Takeaways:
- Redefine Your Happiness
- Let Go of Surface Pressure
- Enjoy the Little Things
- Embrace Quality Over Quantity
- Don’t Be Afraid to Show Off the Real You
Many of us are trapped in an idea of a happy life that involves having a huge circle of friends, going to some of the best schools, getting married, having children, and so on. This can be very toxic: if it doesn’t work out exactly as planned one feels incomplete or lacking in purpose. Introverts in particular suffer from this pressure, as they might prefer to keep a small group of friends, spend a lot of time alone with their own thoughts, and sometimes want to adjust their personality so that they become more extrovert. These strategies will help you live an introvert life very successfully:
- Reimagine Your Happiness: What might happiness mean to you? Is it all about a picture-perfect family life, or perhaps wealth and status? Maybe it’s about achievements and status. Maybe it’s all about a sense of personal expansion and artistic creativity. Tell yourself that it is absolutely possible to be happy, and you don’t need to be a particular ‘type’ of person or achieve a specific number of goals in order to be happy. As the Israel-born, US-based positive psychology coach Derek Carpenter puts it, happiness comes down to your choices and your behaviours and what you can and cannot control. It’s okay to be an introvert and still be happy. It might just mean that your road to happiness doesn’t follow the traditional route.
- Stop caring about what other people think of you: Society influences many of our decisions, leading us to act in ways that align with societal expectations. You’re not as great as you’d like to be or as others tell you to be; you’re so much better than that. You’re already perfect. What does it mean to ‘get your shit together’? It goes beyond just fear, anxiety and negative self-worth. The cliché also suggests striving to be better than you already are. There’s a sense that if success meant doing the right things, you’d be experiencing it and feeling fulfilled. But perhaps getting it together indicates that you’re on the right track and can focus on achieving more. Beyond that, all improvement beyond basic competence can be interpreted negatively. I think our concept of what it means to ‘get it together’ would be revolutionary if we got rid of our obsession with external approval. Start working toward your goals, what you love, and you’ll see where it takes you. But know that someone else isn’t going to fix you.
- Appreciate Life: Learn to RESPECT the things around you and take FULL advantage of the beauty of life on Earth.Implementation Intentions: I will waste less time ruminating on the past when I am idle, but will think of something that I am grateful for in my life.The Rutgers study suggests not only that appreciation can lead to satisfaction with life, but also that life satisfaction can thwart negative emotions: when people are experiencing sadness, they’ll feel better if they engage in pleasurable activities. For example, taking romantic walks will make people feel better when they are sad, irrespective of whether they are in a loving relationship or not. The Rutgers team found these relationships while separating feeling good from doing good. Gratitude and good deeds aren’t just linked because they both make people feel good; rather, when people are happy, they are more likely to engage in pleasurable activities. The study therefore shows that happy people are nicer to others, but they’re also motivated to get more happy. ‘One way to capture the immediate happiness from a good deed is to live in the moment and take full advantage of the simple pleasures of life,’ Glidden suggested. In fact, doing so will help you last longer. In these instructions for building gratitude, the standards are lofty but the assignments are useful and easy. Even mundane activities can have long-term benefits.
- Quality over quantity: As an introvert, you might enjoy being alone but understand the value of healthy connections. Maintain strong genuine relationships even if that means you aren’t everyone’s best friend and never have groups of people to hang out with. ‘Try to stay grounded in who you are,’ recommends Scott Barry Kaufman, a cognitive scientist at New York University and host of the YouTube channel by the same name. ‘Focusing on what you’ve been told you should be or you are “supposed” to be or the norm of social existence will make you miserable. Be you — the best and most authentic version of you, and realise you can find happiness!’
Stop Following the Rules: Don’t buy into the myth of a ‘right way’ to be happy. Do what you want to do, even if it’s not what everyone else is doing. You can be alone, or you can work on your knitting. Follow your values and your desires. The bottom line is: be yourself, and be happy being yourself.
Let me know if you have any other suggestions or have found more about how we introverts can live well.
Thank you!