Sorry I'm Late, I Didn't Want to Come: One Introvert's Year of Saying Yes

by Jessica Pan

His experience has shown that an effective treatment for social anxiety is a form of exposure therapy: to put people in their worst-case scenario, where they are guaranteed to be repeatedly rejected. For instance, he might instruct a patient to stand on the side of the road and sing really loudly. Or he’ll have another patient approach one hundred strangers on the train and ask them for $400. Or have someone spill a cup of coffee all over themselves at a very public place, every day.

“You need to self-disclose more. Share more about yourself. Ask them personal questions.”

But if you think about it, no one taught us how to do this. OK, technically, life did, but I’ve come across so many people who are also pretty bad at this: they ask no questions, they ramble, they don’t listen, they interrupt, or they ask too many questions and offer up nothing of themselves. Talking is what bonds us to other people the most, and we are supposed to learn this through experience out in the real world, but I’d spent that time hibernating with a book.

“That’s the truth of the world, Jessica,” he says, casually full-naming me to let me know something big is coming. “Nobody waves—but everybody waves back.”

And the research is right: it brings me joy.

Loneliness has been declared a health epidemic, and spending time with each other is the obvious cure.

We’re told that we can engineer conversations to be more emotional and interesting by understanding that we all have a “Surface Self” and a “Deep Self.” The Surface Self talks about the weather, facts, what we had for dinner, our plans for the weekend. The Deep Self talks about what these things actually mean to us and how we feel about them.

Deep Self holds on to our fears, our hopes, our loves, our insecurities, our dreams. Surface Self is preoccupied with logistics, facts, details, admin. Deep Self is the wedding vows; Surface Self is the wedding planner. Deep Self likes to stare into your eyes talking about your secret desires, while Surface Self keeps checking out of the conversation to plan their shopping list.

“People are usually very happy to answer personal questions if they feel the person asking them is genuine and kind.”

“The fear and bleak reality of being boring and dying having never connected with anyone is vastly underestimated.”

sharing our vulnerabilities and insecurities is the quickest way to make a real connection with someone. Most people want to boast about their lives, but this leaves people feeling jealous or resentful.

“It’s not that we want others to fail, but we need to know that our own sorrows have echoes in other people’s lives. That’s what connects us. Strength may be impressive, but it’s vulnerability that builds friendships,” Mark says.

“We think to be interesting we have to be impressive—but sharing our failure connects us more than sharing our success.”

I’m also shocked to discover that talking to strangers turns out to be one of the cheapest, easiest ways to feel good and get a hit of dopamine when you’re feeling low, invisible, or lost in your own world.

Public speaking is an incredibly common fear—though introverts are significantly more likely than extroverts to suffer. Typically, we are more sensitive to new stimuli and to our environments, so when faced with an unnerving task like speaking in front of a large group of others, introverts are more likely to have a faster heart rate or increased blood pressure.

And I know, deep down, that what scares you owns you. I didn’t want to be owned by my fear anymore.

Sociobiologists trace this fear back to our ancestors: singling yourself out from a group is inviting them to attack you. Or ostracize you.

I love my parents. I do. But we’re all a little fucked up by our parents, no matter who they are.

How the right stranger can become your personal hero.

That reminder that my fears and problems are inconsequential when it comes to actual life and death. That everything is really small stuff compared to what I’d just been through.

‘I’m looking for new friends,’ and people would hear, ‘I have no friends,’”

A big source of my loneliness is not having a close friend I can call and meet for coffee at a moment’s notice and share everything that’s been happening in my life.

Studies show that we’re spending more time online than ever before, scrolling through our social media accounts, liking photos of strangers’ cats and dinner plates, reading twenty-four-hour news, watching the latest Twitter meltdown of our world leaders unfold, but all of this connectivity is leaving us isolated.

Who hasn’t reunited with someone from their past only to realize the best parts of the conversation were when you two were reminiscing? You leave, disappointed and sad, knowing they feel the same way.

Being seen is something we crave out of friendship—that feeling of “This person gets me more than I get myself.” When we lose that with old friends, the magic is gone.

“strong tie” is our close friends and family, who are likely to have similar connections and knowledge as us. It is the weak ties, the people we are only loosely connected to, who are actually more influential on our lives. They bring new information, advice, and perspectives: new job prospects, commissions, fresh inspiration, or collaborators that we would otherwise have never discovered.

But then, when the day arrives, I’m a no-show. Skipping events is one of my top five hobbies, ranking just below watching videos of dogs jumping into piles of leaves.

charisma is a set of behaviors that anyone can integrate into their personality.

He’s telling me why maintaining eye contact when shaking hands with someone new is one of the first ways to make a positive impression.

Richard maintains eye contact, his voice is steady, he smiles, he gesticulates, he has open body language. Charisma: 10/10. Would charisma again.

He tells me to make eye contact with people, smile, and join on the end of the group. Nod at appropriate times. Then wait for a gap to join in and introduce myself. This feels like a manual for Human Behavior 101, but I clearly need it.

Matching the energy of the person we’re talking to.

According to Richard, radiating charisma is actually easy and can be done in a couple of simple steps: ask an open-ended question (not something that can be answered with a yes or a no), listen to someone’s answer, and then show how much you care about their response by asking them a meaningful follow-up question: How did they feel about that? What was that like? What appealed to them about that? And then, crucially, you validate their feelings:

“Authenticity is also important,” he reminds me. “You have to be genuinely interested in someone and in connecting with them or they’ll sense insincerity.”

At networking events, people tend to be guarded or overeager to please, but if you let them vent their feelings and show them some empathy and compassion, you can create a real connection. But you gotta move fast, because these encounters tend to be brief.

When I ask her about whether networking is really worth the pain for a shy introvert, she tells me, “You absolutely never know when people are going to turn up in your life again. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain. You might gain friends and opportunity and an enjoyable evening.”

When it comes to the constant canceling and de rigueur flakiness, Daisy explains that she has had panic attacks and canceled on events because of anxiety in the past. “Now I know the difference in myself when I’m anxious and it’s making me ill,” she says, explaining that this is a perfectly valid reason to cancel. “But if I’m just feeling a bit run-down and want to hide behind ‘self-care,’ then I know I should probably show up for my commitments.”

It’s just like hunting, I think. Stay quiet, wait for the right moment, don’t scare my prey.

“I honestly avoid these situations. I have never had any meaningful interaction at a stale networking event where people wear big name tags. A dinner or some casual drinks with a smallish group of new people, on the other hand, is absolutely amazing for ‘networking.’ The trick is to create an environment where you don’t feel like you’re doing it.”

I make a few rules before each event. Go with an intention. Talk to three people, with Richard’s advice in mind, and aim to really bond or connect with one person. Psychologists also say that it takes time for shy people to warm up, so if you always leave after ten minutes, you’re never giving yourself the chance to actually succeed. Stay for at least an hour. Also, don’t arrive late. This is very hard to do for an event that you’re dragging yourself to, stopping at every distraction along the way, but when you show up in the middle of an event, the crowd feels impenetrable. Arriving five minutes early gives you a moment to ease your nerves and connect with people as they arrive.

It’s a long game. It’s a slow burn. Less of a hunt, actually, and more of a sprinkling of seeds in the soil.

Paul (has seen ghosts, from Clitheroe) tells me that when he feels too intimidated to walk into a room full of strangers, he tries to go with a friend or coworker, and they agree to split up for the first hour (this is an obviously great idea that I did not think to do once in my whole life before now).

And, obviously, always have an exit strategy.

See, everyone says they hate the idea of participating in improv because you have to make it up as you go, you can’t plan ahead, you can freeze under pressure, or you can be caught looking stupid—and everything that happens is all your fault.

I like to have a sense of what’s going to happen next—and improv consistently pulls the rug out from under me.

Psychologists say that improv classes can help alleviate social anxiety and stress—the exercises encourage you to think quickly on your feet, speak in front of others, and become less obsessed with perfectionism.

But self-confidence doesn’t find us: we have to push ourselves to do something hard and live through it, and then confidence will eventually follow. I’d faked confidence and, by doing so, created it. It really did feel like a feat of wizardry.

It’s taken me a long time to really believe, to know, that loneliness is circumstantial. We move to a new city. We start a new job. We travel alone. Our families move away. We don’t know how to connect with loved ones anymore. We lose touch with friends. It is not a damning indictment of how lovable we are.

Introvert or extrovert, shy or outgoing—loneliness can catch you no matter who you are.

Introverts crave a particular kind of connection, so while extroverts might get a buzz from a busy city where they have small, surface encounters with people, introverts tend to feel lonely in crowds, even if they are interacting with a few people. (In other words, we’re difficult to please.)