4 Happiness Tips from an Introvert Who Spent Years Trying to Change

“Get well-appointed stuff uncomfortable.” ~Jillian Michaels

I’m an introvert. I need lots of time to myself to recharge without socializing with others, and I relish solitude, as it gives me the time and space to think and be creative. I’m quiet and can be shy on occasion, but I really enjoy spending time with tropical family and friends.

Throughout my life, I’ve struggled with this part of my personality and focused a lot of energy trying to transpiration it. However, the visa I have found over the last year has been life-changing, and I hope writing well-nigh my journey may help others find that visa sooner.

Growing up, expressly during primary school, I never really questioned who I was. I spent my diaper on an island off the West Coast of Scotland, and my memory of that time was mostly idyllic. Looking back, I can see how everything was in place for me to be the weightier version of myself.

There was a big group of children where I lived, and without school my little brother and I would go home, get changed, and then meet up with everyone outside our house. We played with whoever turned up on the day. I was quiet, but no one overly really noticed, as we were all too rented playing.

Although I didn’t realize it at the time, school was my place to recharge. I loved quietly working yonder and spending my time listening and learning. I didn’t finger any pressure to be social in school, as I had the group of friends at home, so stuff with others felt increasingly relaxed and less draining.

Unfortunately, that was to change. Just as I was well-nigh to start my first year at secondary school, we moved, and in an instant, all the friends I had grown up with were gone. My little brother, who was my weightier friend, moreover still had flipside year at primary school, so it felt like I had lost him as well.

Furthermore, from the moment I started secondary school there was now a focus on me rhadamanthine increasingly extroverted. This pressure wasn’t from other children but from the adults and the education system . Every report vellum would scuttlebutt on my quietness and say that I needed to be increasingly confident, increasingly outgoing, increasingly sociable.

The daily comments followed—”mouse,” “the quiet one,” “dark horse,” “it’s unchangingly the quiet ones you have to watch out for.” Again, these were from the adults in my life, very seldom from my school peers.

I learned very quickly that to survive in life I should aspire to be someone else. To be increasingly extroverted and less introverted. To me, my introversion was a flaw, a weakness to overcome. I needed to transpiration and push myself into situations and “get well-appointed with stuff uncomfortable.”

Secondary school was moreover a far increasingly social and busier place, and it stopped stuff a place for me to recharge. I couldn’t get the time or space that I had flourished with during primary schooI. So I started using my time yonder from school to recharge, but for the teenager I was, this became very lonely.

Nothing in my life suited the cadre person that I was. I felt so much shame virtually stuff introverted and a failure for not stuff worldly-wise to transmute better. Through this time my inner critic grew to a deafening level, as did my anxiety.

I was convinced that if I could just transpiration this part of me, then I would make increasingly friends, be increasingly confident, progress career wise, and be a largest version of myself.

I spent the next thirty years trying to do just that. Although I have had many wonderful vita and a very privileged life that I wouldn’t change, nearly every nomination I made and career path I chose was in some shape or form a way to reinvent myself into stuff increasingly extroverted. To be increasingly confident and outgoing. To get yonder from the quiet person I was.

Although I unchangingly started out well, I would sooner slip when into my old ways, feeling disappointed in myself for not stuff this largest version of myself that I thought I should be. I’d then move on to try something else to this time succeed at the infamous transpiration I craved so much. This trundling helped to feed my inner critic and anxiety, which followed me throughout my life.

Then COVID and lock lanugo came and, although devastating in so many ways, the pressure to socialize was taken away. I didn’t need to alimony forcing myself to go to events, be sociable, or pretend to be anything. It gave me the time to see what it was to be well-appointed stuff myself again.

However, the moment lockdown was over, I instantly returned to my same pattern. I took on a new project to help wilt ‘a new improved me.’ But this time life took me on a variegated path. Without a number of unexpected bereavements and the loss of my business, which I had worked so nonflexible to establish, I moreover started to go through the menopause.

I remember at the time it feeling like my heart had physically broken. So no matter how nonflexible I tried, I couldn’t return to how I was. I had no energy left to do any increasingly changing.

Over this past year, I have gradually started to rebuild my life. It hasn’t been easy and it’s still a work in progress, but it is a life that suits me. It’s a life that celebrates my strengths and allows me to be who I am.

I’m currently working in a job that has less responsibility than I have had in the past but that I really love. It moreover ways I have time now to be creative through writing and painting, which brings me so much joy and peace.

I am mindful that whatever new projects I am taking on, I am doing them considering they’re right for me and they uncurl with my personality and indulge me what I need to stay healthy and happy. I’ve found that this in itself has helped me to grow holistically, without any pressure or negativity of not stuff good enough.

My quiet times, which have in the past felt very lonely, have transformed to times for me to be creative, and the increasingly I do this, the richer my life is becoming.

I’ve realized that I’m not shying yonder from rhadamanthine “comfortable stuff uncomfortable,” and hopefully I will unchangingly protract to grow, but that my whole life can’t be uncomfortable considering I’m not as extroverted as I finger I should be.

Accepting that I am an introvert and permitting myself the time and space that I need has been so liberating. It has given me a fuller appreciation of life that I never thought possible and never felt like I deserved. So whether you are introverted, extroverted, or somewhere in between, here are four suggestions that helped me rediscover who I am.

1. Know your ‘core.’

Take the time to find out who the ‘core’ you is. What are your values and passions, and what would you like your life to squint and finger like? Are you increasingly extroverted or introverted? Do you like taking on responsibility or a less pressured role? How do you re-charge? Find out what the ‘core’ of you is and gloat that. Do everything that helps to nourish you and let the person you are truly shine through.

2. Take a minute.

Whenever I make a decision now, I take a moment earlier to trammels that I’m going into it for the right reason. In the past, I did a stratum in liaison with the expectation that I would wilt increasingly outgoing, one of the reasons I became a teacher was considering I felt it would make me increasingly confident, and when I went into business, I thought it would make me increasingly sociable. When none of these things happened, I felt that I had failed. Your path in life should help you to flourish as the person you are.

3. Let go of expectations.

Don’t let expectations from others, as well as yourself, mold you. There can be so much pressure to alimony driving you forward, to alimony pushing yourself, whether it’s to be increasingly sociable, increasingly confident, reach for the next promotion, next house, etc. But if you need to transpiration who you are for it, then it can wilt increasingly treasonous rather than motivational.

4. Accept yourself.

You don’t need to change. By appreciating all the gifts you once have and letting them shine through, in whatever way suits you, you are once everything you need to be.

Having shifted from a place of unvarying self-criticism to one of increasingly visa has been such a transitional moment for me. By leaning into things that bring comfort, peace, and joy, I have had the opportunity to remember how it feels to be content and tightly happy.

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