3 Lies The Internet Believes About Extroverts

Very much inspired by my friends over at Zoelogist and The Sea Calls Us Home. I absolutely love you guys. ;D

 

As we all know, the introverts have begun to dominate the internet. Anonymous support groups have been made, consistent blog posts are created, and self-help courses have all been consumed by the introverted majority. Us extroverts have been dissed to the ends of the earth and made fun of for our desperate need want for human interaction and mediocre conversational abilities.

All of us extroverts are not the cookie cutter image that has been spread around and beaten into the dirt- for I, Felicity Annora, have experienced both extroversion and introversion. Call me sensei, because I shall now show you the ways of the true extrovert.

and can we talk about how silly this intro is? i’m making this sound like a weird dramatic lead in to a movie or something

 

 

However, you must understand what “extrovert” and “introvert” means in the first place.

Extrovert is not a synonym for “shallow.” Nor will you find “a lover of small talk” as the definition in the dictionary. The same goes for introvert- you will not find “a deep soul-searcher” as the definition of an introvert.

Introversion and Extroversion simply describes how you get your energy. If you are an introvert, you get tired of people and need to go sit by yourself for a little while to feel energized. If you are an extrovert, you feel energized from spending time with people.

You will occasionally find an ambivert. These rare unicorns get energy from spending time with people, yet experience periodical moments where they NEED to get away to take a quick mental break (which is usually due to sensory overload). They never take long breaks, though- and hop right back into the maddening crowd when they’ve had their breather.  They are Divergent and must be killed because they disrupt the system.

One person can never fully be introvert or extrovert, which is why SO MANY people identify as an ambivert- though we are not discussing this type today. Which is why I’m sweeping this under the rug for now.

*sneakily pushes it out of view before you have the chance to comment on it*

So now that’s out of the way- let’s dive into the lies that the internet believes about extroverts.

 

 

LIE 1: We’re all confident and have the wit of 100 people.

*crickets chirp loudly*

*one lone man coughs in the background*

…

NO.

Whoever spread this around was a dirty rotten liar and his pants literally caught on fire.

A lot of us actually have stage fright and have issues trying to talk cohesively in sentences. Around this time last year, I would’ve nervously laughed and shook my head if you told me that I would become the official speaker for my youth group’s announcements. It was only up until recently that I have become happier with how quickly my brain forms responses.

And even then, you can still basically hear my brain farts across the room when the situation occurs.

It’s not pretty when you catch me on a slow day. I have a feeling that a lot of my fellow extroverts feel the same way.

 

 

LIE 2: All extroverts are positive, smile a lot, and talkative- and therefore, are somehow stupid.

My intuition tells me that this is the underlying issue of the reason why we constantly get labeled as “shallow.”

First of all- not all extroverts are positive. I have met a few extroverts who are toxic to be around or only mope. I don’t have many friends who are like this because, personally, I find personalities like that to be extremely draining and annoying. I would also probably tell them to take a short walk off of a tall building if I was hanging out with them everyday.

Secondly- just because we are outgoing and smile DOES NOT MEAN WE ARE STUPID. We are not smiling idiots. We are smiling because we were thinking about the good things that happened to us, we’re having an awesome daydream, we just heard a good joke, we actually got to talk to someone, or smiling is better than going ballistic and screaming at anyone who bumps shoulders with us at the grocery store. no lie, I was close to doing that one time when I was in a bad mood and felt too crowded

I’m pretty vocal about this topic because it’s something that happens to me almost every time I go out. I literally feel judged for smiling too much as I’m walking around the store. And it’s still something that I surprise my close friends with when they find out I try to do challenging things like learn a new language or debate politics with them.

As for being talkative… well, we have our moments where we talk over each other and create mass confusion. But that doesn’t mean we’re shallow. It’s just means that we’re loud (and sometimes ridiculously excited) about the things we’re passionate about.

 

 

LIE 3: If we’re not talking, then there’s something very VERY wrong going on. 

I’ve had friends come up to me and scream at me:

“ARE YOU OKAY? YOU’RE VERY QUIET! ARE YOU UPSET?”

No, I am not upset-

I am okay. I just can’t be “on” all the time.

Extroverts are not immune to the effects of sleep deprivation (even though it’s sometimes delayed due to the energy spikes we get when we hang out around people). There are even a few of us who can’t string a sentence together for the life of them until it’s past 10:00am and they’re on their 3rd cup of coffee.

We have our quiet days.

This especially goes for the shy extroverts. We have moments where our mouth can’t keep up with our brain, and we have moments where we can’t find anything to say and enjoy people watching at that moment.

Don’t worry- we usually wear our emotions on our sleeve. You’ll KNOW when we’re upset or having a bad day.

 

 

So that was a few things about extroverts! Are you an extrovert and can totally relate to this post? Or do your know someone like this that would claim that this was themselves in a nutshell? I would love to hear from you!

Thanks for reading to the end of the post!

~Felicity Annora