Introversion is not some kind of umbrella excuse to be a bad friend

By Brianna Wiest // humanparts.medium.com

For years, I believed I was an introvert.

I worked alone, and I lived alone, I traveled alone and ate alone. All of this was by choice, one I was proud of. I felt free and confident; I was living life on my own terms.

“You really come alive when you’re around people,” a friend said to me.

I knew there was some truth to that, but I was totally against the idea. I still identified myself as an introvert — it had become part of who I was. In the process, it also became something I started to defend. In retrospect, it’s clear that there was some part of me that knew something wasn’t quite right.

I came to find that I am not introverted, and really never was.

For years, I was what I now call a “wounded extrovert,” someone whose connections to those she once cared about were severed in one way or another, and so she found it safer to instead connect to herself.

This worked, for a while.

However, as my life readjusted and improved, I found myself naturally reconnecting with others and actually valuing my time with the people I loved more than anything else. My extroversion was on full display, and I eventually did go back to that friend and tell her she was totally right about me. I have been highly extroverted since the time I was a kid, I just stopped trusting that I could connect with other people in the way I wanted to.

It made me realize that there is a difference between actually being introverted and simply trying to isolate yourself. It’s a difference that few people are aware of and even fewer can differentiate.


Despite so many people believing they’re “introverted extroverts,” the reality is that everyone falls somewhere on the spectrum of introvertedness to extrovertedness. Everyone is, by definition, an ambivert, but your dominant preferences and traits classify you as one or the other. Specifically, the way you regain more of your energy is what will put you in one category over the other.

For introverts, spending time alone is more refueling; for extroverts, spending time with others is. In many cases, the differentiation is subtle, which can make it hard to correctly categorize.

Introversion is not some kind of umbrella excuse to be a bad friend.

More broadly, the term “introvert” has become a catchall for any behaviors that do not classify as being extremely outgoing or constantly social. More people have identified with it in recent years, and I believe that has to do with the rise of constantly feeling exposed and accessible online. Most people want to return to their natural equilibrium by restoring some distance and allowing themselves some space and alone time.

This has led people to confuse self-isolating behaviors with introversion.

If you are constantly canceling plans with your friends, not following through, neglecting to answer messages for days and weeks on end, ignoring invitations, and not showing up for people at very important moments in their lives — that’s not introversion, that’s isolation.

Introversion is not some kind of umbrella excuse to be a bad friend.

In fact, most introverts I know have a number of very close friends for whom they would do just about anything. Big partygoers they may not be, but that does not mean they are fundamentally poor at maintaining human connection.

But there’s a whole new class emerging that consists of the extroverts who were too wounded to continue to sustain their extroversion, and so they misattribute unhealthy behaviors to a personality trait that they do not have.

This is happening for two primary reasons:

1. Falsely identified “introversion” is used as an excuse to restore healthy boundaries, which many people do not have or correctly reinforce.

Most people are not great at boundaries, but boundaries are the foundation of any healthy relationship.

What we cannot achieve by disconnecting digitally, we achieve by disconnecting emotionally.

Boundaries communicate to those around us what behaviors we will and will not tolerate, and what treatment we will and will not accept. It can be as simple as saying when we are going to bed and then honoring that commitment, or as complex as telling someone we will not be doing their emotional labor for them, and we are not open to hearing their barrage of negativity day-in and day-out.

We are turning to “introversion” specifically, now, when our lives are more hyper-connected than ever. In a world in which we are constantly, immediately accessible to virtually anyone and everyone, we crave a healthy dose of alone time.

When we cannot achieve this by disconnecting digitally, we do it by disconnecting emotionally.

It has the opposite effect of what we intend. We do not end up stronger or more refreshed. Instead, we end up actually isolating ourselves from the people we care about because we have totally satiated ourselves with a false sense of “connection,” leaving very little room for the real stuff.

2. After any kind of relationship trauma, wounded extroverts turn to “introversion” as a means of self-protection.

Another behavior that’s becoming increasingly common is turning to isolation (that we call introversion) in order to self-protect in the aftermath of a traumatizing series of relationships.

Instead of trusting in our natural and healthy need for human connection, we start to believe that other people aren’t safe and that we’re better off spending time without them. Though being able to be independent is essential, we do also require interconnectedness to really thrive. It’s what we’re designed for.

Instead of knowing how to restore healthy relationships (by pursuing relationships with people who are capable of having healthy relationships) we instead avoid it altogether. We’re afraid that another rejection might be an unbearable blow to our already fragile self-worth.


Real introversion is not rude or selfish, nor does it involve the complete disregard of other people’s needs.

Those behaviors only happen when we’re isolating. We usually isolate first if we have been hurt, and then more often if we do not want to be held accountable for some set of behaviors we know aren’t the best though we can’t seem to get a hold of them.

Isolation is a sign that we know we have something to fix, and yet we don’t feel we are capable of mending it.

The difference between introversion and isolation is simple: One is a natural expression of your personality, and the other is a coping mechanism, a way to turn off all connections and not look at what we really need to see. It’s not a healthy nor sustainable solution to life’s inevitable blows.

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