Yesterday I explored this idea that a feeler that vents (in the thinker/feeler spectrum) is attempting to cope using thinking language. Though, I’m pretty far on the thinker side of this spectrum so I was trying to figure out what the equivalent style of venting is for me. Venting has never been a helpful tool for coping for me. It’s all too real. If I was to start just calling someone names and bemoaning my situation out loud to my friends, I would feel very uncomfortable in my own skin.
However, there is similar need for connection and being heard for the thinker. So while you will rarely hear us go off the handle about a situation, what you will hear is us ramble. So I’d like to suggest the ramble is the thinker’s equivalent to the rant.
A ramble will likely be logically consistent inside of itself but will become redundant and meaningless. We’ll emphasize really useless points and talk in circles and continue to bring up the same things over and over again.
We do this for similar reasons a feeler will vent. We are looking for connection. We want to be understood. But understanding how I feel is rarely comforting. Don’t do active listening exercises with me and repeat things back to me. Don’t touch me. Don’t give me a shoulder to cry on. Give me arguments. Enter into the ramble and unpack it with me.
You can tell when a thinker does a ramble with a feeler and the feeler just gets overwhelmed and starts to apologize and bring comfort. Sometimes the feeler gets overwhelmed because the content of the ramble is really heavy and they think what they are hearing is a lament of sorts and so they engage on the feelers level. It feels quite condescending and patronizing to be emotionally comforted while you are just interested in cognitive discourse.
The ramble can become tiresome to everyone around them. Generally a ramble can end quickly if they are engaged and have interaction. But if there is no interaction, the rambler goes into overdrive just going on and on about the same things. We aren’t looking for agreement even, just engagement.
Thinkers need to give a disclaimer before they enter into a season of rambling, especially if they don’t have other thinkers around them to interact with. But if you are a thinker with a group full of feelers, the rambling is only going to trigger a whole lot of emotions that you aren’t feeling. This will cause your rambling to end up being apologizing because you will start to realize you have engaged people in something entirely different than what you were in it for.
This blog has sort of been my way of avoiding the ramble. Almost all posts on here would have been a ramble in my groups of friends, but writing out my thoughts and arguments and posting it on my site has created an environment for the engagement I need to take place. I can flesh out my ideas, get engaged and then I move on. If I didn’t have this, I would be significantly more annoying to my friends.
Next time you see a thinker go on a ramble. Argue and engage them purely for the sport of it for a few minutes. Watch how they feel heard and validated and then the rambling will slowly die off. Rambling is just a cry to be seen and heard.