It's a funny thing: For a very long time, I thought I was an introvert. I was always the quiet kid, reading a book in the corner instead of engaging in conversations with classmates. I didn't feel the need to talk to my peers, the idea always seemed too cost-ineffective. I occasionally did it just because that's what kids are supposed to do, in an attempt to appear "normal," but it always felt obligatory.
Yet I never had to struggle while talking to the adults. If I needed to ask a question in the class, I just did. I had a respect for adult people and almost considered them more-than human (from the child perspective). This started to change during high school. The teachers very often did not have satisfying anwers to my questions and I only increased the distance between me and my classmates. I had very few friends and even they were rolling their eyes together with the rest when I dared to raise a hand, before even saying anything.
I was getting a bit too comfortable in the role of a black sheep.
I started to realize that simply reaching the age of maturity does not make you more wise. The world is full of old children. None of us really know what we are doing. Some people are just more talented in the adult pretending. There is no correct answer to the question of how to conduct my life. If I should have any goal, it would be learning how to swim in this vast ocean of chaos.
At a certain point in my life, I had to switch to a job which required constant communication with people. My success was dependant on the way I formulated what I wanted to say. My old, straighforward, energy-saving way of communicating, designed only to obtain information as fast as possible, wouln't get me very far. I had to learn some crucial facts:
- People don't care as much about what you say as they care about how you say it. Non-verbal communication is even more important than the verbal one. Especially in environments consisting of non-native English speakers. Simply saying the correct words is not enough to pass the message.
- People don't remember what you said, they remember how you made them feel. It's not "Anything you say can be used against you" anymore. It changed to: "Anything I think you've said will be used against you!"
However I wish I could live in a world where communication is easy, straightforward and effortless, I have to accept that the reality is different and learn to behave by the rules of our society. At least while I'm in the public space. I realized that noticing and following the communication style of the other party is absolutely necessary and I've been putting a lot of effort into improving those skills ever since. I started to imitate the behavior of extroverts.
But What Does Extraversion Even Mean? The school definition usually includes phrases like enjoys talking to people, needs attention, focuses on the outside world more than on the inside, acts first and thinks later... None of these things has ever defined me. Even so, when I told my not-so-old friends: "You might not believe me, but I'm actually an introvert. I have to put a lot of effort into communicating with people properly," they just laughed and said "Sure, you are an introvert, that's a good one!" - or something of the like.
If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck... or is it?
It's not only the question of Introversion vs. Extraversion. There were many personality traits I believed I possesed, but was proven otherwise after entering a different environment. I'm starting to suspect that the way I behave and the way my personality shows depends mostly on the situation where I'm required to act. Have I changed that much, or is it all thanks to the improvement of my communication skills? Is it even a good thing, or should I perhaps be less compromising and hold onto my old ways of information exchange?
There is a difference between innate and learned personality traits. I have learned to pretend being an extrovert so well that I've become indistinguishable, I've become one of them. That does not mean I've ceased to be an introvert. Perhaps we can acquire many seemingly opposing traits and choose to use them to our advantage, depending on the situation. I am sure it is not only possible, but we are all doing it on various conscious and unconscious levels.
If that is the case, where does it leave us in relationship with our personalities? If we can learn to change them almost like a clothing, we are really just actors, performing the play of life where nobody knows the script and we make it up as we go. If personality trait is just a tool we can choose not to use, the nature of our self does not possess any aspects. Our motivations are created by the depth of our immersion in the play, by the level of our unawareness of our true nature.
What should we do with those realizations? If we detach ourselves from our personalities, we might lose our life motivations and stagnate, not being able to communicate, to perform properly. If we immerse too deep, we expose ourselves to the danger of developing patologic patterns of behavior. How do we find the balance? Will you help me find the answer? I will be grateful if you share your views and your experience!