The Valuable Role of Introverts in the Introvert-Extrovert Balance

Written By Caroline Smith

Sometimes it can be easy for introverts to feel out of place in the world, especially when the personality with the most visibility seems to be more extroverted people. In this episode, we discuss the valuable role that introverts have in the balance of introversion and extroversion in the world by exploring how the two opposing personalities create stability in human societies and how both introverts and extroverts can learn to be better counterparts to one another.

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Transcript:

Welcome to The Introverted Misfit Podcast with me, Caroline Smith, where we discuss topics to help awkward and anxious introverts create fulfilling relationships and build community while being their authentic selves.

Today’s podcast explores the essential role of introverts in what I call the introvert-extrovert balance. I want to start this podcast of a little differently than usual by reading a poem that I wrote a few months ago.


The Meek Deer and the Roaring Lion

Would not it be a funny tale if deer should envy lions?

The deer would ask, “Say, how’d you get so prideful without tryin’?


The fearless way you sway your hips without a thought of hidin’.

The way you hold your head up high sends all who see admirin’.


And Oh! That mighty roar demands that all who hear it listen;

They scatter and cease their prior doings in reverent adoration.


Your eyes are full of great assurance that suggests no inhibition.

And all I seem to have’s unyielding fear that screams submission.


So tell me, how can I attempt to do the things you do?

To strut, to roar, command the floor, and gleam with pride, like you?”


“Relax, my child,” the lion says, “You’ll learn in time that’s due

That every wonder has its place, and that includes you, too.


Birds were meant for flying high; Seasons meant for changin’.

Roaring lions lead the pride; meek deer were meant for grazin’.


Grazin’ keeps the grasses trimmed that shapes our natural dwellin’;

‘Cuz if the grasslands grow unchecked, they’ll be no room for seedlin’s;


And if the seedlin’s have no room, there’s nothing we can sow,

Which leaves the land more vulnerable, and nothing new can grow.


You see, we all have special roles that keep our world from ceasin’,

And just because yours is not mine does not defeat your meanin’.


So we must be content with who we are. There’s no denyin’

That it would be a tragic tale if deer should envy lions.”


I honestly forgot about this poem until I came up with the topic of this podcast episode, and then I suddenly remembered that this topic is the exact message I was trying to portray in this poem.

That message is that the scale of introverted and extroverted personalities is one aspect of how human societies remain stable in our relationships to one another.

Disclaimer: The complexity of the human mind is so vast that trying to simplify it down to introvert and extrovert is oversimplifying it, but this episode is just me telling you my thoughts based on my own experience and research.

Equilibrium.

Equilibrium is a state in which opposing forces or influences are balanced.

If there’s one thing I remember from my high school biology class, it’s that every living being is constantly trying to keep itself in a state of stability, otherwise known as homeostasis, which is the tendency toward a relatively stable equilibrium within our body maintained by physiological processes.

Everything from the smallest microbe to the largest living organism needs to be in a state of homeostasis to survive.

That’s why we feel hunger and thirst, because those are our bodies’ ways of telling us that it needs energy and hydration to keep our organs working and get back to equilibrium.

That’s why we sweat, especially in this sweltering heat we’ve been experiencing this summer, because our body is trying to regulate it’s internal temperature - another example of equilibrium.

Even our brains try to keep us mentally stable. We feel mental anguish when something in our environment and/or within ourselves is not right, and often times in an effort to get our brain chemistry back to a state of stability, we find all kinds of different ways to cope - some more healthy than others - but the point is we’re trying to reach mental equilibrium.

Even on a much broader scope, if you think about how different organisms in an ecosystem are able to sustain life, there must be a settling point of equilibrium, otherwise the ecosystem cannot thrive.

In the Savanna grasslands, if there are too many primary consumers (the organisms that eat plants) and not enough tertiary consumers (the apex predators) to hunt the lower level consumers, it throws everything off; they’ll eat up all of the plants, and when there are no more plants, the producers die off, and the tertiary consumers have less prey to eat until the plants have a chance to flourish again, which will then create more resources to sustain the primary consumers so that the apex predators have more game to hunt, and so on and so forth - all in the name of reaching a state of balance, or equilibrium.

Even something as basic and foundational as a household needs equilibrium, or at least the people living inside of the house together need stable relationships in order or people to be content.

I could give so many more examples but hopefully you get the picture.

So when you think about this concept of equilibrium and how it can be found in pretty much every area of life, that got me thinking about how that might manifest in human societies, which are essentially made of individual people with varying personality types and other attributes, including introverts and extroverts; men and women; feminine and masculine energy; people who know when to be quiet and people who don’t know when it’s time to stop talking so much; people with high emotional intelligence and people with poor control and understanding of emotions; rich people and poor people; basically all of these varying degrees of the human condition.

And since the beginning of the first humans, we have been trying to reach our own version of equilibrium while having to grapple with these facts of human life.

That’s why every few years there seems to be a new war that breaks out over resources, arguments about who should and shouldn’t be in political positions, etc.

So what does all of this have to do with introverts, extroverts, and ambiverts?

Here’s my main thesis: On the societal level, I think that introverted and extroverted personalities are opposing forces that balance communities out because of our differing strengths and weaknesses, and on the individual level, I think it’s important that we don’t become so pigeonholed into our own natural introverted or extroverted tendencies that other importance aspects of our lives suffer, because personality types exist on a spectrum.

I’m going to break up my supporting arguments into two main sections:

  1. Explaining why this balance is necessary on the individual and societal level.

  2. How we as individuals involved in society can find balance within ourselves to be better counterparts to others.

Why balance is necessary.

I’m going to start this section off using an example some of you may be familiar with and others may not. It’s a religious example but it’s not going to be divisive because I’m purely focusing on the people — not religion or spirituality.

So I’ve grown up in church pretty much all of my life except a few years in college when I was questioning my walk of faith in Christianity, and after 20 years of listening to many sermons and from the perspective of a congregational member (or audience member for those of you who aren’t familiar with church language), I’ve learned that congregations often have their own overall personalities during a church service.

Similarly, pastors will have their own personalities when they are delivering a sermon.

I would broadly classify these personalities that I’m referring to as introverted and extroverted styles of preaching and worshiping.

On one hand, you have the pastors who are more extroverted and expressive in their delivery, and they communicate with a lot of emotion, loud vocals, sometimes they go as far as to jump around on the stage or pulpit. A family member of mine who has been a church pianist and organist for over 30 years would jokingly call these types of pastors “Hoopin’ and hollerin’ pastors.” My family is from the south so that’s how all of them talk.

So when these types of pastors are preaching to an equally as extroverted audience, it’s seemingly a great fit for them, because the audience is responding back to them excitedly - their exclaiming things like “Amen!” “Hallelujah!” “Thank you, Lord! very joyously and loudly, and sometimes they will clap their hands and dance around, too.

You can tell they really feed off each other’s energy.

On the other hand, you have the more introverted and reserved pastors who are not as expressive in their delivery.

The sermons almost sound like a lecture, or a tame conversation. It’s a much calmer and quieter atmosphere that’s more conducive to self-reflection and deep thought, and when these types of pastors are preaching to an equally as reserved congregation, you can tell there is a kindred spirit and mutual understanding by the nodding heads, the smiles, and mild laughter, and the quiet verbal responses if any at all.

As you can imagine, it’s quite an interesting event to witness what happens when those scenarios are switched up, and I’ve been a witness to just about any combination you can think of.

When you have an extroverted pastor with and introverted audience, it’s almost like watching someone yell at a brick wall, because it’s clear that the pastor is expecting more of a response from the congregation that he or she is not getting, and I’ve even seen this cause some tension when the pastor will half jokingly suggest that the audience must not understand the message well enough because they are not responding as emotionally as the pastor is.

And then when you have an introverted pastor preaching to a more extroverted audience, you can sometimes tell when the energies are mismatched, because the audience is trying to respond verbally and emotionally to an energy that isn’t there, and it’s kind of off-putting to watch. It’s like watching a dove softly cooing at a flock of noisy birds. I’ve even heard some church goers suggest that the pastor wasn’t expressive enough for them.

Both of these scenarios that I was thinking about when planning out this episode got me thinking, “Wow. Is the delivery really that important to some people that they will either intentionally ignore or just not grasp the message of the sermon because they couldn’t get past the preaching style?”

As it turns out, that’s exactly what can happen. And church is not the only example you could use here; I could’ve done a similar example using a teacher or professor who is teaching a class exhibiting certain personality traits as a whole, or a team leader and team pairing at your job.

So how do my observations in the church example prove anything about equilibrium in a society?

Well, going too far in one direction about most things in life is generally not good.

You can see examples of that in the current American political climate where we’ve got these two parties - democratic and republican - that don’t seem to be going anywhere any time soon, and there seems to be no room for in between voters who can acknowledge that there are good and bad aspects of both political parties. It really is a mess that we’ve made for ourselves because we can’t find an equal grounding on a lot of important issues.

In terms of the introversion/extraversion scale, I think it’s possible for society to be so catered for more extroverted tendencies that there is no room for important individual activities like self-reflection and deep thought, which is important for things like changing and evolving as a person, but on the other hand, if society is more catered to introverted tendencies, there may be no room for the more expressive and communal behaviors that can pull us out of our own heads.

It’s all a balancing act.

Sometimes, you need the introverted friend, or boss, or coworker, or neighbor that’s going to naturally encourage those important self-reflective and introspective behaviors, and sometimes you need the more extroverted friend, boss, coworker, or neighbor that’s going to keep you from going so deep within your own self that you will drive yourself crazy.

And I think that once we understand those differences in each other on the individual level, that understanding will organically spread throughout society, because communities are nothing but individual people who are trying to get along with each other the best they can.

How can we encourage balance in ourselves?

So now we’ve come to the second part of this episode where I explain how I think we can find balance within ourselves to be better counterparts to our fellow introverts, extroverts, and ambiverts.

The first key to doing this is to have a mutual understanding of each other’s personality differences.

By definition, an introvert is a quiet, reserved person who tends to be introspective and enjoys spending time alone. An extrovert is an unreserved person who enjoys and actively seeks out social interaction. Just hearing those two definitions, you can see where the opposition comes into play.

As a lifelong introvert myself who grew up with an extroverted, larger-than-life sister, I know how frustrating it can be when those opposing personalities clash: I never understood her innate need to speak to any and everyone who would listen, no matter where we went; and she never understood my natural tendency towards being quiet and my aversion to starting conversations with people, even ones that I knew.

It turns out that scientifically, introverts and extroverts have differently-wired brains in the following ways:

  • The prefrontal cortex is thicker in an introvert’s brain than an extrovert’s; this means there is more tissue in the area of the brain associated with decision-making and deep thought. As Dr. Lisa MacLean, M.D, Henry Ford Health psychiatrist put it, “Since extroverts have thinner matter in the prefrontal cortex, they process information quickly and tend to react impulsively compared to introverts, who mull things over before deciding on a course of action.”

  • While introverts and extroverts have the same amount of dopamine in their brains, extroverts have a more active dopamine reward network. For example, when extroverts prepare for a party, they feel motivated, energized, and excited, while introverts may feel less enthusiasm — or a sense of dread — under similar circumstances.

  • Acetylcholine is linked to pleasure like dopamine; however, unlike dopamine, acetylcholine makes a person feel good when they’re calm, quiet, and introspective — and introverts tend to have more acetylcholine receptors in their brains than extroverts. In a calm environment, introverts are able to reflect and focus on the task at hand without a lot of external noise.

Once we can learn to accept each others differences, I think introverts and extroverts can be much better counterparts in a community.

And just to revisit my church example, I’ve witnessed quite a few of these seemingly mismatched pairings of pastors and audiences that work well, despite the personality differences, and I think what makes them work so well is that there is an understanding from the pastor that just because this crowd doesn’t express themselves the way you do, doesn’t mean that they aren’t taking in and understanding the message, and it’s not their job to force the audience towards expressing themselves in a particular way; it’s their job to deliver the message in the way that feels most natural for them. Similarly, there’s an understanding among the congregation that even though this pastor’s delivery is not their cup of tea, that doesn’t mean they can’t get some value from the message.

It’s the mutual understanding that makes it work as well as it does in a lot of different scenarios.

The second key is to become confident in our own strengths while acknowledging our weaknesses.

Just as we’ve all got our own strengths when it comes to communication, relationship-building, information-processing, and more, we can also acknowledge when a situation requires a skill set that we just don’t have, and that’s ok!

I mentioned earlier that I have an extroverted older sister, and it’s amazing to watch how she can walk into a room full of people that she barely knows and immediately engage with ten of them all at once, as if she was just supposed to fit in there all along. They usually laughing, telling stories, hugging each other, having fun, just really connecting with one another.

I used to be really self conscious about the fact that I couldn’t do that, until I realized that my unique strength of connecting with people one-on-one allows me to create some very deep, genuine connections that I know for a fact wouldn’t be possible if I was trying to engage with multiple people all at once - because that’s simply not my strength.

And that’s ok.

We can’t all be good at everything, but we are all good at something that can contribute to the betterment of society.

If you happen to be an introvert that needs help building some confidence in yourself as well as your social skills, you can receive my free 6-step guide to small talk for awkward introverts by clicking the link in the description of this episode.

The third key is to not let a label like introvert or extrovert define your every move.

We all have our natural tendencies as introverts and extroverts, but sometimes the moment calls for you to take a step out of your comfort zone to make something great happen, whether that’s in a meeting at work, or in your friend group, or to a stranger in the grocery store.

I’ll give you an example of something that I witnessed happen about a year ago now in an airport.

I was traveling with my 2 year old niece to Atlanta, GA, and I was waiting for TSA to search through my bag for something that had set the alarm off, and there was a woman in front of me who was previously waving and smiling and talking to my niece, which I very much appreciated because it’s not everyday that you run into nice people in the largest airport in the southeast, right?

I happened to notice that TSA was examining two large, white candles with pictures of two women on them - one older and one much younger. I could tell by the formatting of the text on these candles that the women had recently passed away on the same day, unfortunately, and these candles belonged to that same women from before who was so nice to my niece.

Well, being the quiet, reserved person that I naturally am, I decided not to invade this woman’s time and personal business with my questions even though I felt very sorry for her after putting the pieces together.

Another woman who came up a few seconds later had a different idea, and kindly asked her what those beautiful candles were for, and the woman breaks out in tears only to tell her that the two women who had passed were her best friend and goddaughter who were in a tragic accident just a few days ago.

And after a few minutes of the women talking and embracing each other, and just - you know - being very warm towards each other, the woman with the candles doesn’t leave the interaction without telling this other woman that she really appreciated her condolences and kindness.

Now mind you, these are two complete strangers who had never met each other before and probably would never see each other again and it was such a nice moment to witness, but imagine if she hadn’t walked up at that time and it was only me standing there thinking I’d better not pry, even thought this woman had already shown to me that she was a very nice woman who probably wouldn’t have minded some small talk and some meaningful, human connection.

I think it’s good to know when it’s time for you to speak up and engage with someone even though it might not be a large part of your personality, as well as when it’s time to take a step back from being the first one to speak and listen to what others have to say.

Again, it’s all about equilibrium.

That’s all for today’s episode. If enjoyed this talk, please don’t forget to hit the follow button, leave a review, and share this podcast with your fellow introverted misfits. Thanks for listening, and have a great day!

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Caroline Smith

Caroline is the founder of The Introverted Misfit, a community committed to helping socially inept people become more socially confident in themselves.

https://theintrovertedmisfit.com
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