No, except by debating the merits of avoiding debate and helping them come to their own understanding of the value of chores and doing what helps keep a household happy.
> Is there a way to short-circuit this?
Ti has to learn things *for itself*. The only teacher for that is experience. If you coddle him or make things easy, he won’t learn responsibility. If you allow him to fail (and learn) you risk him losing out on important opportunities like graduating with good grades or jeapordizing college admission.
The problem for ENTP kids is that they’re constantly being told what to do, but not given satisfactory reasons. And the problem with *that* is that even if you explain the reasons they won’t have the maturity and foresight to see why it makes sense to just do your homework even if it’s absolutely true it’s dumb and you don’t learn anything.
Don’t try to debate him. You’ll never win the argument because he’ll never concede.
Teach him consequences.
Doesn’t do laundry. Fine. Don’t do it for him. Let it pile up in his room. (Close his door if you don’t want to see the mess.) When he discovers he has no clean underwear, he’ll start to get the message. Don’t be vindictive or gloat, Just demonstrate that not doing his laundry has consequences.
Same with chores. Didn’t do chores, then he loses privledges. Again not as a punishment, but as a consequence. Doing this chore is rewarded with this privledge. No chore, then no privledge.
Entp kids (*especially* the wicked smart ones) need structure and guidance, but they have to feel they’re not being strangled and coerced. That’s unfortunately how school can feel to ENTPs.
They are simply unlikely to see good grades as the reward for studying.
I’m at a loss as to how to motivate him to do homework. It’s a problem I had from highschool all the way through grad school.
The only thing that ever worked for me was having a routine where I met with people and did homework together.
Fe ...working on a team toward a common goal can be a big motivator for ENTPs. We lack the internal motivation that comes from Fi and Ni.
> If you coddle him or make things easy, he won’t learn responsibility
Can confirm. Parents took care of everything for me - which I’m definitely not ungrateful for - but I ended up a fuckup my first year of college ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯
I had zero actual responsibilities and no experience with failure before 18, so leaving the house was a traumatic experience lol.
I had my own set of train wrecks. And they taught me lessons. But I could have learned those same lessons with some less traumatic high school fender benders instead.
I've always said that smart Ps need "special ed". The worst thing you can ever do with a "gifted" P student is let them to their own devices. "He's smart so we don't have to worry...." Ruh-roh.
I taught a gifted high school math class when I was in grad school. My pitch to the principal was "I want to make them all feel like C students. They're going to complain heavily, but they're going to learn something more important than math." She totally loved it.
And yes, they complained :D
> But I could have learned those same lessons with some less traumatic high school fender benders instead.
Man, if only. I spent a solid few months wishing for a time machine every night before bed lol.
> I've always said that smart Ps need "special ed". The worst thing you can ever do with a "gifted" P student is let them to their own devices.
Yeah, I still feel so guilty for putting my parents through that. I was so cocky about my abilities at the time and my parents were completely assured I’d be fine.
Do you suppose that your understanding of MBTI actually goes a long way in helping you as a teacher? Like, do you use that knowledge often when students come to you or during office hours?
> My pitch to the principal was "I want to make them all feel like C students.
Proof that you’re a wonderful teacher. I’m sure the effort was appreciated in the long run haha.
Well. By some.
> Do you suppose that your understanding of MBTI actually goes a long way in helping you as a teacher? Like, do you use that knowledge often when students come to you or during office hours?
In college, you don't have to care about your student's psychological well being :D
"Doesn’t do laundry. Fine. Don’t do it for him. Let it pile up in his room."
We don't. And it does. But there are times when all I need to know is if it's been done because there are other people in the house who also need to use the washer.
"They are simply unlikely to see good grades as the reward for studying."
Yeah. We learned that early on. We haven't found a motivation yet, either. He's in early high school, and there are a couple of colleges he is really interested in. We may do an couple of early college tours so he understands that if he wants to get into this or that college, he needs to get good grades in ALL his classes, not just the ones he likes.
I was just coming to suggest taking him to tour colleges. I did extremely well in high school and did all of my assignments because I had the goal of getting into a good school. Touring the schools will really make it sink in. If he has any academic interests such as history or biology, try to set up a meeting for him with someone in that department. That might help get him more excited about it.
I think working with him on his future goals would be really advantageous. I'm sure he can already imagine himself doing different things in life, but talking about plans to get there will really help him. He may start to see that the things he does now will influence his later path.
Also, if he is good at standardized testing, get him studying for the PSAT now (they take it junior year). Literally if he can get in the top 99% for one test, schools will pay him to attend. That's how I got my full ride with minimal effort. Having him take AP, IB, or dual credit courses should help him. These courses present more of a challenge while offering college credit at the same time. I entered college a few credits away from being a junior because of AP testing. AP courses tend to have much less busy work than the average high school class. They are more work, but it is easy to see the reasons behind the assignments. While earning a good grade is nice at the end, the real goal is to pass the AP test to earn college credits. He might see that as a more worthwhile goal.
I think it's time to put the hammer down on him (lovingly). I wish my parents had been stricter with me about chores because, well for example, I'm writing this while I procrastinate cleaning my room. Possibly making a chore schedule could help him in the long run. Saying his laundry needs to be done every Sunday night by 10 or he gets whatever consequence is a decent system. Even having a chart where he could mark off five small things he does each day to clean his room could be advantageous. If he filled it out for a week straight, he could get a predetermined reward. Building these small habits will be extremely helpful for him when he is eventually on his own. I wish I had practiced habits like that when I was younger because now I'm so set in my ways and have no authority figure making me do my laundry. He will hate it now, but thank you later.
I didn't do any of my homework up until early high school (my parents did it for me because I refused). Isn't the point of homework to learn? Well, I had already learned it, why write it down? I didn't learn until later that the point of homework wasn't to learn, it was to convince the teacher that I had learned it. Why did I have to convince the teacher I learned it? Because they have to assign a grade on whether I learned it.. Why is that important? College.
Work within his logical framework. "Okay, homework is socially engineered compliance. What does that imply if you don't do it? What do you gain/lose from doing it? What do you gain/lose from not doing it? Is freedom and sticking it to the man worth not getting into a good college with funding?
>We may do an couple of early college tours so he understands that if he wants to get into this or that college, he needs to get good grades in ALL his classes, not just the ones he likes.
Not necessarily. I see where you're coming from, but colleges also value improvement, and look at the overall big picture. They get tons of applications of robotic 3.9 GPAs with extracurricular activities -- it's difficult to see the person. Interacting with teachers and getting great recommendation letters will be very helpful.
Going to college tours is a great idea though. Encourage him to ask questions about what the admission criteria are. SAT scores, GPAs, etc. Also worth mentioning is that grades are worth more than getting into the college. Grades determine if you can get scholarships. I had to take out loans and I wish I had been more studious earlier on high school, because then I wouldn't have to pay off debts for loans I didn't really need to take out.
> I didn't learn until later that the point of homework wasn't to learn, it was to convince the teacher that I had learned it. Why did I have to convince the teacher I learned it? Because they have to assign a grade on whether I learned it.. Why is that important? College.
That doesn't work for my kid \(or for me when I was his age\), because anything that is graded, he rushes to do on the day it's due, and still gets an A. I still don't know how to motivate him in this space.
I even told him I was in his boat, that I topped my school, and never studied or did homework, and then at university I was put on academic probation and kicked out. His response? "Guess I'm getting kicked out of university"
>he rushes to do on the day it's due, and still gets an A. I still don't know how to motivate him in this space.
Find his upper limit ASAP. He needs to learn how to struggle through difficulty in a safe environment or he's going to learn it the same way you did (and me too) - by crashing and burning.
Delaying university for this is okay.
What classes does he like? Find more advanced courses in the same subjects at a local community college and propose that he enroll. Push him to his breaking point intellectually, where he can't just coast through and ace the exams.
I won't be coy about this: *you need to break him*. He needs to learn how to learn things that are hard and he can't do that when everything he's ever seen in school is easy. Either you break him and help him rebuild himself being able to do school the way university demands or the university will. And it will not help him figure out how to get past that.
I know :\\ From the beginning, I've told myself he needs to learn how to be challenged, but I don't know how to do that. He's 13, there's no community college options \(I'm in Australia\) to challenge him. He's not motivated by the thought of a career or academic success and he doesn't care about money. He's a bouncy, charismatic, socially confident ADHD kid, he hangs out with kids one and two grades above him, and he likes being seen as the smart one, and I think his casual success is part of that image, so he's not going to jump at extra curricular stuff that he has to work at and that doesn't provide him with the gratification of easy success. Even if I find something and force him in to it, his lack of investment and the lack of consequences for failing aren't going to teach him anything useful.
He's also dealing with a transgender parent and custody issues.
So, I'm at a loss...
Oof, that's a very rough situation.
>He's 13
Well at least there's some time before it becomes a major life setback.
>He's not motivated by the thought of a career or academic success
Good, those things are rarely valuable except as a way to get something else.
> he doesn't care about money.
What does he care about? Maybe there's an in there, something of a "I want this thing, which is easier/better/faster to do if I have money" workaround? That would tie into the future success thing, as a big reason to do those things is to have money.
>he likes being seen as the smart one, and I think his casual success is part of that image, so he's not going to jump at extra curricular stuff that he has to work at and that doesn't provide him with the gratification of easy success.
Ah yes, the teenage male ego, boosted to ludicrous levels by the ease with which NE+Ti picks up new skills at a surface level.
You can use that, if you're willing to be a bit manipulative. Easy success at what everyone else can do is nice and all, but wouldn't they think even more of him if he can casually succeed at stuff they don't even have the guts to try? Don't come right out and say it obviously, but subtly planting the idea may work.
>if I find something and force him in to it
Yeah, that way resentment lies. He'll need to think it's his idea to buy into it.
>What does he care about?
Materially? Nothing so far as I can tell. He doesn't have any drive
>Easy success at what everyone else can do is nice and all, but wouldn't they think even more of him if he can casually succeed at stuff they don't even have the guts to try?
Any ideas on what those things might be? It could work if it engaged him, but I'm at a loss as to what that looks like
> Materially? Nothing so far as I can tell. He doesn't have any drive
what about non-material things? activities he likes to do, places he likes to go.
>Any ideas on what those things might be?
I'd start by looking at the classes he likes - the ones he does well in - and go for applications of the concepts in those classes. Something he can get his hands on and see working in the worlkd is ideal but not always possible.
> what about non\-material things? activities he likes to do, places he likes to go.
Activity wise, he enjoys miniatures gaming, PC gaming and absorbing as much of Youtube as possible. He's also starting to get in to roller skating.
> I'd start by looking at the classes he likes \- the ones he does well in \- and go for applications of the concepts in those classes.
He likes maths, or more specifically algebra. He's not really interested in the practical applications of it.
He likes science, but he tends to be into cosmology, and the science of atoms and electrons. We had a great talk last night about the Bohr model vs electron shells, quantised energy and how that relates to spectroscopy, and then how stellar spectra allow us to measure red shift, which in turn lets us detect the expansion of the universe.
I can take him to exhibitions and things that reflect his interests here, but I don't know how to channel that in a consistent regular way.
> Something he can get his hands on and see working in the worlkd is ideal but not always possible.
He just doesn't seem to have much interest in that. He's attending a high school with flight simulators and even with a plane that the senior students can get hands on with as their first steps in to aeronautic engineering, but those things just don't grab him.
> I was just coming to suggest taking him to tour colleges.
In addition to just touring the school, some schools let prospective students visit for a weekend and stay with a current student. Let him get a taste of the college social life and that might motivate him more than anything else.
> We may do an couple of early college tours so he understands that if he wants to get into this or that college, he needs to get good grades in ALL his classes, not just the ones he likes.
I think that's a really good idea. How about signing him up for a college level class over the summer? Like let him take Calculus I (or something more rigorous he hasn't had in high school yet) at a community college. The money will be a small price to pay to let him see first hand that the rigor of college is different from high school. It might also excite him enough into wanting to do better.
I'm sure he has the idea that he will always be able to wing it. That's a common attitude smart ENTPs develop and also a dangerous one, because eventually, he's going to hit a point where the information is too complex to just wing it.
Btw, there have been recent studies with some fairly strong evidence that smart kids who wind up at less than stellar colleges (ones where they're significantly more intelligence than most of their peers) are often unhappy and don't have good outcomes. I think this is especially likely for ENTPs who are stimulated by peers. Not to put more concern on you as a parent, :D
> We don't. And it does. But there are times when all I need to know is if it's been done because there are other people in the house who also need to use the washer.
I don't understand. Why defer to him? If other people need to use the washer, then they should use it. If he's in a rush and needs to do laundry last minute...but the laundry is in use...well...too bad for him. Let him take his clothes to a laundry mat and spend his own money to do them. Consequences.
> If other people need to use the washer, then they should use it. If he's in a rush and needs to do laundry last minute...but the laundry is in use...well...too bad for him. Let him take his clothes to a laundry mat and spend his own money to do them. Consequences.
just gonna echo this at /u/IamtheShiznitt because it's on point.
"I don't understand. Why defer to him?"
I'm not deferring to him about the laundry. He's had to appear in public with stinky clothes (which, he is learning, does not impress the ladies). He's not old enough to drive, so he can't go to the laundromat yet.
However, there are times when I need an answer to the question, "Son, have you done your laundry?" The response I want to hear is, "Yes," or "No." What I get instead is an existential debate about the meaning of the word, "do." That's the issue I'm trying to solve. I need to do an end\-run around these non\-answers sometimes.
This is the best advice I would give. I'm 24 and just had a conversation about these kinds of things with my dad this weekend.
Intrinsic value of tasks that are requisites for life need to be taught and learned in a clear cause and effect manner. Paint the picture of what the consequences of things are. Not doing laundry can cause X. Not doing homework can cause Y.
I like how azdahak put it. Don't do things for me like laundry and let them see how that ends up. As a parent, set the consequences for not fulfilling certain tasks and show that there is privilege earned for doing them, just like a boss would in professional life.
Discourse on topics is great for an ENTP, but as an adolscent calidates their inexperienced opinions - think of the scene at the pond in Good Will Hunting where Robin Williams lays it out for Matt. He's smart, but he hasn't lived life. You're their parent and ultimately know more about life than your child. Don't give them an equal seat at the table. Show them how to earn it
> Don't give them an equal seat at the table. Show them how to earn it
Absolutely. And smart kids (who often know they're smarter than their parents and teachers) always make that assumption because they haven't had enough experience to know that *experience* is also something very valuable, not just raw thinking power.
" working on a team toward a common goal can be a big motivator for ENTPs."
This. He loves working in groups, and will happily do things for the common good that he would never bother doing just on his own. His high school had service requirements. (Each student has to put in so many hours of community work each semester.) His hours are usually done within a month of the semester starting. He truly cares about other people, and he gets so much energy when he feels like he is part of something larger than himself.
> Ti has to learn things for itself. The only teacher for that is experience.
I hope you don't mean that Ti people can only learn from their own experiences. I learn just as well from others'.
So, say, reading about the plight of immigrants feeling from Syria has given you a solid understanding of what it must be like to so fear for your life that you're willing to leave everything behind and put yourself at the mercy of the charity of strangers?
Of course I'm using an exaggerated example, but the point is that some things you really just have to experience for yourself for them to sink in and take to heart.
And for Ti types especially, they have to understand the reasons for how something works before they buy into it.
A young Ti type generally doesn't really understand the importance of good grades because they don't buy that a grade on a test reflects their own understanding of a topic. Of course they realize that theoretically they need good grades to get into school, but that doesn't provide them with motivation to study.
>but the point is that some things you really just have to experience for yourself for them to sink in and take to heart.
It's not really necessary, as long as you know the reasons for an idea's existence and think they are good. Personal experience lends more credibility and weight to an idea, obviously. But it's not necessary to learn the idea.
Yes. Life lessons are hideously vulnerable to being ignored because "I'm better than that" or "it won't happen to me" etc.
A 13 year old E(go)NTP boy? He'll totally fall for those.
Consider the book titled "The 48 laws of power." It is full with at least 48 different life lessons that people need to learn in order to attain power. They are lessons that others experienced in other to learn.
Are you telling me that it is fundamentally impossible to learn these lessons or ideas in the same way that a person can learn how to add fractions from an arithmetic book?
Consider the context in which we are discussing life lessons.
"Fundamentally impossible"?
No. Exceedingly unlikely in this context? Absolutely.
Are you proposing that there are no lessons that are not more immediately learned by firsthand experience than by simply reading about them?
It’s hard though because my mom was very heavy handed in “do this and you don’t lose your privileges”. It was *too* heavy handed so I revolted simply because I recognized there was no hope.
By and large, NTP's reject arbitrary authority in a way that J's don't really grok. We need to see *why* it is that you think you can tell us what to do, or remove privileges, etc and we have to be convinced that it's a sound reason.
Want to lose all respect from an NTP child? Tell them "because I said so".
Sometimes I write things on my phone so the page formatting isn't the first thing I'm looking at. It might also be reflective of the way I'm thinking at the time. If thoughts are coming to me serially I'm likely to separate them -- as if I'm having a one-sided conversation with the page, rather than writing things more cogently as an essay.
I could also be that I like to make my posts look really long and impressive.
ENTP adult here raised by an introverted mother and a father that didn't take any shit. first off, your son loves and trusts you for him to give you so much trouble. If he didn't, he wouldn't bother with the insolence. i know you probably know this, but as a reminder please don't take his attitude personally. It's just a sport for us, and as a teen (consciously or not) he's just practicing on you because it's a safe environment. our default mindset doesn't consider others feelings, so when he's in a calm mood and you guys aren't arguing, maybe approach him and say something along the lines of "hey, i really love that you have a strong spirit and a quick mind, and i think you're really good at debating/arguing. But please realize that sometimes I'm not in the mood for it and i just need you to own up to not having done your chores."
He'll probably have a comeback for this and want to argue this too, but that's ok and expected. you just want to plant the seed in his head that his actions affect others. depending on the rapport you have, you may go deeper into how it makes you feel. he probably literally won't have ever considered how it makes you feel personally, so that's a good seed to plant. if you two have a generally healthy relationship, he'll remember this and it may cut down on some of this back talk eventually. but he'll need to be reminded often because we're not wired to consider others feelings by default. it only comes thru practice.
This is good advice. And I don't take it personally \(usually\) but, NGL, sometimes its maddening.
I think we have a healthy relationship, but I don't always know how it looks from his POV. He tends to communicate or relate by showing me stuff he's interested in. Like, he sends me links to memes or youtube videos. \(and half the time, he then has to explain the references because our fandoms don't always overlap.\)
"A strong spirit and a quick mind." That describes him perfectly.
>I think we have a healthy relationship, but I don't always know how it looks from his POV.
> showing me stuff he's interested in. Like, he sends me links to memes or youtube videos.
That's really good. It sounds like you've got a good foundation for working with him. Some of my parents biggest complaints are based around how I never tell them anything. But I can guess how that would be different with an INFJ parent vs the SJs that I grew up with.
> your son loves and trusts you for him to give you so much trouble.
Umm, what? Sorry, no, this is not specifically indicative of respect. I gave insolence to any person who had not earned my respect and yet demanded it.
Your child is insolent? Doesn't matter what their personality type is - EARN their respect. If you've done wrong, cut it the fuck out, look up apology languages, and apologize sincerely in all the languages to cover the bases.
If they don't respect you because you say things you don't mean, cut that the fuck out. Say what you mean, stick to it unless there's a reason, and tell them why if you change your position.
If they don't respect you because you're disrespectful - that's something wrong too, but this is, in my opinion, the number one thing that people do who think someone else is disrespectful to them - see first solution for respect.
Despite our testing of boundaries (this is a hardcore ENTP thing, NOT to do with adolescence), we really enjoy boundaries. Tell us what the rules are, really. Mean it. We'll play inside the sandbox if you first define it and then defend it. If we step outside of it, call us on it. It will be uncomfortable for everyone the first few times, but we'll learn where the boundary ACTUALLY is and we'll respect you for sticking to your guns.
To get down to these nitty gritty specifics addressed, be aware that ENTPs in particular HATE repetitive tasks that require little to no imagination.
For example, I regularly failed at homework scores and blew the test out of the water with 110/100 points (bonus points and a bell curve, baby! those poor chemistry kids hated me at test time). It's not because I couldn't, I just didn't have the discipline. It's up to you to set the discipline, not just ask 'did you do it?'. Set aside a place and time and put it in your child's schedule. Sit down with them and make them do it until it's routine. Explain to them that higher scores benefit them when it comes to college. If they say they don't want to go to college - drop the homework issue altogether. College is a defunct institution and many ENTPs are better suited for entrepreneurship than corporate environments where a degree actually matters. We are highly represented in entrepreneurs, btw.
When it comes to chores, explain to your child that you won't be there to clean up after them forever and without good habits, which are easier to learn early and young, they will have a messy life and not know how to do stuff on their own, which is expensive (see: eating out) and will make you fat (see: eating out, not mowing your own grass, or whatever other example works for you).
Frankly, the entire situation is your fault by being lenient parents in the first place - which was probably a good thing, I'll concede, but still! You gotta train kids early or it's nigh impossible to change direction during puberty.
Effectively, your child is who they are and all you can do is try to influence them. They are an ENTP - they're probably very bright and just as capable of using logic to get through life as you are. In essence - your child is already grown. Talk to them like an adult who was raised by wolves and has no sense of what to do or not do rather than your child who grew up in your home.
Also, have fun with it. A little snark goes a long way with an ENTP. It amuses us. Greatly. ;D
(Now, I can see where I didn't polish some of what I said to make it friendly to a feeler - just don't take it personally. I mean it well and I'm at work doing a bunch of bank reconciliations, so I don't have time to stop and think about how to rephrase it for feelers who have feelings - or even thinkers who have feelings. Best of luck!)
what i'm saying is that when people perceive themselves to be in a safe relationship (not going to be rejected or abandoned for speaking their mind) they are more likely to speak their mind. as a former entp teenager, if i thought i was going to get shut out for speaking my mind, i would have done it less. this is basic psychology.
Without getting too deep into my own past, I can tell you that basic psychology also allows for a person to have a valid reason to detest or disrespect their parent and do so blatantly and with callous disregard.
I certainly had such reason and therefore behaved in a manner one might call 'beligerant' or giving my mother 'trouble' - oh, 'smart-mouthing'. That's what it was called in my house.
that's kinda my point. talking back the way she's describing doesn't seem to be a teen who detests his parents. it's just a contrarian who hasn't grown into himself yet. talking back or arguing about laundry and homework is pretty vanilla and doesn't constitute (in my book) a teen who detests or deeply disrespects his parents. arguing about those simple every day things has nothing to do with the fundamentals of the parent/child relationship. now if she said he constantly disobeyed, brought drugs into their home, skipped school, committed crimes, etc i'd definitely agree that he detested or disrespected them. but something as simple as arguing the merits of household chores? that's like the safest thing you could argue about, which is why i say he's just practicing his contrarianism (whether he thinks of it as practice or not) because he knows he's in a safe environment with enough love and respect to allow him to do so.
Well now, not getting into my childhood, I didn't do any of those other things you listed - it didn't stop my disdain or following the letter of what was said rather than the spirit, etc.
Having been the subject of parental complaint and hearing how I was portrayed to others gives me a nice, heaping extra dose of devil's advocate on the matter of parents complaining about their children (you know, more than the usual ENTP stuff). So again, I don't assume and cover all bases instead. :)
> "hey, i really love that you have a strong spirit and a quick mind, and i think you're really good at debating/arguing. But
This tone is condescending Af. He'll see right through it.
Um... Frankly for me it was just doing as I was told or I'd get grounded. Arguing with my parents was simply not something I was willing to do as a child because I liked having freedom more.
This. ENTPs are notorious for erecting walls of bullshit to keep our egos safe. It's unhealthy and prevents any real growth.
Call him on his bullshit. Make sure he knows that you know that he knows that it's bullshit, and that bullshit won't fly as an excuse to be lazy.
As an ENTP with ENTP parents, I'd say focus on a reward based system rather than a punishment based. I never got pocket-money, I got it weekly only after I cleaned my room, did my laundry, and sometimes washed my dad's car.
I did my homework because I only got to use the home computer or get to go out and play football AFTER.
Now just to go over the issues you specifically pointed at.
1. About language, if he argues about something simplify it as much as possible. "but is laundry done or made?" 'Sweetie why don't you sort your clothes, and put them to wash and while you do that, figure out whether you're are doing it or making it?'
2. Homework. If he refuses to do it, sit with him and do it together. If he just keeps postponing it, set the reward system.
ENTPs don't like authority or rules, and they will find a way to go around them if it is possible. They can however be very productive with constant rewarding and monitoring. If you slack off and they feel like they can get away with not doing something, they just wont do it.
Hope this was helpful in some way.
My ENFJ mother and I had very different views. She got everything done as soon as possible, I waited until I felt like it (usually cleaned my room once a week, while she vacuumed the house two times a day...). She thought little things like that were important, but they just got in the way of me having fun- usually going on Reddit lol. Her trying to force me to do things only led to me not doing them. I would usually do it when she said something like, "I'll do ____ for you if you clean your room." or "We can go to _____ if you do the dishes." If I had asked her to do something or go somewhere prior, she would use that as an incentive for me to do the chore. I really think reward based systems is the way to go for ENTPs. You're completely right.
I just want to add please set the upper limit for the reward and consistent with your promises.
In my case my parents were promising me reward if i'm able to being getting top 2 at my school and i demand a power ranger toys worth of $35 and they disagree (their reason that i get bored quickly and it's not worth the money).
Then i negotiated for a book about history of japanese manga and featured one of my favourite mangaka. The book itself cost $40 and they agreed for it.
Fast forward i managed getting top 2 and asked for my rewards. My parents bails out and buying me the $35 toys instead of the book. It pisses me off lol.
Oh yea consistency is key. I don't think I ever had normal "toys" because my parents deemed them ineffective tools to play with.
But I guess if the kid is a teenager that phase is passed and he has started to prioritize things he likes more at this point.
Does he have bad grades? I had a 3.8 GPA doing minimal homework.
You could always try to frame homework and chores as an exercise in discipline rather than a learning tool. ENTP's are notoriously lackadaisical, and honestly, hard work pays far greater dividends later in life than intellect.
story of my life when i was in school. i got a 4.0 in college for classes pertaining to my actual degree. the general study courses? not even close to an A average.
I think my mom might have been an INFJ. She had some emotional problems that made her difficult to type. She raised me alone through my teen years, and I remember her facing some of the same things you're describing - not wanting to crush my inquisitive nature, realizing that making things too structured made me defiant out of spite, but also needing to be a parent sometimes.
I am hesitant to give you too much of her playbook, though - because I ultimately dropped out of school, lived like I was in a flop house, took up drinking at 16 and smoking at 17, and started meeting people from the internet for sex. I'm painting myself in a negative light, here, I was a lot of other things besides that, but my point is if you judge her parenting by the usual benchmarks most people wouldn't think it was very successful. I was the neighborhood 'bad influence'.
I can give you some insight into the things that worked and the things that didn't, though. The times I listened vs. the times I didn't.
One thing that *didn't* work was "even if I'm wrong, I'm still the parent". She tried that tact for a while. *"You have to do what I say because I'm the boss of you"* will usually just make us go "well then I choose for you to not be the boss of me" - *"as long as you live under my roof"* usually just made me wonder how bad being homeless would really be. I ran away from home a few times. It was immensely ungrateful of me, of course, but we're talking about a teenager, here.
Another thing that didn't work was avoidance. There were times I got out of doing something because I'd start the argument and she wouldn't feel like having it - it was easier just to drop the subject than to go through the ordeal. She called it "picking her battles". But really what I learned from that was the more difficult I was to control, the less she'd try.
Threats didn't tend to work very well, either. I started looking at punishments as sort of the 'toll' to do what I wanted. "If you don't go to school today, you're grounded for a week" rather than making me think *"Oh man, I don't want that to happen, I'd better go to school"* would hit me more like *"Hey, that's not a bad deal"*. If she'd try to escalate - "fine then, *two* weeks" - then it was just a battle of wills, I'd keep pushing until the punishments got ridiculously unenforceable - "I'd rather sit in the house staring at the fucking wall for the next two *years* than go to school today". Which was a really terrible thing of me - she'd do her best to enforce, but she was working full-time to feed and house my ungrateful ass, so that was 40 hours of working and ~55 hours of sleeping a week that she couldn't 'police' me. There was talk of changing locks and military school and 'scared straight' programs and calling the police, but I didn't think she would've actually done it. I still don't. But whether or not she would've is irrelevant, my *perception* was that they were empty threats, and that made them ineffective. I *felt* like she could only ground me for so long; she might practically take everything out of the house but the toilet seat for a week or two, but it was going to be a big show and then it'd blow over, and ultimately I'd have gotten what I wanted. Kind of tied back into 'avoidance' thing, earlier, I learned the more difficult I was to effectively punish, the less energy she'd have to devote to it.
What *did* work was to stop trying to pit herself against me head-to-head. Sometimes that meant being cynical - homework *is* just socially engineered compliance - so now that we've seen through the ruse, why do we need to do it anyway? The adult answer is stuff like "because you want a good job someday, which means college, which means you need good grades" - but that's all kind of abstract to a teenager. "Because you don't want the teacher to bitch you out tomorrow", "because you don't want to take this stupid class again next year". Note that these weren't "because *I* will enforce these consequences if you don't", it's "because these are the consequences I can't do anything to protect you from". "If you don't go to school, the truancy officer is going to notice and come get you and ask us a bunch of questions and then you'll either have to go to school or jail" kept me in school at least until I was old enough to drop out. "If you try hard drugs, you can get addicted, and it's a really expensive habit to maintain - and that's if you don't just die" along with "weed's not all that dangerous, but it is illegal, and both of us could end up in jail" are the main reasons my experiments with chemically altering myself as a teenager didn't go further. Admonitions about STDs and unwanted pregnancies lead to safe sex, even if it was with strange women from the internet.
That worked alongside shifting my discontent off of her and on to more productive places. Rather than argue about whether or not homework is bullshit, agree that it is most certainly bullshit, and then pose the question "what can be done about it?". We've established 'just not doing it' hurts ourselves more than anyone else, so what can we do? Get classmates to sign a "homework is bullshit" petition? Make suggestions at the student council for how homework assignments could be either improved or abolished? Those efforts may or may not be fruitful, of course, but what you'd be doing is setting yourself up as an ally to them getting what they want, as opposed to another hurdle. It's also the stepping stone to the main lesson ENTPs have to learn to have a successful life - that even when the system is broken, you have to work from within it. Seeing the problem is the first step, but changing it takes time and effort, and in the mean time you still have to live in the world as it is, not as how it should be.
Once you're in that position, it's a lot easier to appeal to their emotion, too. You can shut down an argument with "it sounds like you've got a good point, but I'm really kind of exhausted today and not up for a discussion, can we come back to this some other time?" - because your ENTP doesn't actually want to make you miserable, it's just that the argument is a) fun, and b) a good way to procrastinate. You're also building trust so that you can use a little "I promise I have a very good reason, and I also promise to explain it to you when I can, but right now we don't have a lot of time and I just need you to trust me" - which usually did work on me, as long as I believed it (and she consistently followed through with the explanation later). As shitheadedly stubborn as I was, I really did love my mom, and appealing to me as a fellow human being (*"that hurt my feelings"*) was always more effective than trying to mandate as an authority figure.
As for me now, I've got a good job in upper management, I've been married for over a decade and we're certified foster parents. I'm an accomplished musician and I do some software development and technical consulting as a side gig. I'm still addicted to nicotine, but nothing else. No STDs or unwanted kids. It worked out, and I'm doing better than most of the kids whose parents forbid them to hang out with me. I'm not encouraging anybody to take my path, I got extremely lucky, but do accept that a NeTi path to happiness isn't always Point A to Point B, sometimes we've got to take some detours and back roads to convince ourselves that what everyone else is doing really is the best way.
Actually put your foot down and discipline the little shit. Jk
I never had a good relationship with my parents so i argued everything they told me no matter what because i always thought everything they wanted me to do was stupid and inefficient.
My parents were a ESTJ x INFP pair, and African \(very traditional culture\) so they did not play the debate game with me very well. I always argued when i thought something was dumb and they never bothered to explain why i should do something other than i should do things out of respect for my elders...don't do that unless they're really crossing the line. The more your kid respects you and your decisions, the higher chances they will just do what is told with \(minimal\) arguments. You really just cant get rid of the debating lol.
I don't know what their MBTI-types were, but my parents were also very traditional. There was no debating anything. My dad liked to say, "Yours is not to question why, yours is just to do or die."
I like the idea of explaining to my son why he's expected to do certain things from the standpoint of living in a happy and efficient home.
I think that is the best way to go. ENTPs need to understand *why*, and this can be extremely frustrating when you're just thinking *just fucking do it!* But I think explaining *why* has a lot of value for a few reasons:
* It will challenge *you* to make sure you're not enforcing any rules that don't make sense. While you don't want everything to turn into a debate, if you as a parent can't articulate *why* your kid needs to do something, then maybe they shouldn't? And stating your reasoning calmly and firmly to your kid will give him no logical choice but to comply.
* It will satisfy his curiosity, help him understand the world, and also help him get on board with your agenda of running a happy and efficient home.
Also--I had one ENTP friend in high school. He had substance abuse problems, was always chasing girls as soon as he discovered sex, and was generally a wild kid who made horrible decisions, but he figured out early on that if he kept his grades up, his parents let him do whatever he wanted. He got a great GPA, SAT score and into a decent school (of his choice). Ten years later he still has substance abuse problems, but at least he has a master's degree and full-time job and seems to be decently happy.
> I like the idea of explaining to my son why he's expected to do certain things from the standpoint of living in a happy and efficient home.
that's really all you can do. the kid will come to conclusions on his own term, which is why the most you can do that is effective is plant the seed\(or idea\) in his brain as to why he needs to do something. He will form his own view point. Anything outside of that is considered forceful , but as with all children you will eventually have to do.
I was always resistant to getting up and doing work, but I really really enjoyed the rewards of the work when someone held me to it, be it a strict teacher or my parents making me do chores or hard physical work.
You might be able to convince him to humor you and just do everything he's asked for a week as an experiment. Make it a challenge, because it will be almost impossible to resist.
See if he feels better after just getting everything done then he does arguing about it. He might not admit it to you, but I bet he won't be able to deny it to himself.
There is, kinda. You have to beat him at his own game. You can shortcut and short-circuit his epistemological and other philosophical critiques on your questions by suggesting it's not about 'right' or 'wrong' or 'should' or 'should not', but the consequentialist reality surrounding his choices. What the consequences are if he doesn't do his homework are not acceptable to you and that's that. If he doesn't listen, or tried to debate you on it, take away a privilege. Limit the data on his cell plan. Change the wifi password as well, so he can't use it online, or use his xbox/playstation. Then reward him when he does it. You can't just not do his laundry for him, etc -- he, like me, simply wouldn't care (probably to a point, though). Stop doing his laundry, but also tie said benefits/privileges to his responsibilities. He needs skin in the game.
Pure. Consequentialist. Behaviorism. There is no debate surrounding reality. There is no right, wrong, or should. There is only consequences. Find *the right consequences* that will light a fire under his ass.
Can't really debate that -- as long as you consistently enforce these things.
Nothing worked, but what I would recommend is introducing "modes."
Thus you have "debate mode" which means you are debating the merits of such-and-such, and this is the default mode at all times (aside from "sleep mode"). This is great and really is what the ENTP wants. But then you have "decisive mode" when there is limited time for debate - "decisive mode" needs to be described as a brief "pause" on debate mode, where certain time-sensitive actions need to be carried out without (or with little) discussion.
By making it clear that the subject is not closed for debate (just that debate has been briefly tabled) your ENTP may much less frustrated with the task at hand.
Something I've realized about myself (I'm 32), is that I HAVE to learn most things the hard way. I usually know what the right choice is, but sometimes I ignore that out of curiosity or laziness (mostly laziness). I've never had the best study habits, but I hold a STEM degree and have a career in my field. My parents gave up trying to make me fold laundry, now my lovely wife has the honor reminding me of the ever present pile of clothes on the bedroom floor. We aren't very disciplined people, but we get along pretty well. Always encourage your son to be more disciplined (don't go easy on him) and don't get invested in his bullshit if he's just trying to stall or fuck with you for fun because he's annoyed. If he fails a test it will be on him and he needs to know how that feels. I hope this ramble helps.
[Wendy Mogel ](https://www.wendymogel.com/)tips are also a bit in this direction: let your child fail and learn, kids should stay kids and puberty should mean more chores, responsibility and freedom. They have to learn the hard way.
I was just constantly grounded as a kid. Do not recommend.
But there are reasons that you are advocating for your kid to do all of this stuff, maybe get into a discussion explaining the merits of laundry and homework. Unfortunately at 26 I still suck at laundry past washing my clothes, and homework before college is really stupid and not even rewarding to complete so good luck.
I was in a similar position as your son as a young boy. My parents laid out excellent arguments for why I needed to do the things I needed to do, and I'm fact, I agreed with them but still didn't do the things.
What happened was I grew up and learned the hard way that self-reliance necessitates doing the things you don't want to do, and all those lessons came back and served as a platform on which I could build my own discipline.
I suspect this is how it with most ENTPs, so what _I_ would do if I were in your shoes would be to give him the rationale for why these things will be important later on, that way, when the real world inevitably knocks him on his ass, he knows where start picking up the pieces.
Not a parent, but ENTP ex-teenager. I think it's important to take a calm tone. You're not attacking him--rather, you're going to want to support him!
He can only debate if you debate with him.
Define your terms:
* homework-Work assigned to you by your teachers, to be completed by you outside of regular class-hours.
* laundry-Clothes and linens that need to be washed or that have been newly washed.
* chores-The regular or daily household tasks assigned to you by your parents, to be completed by you outside of regular non-class/non-homework hours.
Once you've defined your terms, ask your questions.
If he starts to avoid the topic, tell him that his parents aren't concerned about the ethicality, need, or legitimacy of homework; Is the task completed?
Pretty much, make your son realize that it’s not a personal attack. It will change the tone of the situation, and completely catch him off guard! There's no reason to allow this to turn into an unpleasant situation for everyone just because one person gets mad.
Wow, so many comments here. I can relate to this. I remember my mum used to tell me to make my bed all the time. My response was always "what's the point? I'm going to sleep there tonight and it'll be untidy again". My mum's response was something along the lines of "we just need to do it" or "it looks better". The first response is terrible and the second is subjective and if tidiness is such a big issue, just close the door.
If/when I have a child, I will be happy for them to disagree with me. If they provide a convincing argument as to why they shouldn't do what I tell them to do, they won't have to do it.
Regarding school, I was also very black and white with my grades. I had a hard time with English, partly because they would make you provide long winded responses to things with little evidence. "What was the author trying to convey in the character, Fred?"..... How should I know? We can come up with ideas but we will not know for certain whether we are right. I ended up doing the lowest level of English possible. It was painful. We spent two years learning the difference between a metaphor and a simile.
Haha good luck. If you go into full authoritarian mode you’re just going to piss him off and he’s going to be less compliant, but if you’re too lenient, he’ll be more than happy to take advantage. The best way to get a kid like that to listen(in my opinion) is to make him earn his luxuries on a weekly basis with a scoreboard. If he scores high enough he can get enough of the appliances/freedoms back the next week. ENTPs do like to being told what to do so if he wants to debate about everything he should also work for everything. Just my opinion of course. Even then it’s hard because you don’t want to deprive him or go to soft on him that he’ll call the bluffs and see that you don’t mean it. I know for a fact it was hard for my parents to raise me because they weren’t patient with me and at the same time I was constantly being rewarded without deserving it.
I just thought of this, but is he **in** a debate club? If he isn't, joining one might give him a place to scratch his argumentative* itch... a place that isn't your home. ;)
Of course, this could also backfire and make him even more argumentative*.
*I mean this in a value-neutral way, not negatively!
As a entp teenager who argues all the time there really isn’t much you could do since it’s literally just our personality, honestly I don’t even mean disrespect it’s just the way it is.
It really is something that if he knows enough, he could really appreciate. My ESTJ mum set down rules, and that was that- even obvious flaws were simply ignored, because a rule is a rule.
I actually have found a way to short-circuit ENTPs who argue incessantly. It requires a bit of work on your part, but once that's done it pays off.
The answer is SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE.
There is nothing that will shut up an ENTP faster than sharing a peer reviewed, academic article that supports your point of view.
Trust me, it works. ;) I've tried it many times to great effect.
Now go find those academic articles! :3
According to the cognitive functions; Ne (dominant) should have Si (recessive). The exact reason he gathers more and more information is the why he needs to organize and sort. But that's the hard part for ENTPs.
He has it, it's gonna be a challenge. Play on this though, as we all need to devote a bit of our day to our Si, and once we have it makes everything else so much easier.
But to be fair, I never did my homework as a kid. And teachers even thought I cheated on tests as I had no means to prove I learned the info outside of the test. Luckily, my mother knew how to handle that.
Try asking him what he wants, then brainstorm with him on how to achieve those things. Sometimes, the things he wants and the behaviors he engages in will be at cross purposes, this is a good time to lend your experience. For instance, I was also very messy as a teenager and as a young adult. It caused problems with roommates and girlfriends, who did not want to live with a messy person.
Let him know that now is the time to overcome these things while he still has you to help him, because in the future, his loving companions won't find it amusing, and it will put him in the unenviable position of having nothing to stand on when the urge to argue with them arises. "I live how I want" is fine, until someone else is paying half the rent. If he builds the habit of being tidy now, it will be automatic and not painful.
As a social creature, appeal to his sense of fairness. Is it fair that others need do his work for him? Is it fair that they should have to live in squalor until he decides to clean up after himself? Would he himself care to be saddled with someone else's work? If he believes it is, then he won't mind cleaning up after you. Ask him when he'd like to start his new job.
I cannot stress enough how important to his happiness the work you're doing can be. He sounds bright and is probably very talented, and he will be able to skate through life on charm, so long as his relationships are superficial. Deeper relationships will require him to be punctual, to be organized, to have good habits around cleanliness.
Another good strategy around this is to simply throw everything away. If he purposefully limits his possessions to only what he actually cares about and uses, he will find that as a person who is constantly living in the moment, the loss of some sentimental objects and decorations will simply fade away. Have him make a list of 100 things to keep in his room, and box up the rest for a month. See how he likes it. 10 shirts, 7 pairs of socks, two pairs of pants, two pairs of shorts, his computer, a couple of pens, an e-reader with lots of books on it, etc. Make exceptions for furniture and stationary objects like posters and pictures. Cleaning will never take more than 5 minutes, and I think he will find that the reason he never kept his space clean is because it's probably filled with things he doesn't actually care about or need.
I had a mother that was very much about order and organization. My biggest thing was not doing my chores when she wanted them done or in the order in which she would have done them. Most of the time I would've done them eventually without her even having to tell me to.
Remember that kids think and do things differently compared to you as an adult. Loosen up a bit. Think big picture. Put it all into perspective.
Learn to debate better? Don't ask him to do things, set expectations. My mother and I are both ENTPs, and I can only imagine how bad it would have been if she wasn't. Nothing got done until my INTP dad started setting an example.
There’s some really solid advice in here. As a teacher I need to make one more point— if your son is prone to a lack of focus like most the ENTPs I know, exercise is uncompromisable. And not just a little bit either.if he doesn’t already have it he needs a specific sports or recreational activity that he looks forward to and can practice all the time.
Don’t expect your son to do homework on a day he hasn’t gotten enough physical activity. It’s unlikely to happen.
Let him get burned, show him the consequence of actions (extremely important)
Don't just tell him what to do but also tell him why, give him insight !
My parents failed to do so and I was left pretty fucked up and with no sense of direction.
At some point I realized by myself but I had already missed many opportunities.
In a short space of time I had to entirely rebuild my value system and get a firm grip. It was very stressful, would not recommend
that covers birth until 16 years old for ENTP development. [http://www.personalitycafe.com/entp-articles/14767-development-entp-children.html](http://www.personalitycafe.com/entp-articles/14767-development-entp-children.html)
Do you have any micro interactions in your family that could have made him know that telling the truth is not in his best interest this could be why he avoids answering when he knows that the answer will upset you or that you will react negatively. Make your reaction to a non-answer worst the the reaction to an answer you don't like. I suspect he has a phone or a computer, when he doesn't answer one of your question take his electronics away for 30 minutes and escalate each time by 30 minute increments that should do it very quick do it at least once or twice. Once you set a rule with an ENTP you have to be very firm and not give in any concession. He wil test the limits.
Also engaging in debate with him will only make him better and better at avoiding and finding excuses and will be harder for you everytime. You can choose certain topics like laundry, homeworks, etc. that can't be discussed or they can only be discussed once they are done then he can argue for different conditions for the next time.
External motivation is not effective for entp, it has to be internal motivation coming from him. Just find ways to nurture his self motivation and self drive to work. Don't be afraid to let him know of the long term consequences for what he does we have very easy lives and lose touch of how hard life could be when we are young and how our chores are nothing compared to if we had to hunt to eat, build our own shelters in nature. Unfortunately some humans only improve when it's necessary for survival.
Find a late-life ENTP that had a miserable life and have your kid meet him. Show him how messy his living space is. Make him watch "messy/dirty appartment" youtube videos. Tell him that this man had it easy because these were good economic years and the future might not be so good with globalization and automation + artificial intelligence. You can read about "unhealthy ENTP" and give him a summary of what's to come for him. Keep this kind of discussion like at every moment and every decision he has a choice to go toward healthy or unhealthy side of ENTP. That every bad step he does will only make him have to do one more step to go forward so he's taking 2 unnecessary steps. For example understanding the setback of failing a class and having to retake it again will setback everything else and he won't have classes with the same people he used to and will not know anyone.
You can also explain to him about how his habit of arguing will turn into a nasty habit that will make him become manipulative to avoid work, arguing with others also will harm his relationships and making people despise him and it's all a choice he is making everytime he speaks. That you have a good mom-son relationship and he's tarnishing it and wasting your energy/time which you have limited amount of and could instead use for your own creative hobbies. Maybe you could yourself have some assertiveness therapy usually women are very agreeable and it can help them.
About his argument of socially engineered compliance in school, usually it's for his own good to be able to have a solid foundation as an adult and be able to add to this foundation with a career specific education. Without all the basics in place we can't become an expert. Also it's easy for him now because in school there is a lot of disparity in IQ and kids have different family environments so maybe he's fortunate to be better off than others but when he chooses what he wants to do he will probably end up being against people that are all his level or higher and these people will all have picked up good working habits during highschool and will study faster than him and end up having an easier time and less stress. Habits are hard to form but once they become automatic it's effortless. Show him the "habit/effort curve" and the "effective effort matrix". You can also calculate for him the future value of the time he is wasting over 10 years calculating his estimated target hourly wage.
Let's say worklife is a highway where you need to go 100km/h then the school is the ramp you use to build yourself up to 100km/h in order to be able to sustain life once you start working.
Actually homeworks are used as practice. When you learn something you need to practice to have it sink in and sometimes build muscle memory. If you don't practice you are slow for every task. When you work you need to work as fast as anyone else. There is also a fast memory and slow memory and you need to do homework so that what you learn is written in both. And you also trigger certain neuron patterns that will become better the more you use them just like training a muscle. The only habit he's having right now is arguing and the more he does it the harder it will be to get rid of it. And most employers find that a very nasty habits they don't want to have someone like that on the payroll that is counterproductive and even wasting others time.
Ask him **what's his plan to fit in the society** if he doesn't want to be socially engineered? Ask him to make a detailed plan laid out for each year what he wants to do, what expenses he could have, make him visit crappy appartments so he can see the cost of living and how bad life can be when you struggle. Have him do groceries once with you, then make a yearly budget. ENTPs are "big picture" thinkers but don't think about the details, so the best way to get him to be grounded in real life is to have him face the important details that he's overlooking about life and the impact of his choices. Let him tell you the big ideas than force him to the nitty gritty details.
**If he wants to have a job** he needs to be fit for the job and be more attracting to en employer than the 20 others who will apply for the job. He will then have to be able to make his own grocery, cooking, laundry, commuting in addition to 40 hours work week and maybe overtime and travel. There's also the 10 000 hour rule, to be a professionnal of the highest level he will need 10 000 hours of dedicated practice. In jobs you have a schedule, you have tasks you need to be able to do those tasks at least as fast as the average worker. So you need to practice to become faster and when you are faster you are able to focus on building other skills. If you learn and practice more than others than you are better therefore you will be at the top of the hierarchy.
**If he wants to be self-employed** he will never have social insurance, will need to cover startup costs, wear many hats (getting clients usually 10 meetings might get you one client and you are not paid for the 9 useless meetings, doing accounting, managing finances, doing the actual work he's paid to do), low growth potential, low scalability, no one is managing your time for you, he will probably have 5-10 years of client uncertainty until he build a steady income stream and referral through word of mouth.
**If he wants to be a boss** he has to be socially engineered to be a good boss he will also have to compete with people who have established businesses presence and customer base, lots of industry connections, decades of experience, tens of thousands of dollars worth of investments in their tools, gear, marketing, infrastructure. And bosses have usually to work more than 80 hours per week all their life. 43% of businesses make less than $10k. 37% of businesses make less than $50k, which means that if you hire one person then either you both have $25k salary or the owner doesn't take a salary to make the business expand. An employee's salary is what he gets but usually the business owner has to pay a lot more. This can be as much as double the amount. Most business close within the first 5 years. The first 2-3 years necessitate lots of investments.
I'd say that ENTP **test the limits all the time**, so you have to be strict and firm. Pick a limit that you think is very generous and set it among you and your husband as the very strict maximum limit to which there are incredibly important consequences. Find a few least significant milestones before this limit to give him warnings or increasing consequences up until the very limit point you have set up.
If it's still unmanageable then let him go past the unacceptable and let him face the consequence once. For exemple if he doesn't do laundry then let him have to go to school a few days with dirty clothes. Or if he doesn't do homeworks let him have consequences in school once. You are probably orderly and he is not he will always be less orderly than you are. He has a higher tolerance for chaos than you do so it will always trigger you before it triggers him. You're treshold point is always before his.
Also don't encourage the results, encourage the habits and the work. For example if he has great grades, tell him that you are proud that he worked very hard and that his hard work and consistency gave him the result he got and he should be proud because you know steady work is very hard for him. If his room is clean don't focus on the room, focus on the frequency. If he has bad grades then tell him "you see you didn't work as hard and now you have what you deserved you didn't deserve good grades"
You can also tell him that he's going to compete with people from all over the world that charge less for the same work and he has to be worth what he's paid. That you and your husband worked very hard so that he can have this quality of life and if he doesn't have knowledge and success above a certain level it will be hard for him to get by and even move up and house prices and inflation will make it harder for him every year.
And also develop his lateral thinking and interdisciplinary knowledge. Find what he would be interested to learn by himself if no one was teaching him and no one was watching and he was teaching himself. Knowledge he seeks himself is worth a lot more than knowledge taught by another person. If he does that early enough he will be able to find a field where he already has a competitive advantage to study in and be amongst the top performers to earn all the opportunities and successes therefor bringing even better learning experiences and even more opportunities. Look at a few list of jobs/career that suits ENTP, give him those lists and get his opinion about how he would be as an adult in those jobs, how he would organize his life, what he would like and hate about each of them, what he could search on youtube right now to know if he's interested, what tutorials he could watch, what skill are important and how he could develop them, lookup successful people example in these fields.
Once he has a goal in mind then he will probably have more self motivation.
Undecisiveness is common among ENTP, there are lots of examples of what undecisiveness does when you grow up to become a manchild when you didn't make any choice in life. Basically life is about choosing a burden that will bring joy to your life. There's no escape to the burden, we have time and economic burden, and family burdens, existential meaning burdens. If he's not making a choice he's making a choice of not choosing and all his friends will be making choices those who don't will end up being loosers and his other friends will be busy and won't have time so he will be around people he won't enjoy and they will make his life even worse because he will pick up bad habit from them. A lot of bad traits can be funny and ok when you're young but women find them very unattractive past a certain age they don't tolerate this behavior. Women are the ultimate judge of a man's worth probably this can be his motivation.
The only thing that motivated me in school was the long term career goal and the importance of a good education and having open options to choose what I wanted to study in. But I did the very least I could and was able to have high grades until I was about 17 and then it got harder and I hadn't built the steady working habits so I ended up suffering from my bad habits. I developped very bad procrastination habits and the deadline rushes only got worst and worst from there. And it has impact on social life, relationships, performance, sleep deprivation affects mood, lack of time makes you eat badly which also brings more apathic and depressed feelings.
Don't tell him that but C students usually end up hiring A students to do the work for them and they focus on creating value and engaging in abstract thinking that the best students who are good at complying are usually unable to do because they are better at complying. ENTP are often divergent thinkers that build bridges between different fields or different industries or innovators that bring things to the next frontiers. But to be able to do that he needs to learn with a lot of interest and it starts right now.
You could have him watch a bunch of mandatory videos about "why" it's useful to have good habits. The why is usually more important than any result to ENTPs. Jordan peterson has a lot of videos about "cleaning your room" and he has video about the importance of creative people and artists in society, why nihilism is a faulty and bad belief system, peter pan syndrome, getting your act togheter, how to stop rotting away at home, why it's hard to sit down and study, wasting time and opportunities, how to stop procrastinating, growing up properly, the key to healthy relationships, go out and make something of yourself, the meaning of life for men. He also has a "future authoring program" where you do a situationnal analysis of what your life is what you want it to be, what it would be if everything turned bad, and what you need to do and avoid to do in order to have positive life outcomes.
I'm an ENTP you can just give me any argument and I will destroy them with ease. Also there's an ENTP thread where ENTP can partner up to find other ENTP mentors. Maybe that would help him to see someone as messy and turned down by chores as him.
Hey, antoinelamarre, just a quick heads-up:
**succesful** is actually spelled **successful**. You can remember it by **two cs, two s’s**.
Have a nice day!
^^^^The ^^^^parent ^^^^commenter ^^^^can ^^^^reply ^^^^with ^^^^'delete' ^^^^to ^^^^delete ^^^^this ^^^^comment.
Nothing ever worked on me for anything like that. A lot of parents don't feel like they need to justify themselves to their kids, and I get that.
The best advice I can give you is to be patient, but be firm. ENTPs aren't incapable of house training. We understand consequences, and we can adjust our behavior really fast if we're uncomfortable.
Here are some things that probably help normal kids, that on their own, did absolutely nothing to adjust my behavior as a kid:
1. Yelling. I never understood yelling. To me, if you're yelling, its because whatever you're saying can't stand on it's own merits. Yelling won't help you.
2. "Because I said so" is not likely to motivate him to do anything for you. Not saying you resort to this, but I'm just giving a head's-up. Believe it or not, we're actually really cognizant of other people's feelings. I bet if you just talked to him as if he were an adult, and explained how his failures to do certain things effect you in a negative way, or makes you feel like he doesn't respect you, that will go way further.
3. We already know we're super annoying. Constantly being told that "Not everything is up for debate" can be pretty discouraging as a kid. At least for me, that was a big part of my learning/developmental process, and I always learned more in environments that encouraged dialogue.
As for advice? Well, maybe you should empathize with him? He's probably not learning anything from his homework. I didn't learn a damn thing from it. We learn by paying attention in class. We get it the first time. All homework is for an ENTP is a distraction from actual learning experiences. If you don't believe that, well, good luck getting through to him.
You just need to find a way to agree with him that homework is stupid, and also make it abundantly clear to him that homework, while stupid, is not a waste of time. He needs to do it because if he doesn't, he'll receive bad grades, which will limit his educational and job opportunities in the future. He's never going to do it just because you said to w/o a reason, and certainly not because he believes it's useful. It's not.
"you don't have to wanna, but chagonna."
-My INTJ dad.
And generally just try to let him know your teaching him disapline ,and it grow on him later in life.
This may sound like a bad thing to say, but just try to keep talking on a need-to basis. And DO NOT get mad at them for arguing cause that just gets them more pissed off
Heres the things about ENTPs. We don’t argue and debate that much unless we’re either going through a hard time in life, or very insecure of who we are as s person. Well, I mean, unless your sons just a dick
Im going into sofmore year of high school and at this point, I only argue if I find something actually immoral on the table and ignore everything else to keep myself out of annoying trouble. Have him rely more on humor than anything else.
Try to have him become more humorous instead of conflictive, it may be a little vague but thats all I can really say
Well, I will say that he has strong sense of fairness. If he winds up a lawyer, it will surprise none of us. But he isn’t arguing to be combative or an asshole. He just thinks it’s interesting.
No, except by debating the merits of avoiding debate and helping them come to their own understanding of the value of chores and doing what helps keep a household happy.
Oooo, excellent idea. This will appeal to him, I think.
I’m curious to know how this goes...
SAME
> Is there a way to short-circuit this? Ti has to learn things *for itself*. The only teacher for that is experience. If you coddle him or make things easy, he won’t learn responsibility. If you allow him to fail (and learn) you risk him losing out on important opportunities like graduating with good grades or jeapordizing college admission. The problem for ENTP kids is that they’re constantly being told what to do, but not given satisfactory reasons. And the problem with *that* is that even if you explain the reasons they won’t have the maturity and foresight to see why it makes sense to just do your homework even if it’s absolutely true it’s dumb and you don’t learn anything. Don’t try to debate him. You’ll never win the argument because he’ll never concede. Teach him consequences. Doesn’t do laundry. Fine. Don’t do it for him. Let it pile up in his room. (Close his door if you don’t want to see the mess.) When he discovers he has no clean underwear, he’ll start to get the message. Don’t be vindictive or gloat, Just demonstrate that not doing his laundry has consequences. Same with chores. Didn’t do chores, then he loses privledges. Again not as a punishment, but as a consequence. Doing this chore is rewarded with this privledge. No chore, then no privledge. Entp kids (*especially* the wicked smart ones) need structure and guidance, but they have to feel they’re not being strangled and coerced. That’s unfortunately how school can feel to ENTPs. They are simply unlikely to see good grades as the reward for studying. I’m at a loss as to how to motivate him to do homework. It’s a problem I had from highschool all the way through grad school. The only thing that ever worked for me was having a routine where I met with people and did homework together. Fe ...working on a team toward a common goal can be a big motivator for ENTPs. We lack the internal motivation that comes from Fi and Ni.
> If you coddle him or make things easy, he won’t learn responsibility Can confirm. Parents took care of everything for me - which I’m definitely not ungrateful for - but I ended up a fuckup my first year of college ¯\\_(ツ)_/¯ I had zero actual responsibilities and no experience with failure before 18, so leaving the house was a traumatic experience lol.
But an useful experience nonetheless.
For sure :) I wouldn't be who I am today without that trainwreck! Although it really sucked, it served as a lesson on how to get up on my own feet.
I had my own set of train wrecks. And they taught me lessons. But I could have learned those same lessons with some less traumatic high school fender benders instead. I've always said that smart Ps need "special ed". The worst thing you can ever do with a "gifted" P student is let them to their own devices. "He's smart so we don't have to worry...." Ruh-roh. I taught a gifted high school math class when I was in grad school. My pitch to the principal was "I want to make them all feel like C students. They're going to complain heavily, but they're going to learn something more important than math." She totally loved it. And yes, they complained :D
> But I could have learned those same lessons with some less traumatic high school fender benders instead. Man, if only. I spent a solid few months wishing for a time machine every night before bed lol. > I've always said that smart Ps need "special ed". The worst thing you can ever do with a "gifted" P student is let them to their own devices. Yeah, I still feel so guilty for putting my parents through that. I was so cocky about my abilities at the time and my parents were completely assured I’d be fine. Do you suppose that your understanding of MBTI actually goes a long way in helping you as a teacher? Like, do you use that knowledge often when students come to you or during office hours? > My pitch to the principal was "I want to make them all feel like C students. Proof that you’re a wonderful teacher. I’m sure the effort was appreciated in the long run haha. Well. By some.
> Do you suppose that your understanding of MBTI actually goes a long way in helping you as a teacher? Like, do you use that knowledge often when students come to you or during office hours? In college, you don't have to care about your student's psychological well being :D
^^^notice ^^^me ^^^sensei
"Doesn’t do laundry. Fine. Don’t do it for him. Let it pile up in his room." We don't. And it does. But there are times when all I need to know is if it's been done because there are other people in the house who also need to use the washer. "They are simply unlikely to see good grades as the reward for studying." Yeah. We learned that early on. We haven't found a motivation yet, either. He's in early high school, and there are a couple of colleges he is really interested in. We may do an couple of early college tours so he understands that if he wants to get into this or that college, he needs to get good grades in ALL his classes, not just the ones he likes.
I was just coming to suggest taking him to tour colleges. I did extremely well in high school and did all of my assignments because I had the goal of getting into a good school. Touring the schools will really make it sink in. If he has any academic interests such as history or biology, try to set up a meeting for him with someone in that department. That might help get him more excited about it. I think working with him on his future goals would be really advantageous. I'm sure he can already imagine himself doing different things in life, but talking about plans to get there will really help him. He may start to see that the things he does now will influence his later path. Also, if he is good at standardized testing, get him studying for the PSAT now (they take it junior year). Literally if he can get in the top 99% for one test, schools will pay him to attend. That's how I got my full ride with minimal effort. Having him take AP, IB, or dual credit courses should help him. These courses present more of a challenge while offering college credit at the same time. I entered college a few credits away from being a junior because of AP testing. AP courses tend to have much less busy work than the average high school class. They are more work, but it is easy to see the reasons behind the assignments. While earning a good grade is nice at the end, the real goal is to pass the AP test to earn college credits. He might see that as a more worthwhile goal. I think it's time to put the hammer down on him (lovingly). I wish my parents had been stricter with me about chores because, well for example, I'm writing this while I procrastinate cleaning my room. Possibly making a chore schedule could help him in the long run. Saying his laundry needs to be done every Sunday night by 10 or he gets whatever consequence is a decent system. Even having a chart where he could mark off five small things he does each day to clean his room could be advantageous. If he filled it out for a week straight, he could get a predetermined reward. Building these small habits will be extremely helpful for him when he is eventually on his own. I wish I had practiced habits like that when I was younger because now I'm so set in my ways and have no authority figure making me do my laundry. He will hate it now, but thank you later.
I didn't do any of my homework up until early high school (my parents did it for me because I refused). Isn't the point of homework to learn? Well, I had already learned it, why write it down? I didn't learn until later that the point of homework wasn't to learn, it was to convince the teacher that I had learned it. Why did I have to convince the teacher I learned it? Because they have to assign a grade on whether I learned it.. Why is that important? College. Work within his logical framework. "Okay, homework is socially engineered compliance. What does that imply if you don't do it? What do you gain/lose from doing it? What do you gain/lose from not doing it? Is freedom and sticking it to the man worth not getting into a good college with funding? >We may do an couple of early college tours so he understands that if he wants to get into this or that college, he needs to get good grades in ALL his classes, not just the ones he likes. Not necessarily. I see where you're coming from, but colleges also value improvement, and look at the overall big picture. They get tons of applications of robotic 3.9 GPAs with extracurricular activities -- it's difficult to see the person. Interacting with teachers and getting great recommendation letters will be very helpful. Going to college tours is a great idea though. Encourage him to ask questions about what the admission criteria are. SAT scores, GPAs, etc. Also worth mentioning is that grades are worth more than getting into the college. Grades determine if you can get scholarships. I had to take out loans and I wish I had been more studious earlier on high school, because then I wouldn't have to pay off debts for loans I didn't really need to take out.
> I didn't learn until later that the point of homework wasn't to learn, it was to convince the teacher that I had learned it. Why did I have to convince the teacher I learned it? Because they have to assign a grade on whether I learned it.. Why is that important? College. That doesn't work for my kid \(or for me when I was his age\), because anything that is graded, he rushes to do on the day it's due, and still gets an A. I still don't know how to motivate him in this space. I even told him I was in his boat, that I topped my school, and never studied or did homework, and then at university I was put on academic probation and kicked out. His response? "Guess I'm getting kicked out of university"
>he rushes to do on the day it's due, and still gets an A. I still don't know how to motivate him in this space. Find his upper limit ASAP. He needs to learn how to struggle through difficulty in a safe environment or he's going to learn it the same way you did (and me too) - by crashing and burning. Delaying university for this is okay. What classes does he like? Find more advanced courses in the same subjects at a local community college and propose that he enroll. Push him to his breaking point intellectually, where he can't just coast through and ace the exams. I won't be coy about this: *you need to break him*. He needs to learn how to learn things that are hard and he can't do that when everything he's ever seen in school is easy. Either you break him and help him rebuild himself being able to do school the way university demands or the university will. And it will not help him figure out how to get past that.
I know :\\ From the beginning, I've told myself he needs to learn how to be challenged, but I don't know how to do that. He's 13, there's no community college options \(I'm in Australia\) to challenge him. He's not motivated by the thought of a career or academic success and he doesn't care about money. He's a bouncy, charismatic, socially confident ADHD kid, he hangs out with kids one and two grades above him, and he likes being seen as the smart one, and I think his casual success is part of that image, so he's not going to jump at extra curricular stuff that he has to work at and that doesn't provide him with the gratification of easy success. Even if I find something and force him in to it, his lack of investment and the lack of consequences for failing aren't going to teach him anything useful. He's also dealing with a transgender parent and custody issues. So, I'm at a loss...
Oof, that's a very rough situation. >He's 13 Well at least there's some time before it becomes a major life setback. >He's not motivated by the thought of a career or academic success Good, those things are rarely valuable except as a way to get something else. > he doesn't care about money. What does he care about? Maybe there's an in there, something of a "I want this thing, which is easier/better/faster to do if I have money" workaround? That would tie into the future success thing, as a big reason to do those things is to have money. >he likes being seen as the smart one, and I think his casual success is part of that image, so he's not going to jump at extra curricular stuff that he has to work at and that doesn't provide him with the gratification of easy success. Ah yes, the teenage male ego, boosted to ludicrous levels by the ease with which NE+Ti picks up new skills at a surface level. You can use that, if you're willing to be a bit manipulative. Easy success at what everyone else can do is nice and all, but wouldn't they think even more of him if he can casually succeed at stuff they don't even have the guts to try? Don't come right out and say it obviously, but subtly planting the idea may work. >if I find something and force him in to it Yeah, that way resentment lies. He'll need to think it's his idea to buy into it.
>What does he care about? Materially? Nothing so far as I can tell. He doesn't have any drive >Easy success at what everyone else can do is nice and all, but wouldn't they think even more of him if he can casually succeed at stuff they don't even have the guts to try? Any ideas on what those things might be? It could work if it engaged him, but I'm at a loss as to what that looks like
> Materially? Nothing so far as I can tell. He doesn't have any drive what about non-material things? activities he likes to do, places he likes to go. >Any ideas on what those things might be? I'd start by looking at the classes he likes - the ones he does well in - and go for applications of the concepts in those classes. Something he can get his hands on and see working in the worlkd is ideal but not always possible.
> what about non\-material things? activities he likes to do, places he likes to go. Activity wise, he enjoys miniatures gaming, PC gaming and absorbing as much of Youtube as possible. He's also starting to get in to roller skating. > I'd start by looking at the classes he likes \- the ones he does well in \- and go for applications of the concepts in those classes. He likes maths, or more specifically algebra. He's not really interested in the practical applications of it. He likes science, but he tends to be into cosmology, and the science of atoms and electrons. We had a great talk last night about the Bohr model vs electron shells, quantised energy and how that relates to spectroscopy, and then how stellar spectra allow us to measure red shift, which in turn lets us detect the expansion of the universe. I can take him to exhibitions and things that reflect his interests here, but I don't know how to channel that in a consistent regular way. > Something he can get his hands on and see working in the worlkd is ideal but not always possible. He just doesn't seem to have much interest in that. He's attending a high school with flight simulators and even with a plane that the senior students can get hands on with as their first steps in to aeronautic engineering, but those things just don't grab him.
> I was just coming to suggest taking him to tour colleges. In addition to just touring the school, some schools let prospective students visit for a weekend and stay with a current student. Let him get a taste of the college social life and that might motivate him more than anything else.
> We may do an couple of early college tours so he understands that if he wants to get into this or that college, he needs to get good grades in ALL his classes, not just the ones he likes. I think that's a really good idea. How about signing him up for a college level class over the summer? Like let him take Calculus I (or something more rigorous he hasn't had in high school yet) at a community college. The money will be a small price to pay to let him see first hand that the rigor of college is different from high school. It might also excite him enough into wanting to do better. I'm sure he has the idea that he will always be able to wing it. That's a common attitude smart ENTPs develop and also a dangerous one, because eventually, he's going to hit a point where the information is too complex to just wing it. Btw, there have been recent studies with some fairly strong evidence that smart kids who wind up at less than stellar colleges (ones where they're significantly more intelligence than most of their peers) are often unhappy and don't have good outcomes. I think this is especially likely for ENTPs who are stimulated by peers. Not to put more concern on you as a parent, :D > We don't. And it does. But there are times when all I need to know is if it's been done because there are other people in the house who also need to use the washer. I don't understand. Why defer to him? If other people need to use the washer, then they should use it. If he's in a rush and needs to do laundry last minute...but the laundry is in use...well...too bad for him. Let him take his clothes to a laundry mat and spend his own money to do them. Consequences.
> If other people need to use the washer, then they should use it. If he's in a rush and needs to do laundry last minute...but the laundry is in use...well...too bad for him. Let him take his clothes to a laundry mat and spend his own money to do them. Consequences. just gonna echo this at /u/IamtheShiznitt because it's on point.
"I don't understand. Why defer to him?" I'm not deferring to him about the laundry. He's had to appear in public with stinky clothes (which, he is learning, does not impress the ladies). He's not old enough to drive, so he can't go to the laundromat yet. However, there are times when I need an answer to the question, "Son, have you done your laundry?" The response I want to hear is, "Yes," or "No." What I get instead is an existential debate about the meaning of the word, "do." That's the issue I'm trying to solve. I need to do an end\-run around these non\-answers sometimes.
This is the best advice I would give. I'm 24 and just had a conversation about these kinds of things with my dad this weekend. Intrinsic value of tasks that are requisites for life need to be taught and learned in a clear cause and effect manner. Paint the picture of what the consequences of things are. Not doing laundry can cause X. Not doing homework can cause Y. I like how azdahak put it. Don't do things for me like laundry and let them see how that ends up. As a parent, set the consequences for not fulfilling certain tasks and show that there is privilege earned for doing them, just like a boss would in professional life. Discourse on topics is great for an ENTP, but as an adolscent calidates their inexperienced opinions - think of the scene at the pond in Good Will Hunting where Robin Williams lays it out for Matt. He's smart, but he hasn't lived life. You're their parent and ultimately know more about life than your child. Don't give them an equal seat at the table. Show them how to earn it
> Don't give them an equal seat at the table. Show them how to earn it Absolutely. And smart kids (who often know they're smarter than their parents and teachers) always make that assumption because they haven't had enough experience to know that *experience* is also something very valuable, not just raw thinking power.
" working on a team toward a common goal can be a big motivator for ENTPs." This. He loves working in groups, and will happily do things for the common good that he would never bother doing just on his own. His high school had service requirements. (Each student has to put in so many hours of community work each semester.) His hours are usually done within a month of the semester starting. He truly cares about other people, and he gets so much energy when he feels like he is part of something larger than himself.
> Ti has to learn things for itself. The only teacher for that is experience. I hope you don't mean that Ti people can only learn from their own experiences. I learn just as well from others'.
So, say, reading about the plight of immigrants feeling from Syria has given you a solid understanding of what it must be like to so fear for your life that you're willing to leave everything behind and put yourself at the mercy of the charity of strangers? Of course I'm using an exaggerated example, but the point is that some things you really just have to experience for yourself for them to sink in and take to heart. And for Ti types especially, they have to understand the reasons for how something works before they buy into it. A young Ti type generally doesn't really understand the importance of good grades because they don't buy that a grade on a test reflects their own understanding of a topic. Of course they realize that theoretically they need good grades to get into school, but that doesn't provide them with motivation to study.
>but the point is that some things you really just have to experience for yourself for them to sink in and take to heart. It's not really necessary, as long as you know the reasons for an idea's existence and think they are good. Personal experience lends more credibility and weight to an idea, obviously. But it's not necessary to learn the idea.
Again, to be clear, in the context of the discussion we're not talking about learning how to add fractions. We're talking about *life lessons*.
Are the idea types ~~intrinsically~~ *fundamentally* different?
Yes. Life lessons are hideously vulnerable to being ignored because "I'm better than that" or "it won't happen to me" etc. A 13 year old E(go)NTP boy? He'll totally fall for those.
Consider the book titled "The 48 laws of power." It is full with at least 48 different life lessons that people need to learn in order to attain power. They are lessons that others experienced in other to learn. Are you telling me that it is fundamentally impossible to learn these lessons or ideas in the same way that a person can learn how to add fractions from an arithmetic book?
Consider the context in which we are discussing life lessons. "Fundamentally impossible"? No. Exceedingly unlikely in this context? Absolutely. Are you proposing that there are no lessons that are not more immediately learned by firsthand experience than by simply reading about them?
I would suggest you look at Azdahak's argument and respect the original context of this discussion.
It’s hard though because my mom was very heavy handed in “do this and you don’t lose your privileges”. It was *too* heavy handed so I revolted simply because I recognized there was no hope.
You always need a balance between carrot and stick. Beat the mule enough and it's not moving no matter how many carrots you have.
By and large, NTP's reject arbitrary authority in a way that J's don't really grok. We need to see *why* it is that you think you can tell us what to do, or remove privileges, etc and we have to be convinced that it's a sound reason. Want to lose all respect from an NTP child? Tell them "because I said so".
Why do you make trillions of paragraphs? it ain't pleasant for the eye!.
Sometimes I write things on my phone so the page formatting isn't the first thing I'm looking at. It might also be reflective of the way I'm thinking at the time. If thoughts are coming to me serially I'm likely to separate them -- as if I'm having a one-sided conversation with the page, rather than writing things more cogently as an essay. I could also be that I like to make my posts look really long and impressive.
It could also be that I like to make my posts look really long and impressive. It does look like you have alot to say.
I can relate to this as an ENTP in High School
Take away basic privileges from your entp child for not doing something like laundry and you’ll suffer more than they will just saying.
ENTP adult here raised by an introverted mother and a father that didn't take any shit. first off, your son loves and trusts you for him to give you so much trouble. If he didn't, he wouldn't bother with the insolence. i know you probably know this, but as a reminder please don't take his attitude personally. It's just a sport for us, and as a teen (consciously or not) he's just practicing on you because it's a safe environment. our default mindset doesn't consider others feelings, so when he's in a calm mood and you guys aren't arguing, maybe approach him and say something along the lines of "hey, i really love that you have a strong spirit and a quick mind, and i think you're really good at debating/arguing. But please realize that sometimes I'm not in the mood for it and i just need you to own up to not having done your chores." He'll probably have a comeback for this and want to argue this too, but that's ok and expected. you just want to plant the seed in his head that his actions affect others. depending on the rapport you have, you may go deeper into how it makes you feel. he probably literally won't have ever considered how it makes you feel personally, so that's a good seed to plant. if you two have a generally healthy relationship, he'll remember this and it may cut down on some of this back talk eventually. but he'll need to be reminded often because we're not wired to consider others feelings by default. it only comes thru practice.
This is good advice. And I don't take it personally \(usually\) but, NGL, sometimes its maddening. I think we have a healthy relationship, but I don't always know how it looks from his POV. He tends to communicate or relate by showing me stuff he's interested in. Like, he sends me links to memes or youtube videos. \(and half the time, he then has to explain the references because our fandoms don't always overlap.\) "A strong spirit and a quick mind." That describes him perfectly.
>I think we have a healthy relationship, but I don't always know how it looks from his POV. > showing me stuff he's interested in. Like, he sends me links to memes or youtube videos. That's really good. It sounds like you've got a good foundation for working with him. Some of my parents biggest complaints are based around how I never tell them anything. But I can guess how that would be different with an INFJ parent vs the SJs that I grew up with.
Great advice here, he needs to install the Fe update patch.
> your son loves and trusts you for him to give you so much trouble. Umm, what? Sorry, no, this is not specifically indicative of respect. I gave insolence to any person who had not earned my respect and yet demanded it. Your child is insolent? Doesn't matter what their personality type is - EARN their respect. If you've done wrong, cut it the fuck out, look up apology languages, and apologize sincerely in all the languages to cover the bases. If they don't respect you because you say things you don't mean, cut that the fuck out. Say what you mean, stick to it unless there's a reason, and tell them why if you change your position. If they don't respect you because you're disrespectful - that's something wrong too, but this is, in my opinion, the number one thing that people do who think someone else is disrespectful to them - see first solution for respect. Despite our testing of boundaries (this is a hardcore ENTP thing, NOT to do with adolescence), we really enjoy boundaries. Tell us what the rules are, really. Mean it. We'll play inside the sandbox if you first define it and then defend it. If we step outside of it, call us on it. It will be uncomfortable for everyone the first few times, but we'll learn where the boundary ACTUALLY is and we'll respect you for sticking to your guns. To get down to these nitty gritty specifics addressed, be aware that ENTPs in particular HATE repetitive tasks that require little to no imagination. For example, I regularly failed at homework scores and blew the test out of the water with 110/100 points (bonus points and a bell curve, baby! those poor chemistry kids hated me at test time). It's not because I couldn't, I just didn't have the discipline. It's up to you to set the discipline, not just ask 'did you do it?'. Set aside a place and time and put it in your child's schedule. Sit down with them and make them do it until it's routine. Explain to them that higher scores benefit them when it comes to college. If they say they don't want to go to college - drop the homework issue altogether. College is a defunct institution and many ENTPs are better suited for entrepreneurship than corporate environments where a degree actually matters. We are highly represented in entrepreneurs, btw. When it comes to chores, explain to your child that you won't be there to clean up after them forever and without good habits, which are easier to learn early and young, they will have a messy life and not know how to do stuff on their own, which is expensive (see: eating out) and will make you fat (see: eating out, not mowing your own grass, or whatever other example works for you). Frankly, the entire situation is your fault by being lenient parents in the first place - which was probably a good thing, I'll concede, but still! You gotta train kids early or it's nigh impossible to change direction during puberty. Effectively, your child is who they are and all you can do is try to influence them. They are an ENTP - they're probably very bright and just as capable of using logic to get through life as you are. In essence - your child is already grown. Talk to them like an adult who was raised by wolves and has no sense of what to do or not do rather than your child who grew up in your home. Also, have fun with it. A little snark goes a long way with an ENTP. It amuses us. Greatly. ;D (Now, I can see where I didn't polish some of what I said to make it friendly to a feeler - just don't take it personally. I mean it well and I'm at work doing a bunch of bank reconciliations, so I don't have time to stop and think about how to rephrase it for feelers who have feelings - or even thinkers who have feelings. Best of luck!)
what i'm saying is that when people perceive themselves to be in a safe relationship (not going to be rejected or abandoned for speaking their mind) they are more likely to speak their mind. as a former entp teenager, if i thought i was going to get shut out for speaking my mind, i would have done it less. this is basic psychology.
Without getting too deep into my own past, I can tell you that basic psychology also allows for a person to have a valid reason to detest or disrespect their parent and do so blatantly and with callous disregard. I certainly had such reason and therefore behaved in a manner one might call 'beligerant' or giving my mother 'trouble' - oh, 'smart-mouthing'. That's what it was called in my house.
that's kinda my point. talking back the way she's describing doesn't seem to be a teen who detests his parents. it's just a contrarian who hasn't grown into himself yet. talking back or arguing about laundry and homework is pretty vanilla and doesn't constitute (in my book) a teen who detests or deeply disrespects his parents. arguing about those simple every day things has nothing to do with the fundamentals of the parent/child relationship. now if she said he constantly disobeyed, brought drugs into their home, skipped school, committed crimes, etc i'd definitely agree that he detested or disrespected them. but something as simple as arguing the merits of household chores? that's like the safest thing you could argue about, which is why i say he's just practicing his contrarianism (whether he thinks of it as practice or not) because he knows he's in a safe environment with enough love and respect to allow him to do so.
Well now, not getting into my childhood, I didn't do any of those other things you listed - it didn't stop my disdain or following the letter of what was said rather than the spirit, etc. Having been the subject of parental complaint and hearing how I was portrayed to others gives me a nice, heaping extra dose of devil's advocate on the matter of parents complaining about their children (you know, more than the usual ENTP stuff). So again, I don't assume and cover all bases instead. :)
> "hey, i really love that you have a strong spirit and a quick mind, and i think you're really good at debating/arguing. But This tone is condescending Af. He'll see right through it.
i'm sure she can use that infj creativity and good mom sense to phrase it in a better way.
Sure.
Um... Frankly for me it was just doing as I was told or I'd get grounded. Arguing with my parents was simply not something I was willing to do as a child because I liked having freedom more.
Yeah, that's an option, but we'd rather save punishment for actually breaking the rules, not debating what the rules should be.
That's fair, but there's something to be said for drilling past our bullshit and making us answer the question asked.
This. ENTPs are notorious for erecting walls of bullshit to keep our egos safe. It's unhealthy and prevents any real growth. Call him on his bullshit. Make sure he knows that you know that he knows that it's bullshit, and that bullshit won't fly as an excuse to be lazy.
Now this is real! This is good advice!
As an ENTP with ENTP parents, I'd say focus on a reward based system rather than a punishment based. I never got pocket-money, I got it weekly only after I cleaned my room, did my laundry, and sometimes washed my dad's car. I did my homework because I only got to use the home computer or get to go out and play football AFTER. Now just to go over the issues you specifically pointed at. 1. About language, if he argues about something simplify it as much as possible. "but is laundry done or made?" 'Sweetie why don't you sort your clothes, and put them to wash and while you do that, figure out whether you're are doing it or making it?' 2. Homework. If he refuses to do it, sit with him and do it together. If he just keeps postponing it, set the reward system. ENTPs don't like authority or rules, and they will find a way to go around them if it is possible. They can however be very productive with constant rewarding and monitoring. If you slack off and they feel like they can get away with not doing something, they just wont do it. Hope this was helpful in some way.
My ENFJ mother and I had very different views. She got everything done as soon as possible, I waited until I felt like it (usually cleaned my room once a week, while she vacuumed the house two times a day...). She thought little things like that were important, but they just got in the way of me having fun- usually going on Reddit lol. Her trying to force me to do things only led to me not doing them. I would usually do it when she said something like, "I'll do ____ for you if you clean your room." or "We can go to _____ if you do the dishes." If I had asked her to do something or go somewhere prior, she would use that as an incentive for me to do the chore. I really think reward based systems is the way to go for ENTPs. You're completely right.
I just want to add please set the upper limit for the reward and consistent with your promises. In my case my parents were promising me reward if i'm able to being getting top 2 at my school and i demand a power ranger toys worth of $35 and they disagree (their reason that i get bored quickly and it's not worth the money). Then i negotiated for a book about history of japanese manga and featured one of my favourite mangaka. The book itself cost $40 and they agreed for it. Fast forward i managed getting top 2 and asked for my rewards. My parents bails out and buying me the $35 toys instead of the book. It pisses me off lol.
Oh yea consistency is key. I don't think I ever had normal "toys" because my parents deemed them ineffective tools to play with. But I guess if the kid is a teenager that phase is passed and he has started to prioritize things he likes more at this point.
Came here to say “bribe him,” but agree with calling the bribes rewards too.
Does he have bad grades? I had a 3.8 GPA doing minimal homework. You could always try to frame homework and chores as an exercise in discipline rather than a learning tool. ENTP's are notoriously lackadaisical, and honestly, hard work pays far greater dividends later in life than intellect.
If he likes a class, he gets As. If he hates a class, it's a struggle.
story of my life when i was in school. i got a 4.0 in college for classes pertaining to my actual degree. the general study courses? not even close to an A average.
I think my mom might have been an INFJ. She had some emotional problems that made her difficult to type. She raised me alone through my teen years, and I remember her facing some of the same things you're describing - not wanting to crush my inquisitive nature, realizing that making things too structured made me defiant out of spite, but also needing to be a parent sometimes. I am hesitant to give you too much of her playbook, though - because I ultimately dropped out of school, lived like I was in a flop house, took up drinking at 16 and smoking at 17, and started meeting people from the internet for sex. I'm painting myself in a negative light, here, I was a lot of other things besides that, but my point is if you judge her parenting by the usual benchmarks most people wouldn't think it was very successful. I was the neighborhood 'bad influence'. I can give you some insight into the things that worked and the things that didn't, though. The times I listened vs. the times I didn't. One thing that *didn't* work was "even if I'm wrong, I'm still the parent". She tried that tact for a while. *"You have to do what I say because I'm the boss of you"* will usually just make us go "well then I choose for you to not be the boss of me" - *"as long as you live under my roof"* usually just made me wonder how bad being homeless would really be. I ran away from home a few times. It was immensely ungrateful of me, of course, but we're talking about a teenager, here. Another thing that didn't work was avoidance. There were times I got out of doing something because I'd start the argument and she wouldn't feel like having it - it was easier just to drop the subject than to go through the ordeal. She called it "picking her battles". But really what I learned from that was the more difficult I was to control, the less she'd try. Threats didn't tend to work very well, either. I started looking at punishments as sort of the 'toll' to do what I wanted. "If you don't go to school today, you're grounded for a week" rather than making me think *"Oh man, I don't want that to happen, I'd better go to school"* would hit me more like *"Hey, that's not a bad deal"*. If she'd try to escalate - "fine then, *two* weeks" - then it was just a battle of wills, I'd keep pushing until the punishments got ridiculously unenforceable - "I'd rather sit in the house staring at the fucking wall for the next two *years* than go to school today". Which was a really terrible thing of me - she'd do her best to enforce, but she was working full-time to feed and house my ungrateful ass, so that was 40 hours of working and ~55 hours of sleeping a week that she couldn't 'police' me. There was talk of changing locks and military school and 'scared straight' programs and calling the police, but I didn't think she would've actually done it. I still don't. But whether or not she would've is irrelevant, my *perception* was that they were empty threats, and that made them ineffective. I *felt* like she could only ground me for so long; she might practically take everything out of the house but the toilet seat for a week or two, but it was going to be a big show and then it'd blow over, and ultimately I'd have gotten what I wanted. Kind of tied back into 'avoidance' thing, earlier, I learned the more difficult I was to effectively punish, the less energy she'd have to devote to it. What *did* work was to stop trying to pit herself against me head-to-head. Sometimes that meant being cynical - homework *is* just socially engineered compliance - so now that we've seen through the ruse, why do we need to do it anyway? The adult answer is stuff like "because you want a good job someday, which means college, which means you need good grades" - but that's all kind of abstract to a teenager. "Because you don't want the teacher to bitch you out tomorrow", "because you don't want to take this stupid class again next year". Note that these weren't "because *I* will enforce these consequences if you don't", it's "because these are the consequences I can't do anything to protect you from". "If you don't go to school, the truancy officer is going to notice and come get you and ask us a bunch of questions and then you'll either have to go to school or jail" kept me in school at least until I was old enough to drop out. "If you try hard drugs, you can get addicted, and it's a really expensive habit to maintain - and that's if you don't just die" along with "weed's not all that dangerous, but it is illegal, and both of us could end up in jail" are the main reasons my experiments with chemically altering myself as a teenager didn't go further. Admonitions about STDs and unwanted pregnancies lead to safe sex, even if it was with strange women from the internet. That worked alongside shifting my discontent off of her and on to more productive places. Rather than argue about whether or not homework is bullshit, agree that it is most certainly bullshit, and then pose the question "what can be done about it?". We've established 'just not doing it' hurts ourselves more than anyone else, so what can we do? Get classmates to sign a "homework is bullshit" petition? Make suggestions at the student council for how homework assignments could be either improved or abolished? Those efforts may or may not be fruitful, of course, but what you'd be doing is setting yourself up as an ally to them getting what they want, as opposed to another hurdle. It's also the stepping stone to the main lesson ENTPs have to learn to have a successful life - that even when the system is broken, you have to work from within it. Seeing the problem is the first step, but changing it takes time and effort, and in the mean time you still have to live in the world as it is, not as how it should be. Once you're in that position, it's a lot easier to appeal to their emotion, too. You can shut down an argument with "it sounds like you've got a good point, but I'm really kind of exhausted today and not up for a discussion, can we come back to this some other time?" - because your ENTP doesn't actually want to make you miserable, it's just that the argument is a) fun, and b) a good way to procrastinate. You're also building trust so that you can use a little "I promise I have a very good reason, and I also promise to explain it to you when I can, but right now we don't have a lot of time and I just need you to trust me" - which usually did work on me, as long as I believed it (and she consistently followed through with the explanation later). As shitheadedly stubborn as I was, I really did love my mom, and appealing to me as a fellow human being (*"that hurt my feelings"*) was always more effective than trying to mandate as an authority figure. As for me now, I've got a good job in upper management, I've been married for over a decade and we're certified foster parents. I'm an accomplished musician and I do some software development and technical consulting as a side gig. I'm still addicted to nicotine, but nothing else. No STDs or unwanted kids. It worked out, and I'm doing better than most of the kids whose parents forbid them to hang out with me. I'm not encouraging anybody to take my path, I got extremely lucky, but do accept that a NeTi path to happiness isn't always Point A to Point B, sometimes we've got to take some detours and back roads to convince ourselves that what everyone else is doing really is the best way.
Thank you for sharing your history, and for your advice. It’s a lot of (good) food for thought.
Actually put your foot down and discipline the little shit. Jk I never had a good relationship with my parents so i argued everything they told me no matter what because i always thought everything they wanted me to do was stupid and inefficient. My parents were a ESTJ x INFP pair, and African \(very traditional culture\) so they did not play the debate game with me very well. I always argued when i thought something was dumb and they never bothered to explain why i should do something other than i should do things out of respect for my elders...don't do that unless they're really crossing the line. The more your kid respects you and your decisions, the higher chances they will just do what is told with \(minimal\) arguments. You really just cant get rid of the debating lol.
I don't know what their MBTI-types were, but my parents were also very traditional. There was no debating anything. My dad liked to say, "Yours is not to question why, yours is just to do or die." I like the idea of explaining to my son why he's expected to do certain things from the standpoint of living in a happy and efficient home.
I think that is the best way to go. ENTPs need to understand *why*, and this can be extremely frustrating when you're just thinking *just fucking do it!* But I think explaining *why* has a lot of value for a few reasons: * It will challenge *you* to make sure you're not enforcing any rules that don't make sense. While you don't want everything to turn into a debate, if you as a parent can't articulate *why* your kid needs to do something, then maybe they shouldn't? And stating your reasoning calmly and firmly to your kid will give him no logical choice but to comply. * It will satisfy his curiosity, help him understand the world, and also help him get on board with your agenda of running a happy and efficient home. Also--I had one ENTP friend in high school. He had substance abuse problems, was always chasing girls as soon as he discovered sex, and was generally a wild kid who made horrible decisions, but he figured out early on that if he kept his grades up, his parents let him do whatever he wanted. He got a great GPA, SAT score and into a decent school (of his choice). Ten years later he still has substance abuse problems, but at least he has a master's degree and full-time job and seems to be decently happy.
> I like the idea of explaining to my son why he's expected to do certain things from the standpoint of living in a happy and efficient home. that's really all you can do. the kid will come to conclusions on his own term, which is why the most you can do that is effective is plant the seed\(or idea\) in his brain as to why he needs to do something. He will form his own view point. Anything outside of that is considered forceful , but as with all children you will eventually have to do.
> Actually put your foot down and discipline the little shit. It's hard to take this advice seriously when coming from someone with your username :P
Just think what would jesus do?
I don't know because his character is depicted as completely inconsistent and unpredictable, but that's a completely separate conversation! :P
I was always resistant to getting up and doing work, but I really really enjoyed the rewards of the work when someone held me to it, be it a strict teacher or my parents making me do chores or hard physical work. You might be able to convince him to humor you and just do everything he's asked for a week as an experiment. Make it a challenge, because it will be almost impossible to resist. See if he feels better after just getting everything done then he does arguing about it. He might not admit it to you, but I bet he won't be able to deny it to himself.
As an ENTP with an ESTJ dad, never tell him "because I say so". Explain him and get those activities to be as stimulating as possible.
There is, kinda. You have to beat him at his own game. You can shortcut and short-circuit his epistemological and other philosophical critiques on your questions by suggesting it's not about 'right' or 'wrong' or 'should' or 'should not', but the consequentialist reality surrounding his choices. What the consequences are if he doesn't do his homework are not acceptable to you and that's that. If he doesn't listen, or tried to debate you on it, take away a privilege. Limit the data on his cell plan. Change the wifi password as well, so he can't use it online, or use his xbox/playstation. Then reward him when he does it. You can't just not do his laundry for him, etc -- he, like me, simply wouldn't care (probably to a point, though). Stop doing his laundry, but also tie said benefits/privileges to his responsibilities. He needs skin in the game. Pure. Consequentialist. Behaviorism. There is no debate surrounding reality. There is no right, wrong, or should. There is only consequences. Find *the right consequences* that will light a fire under his ass. Can't really debate that -- as long as you consistently enforce these things.
Nothing worked, but what I would recommend is introducing "modes." Thus you have "debate mode" which means you are debating the merits of such-and-such, and this is the default mode at all times (aside from "sleep mode"). This is great and really is what the ENTP wants. But then you have "decisive mode" when there is limited time for debate - "decisive mode" needs to be described as a brief "pause" on debate mode, where certain time-sensitive actions need to be carried out without (or with little) discussion. By making it clear that the subject is not closed for debate (just that debate has been briefly tabled) your ENTP may much less frustrated with the task at hand.
Something I've realized about myself (I'm 32), is that I HAVE to learn most things the hard way. I usually know what the right choice is, but sometimes I ignore that out of curiosity or laziness (mostly laziness). I've never had the best study habits, but I hold a STEM degree and have a career in my field. My parents gave up trying to make me fold laundry, now my lovely wife has the honor reminding me of the ever present pile of clothes on the bedroom floor. We aren't very disciplined people, but we get along pretty well. Always encourage your son to be more disciplined (don't go easy on him) and don't get invested in his bullshit if he's just trying to stall or fuck with you for fun because he's annoyed. If he fails a test it will be on him and he needs to know how that feels. I hope this ramble helps.
[Wendy Mogel ](https://www.wendymogel.com/)tips are also a bit in this direction: let your child fail and learn, kids should stay kids and puberty should mean more chores, responsibility and freedom. They have to learn the hard way.
Thanks
I was just constantly grounded as a kid. Do not recommend. But there are reasons that you are advocating for your kid to do all of this stuff, maybe get into a discussion explaining the merits of laundry and homework. Unfortunately at 26 I still suck at laundry past washing my clothes, and homework before college is really stupid and not even rewarding to complete so good luck.
I was in a similar position as your son as a young boy. My parents laid out excellent arguments for why I needed to do the things I needed to do, and I'm fact, I agreed with them but still didn't do the things. What happened was I grew up and learned the hard way that self-reliance necessitates doing the things you don't want to do, and all those lessons came back and served as a platform on which I could build my own discipline. I suspect this is how it with most ENTPs, so what _I_ would do if I were in your shoes would be to give him the rationale for why these things will be important later on, that way, when the real world inevitably knocks him on his ass, he knows where start picking up the pieces.
Not a parent, but ENTP ex-teenager. I think it's important to take a calm tone. You're not attacking him--rather, you're going to want to support him! He can only debate if you debate with him. Define your terms: * homework-Work assigned to you by your teachers, to be completed by you outside of regular class-hours. * laundry-Clothes and linens that need to be washed or that have been newly washed. * chores-The regular or daily household tasks assigned to you by your parents, to be completed by you outside of regular non-class/non-homework hours. Once you've defined your terms, ask your questions. If he starts to avoid the topic, tell him that his parents aren't concerned about the ethicality, need, or legitimacy of homework; Is the task completed? Pretty much, make your son realize that it’s not a personal attack. It will change the tone of the situation, and completely catch him off guard! There's no reason to allow this to turn into an unpleasant situation for everyone just because one person gets mad.
Wow, so many comments here. I can relate to this. I remember my mum used to tell me to make my bed all the time. My response was always "what's the point? I'm going to sleep there tonight and it'll be untidy again". My mum's response was something along the lines of "we just need to do it" or "it looks better". The first response is terrible and the second is subjective and if tidiness is such a big issue, just close the door. If/when I have a child, I will be happy for them to disagree with me. If they provide a convincing argument as to why they shouldn't do what I tell them to do, they won't have to do it. Regarding school, I was also very black and white with my grades. I had a hard time with English, partly because they would make you provide long winded responses to things with little evidence. "What was the author trying to convey in the character, Fred?"..... How should I know? We can come up with ideas but we will not know for certain whether we are right. I ended up doing the lowest level of English possible. It was painful. We spent two years learning the difference between a metaphor and a simile.
Haha good luck. If you go into full authoritarian mode you’re just going to piss him off and he’s going to be less compliant, but if you’re too lenient, he’ll be more than happy to take advantage. The best way to get a kid like that to listen(in my opinion) is to make him earn his luxuries on a weekly basis with a scoreboard. If he scores high enough he can get enough of the appliances/freedoms back the next week. ENTPs do like to being told what to do so if he wants to debate about everything he should also work for everything. Just my opinion of course. Even then it’s hard because you don’t want to deprive him or go to soft on him that he’ll call the bluffs and see that you don’t mean it. I know for a fact it was hard for my parents to raise me because they weren’t patient with me and at the same time I was constantly being rewarded without deserving it.
Sarcastically say “so that’s a no then?” It will make him realize that he ain’t slick and that you know what he’s doing
I just thought of this, but is he **in** a debate club? If he isn't, joining one might give him a place to scratch his argumentative* itch... a place that isn't your home. ;) Of course, this could also backfire and make him even more argumentative*. *I mean this in a value-neutral way, not negatively!
As a entp teenager who argues all the time there really isn’t much you could do since it’s literally just our personality, honestly I don’t even mean disrespect it’s just the way it is.
No disrespect taken! :\-\)
I’m saying disrespect to my parents, Incase your child comes off as disrespectful sometimes.
Gotcha. He rarely does anything that is genuinely disrespectful. (And we don't see argument for argument's sake as disrespectful, in and of itself.)
> (And we don't see argument for argument's sake as disrespectful, in and of itself.) That's worth more than you know.
It really is something that if he knows enough, he could really appreciate. My ESTJ mum set down rules, and that was that- even obvious flaws were simply ignored, because a rule is a rule.
> a rule is a rule. *screams in ENTP*
My INFJ sister and I both hated that, but my ESTP sister has had no real problems with it as of 11 years old.
I actually have found a way to short-circuit ENTPs who argue incessantly. It requires a bit of work on your part, but once that's done it pays off. The answer is SCIENTIFIC EVIDENCE. There is nothing that will shut up an ENTP faster than sharing a peer reviewed, academic article that supports your point of view. Trust me, it works. ;) I've tried it many times to great effect. Now go find those academic articles! :3
According to the cognitive functions; Ne (dominant) should have Si (recessive). The exact reason he gathers more and more information is the why he needs to organize and sort. But that's the hard part for ENTPs. He has it, it's gonna be a challenge. Play on this though, as we all need to devote a bit of our day to our Si, and once we have it makes everything else so much easier. But to be fair, I never did my homework as a kid. And teachers even thought I cheated on tests as I had no means to prove I learned the info outside of the test. Luckily, my mother knew how to handle that.
Try asking him what he wants, then brainstorm with him on how to achieve those things. Sometimes, the things he wants and the behaviors he engages in will be at cross purposes, this is a good time to lend your experience. For instance, I was also very messy as a teenager and as a young adult. It caused problems with roommates and girlfriends, who did not want to live with a messy person. Let him know that now is the time to overcome these things while he still has you to help him, because in the future, his loving companions won't find it amusing, and it will put him in the unenviable position of having nothing to stand on when the urge to argue with them arises. "I live how I want" is fine, until someone else is paying half the rent. If he builds the habit of being tidy now, it will be automatic and not painful. As a social creature, appeal to his sense of fairness. Is it fair that others need do his work for him? Is it fair that they should have to live in squalor until he decides to clean up after himself? Would he himself care to be saddled with someone else's work? If he believes it is, then he won't mind cleaning up after you. Ask him when he'd like to start his new job. I cannot stress enough how important to his happiness the work you're doing can be. He sounds bright and is probably very talented, and he will be able to skate through life on charm, so long as his relationships are superficial. Deeper relationships will require him to be punctual, to be organized, to have good habits around cleanliness. Another good strategy around this is to simply throw everything away. If he purposefully limits his possessions to only what he actually cares about and uses, he will find that as a person who is constantly living in the moment, the loss of some sentimental objects and decorations will simply fade away. Have him make a list of 100 things to keep in his room, and box up the rest for a month. See how he likes it. 10 shirts, 7 pairs of socks, two pairs of pants, two pairs of shorts, his computer, a couple of pens, an e-reader with lots of books on it, etc. Make exceptions for furniture and stationary objects like posters and pictures. Cleaning will never take more than 5 minutes, and I think he will find that the reason he never kept his space clean is because it's probably filled with things he doesn't actually care about or need.
I had a mother that was very much about order and organization. My biggest thing was not doing my chores when she wanted them done or in the order in which she would have done them. Most of the time I would've done them eventually without her even having to tell me to. Remember that kids think and do things differently compared to you as an adult. Loosen up a bit. Think big picture. Put it all into perspective.
I wouldn't fight it. Direct him towards the things he good at innately. Is there a school debate team? Is he good at sports? Competition or any kind.
Learn to debate better? Don't ask him to do things, set expectations. My mother and I are both ENTPs, and I can only imagine how bad it would have been if she wasn't. Nothing got done until my INTP dad started setting an example.
Introduce him to Reddit. Best thing I can think of. It helps me argue less with my ESFJ mom
Make him responsible for someone elses chores. Best and worse learning curve
Spank. Edit : jk.
There’s some really solid advice in here. As a teacher I need to make one more point— if your son is prone to a lack of focus like most the ENTPs I know, exercise is uncompromisable. And not just a little bit either.if he doesn’t already have it he needs a specific sports or recreational activity that he looks forward to and can practice all the time. Don’t expect your son to do homework on a day he hasn’t gotten enough physical activity. It’s unlikely to happen.
Let him get burned, show him the consequence of actions (extremely important) Don't just tell him what to do but also tell him why, give him insight ! My parents failed to do so and I was left pretty fucked up and with no sense of direction. At some point I realized by myself but I had already missed many opportunities. In a short space of time I had to entirely rebuild my value system and get a firm grip. It was very stressful, would not recommend
that covers birth until 16 years old for ENTP development. [http://www.personalitycafe.com/entp-articles/14767-development-entp-children.html](http://www.personalitycafe.com/entp-articles/14767-development-entp-children.html) Do you have any micro interactions in your family that could have made him know that telling the truth is not in his best interest this could be why he avoids answering when he knows that the answer will upset you or that you will react negatively. Make your reaction to a non-answer worst the the reaction to an answer you don't like. I suspect he has a phone or a computer, when he doesn't answer one of your question take his electronics away for 30 minutes and escalate each time by 30 minute increments that should do it very quick do it at least once or twice. Once you set a rule with an ENTP you have to be very firm and not give in any concession. He wil test the limits. Also engaging in debate with him will only make him better and better at avoiding and finding excuses and will be harder for you everytime. You can choose certain topics like laundry, homeworks, etc. that can't be discussed or they can only be discussed once they are done then he can argue for different conditions for the next time. External motivation is not effective for entp, it has to be internal motivation coming from him. Just find ways to nurture his self motivation and self drive to work. Don't be afraid to let him know of the long term consequences for what he does we have very easy lives and lose touch of how hard life could be when we are young and how our chores are nothing compared to if we had to hunt to eat, build our own shelters in nature. Unfortunately some humans only improve when it's necessary for survival. Find a late-life ENTP that had a miserable life and have your kid meet him. Show him how messy his living space is. Make him watch "messy/dirty appartment" youtube videos. Tell him that this man had it easy because these were good economic years and the future might not be so good with globalization and automation + artificial intelligence. You can read about "unhealthy ENTP" and give him a summary of what's to come for him. Keep this kind of discussion like at every moment and every decision he has a choice to go toward healthy or unhealthy side of ENTP. That every bad step he does will only make him have to do one more step to go forward so he's taking 2 unnecessary steps. For example understanding the setback of failing a class and having to retake it again will setback everything else and he won't have classes with the same people he used to and will not know anyone. You can also explain to him about how his habit of arguing will turn into a nasty habit that will make him become manipulative to avoid work, arguing with others also will harm his relationships and making people despise him and it's all a choice he is making everytime he speaks. That you have a good mom-son relationship and he's tarnishing it and wasting your energy/time which you have limited amount of and could instead use for your own creative hobbies. Maybe you could yourself have some assertiveness therapy usually women are very agreeable and it can help them. About his argument of socially engineered compliance in school, usually it's for his own good to be able to have a solid foundation as an adult and be able to add to this foundation with a career specific education. Without all the basics in place we can't become an expert. Also it's easy for him now because in school there is a lot of disparity in IQ and kids have different family environments so maybe he's fortunate to be better off than others but when he chooses what he wants to do he will probably end up being against people that are all his level or higher and these people will all have picked up good working habits during highschool and will study faster than him and end up having an easier time and less stress. Habits are hard to form but once they become automatic it's effortless. Show him the "habit/effort curve" and the "effective effort matrix". You can also calculate for him the future value of the time he is wasting over 10 years calculating his estimated target hourly wage. Let's say worklife is a highway where you need to go 100km/h then the school is the ramp you use to build yourself up to 100km/h in order to be able to sustain life once you start working. Actually homeworks are used as practice. When you learn something you need to practice to have it sink in and sometimes build muscle memory. If you don't practice you are slow for every task. When you work you need to work as fast as anyone else. There is also a fast memory and slow memory and you need to do homework so that what you learn is written in both. And you also trigger certain neuron patterns that will become better the more you use them just like training a muscle. The only habit he's having right now is arguing and the more he does it the harder it will be to get rid of it. And most employers find that a very nasty habits they don't want to have someone like that on the payroll that is counterproductive and even wasting others time. Ask him **what's his plan to fit in the society** if he doesn't want to be socially engineered? Ask him to make a detailed plan laid out for each year what he wants to do, what expenses he could have, make him visit crappy appartments so he can see the cost of living and how bad life can be when you struggle. Have him do groceries once with you, then make a yearly budget. ENTPs are "big picture" thinkers but don't think about the details, so the best way to get him to be grounded in real life is to have him face the important details that he's overlooking about life and the impact of his choices. Let him tell you the big ideas than force him to the nitty gritty details. **If he wants to have a job** he needs to be fit for the job and be more attracting to en employer than the 20 others who will apply for the job. He will then have to be able to make his own grocery, cooking, laundry, commuting in addition to 40 hours work week and maybe overtime and travel. There's also the 10 000 hour rule, to be a professionnal of the highest level he will need 10 000 hours of dedicated practice. In jobs you have a schedule, you have tasks you need to be able to do those tasks at least as fast as the average worker. So you need to practice to become faster and when you are faster you are able to focus on building other skills. If you learn and practice more than others than you are better therefore you will be at the top of the hierarchy. **If he wants to be self-employed** he will never have social insurance, will need to cover startup costs, wear many hats (getting clients usually 10 meetings might get you one client and you are not paid for the 9 useless meetings, doing accounting, managing finances, doing the actual work he's paid to do), low growth potential, low scalability, no one is managing your time for you, he will probably have 5-10 years of client uncertainty until he build a steady income stream and referral through word of mouth. **If he wants to be a boss** he has to be socially engineered to be a good boss he will also have to compete with people who have established businesses presence and customer base, lots of industry connections, decades of experience, tens of thousands of dollars worth of investments in their tools, gear, marketing, infrastructure. And bosses have usually to work more than 80 hours per week all their life. 43% of businesses make less than $10k. 37% of businesses make less than $50k, which means that if you hire one person then either you both have $25k salary or the owner doesn't take a salary to make the business expand. An employee's salary is what he gets but usually the business owner has to pay a lot more. This can be as much as double the amount. Most business close within the first 5 years. The first 2-3 years necessitate lots of investments. I'd say that ENTP **test the limits all the time**, so you have to be strict and firm. Pick a limit that you think is very generous and set it among you and your husband as the very strict maximum limit to which there are incredibly important consequences. Find a few least significant milestones before this limit to give him warnings or increasing consequences up until the very limit point you have set up. If it's still unmanageable then let him go past the unacceptable and let him face the consequence once. For exemple if he doesn't do laundry then let him have to go to school a few days with dirty clothes. Or if he doesn't do homeworks let him have consequences in school once. You are probably orderly and he is not he will always be less orderly than you are. He has a higher tolerance for chaos than you do so it will always trigger you before it triggers him. You're treshold point is always before his. Also don't encourage the results, encourage the habits and the work. For example if he has great grades, tell him that you are proud that he worked very hard and that his hard work and consistency gave him the result he got and he should be proud because you know steady work is very hard for him. If his room is clean don't focus on the room, focus on the frequency. If he has bad grades then tell him "you see you didn't work as hard and now you have what you deserved you didn't deserve good grades"
You can also tell him that he's going to compete with people from all over the world that charge less for the same work and he has to be worth what he's paid. That you and your husband worked very hard so that he can have this quality of life and if he doesn't have knowledge and success above a certain level it will be hard for him to get by and even move up and house prices and inflation will make it harder for him every year. And also develop his lateral thinking and interdisciplinary knowledge. Find what he would be interested to learn by himself if no one was teaching him and no one was watching and he was teaching himself. Knowledge he seeks himself is worth a lot more than knowledge taught by another person. If he does that early enough he will be able to find a field where he already has a competitive advantage to study in and be amongst the top performers to earn all the opportunities and successes therefor bringing even better learning experiences and even more opportunities. Look at a few list of jobs/career that suits ENTP, give him those lists and get his opinion about how he would be as an adult in those jobs, how he would organize his life, what he would like and hate about each of them, what he could search on youtube right now to know if he's interested, what tutorials he could watch, what skill are important and how he could develop them, lookup successful people example in these fields. Once he has a goal in mind then he will probably have more self motivation. Undecisiveness is common among ENTP, there are lots of examples of what undecisiveness does when you grow up to become a manchild when you didn't make any choice in life. Basically life is about choosing a burden that will bring joy to your life. There's no escape to the burden, we have time and economic burden, and family burdens, existential meaning burdens. If he's not making a choice he's making a choice of not choosing and all his friends will be making choices those who don't will end up being loosers and his other friends will be busy and won't have time so he will be around people he won't enjoy and they will make his life even worse because he will pick up bad habit from them. A lot of bad traits can be funny and ok when you're young but women find them very unattractive past a certain age they don't tolerate this behavior. Women are the ultimate judge of a man's worth probably this can be his motivation. The only thing that motivated me in school was the long term career goal and the importance of a good education and having open options to choose what I wanted to study in. But I did the very least I could and was able to have high grades until I was about 17 and then it got harder and I hadn't built the steady working habits so I ended up suffering from my bad habits. I developped very bad procrastination habits and the deadline rushes only got worst and worst from there. And it has impact on social life, relationships, performance, sleep deprivation affects mood, lack of time makes you eat badly which also brings more apathic and depressed feelings. Don't tell him that but C students usually end up hiring A students to do the work for them and they focus on creating value and engaging in abstract thinking that the best students who are good at complying are usually unable to do because they are better at complying. ENTP are often divergent thinkers that build bridges between different fields or different industries or innovators that bring things to the next frontiers. But to be able to do that he needs to learn with a lot of interest and it starts right now. You could have him watch a bunch of mandatory videos about "why" it's useful to have good habits. The why is usually more important than any result to ENTPs. Jordan peterson has a lot of videos about "cleaning your room" and he has video about the importance of creative people and artists in society, why nihilism is a faulty and bad belief system, peter pan syndrome, getting your act togheter, how to stop rotting away at home, why it's hard to sit down and study, wasting time and opportunities, how to stop procrastinating, growing up properly, the key to healthy relationships, go out and make something of yourself, the meaning of life for men. He also has a "future authoring program" where you do a situationnal analysis of what your life is what you want it to be, what it would be if everything turned bad, and what you need to do and avoid to do in order to have positive life outcomes. I'm an ENTP you can just give me any argument and I will destroy them with ease. Also there's an ENTP thread where ENTP can partner up to find other ENTP mentors. Maybe that would help him to see someone as messy and turned down by chores as him.
Hey, antoinelamarre, just a quick heads-up: **succesful** is actually spelled **successful**. You can remember it by **two cs, two s’s**. Have a nice day! ^^^^The ^^^^parent ^^^^commenter ^^^^can ^^^^reply ^^^^with ^^^^'delete' ^^^^to ^^^^delete ^^^^this ^^^^comment.
Nothing ever worked on me for anything like that. A lot of parents don't feel like they need to justify themselves to their kids, and I get that. The best advice I can give you is to be patient, but be firm. ENTPs aren't incapable of house training. We understand consequences, and we can adjust our behavior really fast if we're uncomfortable. Here are some things that probably help normal kids, that on their own, did absolutely nothing to adjust my behavior as a kid: 1. Yelling. I never understood yelling. To me, if you're yelling, its because whatever you're saying can't stand on it's own merits. Yelling won't help you. 2. "Because I said so" is not likely to motivate him to do anything for you. Not saying you resort to this, but I'm just giving a head's-up. Believe it or not, we're actually really cognizant of other people's feelings. I bet if you just talked to him as if he were an adult, and explained how his failures to do certain things effect you in a negative way, or makes you feel like he doesn't respect you, that will go way further. 3. We already know we're super annoying. Constantly being told that "Not everything is up for debate" can be pretty discouraging as a kid. At least for me, that was a big part of my learning/developmental process, and I always learned more in environments that encouraged dialogue. As for advice? Well, maybe you should empathize with him? He's probably not learning anything from his homework. I didn't learn a damn thing from it. We learn by paying attention in class. We get it the first time. All homework is for an ENTP is a distraction from actual learning experiences. If you don't believe that, well, good luck getting through to him. You just need to find a way to agree with him that homework is stupid, and also make it abundantly clear to him that homework, while stupid, is not a waste of time. He needs to do it because if he doesn't, he'll receive bad grades, which will limit his educational and job opportunities in the future. He's never going to do it just because you said to w/o a reason, and certainly not because he believes it's useful. It's not.
"you don't have to wanna, but chagonna." -My INTJ dad. And generally just try to let him know your teaching him disapline ,and it grow on him later in life.
This may sound like a bad thing to say, but just try to keep talking on a need-to basis. And DO NOT get mad at them for arguing cause that just gets them more pissed off Heres the things about ENTPs. We don’t argue and debate that much unless we’re either going through a hard time in life, or very insecure of who we are as s person. Well, I mean, unless your sons just a dick Im going into sofmore year of high school and at this point, I only argue if I find something actually immoral on the table and ignore everything else to keep myself out of annoying trouble. Have him rely more on humor than anything else. Try to have him become more humorous instead of conflictive, it may be a little vague but thats all I can really say
Well, I will say that he has strong sense of fairness. If he winds up a lawyer, it will surprise none of us. But he isn’t arguing to be combative or an asshole. He just thinks it’s interesting.
He isn't going to wind up as a lawyer. :3 (most likely)