I watched Stephen King’s “The Langoliers” for the umpteenth time last night, not because I enjoy the movie that much but I wasn’t really into watching a football game and was too lazy to do anything else. I picked up on something after all of the times watching the movie, claimed by the character Nick Hopewell (played by Mark Lindsay Chapman), describing himself as a mechanic for “Her Majesty’s Secret Service”.
I always considered that if I were in a similar situation, most would say I would come closer to being in a similar roles as his as a no non-sense, let’s just do it type. But after hearing this at the beginning of the movie, I watched his manners and would consider him the quintessential ISTP type. I also started thinking about his usage of the word “mechanic”, and see the term, and that of “operator” in a different light. Although generally we find definitions of the word relating to someone working on machines or tools, am I being too general in my thoughts that when the word “mechanic” is used to describe ISTPs, they’re actually referring to:
3. (used with a pl. verb) The functional and technical aspects of an activity: The mechanics of football are learned with practice…. Or 4. the technical aspects of something the mechanics of poetic style….
I googled ISTP and “mechanic”, and although many of the hits referred back to the forum, I did see a description that I had read more than once from personality pages:
ISTPs are natural mechanics, athletes, musicians, technicians, and engineers. They excel at tasks that require a great deal of tactile mastery, as well as quick, logic-based action. ISTPs are most comfortable using their known skills, rather than being thrown into situations with which they have no personal experience. The nuances of variation in each individual situation will bring a sense of newness and freshness to the experience for the ISTP. ISTPs often resist and rebel situations that are entirely new, or that require a great deal of structured planning and thinking. This way of thinking is foreign to the ISTP, and therefore uncomfortable. When someone tries to push or control the ISTP into these situations, he or she is likely to "walk away" from that person without looking back.
In the spirit of the body of language, I think the term “mechanic” also coincides with the definitions posted. Is this a leap?