Category: introversion

a note on the “d word”

April 8, 2018 / / 0 Comments

Currently, I’m working against a low level of anger and frustration–most of which is directed at myself because I haven’t been as productive as I’d hoped to be. I haven’t hit my stride yet. I haven’t been disciplined enough. When I notice that I’m directing my frustrations outward and turning into an unbearable asshole, I take a deep breath and finally recognize it as my trusty old friend: depression. Ah, Resistance at its finest.

Even though I can fake my way through an hour or two at a time, it can be hard to shake because it manifests in so many different ways. Sometimes the songbird just can’t bring itself to sing. I think I often find things to be critical of in order to protect myself, to put a shell around myself because vulnerability is hard (and there’s another reason why writing is freaking hard, because it’s sharing a part of yourself and inviting rejection and criticism).

I know that pouring into other people and getting out of my own head is a way to beat depression, but the ugly thing about depression is that it makes you feel like other people can’t/don’t benefit from your existence. Something (or a variety of things) in your experience has caused you to believe that your feelings, your efforts, your presence, whatever abilities you think you have, the things you put out into the world—none of it matters. You feel small. Inconsequential. Useless and unwanted.

In spite of carrying around that feeling all the time, it hurts to type it. And from the outside, to those who haven’t truly wrestled with actual depression, it must sound incredibly selfish. I can say with certainty that how it sounds could not be more different than how it feels. It’s not hunger for approval, it’s a deep need for meaning. (Any fellow INFJs out there can tell you how exhausting small talk can be, as there is a longing for substance and depth and connection.) And it’s not circumstantial. It doesn’t change with your environment and you can’t will yourself out of it. This isn’t a defeatist attitude, it’s an unwillingness to take the placebo (“just shake it off and get over it”) and prolong the real problem.

I think it was Charlotte Bronte who said that “a restless mind makes a ruffled pillow.” Depression keeps your mind always wandering, which is probably why the thing a depressed person wants the most is to just sleep. It steals restful sleep, and that leads to a whole host of other problems. It’s a seemingly endless cycle. And most people will either not notice or will just think you’re an unpleasant person. The depressive is generally not an unhappy person. Happiness is a state of a soul content with finding a balance of virtue and pleasure in life, not circumstances or merely a feeling. A melancholy exterior can misrepresent what’s going on inside. Sometimes you’re just exhausted and have to turn down some functions because you’re feeling everything.

I find beauty in a lot of things and am easily moved. I think that’s a common trait among creative types, that they see beauty in things that most others assume shouldn’t contain beauty, so they don’t look, and those who do see beauty in dark places seem melancholy or strange. With that comes very low lows—lows that people who live in the middle struggle to relate to. We notice everything, so maybe it’s frustrating when other people seem oblivious to the things that seem so evident to us. For me, that often results in frustration with other people. I have to check myself and remember not to hold everyone to my own standards, or hold it against them for not understanding what I’m feeling.

I have to also remind myself that life is worth living because it is so dynamic. I personally prefer to stay away from chemical antidepressants  (*standard disclaimer that I am not a doctor and this is not a good choice for everyone) because I’ve never had any desire to live in the middle all the time. I’d rather know that lows are part of the game (as much is it sucks) if I can experience the highs and notice the little beauties that often get overlooked. I have to remind myself that this very trait means I have something to offer, a perspective that I take for granted. Contrast–darks against the light–breaks up the monotony and makes people take notice. No two people see the world the same, and even if others see your take on it as weird, maybe it’s the extremeness of it that illuminates something that no one else would have noticed. So hang in there; you will feel like singing again.

the most important defense against resistance

November 2, 2016 / / 2 Comments

The single most important thing you can do to defeat creative resistance is to get the focus off of yourself and get around people who think bigger than you do.

Find your tribe

I had been so keen on finding what I wanted to niche down into and find out what I was good at outside of my day job that I was elbow deep in assessment tests and books about finding my element. Instead of trying to find my element, I should have been trying to find my tribe. I recently attended the very first seanwes conference in Austin, Texas. I’ve been listening to the seanwes podcast and a part of its online Community for about a year and a half. These are people who think bigger. I was intimidated going into the conference because so many of them are killing it in their chosen industry, and here I am not knowing what I want to do with my life.

When you’re talking to the right people, your floundering introduction of who you are and what you’re about gets abbreviated quickly. I went into the conference with something like, “My day job is as a sign artist for Trader Joe’s, but on the side I also like to write, draw, hand letter, and sometimes I sell crochet stuff and…” Then someone would say something like, “Oh I love Trader Joe’s! What kind of writing do you do? What are you working on?” If you do this more than once, you’ve gotta come up with a better elevator pitch.

I started saying that something I had thought about doing was writing and illustrating a series of books for children that broke down into digestible chunks the key concepts in the Great Books of western civilization, such as Plato, Augustine, Kierkegaard, Emerson, etc. When this was the part of my muddy introduction that people responded to, I tossed out the window the other ideas rattling around in my head that I wasn’t truly on fire about.

Get outside of your own head

If you’re being shy, you’re thinking about yourself. This was my problem in trying to figure out what I might be good at. I am an introvert in the extreme, but these were people I had interacted with online and knew they were people I just had to know in person. I already loved these individuals, and that made it so much easier to walk up and talk to them. I had to stop being selfish, stop being a wallflower.

Yes, I wanted to get the most out of this conference by engaging with people and building relationships. Yes, I wanted clarity for my own vision. But what happens when you get outside your own head and talk to others is that you see their vision, too. It magnifies what you’re doing. It empowers you to think about how you might serve a much bigger purpose, solve a much bigger problem, and to help more people.

That, in the end, is what it’s all about: how can I serve more people? Stop being shy and engage with others about your vision so you can better serve your audience. Serve your audience for the purpose of growing them and helping even more people. Do what you do because you love people.

Get a bigger vision

Get a bigger vision, then talk about it. Talk about it a lot. Once I put it out there that I wanted to do this illustrated Great Books series for children, people said, “Yes, do that!” The more I shared, the more feedback I got and the bigger that vision became. I started to see that the real reason I wanted to do this was to normalize what seems like big, daunting ideas for a younger audience so they’re not intimidated when they reach high school or college.

Sean McCabe often says, “Normalize what seems big to you. Think in bigger units.” Perhaps this would be more than a book series. It could be a whole curriculum. It could potentially change the way we educate young people. If understanding Plato’s cave analogy is normal in elementary school, think how much deeper students can dive into those primary texts when they’re in high school or college.

I went into the conference with very little focus as far as what I wanted to do outside of my day job. By day two, I knew exactly what I wanted to do and started taking action on it right away. By day three, it was a bigger calling than I could have imagined. I never would have imagined it if not for connecting with people who get it. I never would have imagined it if I didn’t have the guts to share that little seed of an idea.

Imagine if I had let shyness prevent me from going to the conference in the first place (I almost did). Sean also said, “The only thing holding you back is the smallness of your ideas.” Get a bigger mission so you can take massive action, be known, and help more people. You’re not being selfish by wanting to do big things and talking about your dreams; you’re being selfish by keeping them from others.

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Don’t be afraid of success

Only you can build your dream. Talk about your vision, get the right people on board, get out of your own way and work your ass off on that thing. Focus hard on that one thing and build a bonfire that can’t be ignored. Get known so you can do more. Walt Disney said, “We don’t make movies to make money. We make money to make more movies.” The money you make enables you to do bigger things, so don’t be afraid to make as much as you can. It’s not greedy because it’s not about you. It’s an enabler of your bigger purpose.

Keep it positive

Even though everyone at the conference was light years ahead of me in their pursuits, I never once felt an ounce of judgement or embarrassment that I wasn’t at their level. Everyone was there to improve their game, and the atmosphere was overwhelmingly positive.These individuals are successful because there’s a team of successful people cheering them on. They are super humble about their success, too, so it’s very common to see high-functioning creatives struggling with impostor syndrome or the occasional hater.

Successful people don’t spend an ounce of energy tearing others down. –Sean McCabe

Sean also made a great point that the opposite of love isn’t hate, it’s irrelevance. If you’re successful enough to be noticed by a lot of people, you’ll elicit strong opinions on both ends of the spectrum. If you remain in the middle, you’re not putting yourself out there enough to be known or for people to care either way. But when people say hateful things, remember that it’s not about you at all. If they’re spending their energy tearing you down, they themselves are not successful. Don’t let someone else’s opinion limit you.

 

When creative Resistance has you up against a wall, try shifting your focus. It’s not about you. Are you stuck in a rut because you’re navel gazing? Remember that whatever your dream or passion, in the end it’s always about serving other people. Any money you make beyond what you need to survive is to equip yourself to serve others with what you do. Your unique talents aren’t merely for your own enjoyment, they are to do big things in the service of an audience. When you have people tearing you down, remember that it’s not about you. When you’re struggling with moving forward, get around a group of people who can bring perspective to your struggle. The world deserves what you have to offer, so put yourself out there. We are built for community. It’s your duty to share yourself and your gifts.

introversion & authenticity

September 2, 2015 / / 0 Comments

Not everyone will like you, but you have to give them the opportunity to make that choice.

Last week I posted about permission and having no regrets. I realized that my only regrets in life are regrets of omission– that perhaps I hadn’t fully participated in life. For instance, I’ve never been much of an athlete, but I was great at swimming. I probably could have really made something of myself on that front, but I got really focused on school and swimming took a back seat. I never continued to develop into the really strong swimmer I could have been. But I can always take up swimming again.  More than failing to hone a skill, what I regret more are missed relationship opportunities.

Every year toward the end of school I would start really getting to know a handful of people, and they’d always say something like, “You should talk more!” or “I didn’t know you were funny.” I guess I always subconsciously felt I had nothing to lose by showing my true colors right before saying goodbye. I was too shy to reveal too much of myself during the rest of the school year. I was always afraid I’d scare people away, even though experience showed that true friends had always been gained when I let my “freak flag fly.” The right friends are the ones who love you for who you are, to whom you are a special treasure because so few are allowed into your world.

But part of me regrets missing out on what other friendships might have been if I hadn’t been so afraid of opening up around people. It’s okay to only let the right ones into your inner circle. In fact, I think it’s entirely healthy. But that doesn’t mean it’s healthy to close yourself off from everyone else. Not everyone will like you, but you have to give them the opportunity to make that choice.

For us introverted types, it often feels safe to be neutral. We’re behind-the-scenes types. We’re observers. Some may even call us floaters. We get along with everyone and don’t fit neatly into cliques, because we don’t really broadcast enough of ourselves for people to put a label on us. But you know what they say: still waters run deep. It’s okay to not have clearly defined, superficial characteristics that allow others to file us away neatly in a box.

Just like honesty is always the best policy, you should always be yourself. Be authentic with everyone. You don’t have to unleash 100% of your personality all the time, but don’t let your shyness be an excuse to not engage with people. If you scare them away, fine. But keeping yourself to yourself might be depriving both you and someone else of a really great friendship. So don’t be afraid to show your true colors. You’ll attract the right people, and the ones you might “scare away” probably aren’t the right people to be around. If you remain in a corner, you’ll never know who may have been drawn to your flame.

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