Sorry I'm Late, I Didn't Want to Come

by Jessica Pan

  That’s because it’s true: modern society favors extroverts. Extroverts are more likely to talk to strangers, are more social, go to more parties, and are quicker to strike up new friendships. They are more likely to be appreciated and noticed at work. But of course I don’t think we should all be extroverts. But the self-care trend has extroverts pursuing introvert activities to help them relax and reflect—so why shouldn’t we introverts do the same? When we need to be loud and social and outgoing, we can steal their traits when we need them. We don’t even have to be bitten by a radioactive extrovert to gain their powers.

  Naturally, my sense of kinship and compassion still lies with my fellow introverts. I love you. In fact, most of the new friends I’ve made are introverts, because I’m naturally drawn to them. The quiet ones, also observing, who are witty and thoughtful and want to leave early with me. (It’s just so hard to get you to hang out with me.)

  So if modern society favors extroverts, what’s an introvert to do? Or, more specifically, what’s an introvert unhappy with their current life to do? I’d spent most of my life telling myself I was one kind of person, not believing I could do things that I saw other people doing. Then I spent a year doing all of those things that petrified me. I know plenty of happy introverts who don’t want to change, and I have nothing but respect for them. But, for me, having the ability to morph, to change, to try on free traits, to expand or contract at will, offers me an incredible feeling of freedom and a source of hope.

  I think a small part of me thought I’d do all these challenges, go through hell, and emerge at the other end as the most socially savvy, articulate, gregarious social butterfly in the world. Or wind up hiding in a ditch. One or the other. But I am still who I was at the beginning of this year. But I know more now.

  I took steps forward, and I took steps back. My anxiety around public speaking will likely never go away, but now I know it isn’t necessarily an obstacle.

  When I visit Union Chapel again, this time once again in the audience for The Moth, I sit still, listening to a young woman tell the story about the first time she met the sister she never knew she had. I can’t believe that had once been me up there. I watch and listen intently to the woman onstage who is speaking confidently, surely. But, suddenly, she stops. It’s a long pause. She has forgotten her next line. She has lost her place. She takes a deep breath and slowly, measuredly, exhales, the air rushing into the mic. The audience, on the edge of their seat, exhales with her. She does not stutter, or rush, or run off the stage in tears. She stands still, waiting. And then her story comes back to her.

  For years, I thought that if you were onstage at a big performance and you froze or messed up, you wouldn’t be able to recover. But afterward, in the bar, the woman is fine. She is better than fine. She is glowing. She doesn’t seem embarrassed or ashamed. The worst had happened, and she is overjoyed. Of course she is. Why had it taken me so long to believe that even when these things don’t go perfectly, we can still survive?

  Even when you face your biggest fears and it all goes as badly as it could possibly go, like when you declare your love for England onstage in Scotland.

  People asked me so many times this year whether I was happier acting like an extrovert.

  At times. In the best moments of improv, surrounded by warm, friendly faces, in a small classroom, just playing and being creative and laughing, I was indescribably happy. When I fell into a good conversation that I had initiated with a stranger, like with Claude on the Eurostar, I had the loveliest sense of unexpected kinship. When I wandered into the first bathhouse in Budapest and floated on my back, staring at the sky, with no plans to make or break, I felt free.

  I loved learning about people and making connections, like having dinner with the storytellers at The Moth, or over pie at book club, or even in the hospital with Pete, hearing about his Chinese grandparents while he took my father’s blood pressure.

  ✽ ✽ ✽

  At the same time, as I ushered those final guests out of our apartment after Thanksgiving dinner, I was so, so tired. How do extroverts get any work done? I genuinely do not know. How do they know what has happened to them without being alone to process it and fret about it and stay up all night thinking about it? How can they hear themselves think with all these new conversations in their heads?

  How do you sleep at night, extroverts?

  A year of living like one was hard.

  But now I have Lily and Vivian. I know that we will continue to meet up and workshop comedy together and that if I ever do perform again, they will be there for me when I say the wrong thing onstage.

  I know that a new friend is only two flights of stairs away, in my Dutch neighbor, Hannah.

  I know that, when it comes to public speaking, I will always feel anxious and despairing, but if I practice and rehearse, then I can do it.

  I know I have a new swimming and coffee pal in Abigail.

  I know that it’s worth it to have Deep Talk over Surface Talk and that even though people are wary of it, it brings you closer together.

  I know that one small action sets off so many more. I met Paul at a networking event, and his girlfriend recommended my comedy class, which led me to Lily and Vivian. Someone on Facebook recommended my improv course, which unlocked a whole side of me that I’d forgotten existed. Talking to a coworker led me to a cozy book club.

  In one evening, I set someone up with a literary agent, give someone dating advice, and, on the way home, lead an elderly French couple to the right Tube station. On the Underground, I help a woman on the escalator with her four bags of luggage. Normally I’d just want to but would be too hesitant to get involved in someone else’s affairs. The woman doesn’t speak English, so instead of saying “Thank you,” she blows kisses at me as she waves and walks away. Perhaps, briefly, I get to be someone’s Pete after all.

  I learned a lot about loneliness. As an adult, sometimes if you’re lucky, you have close friends from childhood nearby, but when you move away from home or outgrow your old friends, you have to find your people. And it’s so hard. It can take years. You have to actively go out and get them. You’ll need them for when life gets dark or one of your loved ones has just gone into the operating room for major surgery and you’re standing in the hospital corridor, scared out of your mind and you really, really need someone to sit beside you. But once you have these friends, you get to keep them. Even if they move to, say, Paris or Portland, they’re still yours. And everyone gets lonely. Everyone I met talked about it. It sneaks up on you, especially if you don’t protect yourself from it.

  Finding my voice and challenging myself to do intimidating things made me feel more confident. This is priceless in a world that can be scary, maddening, and unfair. When there are fewer things we are scared of and fewer things that can control us, this can only be a good thing.

  It was more than I could have ever hoped for when I started. I feel more in control of my life because I can extrovert. I can socialize in a room full of people I don’t know. I can disrupt an entire theater row if I really need to pee. I can get up and shout a question at a lecturer if I genuinely do not understand. I can befriend someone new, take their number, and eventually feed them Coca-Cola ham in my house. I’m beginning to think I’m slowly becoming less of a shy introvert and ever so slightly more of a gregarious introvert (grintrovert).

  This week, I happened to walk by that fancy gym. The one that had the competition that eventually led me to the sauna. I’d been avoiding it ever since the final weigh-in. I didn’t like remembering who I had been that day. One of the personal trainers recognized me through the window and ran out to say hello as I did my best to speed quickly on by.

  “Where’ve you been?” she asked.

  Budapest, Edinburgh, strangers’ houses, improv classes, on stages, on friend-dates.

  “Oh, I’ve been around,” I said, mysteriously.

 
“You know who won the contest this year?” she asked.

  “Who?” I asked.

  “Portia,” she said.

  I feel an overwhelming sense of relief. All is right in the world. I hadn’t messed up the space-time continuum after all.

  I’m about to head out the door to meet Hannah for coffee. Laura has texted asking whether I want to take another improv course with her next month, and I’ve said yes. I’m reading the next book for our book club. Paul and his girlfriend are coming over for dinner next week. Sam and I are going to make Thanksgiving at our place an annual tradition. Claude and I are email pen pals now, and he always signs off, “I hope that you are well and that you do nice things,” which I like very much. Lily and Vivian are trying to persuade me to perform comedy again. Probably I’ll just go along to their gigs and cheer them on. And there’s nothing wrong with that.

  I have a tiny little social life. A new way to experience the world when I want to. I really like my comfort zone, but I also know I’ll be OK if I leap into the unknown or the scary for a little while.

  But if you see me at Glastonbury, please, take me gently by the hand and put me on the first bus home. I have been kidnapped and brought there against my will.

  A Note on Introversion and Methodology

  Like Susan Cain in her book Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking (which I can’t recommend highly enough), I address introversion from a cultural point of view.

  In other words, I am working from the understanding that introverts, to paraphrase: seek solitude, concentrate well, are contemplative, dislike small talk, love one-on-one conversations, find long periods of socializing draining, and are often, though not always, shy and sensitive. And that extroverts are: highly sociable, risk-taking, relaxed in the spotlight, loud, enthusiastic, and enjoy large groups of people.

  Traits associated with cultural introversion may come under different categories in the Big Five personality traits taxonomy (i.e., shyness may fall under “neuroticism,” and a risk-averse nature may fall under “openness to experience”).

  Likewise, the Myers-Briggs personality inventory describes introverts as individuals who obtain energy from contemplation or time alone, as opposed to extroverts, who gain energy from taking action or socializing. This book’s interpretation of introversion is consistent with this definition but also includes the aforementioned cultural traits associated with introverts.

  If you are an introvert (or extrovert), some traits or tendencies I mention may apply to you; others may not. We are, as a rule, too complex for such simplification. And to quote Carl Jung, “There is no such thing as a pure extrovert or a pure introvert—such a man would be in the lunatic asylum.”

  I am not a trained psychologist or academic researcher, but throughout this book, I reference research studies. For the sake of readability, the details of these studies and sources appear in the Notes section.

  Many names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals who appear in this book. I have tried to remain faithful to the chronological details of the events detailed wherever possible.

  Notes

  Introduction

  xiv one out of every two or three people is an introvert: Rowan Bayne, The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator: A Critical Review and Practical Guide (London: Chapman & Hall, 1995); and a brochure published by the Center for Applications of Psychological Type, “Estimated Frequencies of the Types in the United States Population” (Gainesville, FL: Center for Applications of Psychological Type Research Services, 1996). See also Jüri Allik and Robert R. McCrae, “Toward a Geography of Personality Traits: Patterns of Profiles across 36 Cultures,” Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology 35, no. 1 (2004): 13–28; and Robert R. McCrae and Antonio Terracciano, “Personality Profiles of Cultures: Aggregate Personality Traits,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 89, no. 3 (2005): 407–425.

  xiv introverts, to paraphrase, concentrate well, relish solitude, dislike small talk, love one-on-one conversations, avoid public speaking: Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking (New York: Crown Publishers, 2012), 13, 269.

  Chapter 2: Talking to Strangers or New People

  15 an effective treatment for social anxiety is a form of exposure therapy: A. Fang, A. T. Sawyer, A. Asnaani, and S. G. Hofmann, “Social Mishap Exposures for Social Anxiety Disorder: An Important Treatment Ingredient,” Cognitive and Behavioral Practice 20, no. 2 (2013): 213–220, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cbpra.2012.05.003.

  18 discovered that when people talk to strangers during their commutes, it makes them happier: N. Epley and J. Schroeder, “Mistakenly Seeking Solitude,” Journal of Experimental Psychology: General 143, no. 5 (2014): 1980–1999.

  24 Introverts tend to hate chitchat: Several studies associate small talk with being draining for introverts, but this is summed up well in this article by Lindsay Dodgson, “What Everyone Gets Wrong about Introverts—Including Why They Are Not Antisocial or Lazy,” Business Insider, May 11, 2018, https://www.businessinsider.com/what-its-like-to-be-an-introvert-and-what-everyone-gets-wrong-2018-5?r=US&IR=T.

  24 we all have a “Surface Self” and a “Deep Self”: “How to Be Sociable” workshop taught at the School of Life and attended in London.

  28 Deep Talk: Discussed over the phone with Nicholas Epley, this talk reveals findings about how Deep Talk is less awkward than we think it will be: M. Kardas, A. Kumar, and N. Epley, “Digging Deeper: Meaningful Conversations Are Surprisingly Pleasant,” lecture presented at the Society for Personality and Social Psychology Conference, 2019, Portland, OR.

  Chapter 3: Shaking in the Spotlight or Stage Fright

  36 Public speaking is an incredibly common fear—though introverts are significantly more likely than extroverts to suffer: Susan K. Opt and Donald A. Loffredo, “Rethinking Communication Apprehension: A Myers-Briggs Perspective,” The Journal of Psychology 134, no. 5 (2000): 556–570. See also Peter D. MacIntyre and Kimly A. Thivierge, “The Effects of Speaker Personality on Anticipated Reactions to Public Speaking,” Communication Research Reports 12, no. 2 (1995): 125–133.

  47 when we are stressed, our bodies also release cortisol, which interferes with our attention and short-term memory: M. Biondi and A. Picardi, “Psychological Stress and Neuroendocrine Function in Humans: The Last Two Decades of Research,” Psychotherapy and Psychosomatics 68, no. 3 (1999): 114–150. See also G. Matthews and L. Dorn, “Cognitive and Attentional Processes in Personality and Intelligence,” in International Handbook of Personality and Intelligence, ed. Donald H. Saklofske and Moshe Zeidner (New York: Plenum, 1995), 367–396; A. W. K. Gaillard, “Stress, Workload, and Fatigue as Three Biobehavioral States: A General Overview,” in Stress, Workload, and Fatigue, ed. P. A. Hancock and P. A. Desmond (Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 2001), 623–640; and A. W. K. Gaillard and C. J. E. Wientjes, “Mental Load and Work Stress as Two Types of Energy Mobilization,” Work & Stress 8, no. 2 (1994): 141–152.

  Chapter 5: In Search of the One or Friend-Dating

  69 Research says that we have the most friends we’ll ever have when we are twenty-nine: A survey of 1,505 Britons conducted by Genius Gluten Free found that twenty-nine-year-olds, on average, had eighty friends, the highest number of the participants surveyed (the average person had sixty-four).

  69 while other studies say we start to lose friends after the age of twenty-five: K. Bhattacharya, A. Ghosh, D. Monsivais, R. I. M. Dunbar, and K. Kaski, “Sex Differences in Social Focus across the Life Cycle in Humans,” Royal Society Open Science 3, no. 4 (2016): 160097.

  70 Introverts tend to value quality over quantity when it comes to relationships: C. L. Carmichael, H. T. Reis, and P. R. Duberstein, “In Your 20s It’s Quantity, in Your 30s It’s Quality: The Prognostic Value of Social Activity across 30 Years of Adulthood,” Psychology and Aging 30, no. 1 (2015): 95–105.

  7
1 Rachel Bertsche went on fifty-two friend-dates in one year: Rachel Bertsche, MWF Seeking BFF: My Yearlong Search for a New Best Friend (New York: Ballantine Books, 2011).

  71 Brené Brown calls these friends “move a body” friends: Brené Brown, “Finding Shelter in a Shame Storm (and Avoiding the Flying Debris),” Oprah.com, March 21, 2013, http://www.oprah.com/spirit/brene-brown-how-to-conquer-shame-friends-who-matter/all.

  72 Studies show that we’re spending more time online than ever before: An Ofcom study in the UK reported in their Communications Market Report that time spent online has doubled in the past ten years and that one-quarter of Britons spend forty hours online a week, largely on their mobile phones.

  72 Social media is a huge part of the loneliness problem: Melissa G. Hunt, Rachel Marx, Courtney Lipson, and Jordyn Young, “No More FOMO: Limiting Social Media Decreases Loneliness and Depression,” Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology 37, no. 10 (2018): 751–768.

  72 studies also say that it’s harder for men to make new friends: Jane E. Brody, “The Challenges of Male Friendships,” New York Times, June 27, 2016, https://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/06/27/the-challenges-of-male-friendships/.

  72 2.5 million British men have no close friends: Research by the Movember Foundation found that 51 percent of respondents, the equivalent of about 2.5 million British men, have no close friends.

  87 it takes six to eight meetings to feel like someone is our friend: Ellen Hendriksen, How to Be Yourself: Quiet Your Inner Critic and Rise above Social Anxiety (New York: St. Martin’s Press, 2018).