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Loading... Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking| 9,772 | 457 | 610 | 
(4.02) | 386 | This book demonstrates how introverted people are misunderstood and undervalued in modern culture, charting the rise of extrovert ideology while sharing anecdotal examples of how to use introvert talents to adapt to various situations. At least one-third of the people we know are introverts. They are the ones who prefer listening to speaking, reading to partying; who innovate and create but dislike self-promotion; who favor working on their own over brainstorming in teams. Although they are often labeled "quiet," it is to introverts that we owe many of the great contributions to society, from van Gogh's sunflowers to the invention of the personal computer. Filled with indelible stories of real people, this book shows how dramatically we undervalue introverts, and how much we lose in doing so. Taking the reader on a journey from Dale Carnegie's birthplace to Harvard Business School, from a Tony Robbins seminar to an evangelical megachurch, the author charts the rise of the Extrovert Ideal in the twentieth century and explores its far-reaching effects. She talks to Asian-American students who feel alienated from the brash, backslapping atmosphere of American schools. She questions the dominant values of American business culture, where forced collaboration can stand in the way of innovation, and where the leadership potential of introverts is often overlooked. And she draws on cutting-edge research in psychology and neuroscience to reveal the differences between extroverts and introverts. She introduces us to successful introverts, from a witty, high-octane public speaker who recharges in solitude after his talks, to a record-breaking salesman who quietly taps into the power of questions. Finally, she offers advice on everything from how to better negotiate differences in introvert-extrovert relationships to how to empower an introverted child to when it makes sense to be a "pretend extrovert." This book has the ability to permanently change how we see introverts and, equally important, how introverts see themselves.… (more) |
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| Epigraph |
A species in which everyone was General Patton would not succeed, any more than would a race in which everyone was Vincent van Gogh. I prefer to think that the planet needs athletes, philosophers, sex symbols, painters, scientists; it needs the warmhearted, the hardhearted, the coldhearted, and the weakhearted. It needs those who can devote their lives to studying how many droplets of water are secreted by the salivary glands of dogs under which circumstances, and it needs those who can capture the passing impression of cherry blossoms in a fourteen-syllable poem or devote twenty-five pages to the dissection of a small boy's feelings as he lies in bed in the dark waiting for his mother to kiss him good night. . . . Indeed the presence of outstanding strengths presupposes that energy needed in other areas has been channeled away from them.
- Allen Shawn  | |
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| Dedication |
To my childhood family | |
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[Introduction]
Montgomery, Alabama. December 1, 1955. [Author's Note] I have been working on this book officially since 2005, and unofficially for my entire adult life. The date: 1902. The place: Harmony Church, Missouri, a tiny, dot-on-the-map town located on a floodplain a hundred miles from Kansas City. [Conclusion] Whether you're an introvert yourself or an extrovert who loves or works with one, I hope you'll benefit personally from the insights in this book. [A Note on the Dedication] My grandfather was a soft-spoken man with sympathetic blue eyes, and a passion for books and ideas. [A Note on the Words Introvert and Extrovert] This book is about introversion as seen from a cultural point of view. | |
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To ask whether it's nature or nurture ... is like asking whether a blizzard is caused by temperature or humidity. "It's so easy to confuse schmoozing ability with talent. Someone seems like a good presenter, easy to get along with and those traits are rewarded. Well, why is that? They're valuable traits but we put too much of a premium on presenting and not enough on substance and critical thinking." (one venture capitalist) We need leaders who build not their own egos but the institutions they run. So if, deep down, you've been thinking that it's only natural for the bold and sociable to dominate the reserved and sensitive, and that the Extrovert Ideal is innate to humanity, Robert McCrae's personality map suggests a different truth: that each way of being—quiet and talkative, careful and audacious, inhibited and unrestrained—is characteristic of its own mighty civilization. If there is one insight you take away from this book, though, I hope it's a newfound sense of entitlement to be yourself. The U.S Army has a name for a similar phenomenon: "the Bus to Abilene." "Any army officer can tell you what that means," Colonel (Ret.) Stephen J. Gerras, a professor of behavioral sciences at the U.S. Army War College, told Yale Alumni Magazine in 2008. "It's about a family sitting on a porch in Texas on a hot summer day, and somebody says, 'I'm bored. Why don't we go to Abilene?' When they get to Abilene, somebody says, 'You know, I didn't really want to go.' And the next person says, 'I didn't want to go—I thought you wanted to go,' and so on. Whenever you're in an army group and somebody says, 'I think we're all getting on the bus to Abilene here,' that is a red flag. You can stop a conversation with it. It is a very powerful artifact of our culture." We don't need giant personalities to transform companies. We need leaders who build not their own egos but the institutions they run. Grant had a theory about which kinds of circumstances would call for introverted leadership. His hypothesis was that extroverted leaders enhance group performance when employees are passive, but that introverted leaders are more effective with proactive employees. Grant says it makes sense that introverts are uniquely good at leading initiative-takers. Because of their inclination to listen to others and lack of interest in dominating social situations, introverts are more likely to hear and implement suggestions. Having benefited from the talents of their followers, they are then likely to motivate them to be even more proactive. Introverted leaders create a virtuous circle of proactivity, in other words. Extroverts, on the other hand, can be so intent on putting their own stamp on events that they risk losing others' good ideas along the way and allowing workers to lapse into passivity. But with the natural ability to inspire, extroverted leaders are better at getting results from more passive workers. Open-plan offices have been found to reduce productivity and impair memory. They're associated with high staff turnover. They make people sick, hostile, unmotivated, and insecure. Open-plan workers are more likely to suffer from high blood pressure and elevated stress levels and to get the flu; they argue more with their colleagues; they worry about coworkers eavesdropping on their phone calls and spying on their computer screens. They have fewer personal and confidential conversations with colleagues. They're often subject to loud and uncontrollable noise, which raises heart rates; releases cortisol, the body's fight-or-flight "stress" hormone; and makes people socially distant, quick to anger, aggression, and slow to help others. Indeed, excessive stimulation seems to impede learning: a recent study found that people learn better after a quiet stroll through the woods than after a noisy walk down a city street. Another study, of 38,000 knowledge workers across different sectors, found that the simple act of being interrupted is one of the biggest barriers to productivity. Even multitasking, that prized feat of modern-day office warriors, turns out to be a myth. Schwartz's research suggests something important: we can stretch our personalities, but only up to a point. Our inborn temperaments influence us, regardless of the lives we lead. A sizable part of who we are is ordained by our genes, by our brains, by our nervous systems. And yet the elasticity that Schwartz found in some of the high-reactive teens also suggests the converse: we have free will and can use it to shape our personalities. We might call this the "rubber band theory" of personality. We are like rubber bands at rest. We are elastic and can stretch ourselves, but only so much. But what [my grandfather] loved to to best was to read. In his small apartment, where as a widower he'd lived alone for decades, all the urniture had yielded its original function to serve as a surface for piles of books: gold-leafed Hebrew texts jumbled together with Margaret Atwood and Milan Kumdera. | |
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▾References References to this work on external resources.  Wikipedia in English (3)
▾Book descriptions This book demonstrates how introverted people are misunderstood and undervalued in modern culture, charting the rise of extrovert ideology while sharing anecdotal examples of how to use introvert talents to adapt to various situations. At least one-third of the people we know are introverts. They are the ones who prefer listening to speaking, reading to partying; who innovate and create but dislike self-promotion; who favor working on their own over brainstorming in teams. Although they are often labeled "quiet," it is to introverts that we owe many of the great contributions to society, from van Gogh's sunflowers to the invention of the personal computer. Filled with indelible stories of real people, this book shows how dramatically we undervalue introverts, and how much we lose in doing so. Taking the reader on a journey from Dale Carnegie's birthplace to Harvard Business School, from a Tony Robbins seminar to an evangelical megachurch, the author charts the rise of the Extrovert Ideal in the twentieth century and explores its far-reaching effects. She talks to Asian-American students who feel alienated from the brash, backslapping atmosphere of American schools. She questions the dominant values of American business culture, where forced collaboration can stand in the way of innovation, and where the leadership potential of introverts is often overlooked. And she draws on cutting-edge research in psychology and neuroscience to reveal the differences between extroverts and introverts. She introduces us to successful introverts, from a witty, high-octane public speaker who recharges in solitude after his talks, to a record-breaking salesman who quietly taps into the power of questions. Finally, she offers advice on everything from how to better negotiate differences in introvert-extrovert relationships to how to empower an introverted child to when it makes sense to be a "pretend extrovert." This book has the ability to permanently change how we see introverts and, equally important, how introverts see themselves. ▾Library descriptions No library descriptions found. ▾LibraryThing members' description
| Haiku summary |
Introverts are strong
their brains are just wired different
this can be a strength
(sullijo) | |
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• We're told that to be great is to be bold, to be happy is to be sociable. We see ourselves as a nation of extroverts—which means that we've lost sight of who we really are.
• Extroversion is an enormously appealing personality style, but we've turned it into an oppressive standard to which most of us feel we must conform.
• Depending on which study you consult, one third to one half of Americans are introverts—in other words, one out of every two or three people you know.
• We live with a value system that I call the Extrovert Ideal—the omnipresent belief that the ideal self is gregarious, alpha, and comfortable in the spotlight.
• The archetypal extrovert prefers action to contemplation, risk-taking to heed-taking, certainty to doubt. He favors quick decisions, even at the risk of being wrong... (and) works well in teams and socializes in groups.
• Introversion—along with its cousins sensitivity, seriousness, and shyness—is now a second-class personality trait, somewhere between a disappointment and a pathology.
• Introversion is different from shyness. Shyness is the fear of social judgement. Introversion is about how do you respond to social stimulation?
• Extroverts thrive under a lot of social stimulation. Introverts thrive when they are quieter and alone. But our schools and workplaces are designed for extroverts and their need for lots of stimulation.
• Introverts focus on the meaning they make of the events swirling around them; extroverts plunge into the events themselves.
• Introverts recharge their batteries by being alone; extroverts need to recharge when they don't socialize enough.
• Introverts feel "just right" with less stimulation, as when they sip wine with a close friend, solve a crossword puzzle, or read a book. Extroverts enjoy the extra bang that comes from activities like meeting new people, skiing slippery slopes, and cranking up the stereo. (