Have you noticed that people don’t go around calling themselves “extroverts”? You think they would, being extroverts.
No, it’s the introverts who are always “confessing” their status, in that mildly humble-braggy way that people “confess” to fall being their favorite season.
Why are introverts so extroverted about their introversion, and vice versa? Two reasons, I think. Introversion is seen as virtuous: sensitive, selfless, thoughtful.
Whereas extroversion is seen as Herb Tarlek.
Also, I think introverts who are extroverted about their introversion are secretly setting up an alibi for some future moment, Monday or month when they will have to hide from everybody for awhile. “Oh, I know it looks like I’m an extrovert when I’m stuntin’ on the Jumbotron, but believe me, socializing exhausts me.”
I run a conference full of self-defined introverts—whose registration deadline is tomorrow, by the way—and as conference emcee, I can’t very well tell these folks I’m an introvert, with a straight face.
I’m their Bob Barker, after all.
But I do hear myself telling people, probably for that self-protection motive, about the anxiety I feel leading up to being the center of all that attention. And I joke about the room I’ve reserved for two days after the conference, at the George Washington University Hospital. Ladies and gentleman, Elvis has left the building.
The truth is, I don’t go in much for this whole introvert/extrovert business, except in the most severe cases. I supposed these terms have done do a little good in the century or so they’ve been in common use—taking the sting out of calling someone “shy,” and creating a euphemism for “loudmouth.”
Me? I work in solitude all day most days, happily. And I run the occasional conference, also happily. I spend most evenings by myself. I enjoy the hell out of a big night out. And I’m every bit as afraid of never having privacy again as I am of being alone in the end.
I know, I’m an “ambivert.”
Yeah, so are you probably.
* Many years ago, I said I’m the strong and silent type, but I can’t stand for anybody not to know it.
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