Happily Introverted After

Some of the readers who wander through here seem particularly interested in the topic of introverts and ambiverts. Today I came across this collection of introvert fairy tales (via @phaoloo) that might be of interest to them. The site's motto is "A Quiet Kind of Happily Ever After."

An excerpt:

Snow White escapes from her family who follow a strict fruitarian diet and flees into the forest. She is taken in by a bunch of kind and friendly men with stable jobs, but eventually the stress of living in a share house with seven other people who are fond of communal singing leads her to self-medicate and OD.

Her housemates take care of her as best they can, but don’t really understand the problem. Eventually a woodcutter comes along...

'Ambiverts'

"There are two kinds of people in the world, those who divide the world into two kinds of people, and those who don't." -- Robert Benchley

This recent piece in The Washington Post (via @danbenjamin) reminded me that the world is more than extroverts and introverts. Extroverts have tended to dominate the culture, for obvious reasons, but there has been a quiet and growing appreciation for introverts in recent years. But extreme introverts do have their challenges.

Well, there is a third way of being. There are also "ambiverts," people who display qualities of both groups. Research success they are more successful than the other two types of people. From The Post:

Extroverts can talk too much and listen too little. They can overwhelm others with the force of their personalities. Sometimes they care too deeply about being liked and not enough about getting tough things done.

But the answer — whether you’re pushing Nissans on a car lot or leading a major nonprofit or corporation — isn’t to lurch to the opposite end of the spectrum. Introverts have their own challenges. They can be too shy to initiate, too skittish to deliver unpleasant news and too timid to close the deal. Ambiverts, though, strike the right balance. They know when to speak up and when to shut up, when to inspect and when to respond, when to push and when to hold back.

Caring for Your Introvert

Here's a 2003 gem from The Atlantic on introverts (via @smc90). I hire a lot of introverts. They make great copy editors. The hard part is getting them past the newsroom extroverts in the interview gantlet. 

Introverts are not necessarily shy. Shy people are anxious or frightened or self-excoriating in social settings; introverts generally are not. Introverts are also not misanthropic, though some of us do go along with Sartre as far as to say "Hell is other people at breakfast." Rather, introverts are people who find other people tiring. Extroverts are energized by people, and wilt or fade when alone. They often seem bored by themselves, in both senses of the expression. Leave an extrovert alone for two minutes and he will reach for his cell phone. In contrast, after an hour or two of being socially "on," we introverts need to turn off and recharge. My own formula is roughly two hours alone for every hour of socializing. This isn't antisocial. It isn't a sign of depression. It does not call for medication. For introverts, to be alone with our thoughts is as restorative as sleeping, as nourishing as eating. Our motto: "I'm okay, you're okay—in small doses."