Long ago, when I turned up for my first official course on the S-Theory with Dimitri Korenev at Freud's Legacy, he began by saying that there are two utterly different civilisations on our planet — and they are not men and women, but introverts and extraverts.
A lot of water has flowed under the bridge since then; between us we have given no end of explanations, readings and descriptions, and held no end of conversations about who these extraverts and introverts actually are. We have even learned to tell them apart by their faces and their movements, without talking to them at all (my latest party trick is counting the ratio of extraverts to introverts at the gym). And I am worn out explaining to people that on this question you cannot go by popular psychology, which sorts people roughly into “party animal versus homebody” or “the silent one versus the one you cannot shut up”.
I have already written plenty of articles about the differences. This one is not about that. This one is about contact between the civilisations — about where and how and why these two kinds of people can misunderstand each other. After all, a long and fruitful relationship is only possible between an introvert and an extravert, and so it is by definition a meeting of civilisations.
The opening situation is a simple one, and in some form or another it comes up fairly often.
“Back then you told me not to sing, and I listened. So for three quarters of my life I have not sung, and I am not sure whether it is worth learning now.”
says O., an introvert woman, in conversation
For her, the key point in her own sentence is that she listened. She is an introvert: she knows herself and has her own opinion of herself, and here she took an opinion from outside for granted, which caused a whole series of mistakes that O. takes full responsibility for.
“You are forever attacking me and rubbing my nose in my mistakes!”
takes offence E., an extravert woman
For her, the key thing in O.'s sentence is that somebody is talking about her, and not very kindly at that. In other words, E. sees that she is being told off, and instantly puts up her defences.
“You always turn everything round to be about you! Do get it into your head that it is very often not about you at all!”
now it is O., the introvert, who takes offence.
Here she has turned her soul inside out, admitted her guilt and her weakness — and got spat straight into that open soul.
Introverts know themselves well and are constantly getting to know the world around them. Extraverts know the world perfectly well but are constantly getting to know themselves.
That has become a sort of mantra which we repeat and unpack every time. O. sincerely believes that everyone knows themselves but not other people, and so she describes her own train of thought to the other person — where else would they get it from? E. is getting to know herself, and treats any situation as a mirror that describes her to herself. So the situation with O. is seen first and foremost as a mirror, and one that does not show her to her advantage.
And it is like this in everything, entirely subconsciously at that. Extraverts look for themselves through the external, and look for themselves in everything external. Introverts are more self-assured: they look for something for themselves and for others, because for them the community, too, is an object of study and admiration.
If a person is not sure whether they are an extravert or an introvert, they are most likely an extravert. Because introverts, even active ones, in the overwhelming majority of cases know exactly who they are.
I once ran an experiment: I asked both kinds to write an advert for a dating site. The introvert women wrote everything precisely: I am this and that, I can do this, I want that. If you want to convince an introvert, set out clearly and without padding what is needed and why. In most cases an introvert will be satisfied with a scheme, a system whose logic fits something in their picture of the world, and the introvert will deliver a terse “yes” or an equally terse “no”.
This will not work with extraverts. They have absolutely no use for an introvert's picture and scheme of the world, because they see the world and somehow magically (from my introvert point of view) understand it, understand how one should act. And what they are looking for in the world is themselves, their own reflection and their own place. So in those same dating-site adverts the extravert women described exactly that place: a romantic dinner in the countryside, a pot of fragrant shchi, an embrace on the bow of a cruise liner and a bearskin rug in front of the fireplace. But not themselves, because they are still looking for themselves (and in the end will only find themselves with an introvert's help). That is why adverts with beautiful people, luxurious settings, universal admiration and slogans along the lines of “because you're worth it” are purely extravert.
Which brings us to the next “textbook” dialogue between an extravert and an introvert, provisionally titled “the bum and the skirt”. Textbook, because the jokes and comedy sketches about it are beyond counting.
“Darling, does this skirt make me look fat?”
asks — invariably — an extravert woman
She needs feedback from the world. If an introvert woman ever asks such a thing, it is only for camouflage, because everyone seems to ask it, so presumably one ought to. In reality the introvert already knows the answer, and will end up using your words against you. I have tried it, for the sake of the experiment. And my extravert husband wriggled out of a straight answer with real virtuosity.
But in fact this may not be about a skirt at all. It may be about the food someone has cooked, about singing, about the solution to a problem, about yet another qualification, and so on and so forth. But for simplicity's sake let us stay with the skirt. It is important to understand that this skirt is only one of the possible scenarios, and none of them depends in the least on who is male and who is female. It makes absolutely no difference whether the exchange happens in a man-and-woman couple, between two men or between two women. The pattern (yes, this article is being written by an introvert woman who is trying for the article's sake, but cannot change her own nature) is the same everywhere.
The introvert answers either simply “no, it does not”, or, if in a really benevolent mood, “what do you mean, that skirt sits beautifully on you”. The extravert in the skirt beams and, having possibly repeated the question another three times, enriched with “are you sure?” and “really, really?”, flutters off.
And now pay attention: as far as the introvert is concerned, the matter is closed. Full stop. An opinion has been given, it has been heard, everyone is happy. Yeah, riiiight.
As was said earlier, it is the introvert who knows himself and his own opinion. The extravert woman, on the other hand, needs feedback from the world, and the world does not end with that one introvert. So all of a sudden the extravert watches in astonishment as the extravert in the skirt puts the same question to five more friends, or even posts it on social media.
And some even manage to come back to that same introvert with all the feedback they have collected: “can you believe it, Masha and Katya said the skirt is not my style and does not suit me!”
From the extravert's point of view everything here is perfectly logical. They are in their element: they ran a survey, gathered opinions, examined themselves from every angle in the mirrors the world gives us and... shared the priceless feedback they had collected absolutely gratis, that is to say for free, with their beloved (or with a friend, or with mum or dad, or with a daughter or son).
But the introvert does not take it that way. The introvert has already given an opinion, closed the subject and relaxed — and now people come to him and signal: you were wrong, and in any case we do not value your opinion in the slightest. Because if they did value it, they would not have run off to conduct an opinion poll. And they certainly would not have come running back to the introvert looking as if he had never been asked at all. That is not why the introvert tore himself away from his important reflections and patiently analysed the matter three times over and answered honestly — not so that the extravert could now pretend that none of it had ever happened.
Because the introvert does know himself, and knows that he answered honestly. And here his expertise is being doubted, which means he himself is being doubted. And the introvert, who gets to know the world by building models of it and testing them for adequacy, concludes that either the extravert or his model of the extravert is completely inadequate. Because the introvert does not seek feedback about himself and cannot think like an extravert by default.
So most introverts, after a slap in the face like that — unintentional, but a slap all the same — withdraw into themselves and start reflecting, rebuilding models, adjusting variables and generally, from an extravert point of view, agonising over goodness knows what. And after N number of “devalued” opinions (devalued only from the introvert point of view, naturally), something like “why do you even want my opinion, you do not give a damn about it!” may well be born.
And this feedback is now rated by the extravert as utterly absurd, false and deeply hurtful. What do you mean, do not give a damn???? If we did not care, we would not have asked!
In fact one could give dozens more examples and take them apart by the mantra: “Introverts know themselves well and are constantly getting to know the world around them. Extraverts know the world perfectly well but are constantly getting to know themselves.”
Talking through every situation would take several volumes. The aim of this article was simply to draw attention to these differences. And to try to make one thing clear: going by all the laws of attraction and of relationships, and by a fairly extensive body of accumulated statistics, your partner almost certainly belongs to a different civilisation from yours, and therefore sees the world from a completely different perspective. Because a relationship is development, and development is possible only through exactly this kind of contact between civilisations.
And that contact can be made a great deal simpler if you understand who is who — and above all if you understand yourself.
