Introverts didn't 'win' lockdown
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Early in the lockdowns I made a trip to the closest big city for a dentist appointment and I was amazed by the transformation, the closed businesses, the long lines, the obvious ubiquitous fear. Several family members struggled after losing jobs. It's quite clear how this disaster has seriously affected so many other people.
So while I don't count myself as a winner in this, it does seem to be a substantial win to not be one of the losers.
Even when my partner is away for a few weeks I don't feel alone. I've spent months alone in Asia without feeling alone.
I feel really lucky today for being in this situation. Some people turned their life upside down and I just got more of the life that I always wanted.
Edit:// I forgot to mention that I indeed have friends and also did all the social things regularly 2 years ago. My point is that I often felt like I have to attend these social things and I actually don't miss them. Still chatting online from time to time.
Basically years of building more or less successful side projects.
But to be fair no 2 years ago I was delivering paper ads for a few months, because a bunch of random projects surely aren't a sustainable income , always :)
Edit:// also it is actually cheaper living as I do than it was living down in the city. My house is old, we heat with wood only. Farming markets here are generally cheaper than supermarkets for quality meat and Vegs. The $500 overhead we pay for our car leasing we would not need otherwise is way less than what we save per square meter living so remote. And we need some extra space for the mentioned e-commerce
Same. I was extremely fortunate that this disaster and my work, family, and financial setup meant things had little impact on me. It hit my kids harder socially, but educationally they ended up much better because they had a highly educated retired family member as a neighbor. They did and did their remote schooling there, with help available at all times to extent far beyond what 1 teacher with 25 kids can do in a classroom.
That was extremely fortunate, especially seeing other kids in the school whose families basically had no choice but to lose a year of school-- but the way things are functioning, they're still moving up a grade and schools all over the country are going to be having problems with a significant % of students who not only didn't learn anything, but are 1.5 years away from the last time they were even in the habit of having to learn.
"Not a loser" is indeed winning in this case.
But for neighbors etc that were in the same social bubble observing the same careful restrictions it seems too much. I think the government has been well within its rights in certain mandates that ensure careless people don't inflict their negligence on other people, but in some cases I think it went too far.
On the other hand, especially at the beginning, everyone was dealing with incomplete and imperfect information. It was not an easy time to be a decision maker on such issues especially when people's actions became expressions of political affiliation. Masks are a perfect example:
Resistance started as a rallying cry to allow people take personal responsibility, a mindset I can understand. But it then morphed into a refusal to take some precautions-- essentially a refusal to consider personal responsibility issue-- due to the politics involved instead of a reasoned & informed stance on the risks. (PLEASE note that I'm not making a statement about masks themselves one way or another-- just pointing out that choices influencing medical issues became driven by political affiliation. I saw extremes of this behavior on different ends of the political spectrum, substituting critical thinking with selectively listening only to experts that were aligned with a given political stance.)
Actually, it eventually made me Republican.
I can't tell whether this is sarcasm, but in the unlikely event that it's not, how do you explain every place that didn't lockdown having dramatically better numbers than NYC?
Surely there's no remaining possibility of regarding lockdowns as a success?
What data can possibly conclude this experiment if not the data which already exists?
Doctors didn't dare to go against the guidelines, even with their reservation (they could be held responsible if they did).
Some people I know wrote a book on the subject and are claiming we should held governments accountable for those dead in the first wave (and they've been promptly censored and facebook-banned out of existence). I tend to err on the side of incompetence more than malice.
That said, there is plenty of ignorant people claiming ventilators kill based on statistics - but it's usually the other way round: once you need a ventilator you're either dead 100% or you can get a 40% survival rate with a ventilator.
- are intended for use for a few days, not a few weeks. The artificial air pressure destroys lung cells and capillaries
- patients are sedated to avoid pulling out tubes. This weakens both their lung function and the rest of their body due to immobilization, including bed sores. Usually their trachea is damaged and they cannot talk after removing the tubes for a period of time, and must do physical rehabilitation afterwards.
- doctors and nurses consider patients on ventilators the sickest in the hospital, followed by recent ventilator patients
- being in a hospital for a month or more exposes patients to other infections, which are not immediately apparent in a sedated patient
- China warned about ventilator use being usually unproductive with corona very early in 2020, so it took a while for US doctors to understand that the low oxygen levels measured in corona patients was not a critical thing in most cases if they could still breathe on their own.
ER doctors are not researchers, so they follow previous recommendations until told otherwise.
It clearly has nothing to do with epidemics, so what's your link supposed to prove?
Same. My wife and I actually do live in one of the big cities hit hard by the pandemic (NYC), but ended up having some of the initial restrictions work to my advantage. For instance, having a limited selection of restaurants (order-in only) led to us cooking more and calorie counting again, and we've lost 30 pounds each. We also bought an apartment once the initial hard restrictions were lifted last summer, and I suspect the extreme lack of buyers made us look a lot more attractive to sellers than we would have in 2019 (NYC co-ops are infamous for requiring 2 years of mortgage+maintenance fees in liquid which we certainly didn't have after shelling out a 20% down payment). My wife spent the entire year looking for a job after being laid off in January and COVID made that significantly harder, but I think it did help her finally find a fully remote company a year later - her new employer embraced remote work in COVID by allowing employees to move away from their CA and NY office, now she's helping them expand hiring across the entire US and Canada (she's in HR and they don't use a PEO for payroll, its a surprisingly non-trivial effort). We both prefer working remotely so this was important for us.
Overall I feel good how things ended up for us but considering how terrible its been for huge portions of the world its feels uncomfortable to call it "winning lockdown".
It isn't a good way to live. But for some weird reason it isn't very lonely ... until I'm around people. Then the loneliness becomes unbearable and I retreat.
I don't understand how this goes. Could you describe your experience with more details ?
> I built a desk a couple of years ago and I'm still waiting to show it off to somebody.
Well, you could paste a picture here :).
That does sound like a pretty nice thing to say! That said, i can't exactly recall seeing many "Show HN" posts about making furniture, though awesome stuff like that does occasionally appear in the comments.
I do feel like reaching out to some of the online communities for those particular interest groups could be pretty beneficial, though! For example:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Carpentry/
https://www.reddit.com/r/woodworking/
https://www.reddit.com/r/DIY/
I've found that working this way and being able to see the product of one's labors slowly forming and taking shape often brings rewards in and of itself that I seldom experience in my technical work. It's difficult for me to put into words but there's something inherent in the nature of the process and to the flow of this way of working that provides fulfillment and that one rarely seems to tire of doing it. I know a few technical/professional people who are disparaging of such pursuits and view such work as just an unskilled or menial activity—or that it's tedious and boring.
I feel sorry for them in that they've not grasped the idea or notion of doing creative work with one's hands is not the slightest bit in conflict with their professional work and in fact that both activities usually complement one another.
It also makes considerable sense to me that introverts would seek solace and comfort in such activities for the very reasons I've given.
Plus, it's a way to get some fresh air or have a reason to spend a bit more time outside, in addition to leisurely activities such as boating or hiking. I don't actually have any stats on this, but it seems like quite a few people who work in software also have such pursuits outside of work, some joke about retiring to a farm or a secluded place amidst nature. :)
When i have the time, i rather enjoy jogging, helping my parents with their greenhouse or vegetable garden, mowing the fieds with a tractor or even just doing some woodworking. That said, most of it is rather utilitarian and not all that pretty to look at.
Why do you choose to live like this. I am asking because wht you are describing here stuff of my dreams. I even bought a piece of land in rural colorado during the pandemic that I plan to start building in september.
There are things that only start to affect you after extended time in a lifestyle.
Maybe it would actually be great for you, but it could also be that the downsides only become apparent after a year or two, at which point it can be hard to find a way to get to a good place.
EDIT: Current situation doesn’t sound healthy, though. The sweet spot is probably somewhere between the two extremes.
Don't get me wrong, I've fallen into that trap of thinking.
My wife and I bought a small RV trailer that we tow to these kinds of "middle of nowhere places", we stay for a few weeks, or long enough to make us want to come back.
My point - so.many of these comments I read on HN focus on putting all eggs in one basket. Why does it have to be bumper to bumper traffic and open plan offices vs. Hermet life in the woods?
The reality is if one finds a good job I a semi-major urban center that often allows them to live both lives. Take a month or two off int he summer, live and work remotely in the boonies, then go back to "normal life". If you live full time in the boonies and align with that lifestyle that's all you get, it's hard to then go live for a few months in the city without blowing the budget.
Variety is the spice of life?
If those are the baseline options, then it's really easy to have the best of both: Have a nice comfy property 100 miles from a city, then make visits to the city outside of rush hour so it takes less than 2 hours.
(Though honestly 20 miles can usually get you quite rural.)
Frankly, I have very little difference in the amount of human contact I have now vs. what I did when I lived in a city before the pandemic.
Where you live can certainly influence how much contact there is in your life, but you can be surrounded by people in the country just as easily as you can be a hermit holed up in your apartment in the city.
On a year-to-year basis, there is usually one metal festival 2-3 concerts, 2-3 visits to the parents and every few months meeting with friends, those were pretty much the only things I lost during the pandemic.
I generally count myself as a winner of the pandemic, my job was not affected, private life barely, and I only know one person who got Covid (an American who studied in Germany a few years ago, he’s young and got over it with no lasting effects).
And it’s only a recent development. The older I get, the less extroverted I am. When I was in school and early in university, I tended to stay out till noon the next day. Then it changed to 5 in the morning. And nowadays, I go to bed at a time I used to start thinking about going out ;)
I was working remote before covid so daily life didn't change much.
But they also closed my gym, my kids' school, cafes and restaurant I used for fun and prevented me from travelling.
Sure, I'm lucky my job is safe, albeit I'm not as lucky as those who were furlough in the UK and got 80-90% of their paycheck without having to work for months. Incidentally, I'll have to pay for this massive spend with an upcoming massive increase in taxes and delays to when I'll be able to withdraw my private pension.
Overall, not having childcare available and no fun didn't make me very happy and caused to lapse again into depression.
I stopped training for 6 months (Even though I bought a home gym), got fat, miserable and angry, had problems sleeping and burn out at work.
And I still count myself to be one of the lucky ones.
It's interesting how all of this highlighted social divisions, even subtle ones that weren't much of an issue before, like well paid doctors and nurses and other medical staff that couldn't work from home, and had to take risks with their & their family's safety:
I know someone whose spouse is an EMT, and they basically has to quarantine him in the house to stay safe because they worked in an extreme outbreak hotspot. Even then, the EMT brought home COVID and the other spouse ended up in the hospital, all just before the vaccine became available. That person still hasn't fully recovered, even though they're otherwise a perfectly health non-risk-group person, still weakened enough that even a partial return to working in person is at least a few weeks away.
There's going to be research for decades just on all of the social impacts this has had on society.
The closest comparison I can think off-- though not perfect-- are the social and workforce changes that occured I'm the wake of WWII... Not to mention the failed attempt afterwards to put the genie back in the bottle of women in the workplace.
Strange, interesting, horrific times we're in.
I’ve come to see the truth of the matter like this: every human being has a need for socializing, but it takes effort and is exhausting. The amount of effort it takes and the degree to which it is exhausting differs from person to person, but it is not fixed. Socializing is like a muscle or a skill that can atrophy with neglect or develop with training.
It’s also completely relative. I consider myself extroverted, but having grown up in the suburbs mostly hanging around my brother and a few close friends, I’m really not that used to other people. I get socially drained quickly. I have a friend who considers himself introverted, but grew up in a densely populated city, so he’s comfortable being around a lot of people for longer than I am.
I get that most people are likely unaware of the measures of complexity involved in these issues, but at the very least I would expect today's intellectual trendsetters to stop giving any further validation to such an obsolete piece of pseudoscience once and for all.
On a far more speculative note, I bet most of the complex parts of the brain don't vary much between people, or at least don't play into personality much. That's not backed up by anything though, just an idle thought.
One of the most harmful beliefs about the concept of intro-/extroversion is that it is something you are and not something you do. Many people limit themselves massively because of how they've labeled themselves.
Especially in "strong introverts", the label is often used as a convenient excuse for not going through the often painful process of trying to improve their confidence skills and social skills. "I'm an introvert" is often the easy way out.
The world is often structured to heavily advantage highly social individuals. You're right that being less social or even asocial can bear a large accumulative cost.
Still, many of us live in our ways because we've followed our feelings and sensations. Trying to mold to the ways of interaction and time allocation according to the norms of a population that feels alien is wasteful. Instead, I spend my life exploring into less socially determined ways of being that seem a more functional and thoughtful in my experience. They're customized to me and feel great.
In fact, frequently some of my more social friends express a sense of relief and comfort when spending time with me. It feels more emotionally clean, whole, and loving to them. They love it but the population didn't teach them how to be this way and they also don't know how to navigate the divide to try living in this way more broadly. They appear to recognize it's unhealthy but also be tied to and habituated to the way of things so that psychologically bridging is too great an effort.
Being an introvert is definitely no easy way out. Extroverts tell me there's something wrong with me in lots of little ways and have excluded me regularly from the little clubs that form which has reduced my career trajectory and the rewards I receive from society (though I have still become greatly rewarded). Most concretely, I suspect that I would have had much more capital funding available for my passion projects if I had been more sociable. I would also suggest that the world would be a better place to live if I had received more funding but that's highly speculative.
If you've concluded that other things than increasing social skills are more worthwhile pursuits for you in your life, then that's great. You do you. However, you can't then also complain in the next breath about what your lack of social skills, that you won't spend an effort acquiring, exclude you from.
"Still, many of us live in our ways because we've followed our feelings and sensations." is slightly problematic in my view. The hardest things to change are the one that conflicts with feelings. It doesn't feel good to start exercising it you are overweight for example. Socializing with low social skills and confidence doesn't feel good either. I'd argue that both are worthwhile efforts, even though we need to combat our feelings and fears in order to do it.
Again, if you're totally happy right now that's awesome! Just don't let "I'm an introvert" be your "I'm big-boned" type of excuse for not changing anything if something could be improved by change.
I didn't downvote your comments but as counterpoint, I think you and tboyd47 are too influenced by the idea that "introvert" is merely a label.
Yes, I understand the good intentions for stressing the "label isn't destiny!" -- because we always want people to improve.
That said, I'm an introvert because that's currently the best description of my stable traits. If you didn't know me, I would not look like an introvert to you because:
- I'm not shy.
- I don't have poor social skills.
- I'm not uncomfortable around people and do enjoy parties.
- I've given presentations to large audiences in Las Vegas
... however, I've always had an underlying preference for solitary activities over group gatherings. I've had this preference for as a long as I can remember even as a little boy. Even the later adult years of consulting work where I went out for drinks and dinner every night with buddies does not change that.
I actually noticed the pattern of solitary pursuits in my life first -- and then I later found the word "introvert" that matched it.
It's like being "right-handed" or "left-handed". I'm right-hand dominant and it's a stable trait that doesn't change even if I learn to type 'Q' and 'Z' a million times with my left hand on a QWERTY keyboard. The label "right-handed" didn't make me right-handed. And learning new skills with my left hand will improve my life but will still not change my internal right-handedness.
Going to more social parties does not train me to be less introverted. Instead, it actually reveals to me how introverted I truly am. Yes, I can laugh and make small talk with everyone -- but it doesn't change the underlying feeling that I'd rather be somewhere else.
If the word "introvert" is useless because some people think it's a changeable trait... then I don't know what alternative word to use to describe that unchanging stable preference that I've had all my life.
"<...> Of course, what's relevant to this story and these comments are the reasons behind the motivation for why some people are introverted and or why they act this way—as critically it determines whether a person considers said trait to be either distressing and unwanted or desirable and necessary—or perhaps even essential:"
Certainly, we would agree that to socialize one needs to try doing it and grow. Sometimes there will be failures and consequences.
I've done the work to acquire my social skills and would hazard a speculation that I might have more sophisticated social skills than many.
Having to learn a skill to use it is not the thing I am objecting to. That is unless by "skills" you mean willingness to meaninglessly spend my time and resources practicing the skill. To be more concrete, a normality in business is checking in with people about their children and other important aspects of their lives. I actually like that but find it annoying that very few people actually want to dig in to any depth and talk about the flows of their emotional journeys, their core intellectual advanced, the things that they've learned, or instructive errors that they've made so that we gain wisdom from the conversation. They're responding to incentives because having broad social capital has in many scopes become a gating function to prosperity. It is such that those who enjoy socializing voluminously have quite a bit of advantage. I would much rather build and create tools that solve problems, or use my socializing to really clearly identify the cores of problems so that they can be better solved. I completely appreciate the value of socialization and collaboration. It is simply that those who really enjoy socializing in and for itself will dilute conversations to make them less valuable and have created a norm of this that seems to me to carry a lot of opportunity cost.
We completely agree that sometimes we must experience and accept pain and struggle. There's a big difference between feeling our efforts and being self displacing.
Consider an engineer who gets positions because they are well connected and another who is an effective teammate and simply amazing at their job. Which one do you want to hire? You're more likely to hire the first. What if they're in the same team and the latter did most of the work? Often it's the former that gets the recognition.
I'd enjoy doing that with people I work with, but I don't think they'd appreciate me asking.
Perhaps as a result I come off as one of those people that doesn't want to dig in to any depth about the kinds of life aspects you listed.
But I'm optimising for getting along at work without coming across as intrusive and probing. I don't want to make people uncomfortable by showing too much interest in their personal lives and excitements, if they aren't volunteering it. There are definitely people who want their work life to remain very separate from the rest of their life.
If I'm doing that, willing to engage in deep conversations about wider aspects of life but optimising to not be intrusive at work, perhaps some of the other people in your work circle are also doing so.
Introversion is a measure of what effect socializing has on you, and how comfortable you are being alone.
Extroverts dislike being alone, Introverts like it. Extroverts feel energized by social interaction, Introverts feel drained by it.
That's it. I'm tired of these ignorant "Introverts are just socially awkward and if they just went out more they would be cured" type takes.
However, the real question is why it was tiring. It was tiring because I wasn't comfortable, it wasn't second nature. It took extra effort, just like all other the things we do that we aren't good at doing. When it eventually became easier and took less effort, it naturally also became less tiring.
I wish we could just stop with the stupid binary introvert/extrovert terminology. It's on the same pseudo-scientific level as saying people are left-brained or right-brained, people aren't that binary or simple.
If I, 10 years ago, had just said to myself "I'm an introvert, social interactions aren't my thing and they make me tired" I'd likely be significantly less happy than I'm now.
I think you are the one mislabeling people. Being an introvert doesn't mean social skills are low. You might work with or be friends with strong introverts and have no idea.
There is also this idea that as an extrovert you have great social skills. I know plenty of people who crave social experiences, attention, or constant companionship that have poor social skills. You know them – they may say hurtful things, claim their own jokes as funny and laugh at them, disregard other people's feelings, lack the ability to control their vocalizations or comments, get in people's faces, create distractions, try to control conversations, etc. You get the point. Should those "strong extroverts" work hard at improving their social skills? Sometimes that means not talking or seeking solace in their own thoughts before entering a an existing social gathering.
It seems to be a moderately common assumption in discussions like these that the extrovert is the one with social skills and the introvert finds them difficult, but the reverse is often true.
Think about someone who is often out and seems to be consistently loud, boisterous and showing poor social awareness to the point of irritating others in social settings. That's a sign of poor social skills that I'd associate with extroversion.
Compare with someone who is quiet, thoughtful, and rarely seen, but when they are seen they seem to be caring, interesting and listen thoughtfully and engage with each person they talk with, leaving a positive impression each time. That's high social skill.
It's certainly true - actually tautological - that introverts are missing social opportunities.
Is it impossible that extroverts are missing experiences of equivalent value?
However I have always felt that is a mask I wear, it's not who I really am and I find it draining when I put it on.
It appears to me the two things (social skills and introversion) are somewhat orthogonal.
If you go on the r/introvert subreddit there's a load of people talking about their crippling loneliness and social anxiety. These people crave social contact, they don't seem like introverts to me, but they seem to have convinced themselves they have some personality trait that makes social connection impossible.
Nope. I'm not neurotypical. Stop trying to gaslight me into thinking I'm flawed because I'm not extroverted please. This rationale is the gay conversion therapy for introverts.
That's about the best way I can sum it up for how it works in my mind.
"Humans are social creatures, so you will be happier" is what people reply whenever I choose to work at a hackathon alone, or prefer to skip all the social events at the office, or contemplate working remotely on a permanent basis, or back when I was in school and would go to the library to read rather than play with other children.
I think it's natural for them to show up in the kind of culture clash that happens when groups of people who don't feel as accepted/appreciated try to make a positive space for themselves.
Sorry for the vague wording
"I'm a introvert who can't be comfortable around other people" and "My social skills and confidence aren't where they should be, I need to keep working on that" are two similar stories with totally different outcomes.
I’m perfectly content to not be around other people for very long periods of time, like months at a time, other than buying groceries/supplies. Doesn’t bother me a bit, while it would drive my wife and kids crazy. I’m also perfectly fine when I am around other people, so in my case at least, it’s just a (lack of) preference rather than an inability.
How we chose to write the story, with the elements we're handed, is our decision. We often can't affect what happens in the outside world, but how we interpret what happens is up to us.
People can get more social skills as they age, regardless of their personality, and it may appear as extraversion, but I don't think of it as a core change. You don't have to enjoy socializing to do it, just like you don't need to love your job to be good at it. Introverts with good social skills simply do the necessary amount of socialization to fulfill their needs the go back into their head once their are done.
But while people mature, get new hobbies, get jobs, become parents, etc... Barring extreme situation, their core personality tends to stay the same, they just transfer. For example, an online game addict may end up getting out a lot more and vice versa, but online or outside, if they are extraverts, they will tend to have a lot of social interactions. It is usually apparent when people lose self control.
There is an old write-up[1] about MUDs, the ancestors of modern MMORPGs. Players are categorized into 4 archetypes: hearts, clubs, diamonds, and spades, also called socializers, killers, achievers and explorers respectively.
Socializers and killers are the extroverts. They play the game for the multiplayer aspect, socializers see the game as a communication platform while killers see it as a way to get attention. Achievers and explorers are the introverts, and for them, the multiplayer aspect is not really important.
I have a few friends in the first category. They are very far from being socially isolated, even if they spend thousands of hours gaming.
Also, in retrospect I need to apologize for how incoherent my original comment was. I wrote it at 5am just as I am for this one.
I have definitely become more of an extrovert as I’ve gotten older. Only child of only children growing up in a rural area…kind of an incubator for introversion. But having lived in a big city, been out in the world, seen what there it to be seen, I’ve become far more outgoing. [also maybe drugs, i dunno]
And I am coming out of the pandemic times rarin’ to go. Arguably too much—I am purposefully having a slow weekend after the madcap last 2 weeks.
That's ever so true and socializing does take considerable effort and it's exhausting. I should have made that point in my earlier post. If you read it then you'd know that I wasn't the slightest bit concerned about the isolation the pandemic has brought into my life. These points you make also account for the answers I gave to the article's poll—in that at times I'm very sociable and at others not so much.
As socializing takes effort and that it's tiring, I've cherry-picked the easy bits and largely ignored stuff that requires serious work and effort. I know that if I want or need to socialize then I can pretty much do so in any environment or situation as I've done so successfully in the past and on quite many occasions. The issue for me (and I reckon also for many others of a technical/scientific bent) is that I rarely see need for me to commit the effort to do so—given that there are so many other activates that I'd prefer to be doing.
Cognitively, I know, and I think I've always known, that I should spend more time socializing and networking than I do, as they can and do take one to high places along with a concomitant increase in one's status and income. Simply, I'd be better off in many ways if I just took the necessary time and effort, however the motivation is just not there for me to do so, as I'd have to stop doing other things that I deem more important and or more valuable.
There's nothing new in this understanding and the notion has likely been around forever. Recently, this old 2003 article by Paul Graham about Why Nerds are Unpopular made its reappearance on the web here on HN but also there have been other similar accounts around for decades. Of course, what's relevant to this story and these comments are the reasons behind the motivation for why some people are introverted and or why they act this way—as critically it determines whether a person considers said trait to be either distressing and unwanted or desirable and necessary—or perhaps even essential:
(Kidding.)
1. There was no choice in the matter, which felt suffocating rather than liberating. Being able to do something just hits differently than being forced to, regardless of how much you 'enjoy' what you're being forced to do.
2. Being stuck inside without any other options means every day felt like an extension of the same endless one, which means you lose track of time and feel kinda meaningless.
3. And as I realised, while I was introverted, I wasn't introverted 'enough' that complete isolation would be perfectly fine for me. Everyone is different in how introverted/extroverted they are, and while some people can likely do well in complete isolation for decades at a time, most people can't. If you couldn't do well like that, lockdown was hell.
You extroverts will never drag me into an office again.
But not me. I'm a hard-core introvert, and the lockdown has been a nightmare to me! I've felt completely isolated and sad, can't get anything done. Often I have to cancel zoom meetings because I'm so down that I cannot bear to talk to other people. At least going to a physical place with my colleagues forced me to dress and stand, and from that I could work, even if I didn't speak much. I don't think I would be able to survive another month working from home. Fortunately, it seems that in September we'll be able to go back to semi-normal.
And people after tasting what working from home feels like, want to continue doing it: https://yougov.co.uk/topics/economy/articles-reports/2020/09...
I like being at home, but I also like not being at home. Even if I'm just working by myself.
A nice contrast to the frat-house bullpen of many offices. It's like trying to study for an exam while your roommates are having a party. "Oh, just wear headphones."
> Social connections are a basic human need… Being an introvert doesn't mean you don't want to socialise at all - Danièle Gubler and Katja Schlegel
Being isolated and happy for months at a time definitely seems plausible. But if life gets hard, and you succumb to dark thought patterns, addiction, or a depression, very very difficult to pull yourself out of it by yourself.
Depends upon the introvert. I have very little interest in society. I don't mean in an academic sense, but I mean I cannot stand being in a bustling city or anywhere where there are a lot of people. It actually makes me feel lonely. Having no people in public places has been mostly a relief to me, honestly.
It's possible to be extremely introverted, preferring no explicit social interactions, while still getting a noticable peace and energy uplift from being able to just watch and be surrounded by other people doing their things.
Think of someone quiet in a coffee shop or library who never talks to anyone, but likes being there, not for the coffee or the books, but for the ambience.
People who meet me in 1 or 2 meetings might think I am an extrovert or non-introvert. I don’t mind speaking in front of 30 people – some of peers would say I excel at public speaking. I just want time to myself afterwards because much of my energy is spent presenting.
Sure there was a bit of unhappiness with the virus situation, but once I figured out that I didn't have to constantly watch the news for scraps of info, and got on with my day, and once I figured out that every day looked the same, and I needed to change it up a bit, it was nothing but happiness.
Recently one of my coworkers got lonely and decided to tell everyone else to come work from the office one day and we could go drinking afterwards. Nope. As much as I like my coworkers, but I've zero desire to commute to the office.
Another thing that I've noticed is that now that there's no external interaction with those same coworkers, I have zero desire for alcohol, and I've never felt better.
A couple of months ago, I went to an old friend's wedding and spent several days with new people for the first time in over a year. About one and a half days in, I'd used up all that pent up extroversion and went right back to my normal introverted self.
As opposed to extraverts, who don't have to adjust.
* none-smoker
* none-alcohol drinker
* programmer
* autist
* hard service user (food delivery, Amazon, etc.)
I go out for the dentist or a small walk. One day holiday in a year. The pandemic changes nothing to me.
I feel bad for the people who got sick or who lost someone, but aside from that I wish this pandemic never ended. I’m dreading the return to normality.
Introverts on average took less of a hit, as they didn't see much change to their lives and many of them already had remote jobs they were able to keep during lockdowns.
This doesn't mean they're loving it.
Well I gotta say many preppers were loving it though.
The best days of my life are the ones where I don't see or speak to another human being. Blessed days.
I'm far more comfortable typing this than I was when a collegue from another department who I've never met before just popped into my van to say hello and ask if I'd seen a certain person. It's funny - I normally work from home, but I'm on an Outside Broadcast today which I don't normally do. Turned up nice and early, one or two people I'd never met asked me some technical questions, that was fine, but as it's got busier (and it will be very busy come 12) I can feel my stress levels rising and decided to destress by posting some random stuff online.
It might be insensitive to crow about winning from the pandemic in a conversation, but it definitely happened in fact.
Before the lockdown I lived in London with a flatmate, went into a sociable office regularly and voluntarily and spent a lot of time in bars. Had a lot more "alone time" when I travelled, but actively sought out company the whole time.
18 months later, I'm living on my own for longer than I ever have before, in a boat travelling through relatively rural locations a long way from London or people I know, and the notion of going out to socialise and having full time work gigs is something in the past, and it's.... fine. Haven't felt the need to overcompensate with catchup calls and messages, will be quite happy taking on projects or a next job with fewer meetings, have seen some friends since but no need to force the issue, because that's the way things are and there are other things to do .
Though I might have to find something resembling a crowd for the coming World Cup Final :)
I have far from been a winner in this pandemic. I wish that I could have been in the office regularly. I am extremely jealous of the engineering department and medicine department who were allowed to be at the university basically any time then wanted.
I wonder if similar studies would show that there really are no introverts vs. extroverts in the sense that all people really have roughly the same need for human contact.
Kind of like everyone needs physical activity, but some people gravitate more to it than others.
Probably the wrong forum to voice such a theory...
But ... if I don’t get it, I start feeling depression symptoms and go sort of insane. Heck, it took me a while to even figure out there was a connection between the two and those symptoms had an easy fix!
I compare it to people who can’t feel pain [1] in that I’m hurting myself but don’t immediately recognize the source of the pathology.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congenital_insensitivity_to_pa...
I don't think it's black and white. It's more like a spectrum. Some people become more drained than others when hanging around other people. Also, some people like to hang out with many different people each day while others prefer to see more or less the same person every day.
I'm an introvert, I have very few friends but very good friends. I find most relationships to be too superficial to my liking. What's the point of having a friend if you know that this friend is capable of betraying you to gain a tiny advantage? I'm a pretty good judge of people and I find that at least 90% of people are far too selfish (not altruistic enough) to make good friends.
It's too draining to hang around the majority of people because I don't like them and pretending to is exhausting and frankly I don't see the point.
I can only be friends with people who are as altruistic as I am (or close to it)... Why would you want to spend time with people who are constantly trying to take something from you? That's the definition of a parasite.
My theory is that people with low altruism are themselves more likely to tolerate other people with low altruism. They might even prefer them since they feel more familiar. That may be part of the reason why psychopaths end up grouping together; aside from their shared thirst for power.
> I wonder if similar studies would show that there really are no introverts vs. extroverts
There has been many and they show that introversion and extroversion are very real.
> in the sense that all people really have roughly the same need for human contact.
People often confuse need for contact, introversion and loneliness. They are different dimensions.
And that anxieties, shyness, awkwardness are orthogonal to it. And that being loud dont imply extroversion either.
The only thing you could say is wrong is the supposed dichotomy. Instead, we have a gaussian distribution along the axis.
Some people are introverts
No one is an introvert
These are each true depending on the framing, and this aspect is even true to the original Jungian theory. Maybe that helps explain why quantification and studies can only go so far. Similar with learning styles...
IMO holding any model lightly is a good idea. That way you don't need studies as badly when you have a conflicting result in which an introvert desperately wants to head to a party.
For my part, I'm introverted, but pretty content with where I'm at. My socialization comes primarily from my family, and there's a few of us living within a few blocks that all observed strict social distancing, were fortunate enough to have jobs we could do from home and enough money to pay a premium on grocery delivery etc.
Very little changed for me except that I got to see my kids more, spent less time in meetings, and didn't waste an hour getting back & forth to an office.
Certainly many other people, introvert or not, were not in nearly as fortunate of a position as I was.
My theory, btw, is that we introverts got our perfect dose of social contact by going to work and a few outings here and there. But during the pandemic it was easy to just do nothing with it as a "mental excuse", and when I didn't get social events handed to me it kinda just became nothing. Normally I wouldn't have to seek out social stuff to get my dose, but now it suddenly was too little.
• office job, bonus points if open office or long commute
• in a relationship or happily single
• not laid off
Noting here that I generally find intelligence to be an unhelpful metric.
However, had our work been impacted, it would have been a very different experience. What did hit us was this year's 99% housing shortage (our rental was sold). Although we beat the very long odds, it was the most terrifying thing I've ever experienced.
Absolutely NO interaction at all, is fairly rare, and more of a feature of people with schizoaffective disorder, and pretty much falls outside the "normal" spectrum of introversion.
When some shows up at the office and gets to advance their career faster, everyone will want to go the office.
I'll help cough (and whisper why can't I taste anything? oh no) in order to get people to be scared of being a COVID asymptomatic carrier; their kids can't be vaccinated yet. Their grandparents/parents are old and vaccinated, but vaccines aren't 100%.
If anyone is scared, just accuse them of not trusting the vaccine and imply they are anti-vaxx.
These people need to be taught a lesson that your kids can't be vaccinated. Why the heck would you want to come back to the office?
If they are okay with their grandparents/parents/kids increasing 1% of dying of COVID, then be my guest.
I will say it. People who want to commute to office when they can WFH are murderers. They increase the risk of road accidents, and they are killing the planet with pollution unnecessarily.
People who can WFH should be forced to WFH (or go to nearby co-working space if you can't set up home office).
Spread the words. Cough at work. Teach them a lesson.
Commute causes road accidents and kills people.
Since then restrictions have been eased in what can probably best be described as partial lockdowns.
You went on multi-hour rides around London without seeing a single mask? Yeah, nah, history revisionism from a place of wanting to rewrite history, your testimony isn't reliable.
I live in central london on a main road and traffic has been really low (relatively) for the last year. Normally even at 4am in the morning there is queueing traffic outside constantly, but even now at 10pm up to 10 minutes might go by without a car. It is a very clear reduction.
I do not believe that you could ride through London in April of this year or last year without seeing a mask. Right now maybe - back last march when the government said we shouldn't wear them maybe.
Things are re-opening now, but during the major lockdowns behaviur changed a lot. I say changed not stopped.
People were allowed out of the house to excersise, so any easy excersise routes (parks, paths, nice walkable streets) have a lot more foot traffic than normal. There is a canal near my home where typically outside commute hours people rarely pass - during deep lockdown it had foot traffic like a commuter station with people queuing to walk down it. But this is a sign of 'lock down' - it is people doing the only behaviur they are allowed to do outside their house.
In terms of open shops during major lockdown - I noticed that in Soho, people would gather with supermarket beers outside the closed nightclubs and street drink together. In fancier areas of town, I saw wine bars selling mulled wine covertly through a crack in the door - looking both ways up and down the street like a naughty school kid selling weed. But again these are changed behaviures that show that the normal version is banned. But I didn't see ice cream shops. Maybe now?
There was a huge uptick in the number of undeground raves - and I also heard this happened in manchester. There were several raves in the mile around my home and we'd find out about them when the police turned up in numbers. These were "break into a shut down shop and turn it into a club" events with hundreds of young partiers, not 8 people turning up for grannies birthday.
This further proves the point that just because somebody is introverted, it does not mean they suffer social anxiety. At the end of the day, both introverts and extroverts need human interaction.
I must admit the mental health aspect of the pandemic took me somewhat by surprise. Before the pandemic, it hadn't occurred to me that quite so many people were mentally affected by being isolated from others but clearly they are (the fact that it's been a perennial subject in the media ever since the pandemic began seems sufficient evidence). Although I note from some other recent reports it's likely been overstated and that people are actually more resilient than the stories make out.
(Please don't accuse me of denying the fact that many are so affected, I'm only trying to cut to the facts. Also, it is not my intention to make light of the fact that this damn pandemic has caused so many people to suffer greatly through loss of loved ones, loss of their income and their jobs, etc., but if we're to get a reasonable gauge of the facts then we must be mindful to separate out a person's intrinsic introversion/extroversion from that caused by his/her experiences of the pandemic. Right, things like this are never simple.)
One of the problems with stories like this is that of definition. To cut to the chase, we do need to disentangle and cut away a bit of the hype. What actually does it mean to be introverted—and how is introversion different from being, say, shy of others—or just indifferent to them or to certain situations, etc.
For example, if many of these instances of introversion were mistaken and they were in fact cases of shyness then it might account for this headline/story—for in pre-pandemic times, circumstances would have forced shy people to mingle more often and it's likely they would have appreciated the fact that being forced into the company of others would have been good for their psyche.
OK, what I'm really saying is that popular/straw polls of people's psychological state—like the one in this story—are unlikely to be sufficiently rigorous to give us a true picture of the situation—even if their questions are graded (as in this poll)—and thus this may dilute or divert help away from the smaller number who really do need appreciable help.
I'll try to illustrate by example why a simplistic approach to the problem isn't the best idea by being a guinea pig for the poll in the article:
"Are you inclined to keep in the background on social occasions?"
Well, it depends on many things, and with this question I'd rank myself about 3. With groups I know well or reasonably well, I am sometimes the center of attention (in the predominant or amusing sense), at other times I act like everyone else and mingle normally without undue attention. When I'm with a large group of strangers it depends on whether I've a common interest with them or not. If I do, then there's no problem, I can integrate so well that sometimes I'm among the last to leave. If I have little or nothing in common (and I'm required to be there for some reason), then I can be bored shitless (as I find idle chatter boring) and I'll keep in the background—I'll look at the ceiling or out the window, etc. (and given half a chance I'd likely leave). On the other hand, if I'm in this group together with a small number of people that I know then I'll separate out and only mingle with them whilst essentially ignoring the larger group.
"Are you inclined to limit your acquaintances to a select few?"
Sometimes yes, sometimes no (here too I'd rank myself about 3). I have a reasonable number of acquaintances (although I've never tried to count them). Also, I'd have to rate each person on a similar 1-to-5 scale depending on the closeness of our relationship. Obviously, my relationship with people in Group 5 would be much closer than to those in Group 1.
"Do you like to have many social engagements?"
Generally not, most are trivial and a waste of time and I've usually much better things to do. That said, I rarely miss an opportunity to meet and socialize with friends and close acquaintances (sometimes I've even gone to the extent of traveling across international borders to do so). Note: As it stands, I am unable to rank this question, as the answer is highly dependent on circumstance. I'd rate my first comment about 2 and the second between 4 and 5.
"Are you a happy-go-lucky individual?"
In some aspects yes, but after an examination of the integrand I reckon I'd be classified as a 'no'. If I had to rate myself then it'd be between 2 and 3.
"Do you like to play pranks upon others?"
Yes, but not often, as pranks can go very wrong and people can either be hurt or their feelings hurt (I try definitely not to embarrass people and I'm upset if I do). I only play pranks on people I know well and even then, I'm careful who I select (personality must be considered, otherwise pranks backfire). Also, I know that pranks are intrinsically reciprocal and that means I'll eventually end up being the 'victim' with almost 100% certainty.
Thus, it is obvious both introversion and extroversion have degrees and these traits can be inherent to an individual and or they depend on his or her situation and circumstance, it's unfortunate that popular reports don't echo facts as they actually exist.
Read into the following comment whatever you wish: whilst the pandemic has forced many changes to my life such as being in lockdown and often isolated from others/family for long periods, I can say honestly that this isolation has never been an issue with me. In fact, I've rather enjoyed the lockdown despite its obvious inconveniences. Being free of having to bother with social events, or being on time for work or appointments, or having to deal with a myriad of other time-driven events, has been rather liberating. As the article points out, I've been free to do many other activities that introverts find 'interesting and energizing'. And they're mostly activities that I otherwise have never had sufficient time to do—anyway not to the extent that I would have wished. I've even had more time to read HN articles and to make pontifical pronouncements thereon. ;-)
Nevertheless, despite having so many obvious introverted traits I know that I'm far from being a definitive/classical case of introversion—as my extroversion must often have its say. As I said, these matters are complex.
This article reads like pro-return to office propaganda. Drawing conclusions from “posts across social media” (posts not included).
* Remote work
* Delivery of everything
* Don’t have to talk to delivery driver, goods left on door
There are a lot of major shifts that happened due to COVID that are absolutely pro-introvert.
I massively won lockdown.
1. Gained a totally new skill that got me employment for a modest pay.
2. Learned to paint digitally.
3. Learned to play the piano.
4. Furthered my expertise with two (human) languages.
5. Learned three new programming languages.
6. Spent a lot of time with people I care about.
7. Read about 50 books.
8. Exercised regularly and got into good shape.
For me, lockdown was the ideal situation to live. Absolutely no regret or worries.
It was perfect.