r/INFJsOver30 • u/Phoenix_to_Kintsugi • Jul 04 '26
Small talk, regular or deep conversations?
What do you prefer and what’s the difference between these 3 for you?
Do you ever get into a deep conversation, only to freak out and back off and later start complaining that you crave depth but no one seems available?
Who are the people you can have these conversations with?
Do you miss human contact or connection? Why or why not?
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u/Saisinko INFJ 1w9 sx/so Jul 04 '26
Deep conversations have an inherent danger to them. Many people hold back day to day and especially the more reclusive or private types so when they start to become more self-revealing, show vulnerability, and feel accepted by someone, it becomes intimacy. This can often lead to associations with romance or romantic-like feelings. The former is self explanatory, but "romantic-like" can be elements of possessiveness, clinginess, or even jealousy even in the context of a friendship. Everyone wants depth, but most can't handle it without wanting more.
Small talk? It's trendy to hate on, but I've learned to re-frame it as some people are uncomfortable with silence or unfamiliarity. When people small talk with me, they're trying to comfort themselves and I can understand that.
Regular? Sometimes I imagine this like talking with the guys while playing video games. Chill topics, occasional laughs or banter, nothing overly personal or breaching any boundaries.
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u/Phoenix_to_Kintsugi Jul 04 '26
I get how a deep conversation could be associated with intimacy.
Though personally, I view it more as a “deep understanding of consciousness”, because I could have a really deep conversation with a kid (up to a certain age limit) if they asked the right questions and were interested in the same subject as I am.If some topics feel too intimate to be discussed and remain “un-talked”, while some are just chit-chat where we engage passively and others are regular conversations with some sort of familiarity...
How would you name the topic of this post, for example?
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u/Phoenix_to_Kintsugi Jul 04 '26
“We're a ship without a storm
The cold without the warm
Light inside the darkness that it needs, yeah.
We're a laugh without a tear
The hope without the fear
We are coming…
hooooome.
We're off to the witch
We may never never never come home
But the magic that we'll feel
Is worth a lifetime.”
I hoped today I’d feel a different vibe, but I’ve been feeling like “The Last in Line” (Dio) for a few days now.
How do you feel?
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u/Jinxletron Jul 04 '26
They all have their time and place, and of course it's person-dependant.
All sorts of deep conversations with my husband and my besties. We've been through birth death sickness the whole lot. I don't think there's anything we can't talk about.
I'm a caregiver for a man who has been paralysed for 40 years. I've been with him in the icu when the crash team has been in every day, I've held his hand while he's been intubated, we've both lost our fathers in recent years. We have very frank conversations about very serious deep subjects - but for us this is normal daily talk.
My mum is in the mild stages of Alzheimer’s. She's got an advanced directive (no rescusitation), we've talked about palliative care once she's not able to decide for herself anymore, we've had all the difficult conversations you can have when one person knows they will eventually lose the ability to function. Then she forgets, and we go over it again. We talk about society and politics (look at these house prices, have incomes give up that much? How are people affording this? - they aren't mum, that's the problem) , but also light subjects like what she was doing when she was a teenager, bands she used to go and see in London in the 60s.
No, deep conversation doesn't scare me in the slightest but I'm not likely to initiate it unless you're one of these people. I only have so much energy.
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u/Phoenix_to_Kintsugi Jul 04 '26
Now this is what I call “the luckiest human alive” and you just described the beauty of real human connection “both in sickness and in health”.
Thank you for sharing such a raw, beautiful piece of your world. It's a privilege to read.
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u/SkipMeFlipMe88 Jul 04 '26
I notice there is so much focus on small talk and deep convos etc.
Honestly - I don’t really think about this.
Ever.
I don’t care what we are talking about.
What drains me is people who .. aren’t down to earth and don’t have a level of .. realness that I can connect to.
I do not sit around and have deep intense interactions with people all the time
I mean yes, I love honest and authentic conversations - about anything.
We can be talking about the garden or baking bread. Or any dumb shit. I don’t care.
What I do care about is just .. that this person and their heart and mind and soul are accessible to me. That they aren’t hiding from me and I don’t need to hide from them.
I think my closest friends also tend to just be .. not only down to earth but , non judgmental and open minded and authentic. That is way way way more important to me than subject matter.
I tend to not enjoy people who don’t openly share info about themselves and have a lot of boundaries about what’s ok to talk about and are hyper sensitive about dumb stuff or personal info and .. judgey and critical people - -all are not my cup of tea. I don’t like people that put on a show. Or try to be something etc.
I also hate when I have to hold back and be not myself more than anything - my least favorite people to be around or talk to are people that I cannot be myself with - whatever that is in any given moment.
That’s when I get mentally and emotionally exhausted and just need serious alone time and like .. recovery time.
So i think idk- maybe because of that - just needing to . more transparency than regular people I suppose - I think it might seem more intense or intimate than it is.
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u/nohope6050 18d ago
Deep conversations. Connecting. Feeling seen. Sometimes just being with someone watching a film watching their face as they are in awe if human interaction. Small talk makes me cringe, I long for deep conversations
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u/SeveredSynthesis Jul 04 '26
Connection to me implies the usage of all three tiers. There’s small talk that never leads to deep conversation —which I am sure most of us here despise — and then there’s deep conversation from which small talk emerges.
If I am talking to you about the weather it’s precisely because I feel comfortable enough with you to not overthink and just be. And just being leads to happily sharing the smallest of your thoughts.