While enjoying a latte and bagel at Barnes & Noble yesterday, I read the first 70 pages of Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can't Stop Talking, by Susan Gain. Interesting how psychology, beginning in the '50s, and playing out at Harvard Business School and beyond, decided that quiet and being introverted was bad for the individual. As a teacher I played my part, too, voicing concern about students who, though doing fine academically, weren’t ‘social enough’. Public wisdom in the education field and beyond was that there was something wrong with introverts; that they ‘had problems’, although often we couldn’t be more specific than that.
I seem to be into the introvert phase of my life. I think I was that way as a young child, but was also socialized to actualize my extrovert propensities. My teen years, parenting, teaching, writing my books and presenting to teachers called upon my extroverted self, all of which I never objected to or even though much about it. In retrospect, I am aware that all of that was balanced by times when I retreated into my solitary self.
What I have read so far in Quiet affirms what I feel is right for me now in my life. Understanding the extrovert/introvert dichotomy in a new way, helps me accept my search for silence, solitude and simplicity, and my longing sometimes to be alone.
Another topic~~ Take a look at the two women in the photo. The one whose back is to me, is reading a novel; the one facing me is taking notes from magazines, which range from cooking to finances. They were together (friends, partners, sisters?) although sitting at separate tables for a morning of reading. I know that they were together because the ‘reader’ got up and offered to fill the ‘note-taker’s’ little plastic cup with water.
“Um,” I thought, “They haven’t spent one cent here today.”
“Um,” I thought some more, “I am not spending one cent on this $26 book. I guess I’d better be quiet about my judgments.”
I seem to be into the introvert phase of my life. I think I was that way as a young child, but was also socialized to actualize my extrovert propensities. My teen years, parenting, teaching, writing my books and presenting to teachers called upon my extroverted self, all of which I never objected to or even though much about it. In retrospect, I am aware that all of that was balanced by times when I retreated into my solitary self.
What I have read so far in Quiet affirms what I feel is right for me now in my life. Understanding the extrovert/introvert dichotomy in a new way, helps me accept my search for silence, solitude and simplicity, and my longing sometimes to be alone.
Another topic~~ Take a look at the two women in the photo. The one whose back is to me, is reading a novel; the one facing me is taking notes from magazines, which range from cooking to finances. They were together (friends, partners, sisters?) although sitting at separate tables for a morning of reading. I know that they were together because the ‘reader’ got up and offered to fill the ‘note-taker’s’ little plastic cup with water.
“Um,” I thought, “They haven’t spent one cent here today.”
“Um,” I thought some more, “I am not spending one cent on this $26 book. I guess I’d better be quiet about my judgments.”