introvert
noun | a shy, reticent person.
Rectangular Peg, Triangular Hole...
When I was younger, my mum and dad would extol the virtues of being social and outgoing. I grew up thinking that to be 'normal', you needed to be everyone's friend and the life of the party. But that was, and remains, totally incongruent with who I am. Don't get me wrong, I love my parents and admire their social vibrancy and energy with others. It's just not me.
I preferred to interact with my friends one-on-one, or in very small groups. Anything more and I usually avoided whatever was being planned. With my closest friends, I could spend hours or days with them and not tire of their company. But convention, according to those around me, dictated that large social gatherings were the only ones worth having. More often than not, I stayed home.
Some of my fondest childhood memories are of hiking as part of a small group, long car journeys (I don't have any brothers or sisters), playing the piano, and building LEGO. I wasn't lonely or isolated, I was comfortable. I couldn't understand why or relate to how other kids enjoyed mass gatherings where everyone competed for attention. But I also felt pressure from my parents and peers to join in.
Over time I became somewhat desensitised to being around large groups and learnt to 'perform' as an extrovert. Without really knowing it at the time, I developed behaviours that made me appear typically outgoing to others. But I started to become easily drained of energy and less able to function when I could manage to find time for myself.
My secondary schooling culminated in an early departure, the direct result of not being able to function as a student because I was pretending to be someone I wasn't. I was tearing myself apart inside, while trying to project a person of confidence and excitement who loved the company of others. As my schooling started to fall apart, so did my friendships. Some of my closest friends started to see through the veil, which for the most part was a bunch of juvenile lies. They told me I needed to be myself, but I refused to listen.
In the end, I left school with few close friends, several friendships destroyed, and no understanding of who I really was.
