I’m An Introverted Extrovert Trapped In An Extroverted Introvert’s Body :S

For many years I considered myself to be an introvert. When I was a kid I was so unbelievably shy it’s amazing I actually did anything in the presence of other people. In high school I turned down invitations all the time because I preferred to sit at home on the computer rather than face people.

Over time that began to change, and looking back now I wonder if I really was as introverted as I was simply used to being alone. I grew up in a small town and then moved to a farm when I was 13. Not the best environment to practice being social in…

The last time I took an online introvert/extrovert test I scored just slightly on the side of being an extrovert and it made me think… maybe there’s something to this whole idea of a spectrum.

After all, nearly everything else in human behaviour works on a spectrum.

I may not exactly be a complete extrovert, but I’m not introverted either. When I go to a party I usually walk around the room talking to people, at least I will after I get settled into a going-out mindset. And yet when I’m at school all I want to do is go home and hide in my room.

I don’t exactly fit into a box, and I don’t think most of us do. We should stop trying to force ourselves to follow some predetermined definition of how we should act and go with what we need in the moment. Maybe right now I need to go out and talk to people. Maybe I need to sit at home and read in silence.

Spectrums are much more fun.

I’ve tried to explain it like this:

It’s like being a gauge that has to be set at a certain point. Whatever that point is doesn’t matter, but it is the optimal point — the setting at which one feels the best.

If you have too little stimulation, you need more, but if you have too much, you need to let some out.

Staying in the green zone, per se, is where you’ll feel optimized.

Where that green zone is depends on the individual, not on either extreme.

Some people are introverts. Some people are extroverts. Some people are introverted extroverts with extroverted introvert tendencies… or something like that.

That makes much more sense, doesn’t it?

It’s all cool.