Are you a mis-diagnosed introvert?

Why a lack of worth makes social settings torture

What if you’re not actually an introvert?

In this post, I will suggest your self-diagnosis may be a bit off. Suppose you cling to the giant and often hilarious introversion community with a thriving online meme industrial complex. You may be unwilling to shed the introversion label but hear me out.

Introverts can be a welcoming community, even if from a distance. The growing online spaces of the 2000s have meant introverts have found their voice. It has become a treasured label that folks are eager to share online. Who knows why it’s become attractive? Maybe it’s to tell people we introverts won’t be showing up to things, or if we do, we don’t want to be there and will find the first excuse to leave. If the head cheerleader and class president got all the attention years ago, it’s attractive to be socially unattracted today.

I read reposted and shared memes by the boatload that are infused with lots of snark about how the person sharing them doesn’t want to go out, be in public, talk to people, or be in situations that are too “peopley.” The new introverts are too happy to tell you they like tacos and maybe three people. I read one today that said: Neighbor said hi again. I’m just gonna move. Below, you’ll see Sheldon from Big Bang Theory, who’s too smart for the unwashed masses, saying he’s not a fan of social settings.

Watching people own the label can feel like walking by a 90’s era herd of goth kids at the mall food court. They all seem to be rolling their eyes at essential human interaction. We get it; humans aren’t your thing. The bad news, though, is you’re still a warm-blooded mammal that needs others.

Admittedly, these memes border more on anti-social than identifying anything about the nuanced spectrum of personalities and character uniqueness. Wanting to be around fewer people and needing downtime to process is real, but it’s made trite by these pointy barbs of humor. Somehow, all these jokes get rolled up into the introversion burrito. Today, introverts seem to be a majority of people rather than the interesting niche people group many have as a reputation goal.

Why introversion might not be you

Feral Souls, those who struggle with inhabiting their worth, can default to the label of an introvert because they are exhausted by groups.

What is a social gathering to you? Is it an intense joust to convince people you’re on par, passable, or perhaps deserve respect as being in the social lead? Are they a space to earn consideration, a subconscious competition to take the lead? In short, do you feel you need to win the dinner party, or at least medal?

When our interactions with others are an audition for approval, the emotional spend can be high, and we will want to limit those interactions or avoid them altogether. The emotional exertion we expend can be exhaustingly high if, when we talk to others, we need to either impress them or ensure we are maintaining a similar life status.

Being human means we need social support. However, having an inner void that can only be filled by impressing others into states of envy or awe sets us on an unsustainable pace. Exhausted from trying to earn our worth will become the familiar end point of gatherings, so saving oneself from the exertion is natural. We have no pressure to win if we don’t show. But what says you need to win? Perhaps it’s the void where your unshakable worth should be.

Your family gatherings aren’t boring.

It can seem lacking when a setting doesn’t afford us a stage to impress or a theater of competitive intensity.

Here’s what I mean.

When a social gathering doesn’t offer intense jockeying for either significance or supremacy, the gathering itself can seem lacking. Talking to our uncle at Thanksgiving, who loves us no matter what, usually holds no socially electric buzz to promote oneself or compete. What if our Thanksgiving gatherings aren’t boring, but instead, they’re not demanding unhealthy things from us? And the absence of tension makes them FEEL boring. We might reach for our phones to see where the action is and miss the acceptance we have at the moment.

At Thanksgiving, why do teenagers seem to want to be anywhere else? The raw power of the endorphins of competing isn’t on offer in the stark light of complete acceptance and the smell of warm turkey.

While in these low-risk gatherings, do our minds hum with the desire for more intense worth-creating moments among social ladder climbers or peers? That’s less about our uncle’s reliable stories and warm predictability being boring and more about the familiar routine of contesting for value in social settings.

Shedding your feral status and coming home

A significant upside to healing our inner worth is social settings become more relaxing. Just know that people aren’t considering your every shirt choice. Many people have no opinion of you, and if they think of you at all, they likely are working from a bare minimum awareness of who you are. Fully inhabit your worth and put down the jousting spear you’ve carried into group settings; they’ll be less draining, and who knows, you may even find they’re not so bad.

Be well, Feral Souls.