An introvert's insight

I’ve always been an introvert, so big crowds of people, like those at Lawnparties this past weekend, are usually my worst nightmare. I often find making small talk with semi-acquaintances challenging and unfulfilling and struggle to be myself when wandering through seas of faces. When I arrived at Princeton my freshman year, pumped full of excited energy, I was convinced, like many, that I could reinvent myself and become the successful social butterfly I’d never been in high school. I had this vision of myself floating into any room and doling out high-fives, fist bumps and inside jokes with ease, loving toward and loved by all.

My extroversion experiment lasted about two months before inevitably the novelty of nights out at eating clubs and excessive drinking wore off. I gradually returned to my natural, more reserved self, but not happily. For a large part of the next two years I blamed myself for feeling self-conscious or bored when in the large party environment every week, finding flaw with myself for feeling tired, for not wanting to get drunk and for judging others disdainfully to soothe my own insecurity.

I felt frustrated at the lack of deeper conversations with peers who I knew to be intelligent, not thinking that perhaps some people wanted to escape from precisely the kind of intense engagement that I happened to enjoy. I also felt trapped in the cycle of going out, since very few friends were willing to forgo a trip to the Street and stay in on a Saturday night. Drinking and mingling are designated by Princeton’s culture as the primary way to have fun, and despite my efforts, I was internally failing. I tried avoiding the Street entirely for a while, but found myself feeling even more deeply lonely and isolated. I may be an introvert, but I’m not antisocial. I still wanted to connect with others, but had turned “going out” into something more emotionally charged and anxiety-ridden than it needed to be — into yet another achievement on this already hoop-filled campus.

After returning from a year off this semester, fed up with my own dissatisfaction, I tried to take a new approach to going out: curbing any huge expectations of how fulfilling or objectively enjoyable a party might be, and accepting the way I felt in the moment, rather than beating myself up. It’s pretty obvious, but it was incredible how letting go of all that negative mental energy could entirely change my experience. It became a lot easier to accept myself and enjoy the environment for what it was, rather than what it wasn’t. I still found myself feeling tired, or on occasion bored. But, instead of feeding into the cycle in my own head, I tried to just let it go — and take myself home earlier or stick with one close friend rather than flit around endlessly in desperate hopes of finding someone to have a deep conversation with.

This story is nothing new — it’s a pretty standard trope of simply learning about one’s self, accepting that and then doing what suits your own needs. But it’s a powerful lesson, that simply an awareness of our thought patterns can completely change the quality of an experience. Whether you're an introvert trying to fit into an extroverted social culture, or some more significant hurdle, so much of life is about managing expectations and judgments, trying to be true to who you are and letting others do the same, without trying to manufacture any outcome or emotion.

Laughter and fun are spontaneous. There’s no formula to them, like in so many aspects of life at Princeton. You can put yourself in any environment, but if you’re stuck in your own web of criticism of yourself and the world, you will continue to feel miserable. I’m constantly reminded of that. When I relax and let go of the reality I’ve constructed in my head, I can focus more fully on the reality that’s actually out there. And when it’s spring, the sun is shining and I realize just how lucky we all are to be able to spend an entire Sunday lounging in the backyards of mini-mansions, it can actually be pretty blissful.

Lauren Davis is a sophomore from North Hampton, N.H. She can be reached at lhdavis@princeton.edu.