A conflicting definition of happiness as an introvert

[Particle]

I have begun to pick up on a trend of mine which has proven to be somewhat paradoxical. I've been searching for happiness for years, as I imagine most do in their 20s. The process really began after high school graduation.

Initially I believed the x-factor was that my way of life had changed. Childhood was basically over, and I was afraid to let go. After coming to terms with that for the most part, my leading theory of what was still wrong became more about mortality. I was essentially having a mid-life crisis at 21 where any pursuit seemed as if it would be a waste of the short amount of time I would be allotted. Nothing short of curing cancer every day would be an adequately constructive use of my ever-diminishing life.

I kept trying to think of things that would improve my situation, and I've had some success. Landing a job has been one of the best things that ever happened to me. On a daily basis I had somewhere to be again, and I was needed there. People depended on me. Later, I began to wonder how to improve my social life. I needed interaction with friends, I reckoned, but there weren't many around anymore.

Have you begun to notice a trend? I'm an introvert, but I appear measure my own happiness by extroverted events and feedback. I enjoy my job because others need me. I want to socialize with friends. I see people dancing and partying on TV shows and whatnot and that's what I feel like I need. The catch, however, is that I have no real interest in doing those things. I just seem to like the concept of what is being symbolized, whatever that is. I don't like to dance, mingle, and party. I'm an introvert. It doesn't really make sense why I'd measure myself by extroversion. So there is the paradox: What I subconsciously appear to desire is something that I consciously want no part of.

At this point, feedback is welcome. Anyone else find they're experiencing the same thing?

 

[pjoa09]

I have begun to pick up on a trend of mine which has proven to be somewhat paradoxical. I've been searching for happiness for years, as I imagine most do in their 20s. The process really began after high school graduation.

Initially I believed the x-factor was that my way of life had changed. Childhood was basically over, and I was afraid to let go. After coming to terms with that for the most part, my leading theory of what was still wrong became more about mortality. I was essentially having a mid-life crisis at 21 where any pursuit seemed as if it would be a waste of the short amount of time I would be allotted. Nothing short of curing cancer every day would be an adequately constructive use of my ever-diminishing life.

I kept trying to think of things that would improve my situation, and I've had some success. Landing a job has been one of the best things that ever happened to me. On a daily basis I had somewhere to be again, and I was needed there. People depended on me. Later, I began to wonder how to improve my social life. I needed interaction with friends, I reckoned, but there weren't many around anymore.

Have you begun to notice a trend? I'm an introvert, but I appear measure my own happiness by extroverted events and feedback. I enjoy my job because others need me. I want to socialize with friends. I see people dancing and partying on TV shows and whatnot and that's what I feel like I need. The catch, however, is that I have no real interest in doing those things. I just seem to like the concept of what is being symbolized, whatever that is. I don't like to dance, mingle, and party. I'm an introvert. It doesn't really make sense why I'd measure myself by extroversion. So there is the paradox: What I subconsciously appear to desire is something that I consciously want no part of.

At this point, feedback is welcome. Anyone else find they're experiencing the same thing?

Working wasn't exactly the best thing that happened to me but sure as hell is better than learning at someone else's pace for 4 years without being of any benefit to those who pay the tuition fee.

I used to enjoy socialize with friends and still do. The difference between an extrovert comes at the point where he starts making new friends and we start unfriending.

Eventually I find myself with some people I trust and a lot that I don't trust. I hangout with those I trust and don't hang out with those I don't trust.

I have made attempts to go the other direction and make more friends but I never make the initiative and if someone makes the initiative and I don't like them I feel they are being pushy and ignore them.

I do enjoy going out with random people and the idea sounds like fun but when I am on the spot I cling on to those that I know anxiously.

Dancing is fun though. I don't care who's looking.

It's all fun and there's nothing wrong with it.

Just you feel shit tired afterwards and just want to stick with whom you know.

I maintain contact with my close friends just so I don't drone out and become mundane.

 

[Ayee]

Yes. And you seem to be the first person to share my feelings.

I was always an oddball. Though I'm by no means shy or quiet, I have great difficulties in deepening my bonds with people. As a child, I wasn't part of any group of friends in class. It didn't bother me at first (I could always spend recess at the library and do my assignments all alone) but eventually... I had to admit I wanted to belong.

So I decided to join a group - only I had no idea how to and I didn't really feel attracted to any particular group around me. I wished for the concept of friendship to erase that chilling feeling I felt when I was walking on the hallways all alone, but I didn't have anybody I wanted to be friends with. I had known my classmates for years and I didn't even particularly like them... so I didn't mean anything to anybody either, which frightened me.

I attempted to make friends with a group of girls who were nice enough to me, mainly by trailing after them. But I was always more interested in what was going inside my head than in the things they were talking about. I never had any fun when I was with them... it didn't feel right. And I guess it went both ways because soon I began to get bullied by M, a girl who was the side-kick of L. L was the ringleader and the only one who seemed to be fond of me, like I was an awkward little duckling that she had taken under her wing. One day, she told me that people made fun of me behind my back so I'd better change my ways soon.

I didn't want to change myself for them, what I wanted was to get the hell out. But going back to being alone would be even worse. So I opted for a fresh start: I changed schools, went to somewhere where people wouldn't know me so I could get another chance. That was terribly silly of me but at the time it made me feel safer.

I was more careful with my choice of friends the next time, stuck with the people I felt I could talk to. The thing is, I don't enjoy attending social gatherings so even with my new friends, I was still left out. They frequently talked about parties and outings which I never attended, and at some point they stopped inviting me altogether.

I feel like time was an important factor - they're now used to... me being me. Once, when I apologized for being lost in thought yet again, a friend of mine told me that they wouldn't change a thing about me. I guess I've come to realize something: friendship is difficult.

You may need to do stuff you don't want to. Lots of stuff... but you do it for your friends. Because you want to see them happy. And they know it. That's why they trust you.

Aye, that's just my opinion. I'm actually not a sentimental person (you wouldn't guess it from my rant... I guess I got carried away 'cause you have the same problem as I do) but I like knowing the meaning behind stuff.

 

[Vrecknidj]

Here are some operating assumptions (which may, of course, be false).

1) People live to about 80.
2) The first 20 years are a blur of infancy, childhood, adolescence, and very young adulthood.
3) People live the last 3/4 of their lives as adults.
4) People live the first 1/4 of their lives as children.

If you're in your early 20s, you've spent your whole life so far getting really good at being an infant, being a child, and being a teen.

From a certain point of view, anyone in his early 20s is only just now figuring out how to become an adult. Ironically, 20-year-olds are like infants relative to adulthood, rather than infants relative to childhood.

You're in a new infancy. It's weird. You're learning to walk and talk and all that, in the adult world.

What you had to learn to survive childhood will often no longer help you survive adulthood, and, in many cases, will totally be the wrong tools and will screw up your life for a while.

Just the way it goes.

 

[Smooch]

Anyone else find they're experiencing the same thing?

O__O And I thought I was the only one who felt this way.

I know what you mean when you say you felt like anything you did would be a waste of time. I often feel that if I do not fulfill some greater purpose in life then there's no point for me to live? Not sure if that's exactly what you meant, but that's how I feel.

 

[basickatie]

I have begun to pick up on a trend of mine which has proven to be somewhat paradoxical. I've been searching for happiness for years, as I imagine most do in their 20s. The process really began after high school graduation.

Initially I believed the x-factor was that my way of life had changed. Childhood was basically over, and I was afraid to let go. After coming to terms with that for the most part, my leading theory of what was still wrong became more about mortality. I was essentially having a mid-life crisis at 21 where any pursuit seemed as if it would be a waste of the short amount of time I would be allotted. Nothing short of curing cancer every day would be an adequately constructive use of my ever-diminishing life.

I kept trying to think of things that would improve my situation, and I've had some success. Landing a job has been one of the best things that ever happened to me. On a daily basis I had somewhere to be again, and I was needed there. People depended on me. Later, I began to wonder how to improve my social life. I needed interaction with friends, I reckoned, but there weren't many around anymore.

Have you begun to notice a trend? I'm an introvert, but I appear measure my own happiness by extroverted events and feedback. I enjoy my job because others need me. I want to socialize with friends. I see people dancing and partying on TV shows and whatnot and that's what I feel like I need. The catch, however, is that I have no real interest in doing those things. I just seem to like the concept of what is being symbolized, whatever that is. I don't like to dance, mingle, and party. I'm an introvert. It doesn't really make sense why I'd measure myself by extroversion. So there is the paradox: What I subconsciously appear to desire is something that I consciously want no part of.

At this point, feedback is welcome. Anyone else find they're experiencing the same thing?

This is great. i know this feeling. so very well.your writing it made this so apparent to me, because i too struggle with my introvertedness, in the very same way. i fantasize about going to parties, clubs, etc. but i really feel no desire to, and it makes no sense to me at all, if you think about it, doesn't that mean you want to? in my case no. i think we're taught to want to be social in order to get ahead in society. maybe like how in china their taught being a tall person gets you ahead of people. but that social butterfly life is not for me.

I had a mid life crisis at 18. i thought i was going to be 17 forever, and just like yourself i wonder if i'll ever do anything meaningful before i die. i think about this alot. i really have no idea what i want to do with the rest of my life. and unlike you, i do not value work so much. it's a paycheck for me, a lousy useless coupon for life. ((emo)) I don't even care for the house i rent. i work hard for it, and i'd honestly rather be a hippie than spend my days as a cashier just to live in a house...

(back on the topic)
i do not get close to people easily. i'm very friendly and likeable. but it's mainly to suit my purposes i realise, so no one can say anything bad about me, i'm lucky that i'm not completely isolated, i do have a husband, i married young, he is an entp. so we do fine, but i relate to this part of you. i'm glad i'm not alone in that sense. smiley-face.

 

[basickatie]

Here are some operating assumptions (which may, of course, be false).

1) People live to about 80.
2) The first 20 years are a blur of infancy, childhood, adolescence, and very young adulthood.
3) People live the last 3/4 of their lives as adults.
4) People live the first 1/4 of their lives as children.

If you're in your early 20s, you've spent your whole life so far getting really good at being an infant, being a child, and being a teen.

From a certain point of view, anyone in his early 20s is only just now figuring out how to become an adult. Ironically, 20-year-olds are like infants relative to adulthood, rather than infants relative to childhood.

You're in a new infancy. It's weird. You're learning to walk and talk and all that, in the adult world.

What you had to learn to survive childhood will often no longer help you survive adulthood, and, in many cases, will totally be the wrong tools and will screw up your life for a while.

Just the way it goes.

I like this alot.
I feel overwhelmed by sudden adult-hood, I think of it as being pushed into the real world street and being ran over, again and again and again.
simply put:
so not fun.
wasn't prepared, and i HATE feeling unprepared.