Jeff Tannen

A very brilliant Psychologist and thinker of the nineteenth century named C.G Jung developed the theories of Introversion and Extraversion.

Today we sometimes use these terms in our society as we tend to classify other people behaviors and self perceptions. What do we really know about these parallel ends of the spectrum and how these two behaviors work together in our society?

To begin with, it is important to note that neither style of behavior is better than the other, As well, an extrovert isn’t always the life of the party so to speak and an introvert is not a recluse or hermit,

We are really looking at the differing attitudes of these two sets of individuals and how they direct their energies.

Everyone falls somewhere in the middle of an imaginary line which connects introversion and extraversion and everyone has some of each characteristic within them. One style of energy direction is more dominant than the other.

The Extravert gets their energy from active involvements in events and activities. They like people and being around them. An extravert is said to be ”outgoing and is comfortable in groups of people He or she prefers being with many friends.

The Introvert by comparison gets energy from his own internal ideas, pictures and memories. He or she prefers doing things alone or with one or two people at the most. More than that tends to create inner discomfort.

The Introvert takes time, uses logic and reason to begin the course of action whereas the Extravert gets their energy from other people, places and things around them.

There is also another interesting piece of the picture regarding Introverts and

Extraverts and it relates to a blog I wrote earlier about communication styles.

I had talked about literalness and inferences. If you think about your loved ones and friends and ask yourself if they fit more into the style of Introversion or Extraversion you may want to concentrate how they relate to you. If someone you know picks up on the literalness of what you are he or she will most likely be an extrovert whereas if he or she tends to react with an inferentially then he is more of an Introvert.

The last thing, I want to say on this subject is that introverts and Extraverts tend to be having differing work choices. Can you see from the understanding of Introverts how someone could be a scientist or an engineer? Sure you can if you. If you think about it, these two professions allow a person to work behind the scenes and don’t require an enormous amount of people energy and that’s why it is comfortable for them to do this work.

By contrast look at the work of any career or type of work where a person is involved with people all the day and is face to face with them; for example an event or party planner is most likely an Extravert and is comfortable being exposed to people all day.

One last thing. Shy people are not necessarily Introverts. This is more of an anxiety disorder issue and this can require psychotherapeutic treatment to help them feel better amongst people.

So, ask yourself; what category do you fall into? But remember, everybody has some of each in them and no one is one hundred percent of anything.

Have fun!