Why?
Because hiding out makes us feel safe. Yet hiding out too long takes away from the life we could be living.
We can hide out physically when we need to take a break from the world around us. Introverts recharge this way. Extroverts hide out too. Extroverts, since they replenish their energy by being with people, if left on their own too long, deplete their energy. Then there are the Extroverted Introverts, also called “outgoing introverts”, “ambiverts,” or “social introverts” have qualities of both personalities. They are not entirely loners but don’t necessarily enjoy spending time with large groups of people.
What’s important to know is that we are adaptive creatures. According to Professor Brian Little, former Harvard University psychology lecturer and winner of the 3M Teaching Fellowship, we can be a little bit of both.
How can this be?
In an article written by Susan Cain, (Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking – Susan Cain (2012), Part IV. HOW TO LOVE, HOW TO WORK ,Chapter 9. WHEN SHOULD YOU ACT MORE EXTROVERTED THAN YOU REALLY ARE?), she explains more.
“The answer, he says, is simple, and it has to do with a new field of psychology that he created almost single handedly, called Free Trait Theory. Little believes that fixed traits and free traits coexist. According to Free Trait Theory, we are born and culturally endowed with certain personality traits—introversion, for example—but we can and do act out of character in the service of “core personal projects.”
In other words, introverts are capable of acting like extroverts for the sake of work they consider important, people they love, or anything they value highly. Free Trait Theory explains why an introvert might throw his extroverted wife a surprise party or join the PTA at his daughter’s school. It explains how it’s possible for an extroverted scientist to behave with reserve in her laboratory, for an agreeable person to act hard-nosed during a business negotiation, and for a cantankerous uncle to treat his niece tenderly when he takes her out for ice cream. As these examples suggest, Free Trait Theory applies in many different contexts, but it’s especially relevant for introverts living under the Extrovert Ideal.
According to Little, our lives are dramatically enhanced when we’re involved in core personal projects that we consider meaningful, manageable, and not unduly stressful, and that are supported by others. When someone asks us “How are things?” we may give a throwaway answer, but our true response is a function of how well our core personal projects are going.
That’s why Professor Little, the consummate introvert, lectures with such passion. Like a modern-day Socrates, he loves his students deeply; opening their minds and attending to their well-being are two of his core personal projects. When Little held office hours at Harvard, the students lined up in the hallway as if he were giving out free tickets to a rock concert. For more than twenty years his students asked him to write several hundred letters of recommendation a year. “Brian Little is the most engaging, entertaining, and caring professor I have ever encountered,” wrote one student about him. “I cannot even begin to explain the myriad ways in which he has positively affected my life.” So, for Brian Little, the additional effort required to stretch his natural boundaries is justified by seeing his core personal project—igniting all those minds—come to fruition.
So if you can fake it, if you master the acting skills, the attention to social nuance, and the willingness to submit to social norms that self-monitoring requires, should you? The answer is that a Free Trait strategy can be effective when used judiciously, but disastrous if overdone.
Understanding our “core personal projects.” First, think back to what you loved to do when you were a child. How did you answer the question of what you wanted to be when you grew up? The specific answer you gave may have been off the mark, but the underlying impulse was not. If you wanted to be a fireman, what did a fireman mean to you? A good man who rescued people in distress? A daredevil? Or the simple pleasure of operating a truck? Second, pay attention to the work you gravitate to. In my sales career, I didn’t much care for the fast sale of a piece of equipment just to sell it, I preferred the consultative sale that offered the solution and added value. I also sat on many non profit boards. Dedicated to the greater good of the organization’s mission. I spent time, leading, mentoring, and developing volunteers as well as raising money for the greater good of the community. I am an introvert at heart, stepping outside myself helped me to help others through modeling and mentoring. Finally, pay attention to what you envy. Jealousy is an ugly emotion, but it tells the truth. You mostly envy those who have what you desire.
Even if you’re stretching yourself in the service of a core personal project, you don’t want to act out of character too much, or for too long. Remember those definitions of introverts and extroverts? How we hide out takes away from our every or can replenish our energy. So when we move across the grain of how we innately fill our tank, we could find ourselves completely depleted. Those hideout sessions tell us that, paradoxically, the best way to act out of character is to stay as true to yourself as you possibly can—starting by creating as many “restorative niches” as possible in your daily life.
“Restorative niche” is Professor Little’s term for the place you go when you want to return to your true self. It can be a physical place, like a physical walking path that is tranquil and quiet or a temporal one, like the quiet breaks you plan between sales calls.
You choose a restorative niche when you close the door to your private office (if you’re lucky enough to have one) in between meetings. You can even create a restorative niche during a meeting, by carefully selecting where you sit, and when and how you participate.
We would all be better off if, before accepting a new job, we evaluated the presence or absence of restorative niches as carefully as we consider the family leave policy or health insurance plans. Introverts should ask themselves: Will this job allow me to spend time on in-character activities like, for example, reading, strategizing, writing, and researching? Will I have a private workspace or be subject to the constant demands of an open office plan? If the job doesn’t give me enough restorative niches, will I have enough free time on evenings and weekends to grant them to myself?
Extroverts will want to look for restorative niches, too. Does the job involve talking, traveling, and meeting new people? Is the office space stimulating enough? If the job isn’t a perfect fit, are the hours flexible enough that I can blow off steam after work? Think through the job description carefully.
Finding restorative niches isn’t always easy. You might want to read quietly by the fire on Saturday nights, but if your spouse wishes you’d spend those evenings out with her large circle of friends, then what? You might want to retreat to the oasis of your private office in between sales calls, but what if your company just switched over to an open office plan? If you plan to exercise free traits, you’ll need the help of friends, family, and colleagues.
The final piece of Free Trait Theory is a A Free Trait Agreement. It acknowledges that we’ll each act out of character some of the time—in exchange for being ourselves the rest of the time. It’s a Free Trait Agreement when a wife who wants to go out every Saturday night and a husband who wants to relax by the fire work out a schedule: half the time we’ll go out, and half the time we’ll stay home. It’s a Free Trait Agreement when you attend your extroverted best friend’s wedding shower, engagement celebration, and bachelorette party, but she understands when you skip out on the three days’ worth of group activities leading up to the wedding itself.
Double pneumonia and an overscheduled life can happen to anyone, of course, but for Little, it was the result of acting out of character for too long and without enough restorative niches. When your conscientiousness impels you to take on more than you can handle, you begin to lose interest, even in tasks that normally engage you. You also risk your physical health. “Emotional labor,” which is the effort we make to control and change our own emotions, is associated with stress, burnout, and even physical symptoms like an increase in cardiovascular disease. Professor Little believes that prolonged acting out of character may also increase autonomic nervous system activity, which can, in turn, compromise immune functioning.
One noteworthy study suggests that people who suppress negative emotions tend to leak those emotions later in unexpected ways. The psychologist Judith Grob asked people to hide their emotions as she showed them disgusting images. She even had them hold pens in their mouths to prevent them from frowning. She found that this group reported feeling less disgusted by the pictures than did those who’d been allowed to react naturally. Later, however, the people who hid their emotions suffered side effects. Their memory was impaired, and the negative emotions they’d suppressed seemed to color their outlook. When Grob had them fill in the missing letter to the word “gr_ss,” for example, they were more likely than others to offer “gross” rather than “grass.” “People who tend to [suppress their negative emotions] regularly,” concludes Grob, “might start to see the world in a more negative light.”
That’s why these days Professor Little is in restorative mode, retired from the university and reveling in his wife’s company in their house in the Canadian countryside. Little says that his wife, Sue Phillips, the director of the School of Public Policy and Administration at Carleton University, is so much like him that they don’t need a Free Trait Agreement to govern their relationship. But his Free Trait Agreement with himself provides that he do his remaining “scholarly and professional deeds with good grace,” but not “hang around longer than necessary.”
Then he goes home and snuggles by the fire with Sue.”
To read the full article, go to https://publicism.info/psychology/quiet/10.html.
Understanding ourselves, the awareness and engagement of the study of personal development will help us shape the person we desire to be. By molding our innate personalities and traits with the variables that we can overcome by our true faith and determination of our core values that are utmost important to us, without hiding.
Visionary Thinkers use their passion to push them to the highest levels of their potential, maximizing their strengths and minimizing their weaknesses.
How are you investing in your personal development? What goals and passions are you still looking to achieve? What’s getting in your way? What are you waiting for?
Ann Franzese is a Leadership and Executive Coach and the founder of Journey to Success. She believes that all things are possible once you know how to maneuver your thoughts and emotional shifts by breaking through the blocks that impede self and progress, up- leveling your thinking to support big dreams and visioning a grand impact you can make on this world. Being open and courageous to go after it, day after day. And crafting a journey to success that brings discovery, exploration, happiness and fulfillment to self and those surrounding you. Learn more at www.journeytosuccess.me.
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