Our culture made a virtue of living only as extroverts. We discouraged the inner journey, the quest for a center. So we lost our center and have to find it again. —ANAÏS NIN
Or at school you might have been prodded to come out of your shell—that noxious expression which fails to appreciate that some animals naturally carry shelter everywhere they go, and that some humans...
Now that you're an adult, you might still feel a pang of guilt when you decline a dinner invitation in favor of a good book. Or maybe you like to eat alone in restaurants and could do without the pity...
Nor are introverts necessarily shy. Shyness is the fear of social disapproval or humiliation, while introversion is a preference for environments that are not overstimulating.
No one can hear her. No one tries.
Most inventors and engineers I’ve met are like me—they’re shy and they live in their heads. They’re almost like artists. In fact, the very best of them are artists. And artists work best alone where t...
Moreover, they tell us that the Extrovert Ideal is not as sacrosanct as we may have thought. So if, deep down, you’ve been thinking that it’s only natural for the bold and sociable to dominate the res...
Men who were too quiet around women risked being thought gay; as a popular 1926 sex guide observed, homosexuals are invariably timid, shy, retiring.
Many introver- ted kids grow up to have excellent so- cial skills, although they tend to join groups in their own way—waiting a while before they plunge in, or particip- ating only for short periods....
Keep in mind the words of Sir Winston Churchill: 'Courage is what it takes to stand up and speak; courage is also what it takes to sit down and listen.
It’s also why exhortations to imagine the audience in the nude don’t help nervous speakers; naked lions are just as dangerous as elegantly dressed ones.
Introverts tend to assume leadership positions within groups when they really have something to contribute….they listen carefully to the ideas of the people they lead. All of this gives them a big adv...
Introverts recharge their batteries by being alone;
Introverts are offered keys to private gardens full of riches. To possess such a key is to tumble like Alice down her rabbit hole. She didn’t choose to go to Wonderland—but she made of it an adventure...
Introversion - along with its cousins sensitivity, seriousness, and shyness - is now a second-class personality trait, somewhere between a disappointment and a pathology.
Indeed, excessive stimulation seems to impede learning: a recent study found that people learn better after a quiet stroll through the woods than after a noisy walk down a city street. Another study,...
In most settings, people use small talk as a way of relaxing into a new relationship, and only once they’re comfortable do they connect more seriously. Sensitive people seem to do the reverse. They en...
In her book Anger: The Misunderstood Emotion, Carol Tavris recounts a story about a Bengali cobra that liked to bite passing villagers. One day a swami—a man who has achieved self-mastery—convinces th...
In fact, the very thing that many high-reactives hate most about blushing— its uncontrollability— is what makes it so socially useful. Because it is impossible to control the blush intentionally, Dijk...
Imagine you work hard to prepare a talk on a subject you care about. You get your message across, and when you finish the audience rises to its feet, its clapping sustained and sincere. One person mig...