Introversion Quotes

Hiding your introversion is a bad idea because introversion itself is not a problem. It only causes problems if different needs affect factored into a burgeoning relationship and handled with respect and understanding. No doubt introversion-related issues will come up over time in a long-term relationship
healthy relationships are fluid and ever changing
but if you start out being honest with yourself and the other person, you will have built a foundation for later adaptation, compromise, and mutual comfort and happinesses. ~ Sophia Dembling

Figure out what you are meant to contribute to the world and make sure you contribute it. If this requires public speaking or networking or other activities that make you uncomfortable, do them anyway. But accept that they're difficult, get the training you need to make them easier, and reward yourself when you're done. ~ Susan Cain

Tocqueville saw that the life of constant action and decision which was entailed by the democratic and businesslike character of American life put a premium upon rough and ready habits of mind, quick decision, and the prompt seizure of opportunities - and that all this activity was not propitious for deliberation, elaboration, or precision in thought. ~ Richard Hofstadter

Not only has volume been ratcheted up but expectations have, too. Quiet success
painting a picture, writing a poem, writing an algorithm
is all well and good, but if you haven't become famous doing it, then did it really matter? ~ Sophia Dembling

It is impossible to fully and fairly understand introversion without looking inside. We aren't just going away, we're going toward something. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

Some of us are fated to live in a box from which there is only temporary release. We of the damned-up spirits, of the thwarted feelings, of the blocked hearts, and the pent-up thoughts, we who long to blast out, flood forth in a torrent of rage or joy or even madness, but there is nowhere for us to go, nowhere in the world because no one will have us as we are, and there is nothing to do except to embrace the secret pleasures of our sublimations, the arc of a sentence, the kiss of a rhyme, the image that forms on paper or canvas, the inner cantata, the cloistered embroidery, the dark and dreaming needlepoint from hell or heaven or purgatory or none of those three, but there must be some sound and fury from us, some clashing cymbals in the void. ~ Siri Hustvedt

I also believe that introversion is my greatest strength. I have such a strong inner life that I'm never bored and only occasionally lonely. No matter what mayhem is happening around me, I know I can always turn inward. ~ Susan Cain

Most people in politics draw energy from backslapping and shaking hands and all that. I draw energy from discussing ideas. ~ Al Gore

For I see not what there is desirable in publick esteeme, were I able to acquire & maintaine it. It would perhaps increase my acquaintance, the thing which I chiefly study to decline. ~ Isaac Newton

It is an easy mistake to think that non-talkers are non-feelers. ~ Wallace Stegner

Our challenge as introverts is to adopt the attitude, based on the introversion assumption, that your need to retreat requires no explanation - it is self-evident. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

The Highly Sensitive Person

Sometimes qualities that get lumped together as part of introversion or anxiety are more closely related to a concept known in psychology as high sensitivity. Some of the typical characteristics of a highly sensitive person (HSP) include tendencies to:

--Process things deeply
--Get easily overwhelmed by too many things to do
--Get their feelings hurt easily
--Be sensitive to other people's moods
--Find negative news very upsetting, even if it's about people they don't know well
--Find it difficult to hide their true feelings, such as when they lack interest in a topic
--Find it difficult to filter out particular types of stimulation, such as being easily irritated by background noise or scratchy textured clothing

People who have a lot of these tendencies aren't necessarily anxious. However, they will often become anxious if they're forced into environments that overwhelm their capacity to filter excess stimulation. ~ Alice Boyes

We don't ask why God chose as his prophet a stutterer with a public speaking phobia. But we should. The book of Exodus is short on explication, but its stories suggest that introversion plays yin to the yang of extroversion; that the medium is not always the message; and that people followed Moses because his words were thoughtful, not because he spoke them well. ~ Susan Cain

The danger of abusing the discovery of the truth value of imagination for retrogressive tendencies is exemplified by the work of Carl Jung. More empathically than Freud, he has insisted on the cognitive force of imagination. According to Jung, phantasy is 'undistinguishably' united with all other mental functions, it appears 'now as primeval, now as the ultimate and most audacious synthesis of all capabilities.' Phantasy is above all the 'creative activity out of which flow the answers to all answerable questions'; it is 'the mother of all possibilities, in which all mental opposites as well as the conflict between internal and external world are united.' Phantasy has always built the bridge between the irreconcilable demands of object and subject, extroversion and introversion. The simultaneously retrospective and expectant character of imagination is thus clearly stated: it looks not only back to an aboriginal golden past, but also forward to still unrealized but realizable possibilities. ~ Herbert Marcuse

Though some of us like to get on stage, many introverts are content to put on their invisibility cloaks and watch. But well-meaning extroverts will have none of that! They need to draw us out, invite us to participate - repeatedly - and question why we are so depressed as to not want to join. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

Since I neither want not can influence the events of the world, my mission is to preserve the internal integrity and equilibrium of my mind; that will be in which the manor in which I recover the purity of the original act; I shall be my own citadel, and to it I shall retire to protect myself against a hostile and corrupt world. I shall be my own citadel and, within it, my own and only citizen. ~ Carlos Fuentes

Denied a Lenin and deprived of Napoleon, France retreated into the last and, we must hope, indestructible redoubt, the world of Astérix. The postwar vogue for Parisian thinkers barely concealed their collective retreat into Hexagonal introversion and into the ultimate fortress of French intellectuality, Cartesian theory and puns. ~ Eric J. Hobsbawm

Here are three separate but similar things: shyness, introversion and social anxiety. You can have one, two or all three of these things simultaneously. A lot of the time people thing they're all the same thing, but that's just not true. Extroverts can be shy, introverts can be bold, and a condition like anxiety can strike whatever kind of social animal you are.

Lots of people are shy. Shy is normal. A bit of anxiety is normal. Throw the two together, add some brain-signal error - a NO ENTRY sign on the neural highway from my brain to my mouth perhaps, though no one really knows - and you have me. ~ Sara Barnard

Introverts, in contrast, may have strong social skills and enjoy parties and business meetings, but after a while wish they were home in their pajamas. They prefer to devote their social energies to close friends, colleagues, and family. They listen more than they talk, think before they speak, and often feel as if they express themselves better in writing than in conversation. They tend to dislike conflict. Many have a horror of small talk, but enjoy deep discussions. ~ Susan Cain

During relaxation we drop our guard. Particularly in conversation. Relaxed conversation leads to openness. And in openness we often reveal what should never be revealed. ~ Edward Carey

If your friend knows you at all, she is being rude by pressuring you to do something that is bad for you. Yes, bad for you. Engaging in a painful activity that leaves you feeling crummy about yourself is self-destructive. But your friend is probably not a jerk - you wouldn't have chosen her for a friend if she were. She's just following the social rules. And you may be following them too. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

I will say that the socially oblivious extroverts do not represent the whole. As with introverts, social skills are independent of extroversion: some are skilled, some are not. The skilled ones know how to listen. But in contrast to socially unskilled introverts, who keep to themselves, socially unskilled extroverts insist on socializing. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

Telling an introvert to go to a party is like telling a saint to go to Hell. ~ Criss Jami

Trust: it's the basis of everything else. ~ Matthew Pollard

Though introverts are drained by interaction, we can take immense pleasure in watching the scene around us. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

Odd how six people could be a crowd when she lived daily among millions. ~ Isabel Cooper

One of the ways I know I shouldn't be online is when I'm looking to get something that I already have in abundance as a child of God. ~ Sammy Rhodes

Extroverts want us to have fun, because they assume we want what they want. And sometimes we do. But "fun" itself is a "bright" word, the kind of word that comes with flashing lights and an exclamation point! One of Merriam-Webster's definitions of "fun" is "violent or excited activity or argument." The very word makes me want to sit in a dimly lit room with lots of pillows - by myself. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

For the introvert, as for the flâneur, observing is not a fallback position - something we do because we can't participate. We watch because we want to. There is something wonderfully grounding about remaining still as others mull about - or mulling about while others remain still. Against the backdrop of the scene, the introvert feels more like an "I. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

I wanted to just sink into my media downloads for a while and pretend I didn't exist. ~ Martha Wells

But the most important thing to know about being an introvert is that there's nothing wrong with you. You're not broken because you're quiet. It's okay to stay home on a Friday night instead of going to a party. Being an introvert is a perfectly normal 'thing' to be. ~ Jenn Granneman

A widely held, but rarely articulated, belief in our society is that the ideal self is bold, alpha, gregarious. Introversion is viewed somewhere between disappointment and pathology. ~ Susan Cain

We have an assumption here in America that the kind thing to do is to be "friendly," which means being extroverted, even intrusive. The Japanese assume the opposite: being kind means holding back. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

To develop understanding and compassion for who we are as introverts, we must be able to explore who we are, what makes us happy, what makes us unhappy, and what our
subsequent needs are. ~ Aletheia Luna

I'm not so sure that live is always better. It is part of the extrovert assumption to value interaction over inner action. Most introverts savor live time with a close friend, because they know there will be plenty of inner action for both of them. But much of what we call "social" in America allows for very little inner action. Emailing a friend or posting a blog entry will probably feel much richer, and help us feel much closer, than being up close and impersonal. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

A philosophy that cannot be lived is no philosophy at all. ~ Philip Zaleski

[On Jung's theory of psychological types:] My mother, Katharine C. Briggs, introduced it into our family and made it a part of our lives. She and I waited a long time for someone to devise an instrument that would reflect not only one's preference for extraversion or introversion but one's preferred kind of perception and judgment as well. In the summer of 1942 we undertook to do it ourselves. ~ Isabel Briggs Myers

Introversion and shyness are not synonymous. Introversion is a natural personality trait where we go inside ourselves to process our experiences. Shyness, on the other hand, is a condition marked by fear or extreme anxiety in social situations. ~ Adam S. McHugh

I'd rather cut off my own balls with blunt bacon scissors than host a dinner party. ~ Derren Brown

My roommate knocks on my door and I try not to move.
My heart is beating fast.
He knocks again and then leaves.
I win.
This is but one of the many victories I have exampled as a human among humans.
I have no equals.
My strength is unmatched. ~ Sam Pink

Recognition is what you feel when a friend sums up exactly what you're feeling, when an author gives you the right words, when someone "gets" you. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

To a greater or lesser extent there goes on in every person a struggle between two forces: the longing for privacy and the urge to go places: the introversion, interest directed within oneself toward one's own inner life of vigorous thought and fancy; and extroversion, interest directed outward, toward the external world of people and tangible values. ~ Vladimir Nabokov

Perception without judgment is spineless; judgment with no perception is blind. Introversion lacking any extraversion is impractical; extraversion with no introversion is superficial. ~ Isabel Briggs Myers

Whatever kind of introvert you are, some people will find you "too much" in some ways and "not enough" in others. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

Where is privacy, if not in the mind? ~ Annie Dillard

Thus Jung's interest, in contrast with Dasgupta's, were with yoga not as "philosophy and religion" but as psychology. Hence his definition of yoga was a psychological one: "Yoga was originally a natural process of introversion. . . . Such introversions lead to characteristic inner processes of personality changes. In the course of several thousand years these introversions became gradually organized as methods, and along widely differing ways."44 Jung's concern was not primarily with the canonical and organized methods and teachings of yoga but with the putative natural processes of introversion that originally underlay them. ~ C. G. Jung

Shyness is the fear of social disapproval or humiliation, while introversion is a preference for environments that are not overstimulating. Shyness is inherently painful; introversion is not. ~ Susan Cain

We don't usually wish we were invisible unless, for some extreme reason, we were noticed first. ~ Joyce Rachelle

Solitude is not lack. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

A Manifesto for Introverts
1. There's a word for 'people who are in their heads too much': thinkers.
2. Solitude is a catalyst for innovation.
3. The next generation of quiet kids can and must be raised to know their own strengths.
4. Sometimes it helps to be a pretend extrovert. There will always be time to be quiet later.
5. But in the long run, staying true to your temperament is key to finding work you love and work that matters.
6. One genuine new relationship is worth a fistful of business cards.
7. It's OK to cross the street to avoid making small talk.
8. 'Quiet leadership' is not an oxymoron.
9. Love is essential; gregariousness is optional.
10. 'In a gentle way, you can shake the world.' -Mahatma Gandhi ~ Susan Cain

How difficult it is to find solitude in a world that constantly demands your attention. ~ Joyce Rachelle

We have created youth ministry that confuses extroversion with faithfulness. We have effectively communicated to young people that sincerely following Jesus is synonymous with being 'fired up' for Jesus, with being excited for Jesus, as if discipleship were synonymous with fostering an exuberant, perky, cheerful, hurray-for-Jesus disposition like what we might find in the glee club or at a pep rally. ~ James K.A. Smith

Similarly, a Solo Date is an outing with yourself to satisfy some of your introvert cravings. And it is a delicious treat. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

Willed introversion, in fact, is one of the classic implements of creative genius and can be employed as a deliberate device. ~ Joseph Campbell

A good rule of thumb is that any environment that consistently leaves you feeling bad about who you are is the wrong environment. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

They focused on the so-called Big Five traits: Introversion-Extroversion; Agreeableness; Openness to Experience; Conscientiousness; and Emotional Stability. ~ Susan Cain

If I were to envy any persons on this planet, it would be mountain hermits. You often hear old platitudes such as, 'Speak out. Be heard.' On the contrary, a breath of fresh air would be something like: 'Silence, think for at least 15 minutes, and then maybe speak out. ~ Criss Jami

Our fear of aloneness incites us to look for love. The terror of never finding anyone to share of with lives eventually causes us to forgo our natural shyness, mingle with other people, and express compassion. ~ Kilroy J. Oldster

Introverts prefer introversion; we tend to gain energy by reflecting and expend energy when interacting. Extroverts have the opposite preference; they tend to gain energy by interacting and expend energy while reflecting. ~ Laurie Helgoe

But for all their differences, shyness and introversion have in common something profound. The mental state of a shy extrovert sitting quietly in a business meeting may be very different from that of a calm introvert - the shy person is afraid to speak up, while the introvert is simply overstimulated - but to the outside world, the two appear to be the same. This can give both types insight into how our reverence for alpha status blinds us to things that are good and smart and wise. ~ Susan Cain

When I realized that I was an introvert and what that meant, I actually became more outgoing, more confident in social situations, and began to enjoy scenarios I used to find unbearable. Why? Because, in understanding what I needed with respect to replenishing my energy, I was able to set limits and boundaries that freed me to be more engaged. ~ Jamie Arpin-Ricci

We cannot find freedom in our introversion until we embrace our primary identities as sons and daughters of God. ~ Adam S. McHugh

My life had got on the wrong track, and my contact with men had become now a mere soliloquy. I had fallen so low that, if I had had to choose between falling in love with a woman and reading a book about love, I should have chosen the book. ~ Nikos Kazantzakis

All I wanted was to be left alone. They abhor a vacuum, other people. You find a quiet corner where you can hunker down in peace, and the next minute there they are, crowding around you in their party hats, tooting their paper whistles in your face and insisting you get up and join in the knees-up. ~ John Banville

I realised I really was shy. And once I was in it, I couldn't escape. I'd go to talk and find my face was made of cement. Nothing would come out. On winter days, I'd feel myself turning grey at the edges and fading into the walls.

Was this defensive strategy? It was paralysing. And it went on for years. ~ Janet E. Cameron

According to Free Trait Theory, we are born and culturally endowed with certain personality traits - introversion, for example - but we can and do act out of character in the service of "core personal projects."
In other words, introverts are capable of acting like extroverts for the sake of work they consider important, people they love, or anything they value highly. Free Trait Theory explains why an introvert might throw his extroverted wife a surprise party or join the PTA at his daughter's school. It explains how it's possible for an extroverted scientist to behave with reserve in her laboratory, for an agreeable person to act hard-nosed during a business negotiation, and for a cantankerous uncle to treat his niece tenderly when he takes her out for ice cream. ~ Susan Cain

I can't be on too long before I have to stop. If she hadn't left, you'd both be home right now."

Victoria's brow wrinkled.

"I don't understand."

"You take energy from people, from crowds, and you expend more. For you, when you're on, you run like a German engine, no?"

"Right."

"When you go home after the party's over and you haven't had enough attention, you miss it. You crave more."

"Right."

"I don't take in energy like that. People take energy from me. I can be social, I can be on, but I go home for silence and solitude, not because it's time for the party to end. I don't want to hear another person's voice for three days so I can recharge. Like a battery. ~ Moriah Jovan

Potential was a red herring to plot a life of wandering curiosity. ~ Nicholas Dawidoff

She thought not so much of what had happened as of how she could describe it. ~ E. M. Forster

I'm one of those introverts with well-honed social skills, and I have even danced on the occasional table, but I have felt sheer panic when my exhaustion precedes my exit. It's like the Cinderella story with a twist: I want to get out of there and into my duds before midnight - or ten, or eight. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

I'll be honest with you. I'm a little bit of a loner. It's been a big part of my maturing process to learn to allow people to support me. I tend to be very self-reliant and private. And I have this history of wanting to work things out on my own and protect people from what's going on with me. ~ Kerry Washington

Cross the street to avoid making aimless chitchat with random acquaintances. ~ Susan Cain

Kagan has given us painstakingly documented evidence that high reactivity is one biological basis of introversion but his findings are powerful in part because they confirm what we've sensed all along. Some of Kagan's studies even venture into the realm of cultural myth. For example, he believes, based on his data, that high reactivity is associated with physical traits such as blue eyes, allergies, and hay fever, and that high-reactive men are more likely than others to have a thin body and narrow face. ~ Susan Cain

Being under my own roof, and my personality not invaded by others makes a lot of difference in my outlook on life and everything. Oh, to be once more alone in a house! ~ Zora Neale Hurston

Based on these interviews, he compiled a list of ten dimensions of complexity-ten pairs of apparently antithetical characteristics that are often both present in the creative minds. The list includes:

1. Bursts of impulsiveness that punctuate periods of quiet and rest.

2. Being smart yet extremely naive.

3. Large amplitude swings between extreme responsibility and irresponsibility.

4. A rooted sense of reality together with a hefty dose of fantasy and imagination.

5. Alternating periods of introversion and extroversion.

6. Being simultaneously humble and proud.

7. Psychological androgyny-no clear adherence to gender role stereotyping.

8. Being rebellious and iconoclastic yet respectful to the domain of expertise and its history.

9. Being on one had passionate but on the other objective about one's own work.

10. Experiencing suffering and pain mingled with exhilaration and enjoyment. ~ Mario Livio

Superficially it may appear that I am more interested in books than in people; but I think it nearer the mark to say that I am more interested in people as they are revealed to me in books than as they reveal themselves to me in daily contact. ~ Vincent Starrett

For introverts, who have limited energy for interaction, we need to be more thoughtful and deliberate about whom we meet - which, happily, is what we do best. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

His retreat into himself is not a final renunciation of the world, but a search for quietude, where alone it is possible for him to make his contribution to the life of the community. ~ C. G. Jung

Sitting in the brightly lit library, surrounded by books, in total silence, that was ma personal zenith. ~ Irvine Welsh

Let's clear one thing up: Introverts do not hate small talk because we dislike people. We hate small talk because we hate the barrier it creates between people. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

People expected certain things of me: assistance, silence, comfort. They had no idea who I was. ~ Alice Hoffman

The juvenile delinquent does not feel his disturbed personality. The intelligent man does not feel his intelligence or the introvert his introversion. ~ B.F. Skinner

Out of town I could simply be, I could feel my self, firm and calm and unmalleable as I could not when I was in school or in any of the usual human communities that seemed to weaken or scatter me. I could sit for an hour in the rocks above the Knife River, asking for no more discourse than that water's monotonous gabble. I was an inward child, it was true, but beyond that, I felt a contentment outside human society that I couldn't feel within it. ~ Larry Watson

Our slower pace of life, our thoughtfulness, our spiritual and intellectual depth, and our listening abilities are prophetic qualities for the evangelical community, calling us to a renewed understanding of God and a fresh reading on the abundant life Jesus came to give us. Yet because of the extroverted bias in many of our churches, introverts are leading double lives. We are masquerading as extroverts in order to find acceptance, yet we feel displaced and confused. We are weary of fighting our introversion, and we long to live faithfully as the people we were created to be. ~ Adam S. McHugh

I am totally fine with my outward appearance, in fact I am very much happy with it. But when someone gives more importance to my outward appearance than my inner 'me', I get detached from them, automatically. ~ Hilal Hamdaan

My Solitude is my Treasure, the best thing I have. I hesitate to go out. If you opened the little gate, I would not hop away - but oh how I sing in my gold cage. ~ A.S. Byatt

It's tricky being shy. You blame yourself for it, and other people blame you too. ~ Jaclyn Moriarty

We don't need to be in a designated role to take ownership of our environment. We can simply decide that we will be the giver, the helper, or the greeter wherever we are. We can even make a little game of it. We can tell ourselves: Today, I'm going to make at least three new people feel welcome. Or we can say: At this party, I'm going to gift two people a genuine compliment. ~ Michaela Chung

The end of the world: the wholesale internal introversion upon itself of the noosphere, which has simultaneously reached the uttermost limit of its complexity and its centrality ... the overthrow of equilibrium, detaching the mind, furfilled at last, from its material matrix, so that it will henceforth rest with all its weight on God-Omega ... critical point simultaneously of emergence and emersion, of maturation and evasion. ~ Pierre Teilhard De Chardin

After he had taught himself to be friendly, everything else became harder. He had to let go of his nerdy passions. He couldn't do both at once. ~ Gary Shteyngart

When an introvert cares about someone, she also wants contact, not so much to keep up with the events of the other person's life, but to keep up with what's inside: the evolution of ideas, values, thoughts, and feelings. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

Many preachers are at home among books but quite at sea among men. ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Online friends networks and dating sites, like the coffeehouse, are responding to the needs of introverts. We can write, not talk. We can get to the good stuff, and we can press delete as needed. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

Introverts live in two worlds: We visit the world of people, but solitude and the inner world will always be our home. ~ Jenn Granneman

Often, we find ourselves wedged in the middle of a draining conversation. We might desperately want to dislodge ourselves from the interaction, but instead we stay in receiving mode, absorbing their words like a slow-acting poison. ~ Michaela Chung

As I learned more about introversion, I became more confident in who I was. I started accepting my need for alone time. I saw my quiet, reflective nature as a strength, not a liability ~ Jenn Granneman

Because Saleem was louder about Islam than I was, he was considered more of a man. ~ Ali Eteraz

How do we maintain integrity as introverts, and at the same time allow our natural extroverted tendencies to emerge?
The answer: organically. We mosh best when we feel like moshing. The T'ai Chi symbol illustrates that introversion (yin) flows into extroversion (yang) and extroversion flows into introversion. Each specialty houses the nucleus of the other. When the introvert is safe, she can extrovert. When the extrovert is safe, he can introvert. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

To express want is to own the desire, to stand in your own reality. The easier alternative is the language of impairment: "I can't come because I'm run down, overworked, under the gun, tired, sick, or not up to it." The underlying message is, "I cannot attend because I am impaired," rather than the more honest and self-respecting response: "I choose to not attend because I prefer the other option. ~ Laurie A. Helgoe

There is a certain delightful sort of hope which the introvert can receive only by having company over...the hope that they will leave soon. ~ Criss Jami