[noname42]

Hi, I’m 23 years old and I've just finished college acouple of months ago. As I’m in the peak of my youth and my “best years” are now far behind, I haveto admit that I have this gloomy feeling that I DIDN’T LIVE MY LIFE. High schoolwas terrible for me and during college I lived in a bubble. I did not achieve anything whether its social,academic or even physical.
My experience with the opposite sex is almostzero. I graduated with a GPA of 2.7 in economics. I enjoyed the shallow part ofcollege (classes, small talk etc.) but not the full experience. Most of thesummer is spent at home and I rarely traveled. It goes on & on &on, I simply survived my life not lived it.

During the past summer I had the socalled “quarter life crisis”, where I reflected upon my life and how part of myyouth went down the drain. Although the quarter life crisis changed me in avery positive way but I’m still in transition.

One of the main discoveries that occurredto me from the quarter life crisis is that as an INTP I theorize life but don'tlive it, I live in a little bubble called my head. I believe that before I was too scared toconfront the world, but even though I'm still scared and hesitant to confrontthe world, I now prefer to live in this imperfect world rather than in my head(INTPs will understand this). Also I believe that we should reduce our analysisand be more objective with life and not categorical (more like SPs). I’m stillin the process of building my system, which hopefully will be more productiveand fulfilling one, so I’m still passing through the crisis (I will re-edit andrepost my conclusions later on)

I would like to know people experiencefrom the quarter life crisis and what they got what of it, whether they PASSEDthrough it, PASSING through it, or know they will PASS through it (this is especiallyfor you INTPs)

*MBTI and these forms have helped me a lot to rediscover andunderstand myself (THANK YOU ALL)
**Don’t get me wrong I believe that the quarter life crisisis a blessing, its a wakeup call. I stopped smoking ; I’m more organized andbecoming more proactive & social. Passing through a crisis at this youngage is much better than passing it through mid-life. So if you are passing through a quarter lifecrisis, HOLD ON.
***Sorry for my English

 

[Murky Muse]

Spacing between words...*twitches*

Anyway, I kind of see where you're coming from. I graduated college last year. I'm kind of drifting while working on getting into grad school. Even though I have a plan, I've been questioning what I really want. It's confusing to have a goal and plan, but not being entirely sure it's really what I want from life anymore.

As for the social front, I feel abandoned my the people I meet in college. I know I wasn't Miss Social Butterfly, but I did get to know a few people and now I don't hear from them at all. It's rather disheartening.

This stuff had me in a bad funk until a few days ago. I'm finally started to feel a little motivated again, but I can tell it's going to be an up hill battle kind of thing.

 

[Solrac026]

DIDN'T LIVE LIFE! Totally how I feel about life now that I'm 25. I'm making up for it by doing all those dangerous things I never did in the past, like rockclimbing, riding a motorcycle, using rollerblades, skydiving, drinking alcohol, some parties, trying to get a worthy 1 night stand, and running down halls with scissors in my hands. Yep, quarter life crisis alright, even my co-workers noticed. LOL

 

[StarDust_Kraut]

Hahaha, sorry but you guys make me smile. 23?? I am nearly 30 now and not really grown up. I want to travel and explore, and it is okay. You are YOUNG!

Dont get me wrong, I take your post very serious. I have felt this way before.

Here a little story:
My neighbor is about 50 and has 2 grown up kids (single mom she is). She fell in love now freshly and is flirting with the guy in front of the house, smoking a secret cigarette and giggling like a teen girl. Now she moved out to live with her new bf. So nice.

Stop thinking, now! Get out of your head, and then your head out of your arse! (Sorry for the language, it just fit so good...I had to...).

Life is not a line from A to B. No matter in which situation you are, you can feeel.

But besides the pseudo philosophical crap, you are really ACTUALLY young. WTF??

First thing I would try is to get more physical, go work out. It will ground you and prevent the thinking endlessly about silly stuff. Sound too easy? It IS actually.

 

[Murky Muse]

@StarDust_Kraut: I think the issue here is that we're at a transition point of life. Or at least I am. Transition points can be confusing, and it takes time to work through them. It's kind of like the floor fell out beneath me, and now I'm falling into dark pit wondering where I'm going to land.

But you give good advice on being active. Short hikes do wonders from my morale; something I'm taking advantage of now that it's not so cold.

 

[StarDust_Kraut]

@StarDust_Kraut: I think the issue here is that we're at a transition point of life. Or at least I am. Transition points can be confusing, and it takes time to work through them. It's kind of like the floor fell out beneath me, and now I'm falling into dark pit wondering where I'm going to land. But you give good advice on being active. Short hikes do wonders from my morale; something I'm taking advantage of now that it's not so cold.

Alright.Yeah, not being trapped in your mind especially when it gets uncomfy is a good idea.

 

[Jennywocky]

Hi, I’m 23 years old and I've just finished college acouple of months ago. As I’m in the peak of my youth and my “best years” are now far behind, I haveto admit that I have this gloomy feeling that I DIDN’T LIVE MY LIFE. High schoolwas terrible for me and during college I lived in a bubble. I did not achieve anything whether its social,academic or even physical.
My experience with the opposite sex is almostzero. I graduated with a GPA of 2.7 in economics. I enjoyed the shallow part ofcollege (classes, small talk etc.) but not the full experience. Most of thesummer is spent at home and I rarely traveled. It goes on & on &on, I simply survived my life not lived it.

During the past summer I had the socalled “quarter life crisis”, where I reflected upon my life and how part of myyouth went down the drain. Although the quarter life crisis changed me in avery positive way but I’m still in transition.

One of the main discoveries that occurredto me from the quarter life crisis is that as an INTP I theorize life but don'tlive it, I live in a little bubble called my head. I believe that before I was too scared toconfront the world, but even though I'm still scared and hesitant to confrontthe world, I now prefer to live in this imperfect world rather than in my head(INTPs will understand this). Also I believe that we should reduce our analysisand be more objective with life and not categorical (more like SPs). I’m stillin the process of building my system, which hopefully will be more productiveand fulfilling one, so I’m still passing through the crisis (I will re-edit andrepost my conclusions later on)

I would like to know people experiencefrom the quarter life crisis and what they got what of it, whether they PASSEDthrough it, PASSING through it, or know they will PASS through it (this is especiallyfor you INTPs)

*MBTI and these forms have helped me a lot to rediscover andunderstand myself (THANK YOU ALL)
**Don’t get me wrong I believe that the quarter life crisisis a blessing, its a wakeup call. I stopped smoking ; I’m more organized andbecoming more proactive & social. Passing through a crisis at this youngage is much better than passing it through mid-life. So if you are passing through a quarter lifecrisis, HOLD ON.
***Sorry for my English

Glad you are sharing this, and I think it's great you are thinking ahead and realizing all this early. The good news is that you still have lots of time to engage life rather than hanging back. I'm older and never really started to engage until much later, so I lost far more time than you have. I'm glad you're looking at this now.

it is one thing to perceive the reality of this ("Oh noes, I'm not living my life, I'm just stepping through") vs actually coming up with a concrete plan / steps by which to actually change life. I think our natural response to life is "head living" and not doing much in reality (where the results stay with us) until we feel we have modeled everything perfectly in our heads and know what risks we will take and how to mitigate them. Compare this to a more tactical approach, where you just leap INTO the situation and then respond to any issues that come up along the way. I think ultimately our approach would involve a mix of these two approaches, along with the occasional dallop of schedule planning (because applied organization, from time to time, actually can be really helpful to reach goals even if we don't like it).

I find it helpful to separate my 'risks' into different categories -- risks that affect nothing by my pride or are recoverable from, vs risks that are more difficult to recover from. No matter how uncomfortable I might feel with the first category of risk, I can actually take those risks because there's no real threat to me or my life. They are just experiences I can learn from. These risks could involve anything from going on a single date with someone I just met (just to "see what he's like and what dating is like") to trying a new food rather than buying the same-old thing I have always ordered to taking a class at a local college to whatever else... the risk is really small overall.

There are risks with more enduring consequences that I need to analyze more deeply, but I can't afford to over-analyze. I think about 80% of the analysis occurs in the first 20% of the time spent, and many times that last 20% of analysis is not as necessary as we would like to think it is -- we typically will have intuitions and can afford sometimes to step out on those.

Anyway, the last thing one wants to do in life is think about living without actually living. And investing is necessary to get anywhere. You want to write that book, for example, so you need to write 1-2 hours a day for some months and then you'll finish that book. it might suck, or it might be excellent; but all we know is that without investment, the book will never exist to start with. Risk and engagement is necessary to succeed and accomplish goals. We also learn by doing, and we also improve our skills and the end product by doing. Thinking without doing won't do any of that...

I am sure I am rambling, but I encourage people to start engaging earlier rather than later. INTPs are smart and insightful, we just tend also to be a bit timid and could afford to invest more energy up front in things.

 

[noname42]

I believe that one of the INTP main problems in life, is that the majority of their lives is quarantined inside their heads. We INTP have a very different type of introversion, I believe that our introversion is not only people oriented but also goals oriented. What I mean here is that most of our goals are perfectly stored within our head, waiting one day to be executed perfectly and flawlessly and our lives will change forever.

Now I used to be the typical INTP who was constantly bullied was a loser by all means (no achievements of any kind, no soical life, no girlfriend) nothing worked in my whole life. As I was graduating from college and turning 23, I started to think of my life and how fucked up I'm, and my inability to improve my life or even live it (like SPs) made think and think. Then I hit bottom and had a moment of clarity and I cam out with one thing and one thing only," ALL OF WHAT GOES AROUND YOUR HEAD IS OF NO VALUE" . Now what I mean by no value I mean that no matter what you think is logical, true or even a fact, it is an illusion as long as it is in your head.

After this moment of clarity, I became more productive and for the first time in my life, I started living. Although I'm not as productive or as social as I want, I'm slowly getting there.

I believe practicing mediation and mindfulness also helps, because it gets you more out of your head and makes you enjoy life.


I hope this helps

I wrote this post a few days ago, it funny how @StarDust_Kraut & @Jennywocky came up with a very similar conclusion (xntp thing). As an INTP (& NTs in general) its hard for us to just simply "LIVE LIFE" without analysis & motive. I lived all my life in my head and I believe it will take time to simply GET OUT THERE.

@StarDust_Kraut: I understand your point but what I'm passing through is not just about growing old and having fun, its much bigger than that. It's about settling with the pst, accepting regrets , living in the moment and planning for the future.
@Jennywocky: I totally agree with you. It's better to try than just having your dreams perfectly preserved in your head. It's better to fail than imaging yourself succeeding. In other words its better to do anything than doing nothing.


The quarter life crisis is just a wake up call, it doesn't actually mean that you have waked up, you put the past behind you and now living your life to the fullest.Just like @murky_Muse, I'm also in a transitional stage. Now as I grew up and becoming more responsible of my own faith, I have to make tough decisions related to my family, social and professional life. Making these life changing decisions is very hard for me.