Tag: introvert

“Can you dabao McDonald’s home for your dad?”

I felt my palms get sweaty and my heart beat faster as I read the text from my mum on the way home from school one day. Should I think of an excuse to not do so? Maybe tell her I don’t have enough money to buy dinner for my dad?

Surely ordering a McDonald’s meal over the cashier wasn’t that difficult. And yet, the thought of having to talk to a stranger left me in a cold sweat. What if I messed up the order? What would the cashier think of me? I hated how these thoughts would consume me at every step of the way. Why couldn’t I be like the other kids? All I wanted was to be normal.

LEARNING ABOUT SOCIAL ANXIETY

Whenever my friends ask me, “Why you don’t wanna join us? Don’t be so anti-social leh,” I wish I could’ve told them that it’s not that I didn’t want to hang out with them, I was just afraid that they wouldn’t like me.

Or when my secondary school teacher gave me feedback that went something like, “You’re too shy in class and should open up and take part in class discussions more,” I wish I could’ve told her that it’s not that I didn’t want to participate more in class, I was just afraid of the humiliation from answering questions wrongly. Would I become a laughing stock? And if I get it right, would they think that I’m just showing off?

In school, I pretty much kept to myself most of the time and I didn’t have a lot of friends.. To an outsider, I was shy and introverted. I guess I came across as antisocial at times.

Because everyone kept calling me shy, I believed that that’s all that it was. But no matter how much I tried to break out from my “shyness”, I couldn’t.

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One day, my friend noticed that I would get panic attacks before class presentations. My heart would race faster and cause a lump in my throat that made it difficult to breathe. She encouraged me to talk to the school counselor.

My school counselor was the first person to tell me that I may have social anxiety disorder. She referred me to a psychiatrist, who diagnosed me with it.

I was finally able to rationalise everything I had been feeling for the better part of my life. However, I also came to realise that it is much easier to let people think that I was just ‘shy’, because when you start telling someone that you have a mental condition, chances are you’d have to start explaining why you feel certain things—how do I explain feelings that I don’t even want to have myself?

Admitting that I had social anxiety to other people was the most difficult part of coming to terms with my mental health. The first time I told someone about my social anxiety, they said: “Huh isn’t that just social awkwardness? I also have!”

I couldn’t blame them for reacting that way but hearing that from friends was still pretty hurtful. It made me feel that what I felt or thought didn’t matter. Them brushing me off made me even more resistant to tell anyone else about it.

Even today, my parents are unaware of my social anxiety. Growing up, I’ve felt the disdain my parents’ have towards mental issues through the passing remarks they make about mental health patients being “attention-seeking” and “weak”.

Because of this, I hid the fact that I had social anxiety to myself. And for the most part of my teenage years, social anxiety controlled my life because I didn’t dare to speak to anyone about it.

WHAT DOES SOCIAL ANXIETY FEEL LIKE?

Social anxiety is not being able to answer questions in class because I was scared of what my classmates would think of me.

Social anxiety is having my heart race 10 times faster when I hear the telephone ring, and then having to rehearse exactly what to say before answering it.

Social anxiety is the constant fear of having my friends talk about me behind my back, because in my mind, I'd keep thinking that they don’t actually like me.

Social anxiety is listening more than talking in group discussions because I’ve convinced myself that my opinions don’t matter, and that I will just be looked down upon.

It decided what I did and didn’t do, and this constant self-doubt and fear got so bad that it created limitations that hindered my everyday life. No matter how illogical the thoughts I had were, I would constantly find reasons to avoid situations that could trigger my social anxiety in the slightest way.

Back when I was on an internship, I called in sick on the day that I was supposed to head for a meeting at another office. The thought of facing the unfamiliar and embarrassing myself in front of my boss and associates scared me. It wasn’t just the nerves either. I genuinely feared the consequences of failure. In my mind, this just kept replaying: “If I mess this up, my boss would hate me and my entire six months of internship would become a nightmare.”

Slowly, I realised that I was letting my social anxiety influence my day-to-day decisions. I had let it consume my life in a lot of subtle ways and there was a point I thought I would never be able to overcome my social anxiety.

For years I ignored having to deal with it. I stupidly thought that ignoring it would somehow make the problem go away. But I realised that it was impossible to avoid situations that could trigger my social anxiety forever. After all, I’d have to meet people everyday, be it at work, in school or in public, I would always be surrounded by people. And with that, I would always be scared of what the people around me were thinking of me.

LEARNING TO RIDE WITH IT

When I joined the workforce at 23, I found that the people around me were a lot more open-minded and accepting, contrary to the people I’ve met in school or at home. That made me comfortable in opening up about my social anxiety.

For the most part, having social anxiety means putting up an act everyday, because it’s difficult for someone else to recognise this disorder, or differentiate it from merely being shy. But finally being able to openly talk about it and realising that there are other people out there who can relate to my struggles made me feel less alone.

I would be lying if I said that I don’t get sweaty palms anymore when I get an unexpected phone call or if I have to share my thoughts to a group of people. And I still often struggle with the habitual thoughts that my friends or colleagues are speaking ill of me whenever I hear them whispering near me.

Social anxiety is probably something that I will never ‘get rid of’ completely, it’s every McDonald’s order, every first conversation, every phone call to a stranger, that has helped me get better over the years.

I’ve come to accept that my social anxiety will always be a part of me and that I should grow with it, instead of against it.

Also read: 8 Singapore Shared Snapshots Of What Depression Was Like For Them

(Header Image Credit: Budagchin Erka)

The open concept office has made its presence very much known in the workplace today. Where it used to be just startups adopting this style of working, in more recent times, corporate firms too have begun adapting to this change.

THE DEATH OF CUBICLES

Cubicles, that once defined the workplace, are a concept of the past. They just weren’t for everyone. People began to realise that cubicles were restricting the "creative flow". Co-workers just weren’t communicating or collaborating with each other. On the outside, it seemed like the perfect idea. Getting rid of walls improves workflow and communication between co-workers. You no longer feel like a captive, stuck within the walls of a cubicle 8 hours a day. It’s an ideal collaboration hub, right? But one major loophole in the open concept office has been neglected. While the open concept office may increase communication and collaboration, it takes away personal productivity.

LESS WALLS = MORE DISTRACTIONS

Sitting here in an open concept office right now, I am triggered by almost 5 different noises. These noises are nothing more than distractions to me. There's the two guys behind me conversing ever so loudly, my friendly co-worker next to me typing furiously, or the guy two seats away munching on his food. Never mind the fact that you’re constantly aware of the movement and footsteps around the office.

THE INTROVERT’S NIGHTMARE

My introvert friends will agree with me on this: if you’re an introvert working in an open concept office, headphones are your best friend. Just be careful not to come off as an anti-social. While the lucky ones may be able to train themselves into blocking out the noise, the open concept office is every introvert’s worst nightmare. There are enough articles written about introverts for everyone to know that introverts thrive on personal space, which evidently, the open concept office doesn’t offer much of. It only makes sense for us to want personal space if we’re going to be spending 8 hours a day seated in the same place. 

NOT JUST ABOUT THE INTROVERTS

The lack of privacy is a hindrance to the creativity and productivity of all workers. It almost feels like your actions are being policed because you never know when your boss or colleagues are watching you. It actually kind of reminds me of Bentham’s Panopticon prison design that forces inmates to self-regulate their behaviour. Of course, the level of intensity is a little different. The truth of the matter is, not every job is reliant on communication or collaboration that enthusiasts preach about. By no means am I implying that I’d rather work in a cubicle. But it makes me wonder if there is a middle ground between the traditional workplace and the workplace of today. A workplace for both the introvert and the extrovert - one that gives you the privacy you need AND allows room for collaboration.

NEGLECTING WHAT’S IMPORTANT 

I’m all for having “Google” themed offices that make it hard for workers to leave for home. Implementing fun into work with beanbag chairs, foosball tables and sleeping pods are all great ways to keep workers happy. But isn’t the main purpose of a workplace… to work? Maybe you’ve just wasted 2 minutes of your time reading this. Maybe it is all about preference. But there has to be some truth behind publications like <a href=" New Yorker, that have reported on how research shows that open concept offices reduce productivity. Until the time comes when open concept offices are a concept of the past, you’ll find me with my headphones listening to Linkin Park, or something. Top Image Credit
Throughout the past couple of centuries and more, society has shifted from idolizing one group of people to another. In the late 19th and early 20th Century it was the scientist and inventor; in the Roaring Twenties it was the young and independent; in the 40s and 50s it was the soldier; in the 60s and 70s the businessman and stockbroker; in the 80s the rocker, and so on. Today, one can (and in my case, will) argue that the “in-crowd” of the moment is that of the introvert. Introverts might hate being in the spotlight, but like it or not, the spotlight is exactly where they’re in.

BOOKS, QUIET, SOLITUDE, RAINY DAY, ETC.

Unless your internet has been out for the past decade (maybe you use Singtel, or something), you must have realized that digital media abounds with respect for the archetype of the introvert. We have this image of what an introvert is, and spout volumes of rhetoric about their virtues. The introspective intellectual; the bookish loner; the quiet party-hater; the lone wolf in his fortress of solitude. Take a hike through the myriad introvert-centric articles of the elitedaily’s and thoughtcatalog’s of the net and you might find that our image of the stereotypical introvert has gotten so specific and extreme that it can only be described as caricature. While many of us identify in some way as introverts, many of us also identify in certain ways with characteristics of the extrovert. Regardless, whether you consider yourself an introvert, extrovert, or ambivert, it is important to realise that introversion-extraversion is not a binary. The vast majority of people fall somewhere in the middle of the spectrum, exhibiting both introverted and extroverted traits to varying degrees. Not all introverts are smart or shy, and not all extroverts are boneheaded jocks or basic bitches who hate books and meaningful conversation. However, many an internet article waxing rhetoric on the shrine of the introvert seems subscribed to the notion that the traits commonly associated with introversion are exclusive to and inextricable from introverts. Come on, guys. You know it’s not that simple.

PRODUCT OF TECHNOLOGY

In her article titled The Introvert Fetish, Whitney Erin Boesel asserts that beyond internet articles and blogposts pandering to the sensibilities of the introvert, the introvert craze we are in might actually have begun as a response to the invention of the internet. With the advent of the world-wide web and the advancement of communication technology, we began to witness an unprecedented level of superficiality in our communications. We realized that in many ways, communicating on the internet resembles our typical ideas associated with extraversion. Messages are short and shallow. Articles are a fraction the length of their printed counterparts. Social media interactions are touch-and-go. Like our constantly ringing smartphones, extroverts never shut up. Like our Facebook accounts, extroverts have far too many fake friends. Like extroverts, online communication lacks depth and authenticity. Because of this, we have gravitated away from the innate superficiality of cyberspace, towards a pursuit of real-ness, hence driving us into an appreciation of the characteristics of introversion, to the point of “fetishism”. Ironically, while the internet may be a haven for introverts and their self-praising fans, the decidedly un-introverted characteristics of online communications may be exactly what birthed the introvert craze in the first place. Or, as Boesel puts it, “Actual introverts may have a particular affinity for the Internet, but the Internet itself becomes an extrovert.” As a way of pushing back against the perceived hollowness of digitally mediated experiences, Boesel believes that we as a society have invented the introvert fetish in an attempt to reconnect with a sense of offline authenticity and meaning, even while staying constantly connected to the internet. We want to call ourselves introverts, because we want to believe that we are genuine and "real", while we flood ourselves with all the fake, superficial nonsense of the internet and social media. What do you think, dear reader? Do you identify as an introvert? If you do, how do you feel about the constant barrage of media sucking up to the stereotypical introvert by portraying a caricaturized version of you? Do you think the introvert craze is a positive movement towards the acceptance of introverts in a traditionally extrovert-dominated world? Or is it simply a manifestation of conservative backlash against the artificiality of an internet-augmented society? <a href=" Image Credit
We all have that one friend who's an introvert. The one who doesn't reveal much and shies away from attention. The one who prefers not to say a word and would rather stay by the side, observing everyone else. The mysterious one who exudes an aura of silence so loud it's deafening. Perhaps calling them introverted might be an understatement altogether. Yet, when introverts show affection, they do it with all of their hearts, sometimes even more so than the extroverts. Want to know if you've won the affections of an introvert? Here are some sure-fire ways to tell.

1. They initiate conversations with you

It takes a lot from them, but they do it anyway. If they see you as someone who's worthy of their time, you'll know because introverts initiate very few conversations with very few people. Introverts hate small talk, but if they're willing to engage in them with you from time to time, you know what it means.

2. They care about your feelings

In fact, they not only care, they care a lot. Compared to their extroverted counterparts, they look out for you in their own quiet, subtle way--no fanfare involved. When you're sick, they'll buy you herbal tea and quietly place it somewhere you'll definitely see it. They notice all the things that make you you, and they remember the little things you say. Because introverts don't expend energy going to many different social gatherings, they devote their attention towards you. They sacrifice their precious alone time for you and they do so with nary a complaint. Introverts are some of the most sensitive people around, and if they focus their attention on you, chances are, the whole world is going to know too.

3. They go out of their comfort zones for you

They don't rely on mere words or sweet talk to show you their affections--they use actions to do so. They leave their comfort zones for you, and they do so voluntarily. They may hate crowds and abhor noisy places, but if you so much as hint to them that you're interested, they'd brave all that for you and more. They might even assume the role of an entertainer if the situation calls for it. This willingness to deviate away from their usual selves only goes to show how important you are to them.

4. They let you into their lives

They let you into territory no one else has gone before. They tell you about their dogs, their saddest childhood memories, their deepest regrets, their dreams and aspirations. Most notably, they tell you about their insecurities. They want you by their side and they're not afraid to show it. These are an introvert’s ways of showing trust in a person, and if you actually know all this information about their lives, it's no easy feat and it's also the clearest indication that they genuinely care for and like you.

5. They see you as their other half

They're not going to do anything without first thinking about you. Whether it's an event that's caught their eye, a movie that's just been released, a song they heard or even a quote they saw, you'll be the first thing to pop into their minds. If an introvert likes you, you are indeed one lucky soul.