The Extrovert Paradox

I know it might seem kinda weird that extroverts, I, their representative, have decided to use a letter to voice out our musings rather than a megaphone rally at motion ground. But you see, that’s one of the reason for this letter — the misconceptions y’all have about cute, social people like us (blinks twice).

 So, hmm, yeah, after many silent years we have decided to speak up through the most subtle of means, a letter. Really, I don’t know if I should call it a letter to or a reply, or an apologetic of some sort. However, it is something everyone should see. We extrovert have a lot to say, lots of replies we have garnered over the years waiting for the perfect moment we get to smash it in your faces. And since the preconceived ideologies and stereotypes towards us have been, pfft, frustrating— why not start with the first one; 

“Extroverts are dull” 

Oh this stereotype! Many a times have people stumbled upon me saying my musings out loud and look so discombobulated like they have seen a ghost. Comments like “So you wrote this?” With that undertone of disbelief. Or “did you score this?” Saying it over and over again till they can believe it. 

Cek! It pisses me off a whole different level and so does it piss off my other brethren. Wait, so because we aren’t hung over backward in a corner with a book in our arms, we are dull?! It is so socially accepted that when an extrovert is smart it is an abnormality that makes people awed. 

Something like “Do you know she is intelligent?” 

“Wow, she is??! She is always in parties and stuff” 

So this is me telling you, we are smart in this group of ours. In fact, one of the smartest among the bunch…Remember Thomas Edision?? Yeah, we that smart. So dead that thought of all extroverts being dull. It hurts us. 

The second misconception would be one of the dreadful ones, we aren’t readers (rolls eyes aggressively).

Ah, ah, ah, Where the h*all did all this come from? You have to see how well read my extroverted friends are…at least before the whole concept of ambivert came up and we legit don’t have extroverts anymore. That aside though, we are wondrous readers. We might not be as many as our introverted folks as we have to stay socially active (chuckles) but we do read quite a lot. So never assume an extrovert doesn’t read. 

On to the last and most important misconception, we don’t have social problems.

It is no news, it is not a new concept in our society that most people view extroverts as the socially adept, cheerful people — that most times when topics like depression, anxiety, insecurities come up, we often push extroverts aside because they are the “perfect social beings.” Though, most times we might appear to be, but we aren’t always perfect. Ever thought maybe the loud behaviour and social activeness is a facade and an attempted cure to the failing inside man? 

Recently, I heard a story that happened in OAU and I was stunned. A student, a social guy, a likely extrovert was saved from an attempted suicide when his friends noticed something was off in his routined happiness and saw it as a call for help. Though I admire such friends, I am appalled that extroverts have to go through all of that. Suicide was the breaking point, he had it coming, but nobody bothered to ask because it was like he had his life figured out. Why do we have to have a drawn face before you ask how we are doing?

Tersely, just so you know, I was gesticulating all through the writeup and the funny thing is you couldn’t even see me. But if you did, oh, you would really get the emotional tension behind this piece. Nonetheless, in few sentences, extroverts are just like introverts, we are humans, we have emotions, we are also equally flawed, and making some stereotypes can be, well, distasteful. Many extroverts commit suicides, fall into deep depression, read, are incredibly smart. And, sometimes, just asking how we are doing can go a long way. We may seem so socially adept and have our lives figured out, but always and always remember, we are still humans.