted my feelings to guide my life. Their negativity after I ignored them.... scares me...... I am afraid of going back to that..... though I know it is not a rational fear because the only reason they were negative was because in fact distrusted them..... at least I think.... I hope...... see what I mean? Right there. I distrusted my feeling/intuition. I don't trust myself. That's my problem.

My closest friends get annoyed at me because I also say "I don't know" when they ask me why I think something or why I am feeling some way. Because I don't know if it is logical. What.... the fuckkkk. They SHOULD be annoyed because obviously my feelings are not logical..... BUT they are right.... in that they are my feelings and I feel this way.

I think after past experiences/friends/girlfriends my past has come to let me believe that logic in fact is better than feeling. Undoing that paradigm within me is hard..... it's hard to do with my head... and ever harder to do with my heart. But that's where the truth lies. That's what I am looking for.... my heart.

I think what you are after is balance?

"The Taoist approach to following instinctive impulses is similar to the thinking of Jung (1959), who also advocates living in accord with our instincts. While cautioning that they must be handled correctly, Jung proposes that the natural impulses we find in ourselves are not arbitrary, but are connected to a divine inner authority".

"I have found that fasting the mind is equally important for my psychotherapy clients. They too tend to follow old habits and programs, rather than remain open to the Unknown. If they are to learn to follow the Tao, they, too, must quiet the ego's constant chatter so the less audible voice of the Self can be heard. For example, a 30-year-old man with a keen intellect and a propensity for planning things ahead of time had the following enlightening dream:

I'm playing some kind of game. It's the game of life. I'm asking people around me how to play—I want to know all the rules before we begin. They tell me, however, that the only way to learn the rules is through playing the game, learning them as I go.

On another occasion he dreamed:
I'm in a large building, trying to work myself through a long, complicated maze. As I'm going along, I keep wondering how I will ever know when I get to the end. Suddenly, it occurs to me that there is no use worrying about it ahead of time; I will recognize the end when I get there.

It is clear to me that these dreams, like the Taoist teachings, are not telling my client to become an empty-headed fool, never planning or thinking ahead. Rather, I understand the message as a compensation aimed at balancing overreliance on rational thought and planned action. The point, it seems, is to learn balance—and to be more trusting of the spontaneous wisdom of the Self".

"FOLLOWING IMPULSES

The superior man goes through his life without any one
preconceived course of action or any taboo. He merely decides
for the moment what is the right thing to do.
—Li Chi (Yutang, 1942)

Imagine a whole community of people whose aim is fasting the mind and living spontaneously, acting only when it is in harmony with the Way. Such a group actually existed in China around the third century A.D. These creative, unconventional souls were the Ch'ing t'an Taoists—otherwise known as the Pure Conversationalists (Chan, 1963; Welch, 1965).

One of the central tenets of the Pure Conversationalists was that a person's integrity depended on allowing the spirit to wander freely, which, among other things meant following one's impulses. This practice of trusting impulses is illustrated in a Taoist story about Wang Hui-chih:

Wang Hui-chih . . . awoke one night to find that it had snowed. Getting out of bed, he began to pace up and down his room, and to recite poems about paying visits to hermits. This reminded him of Tai K'uei. He dressed, took a boat, and started down the shore. Tai K'uei lived far off and it was not until dawn that he reached his house. But just as he was about to knock on his door, he turned and went home. Someone who found out what had happened asked him why. Wang Hui-chih said: "I came on the impulse, and when the impulse ended, I returned. Why had I to see Tai?" (Welch,
1965, p. 125)

In following his impulses, Wang Hui-chih was attempting to keep within the flow of change by allowing the Tao to fluidly express itself through him".