Quiet Quotes

“Parks herself seemed aware of this paradox, calling her autobiography Quiet Strength—a title that challenges us to question our assumptions. Why shouldn’t quiet be strong? And what else can quiet do that we don’t give it credit for?”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Solve problems, make art, think deeply.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Many introver- ted kids grow up to have excellent so- cial skills, although they tend to join groups in their own way—waiting a while before they plunge in, or particip- ating only for short periods. That’s OK. Your child needs to acquire social skills and make friends, not turn into the most gregarious student in school. This doesn’t mean that popularity isn’t a lot of fun. You’ll probably wish it for him, just as you might wish that he have good looks, a quick wit, or athletic tal- ent. But make sure you’re not imposing your own longings, and remember that there are many paths to a satisfying life.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Evangelicalism has taken the Extrovert Ideal to its logical extreme, McHugh is telling us. If you don’t love Jesus out loud, then it must not be real love. It’s not enough to forge your own spiritual connection to the divine; it must be displayed publicly. Is it any wonder that introverts like Pastor McHugh start to question their own hearts?”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Everything in the service involved communication,” he says with gentle exasperation. “Greeting people, the lengthy sermon, the singing. There was no emphasis on quiet, liturgy, ritual, things that give you space for contemplation.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Many psychologists would also agree that introverts and extroverts work differently. Extroverts tend to tackle assignments quickly. They make fast (sometimes rash) decisions, and are comfortable multitasking and risk-taking. They enjoy “the thrill of the chase” for rewards like money and status. Introverts often work more slowly and deliberately. They like to focus on one task at a time and can have mighty powers of concentration. They’re relatively immune to the lures of wealth and fame. Our”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Even though I make no special attempt to observe the discipline of silence, living alone automatically makes me refrain from the sins of speech. —KAMO NO CHOMEI, 12th Century Japanese recluse”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“This would not have come as news to Jason Fried, cofounder of the web application company 37signals. For ten years, beginning in 2000, Fried asked hundreds of people (mostly designers, programmers, and writers) where they liked to work when they needed to get something done. He found that they went anywhere but their offices, which were too noisy and full of interruptions. That’s why, of Fried’s sixteen employees, only eight live in Chicago, where 37signals is based, and even they are not required to show up for work, even for meetings. Especially not for meetings, which Fried views as “toxic.” Fried is not anti-collaboration—37signals’ home page touts its products’ ability to make collaboration productive and pleasant. But he prefers passive forms of collaboration like e-mail, instant messaging, and online chat tools. His advice for other employers? “Cancel your next meeting,” he advises. “Don’t reschedule it. Erase it from memory.” He also suggests “No-Talk Thursdays,” one day a week in which employees aren’t allowed to speak to each other.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Kafka, for example, couldn’t bear to be near even his adoring fiancée while he worked: You once said that you would like to sit beside me while I write. Listen, in that case I could not write at all. For writing means revealing oneself to excess; that utmost of self-revelation and surrender, in which a human being, when involved with others, would feel he was losing himself, and from which, therefore, he will always shrink as long as he is in his right mind.… That is why one can never be alone enough when one writes, why there can never be enough silence around one when one writes, why even night is not night enough. Even”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“it’s always been private occasions that make me feel connected to the joys and sorrows of the world,”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Montgomery, Alabama. December 1, 1955. Early evening. A public bus pulls to a stop and a sensibly dressed woman in her forties gets on. She carries herself erectly, despite having spent the day bent over an ironing board in a dingy basement tailor shop at the Montgomery Fair department store. Her feet are swollen, her shoulders ache. She sits in the first row of the Colored section and watches quietly as the bus fills with riders. Until the driver orders her to give her seat to a white passenger. The woman utters a single word that ignites one of the most important civil rights protests of the twentieth century, one word that helps America find its better self. The word is “No.” The driver threatens to have her arrested. “You may do that,” says Rosa Parks. A police officer arrives. He asks Parks why she won’t move. “Why do you all push us around?” she answers simply. “I don’t know,” he says. “But the law is the law, and you’re under arrest.” On the afternoon of her trial and conviction for disorderly conduct, the Montgomery Improvement Association holds a rally for Parks at the Holt Street Baptist Church, in the poorest section of town. Five thousand gather to support Parks’s lonely act of courage. They squeeze inside the church until its pews can hold no more. The rest wait patiently outside, listening through loudspeakers. The Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. addresses the crowd. “There comes a time that people get tired of being trampled over by the iron feet of oppression,” he tells them. “There comes a time when people get tired of being pushed out of the glittering sunlight of life’s July and left standing amidst the piercing chill of an Alpine November.” He praises Parks’s bravery and hugs her. She stands silently, her mere presence enough to galvanize the crowd. The association launches a citywide bus boycott that lasts 381 days. The people trudge miles to work. They carpool with strangers. They change the course of American history.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Imagine you work hard to prepare a talk on a subject you care about. You get your message across, and when you finish the audience rises to its feet, its clapping sustained and sincere. One person might leave the room feeling, “I’m glad I got my message across, but I’m also happy it’s over; now I can get back to the rest of my life.” Another person, more sensitive to buzz, might walk away feeling, “What a trip! Did you hear that applause? Did you see the expression on their faces when I made that life-changing point? This is great!” But”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“extroverted leaders enhance group performance when employees are passive, but that introverted leaders are more effective with proactive employees.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“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. The”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Talkative people are rated as smarter, better-looking, more interesting, and more desirable as friends. Velocity of speech counts as well as volume: we rank fast-talkers as more competent and likable than slow ones. The same dynamics ap-ply in groups, where research shows that the voluble are considered smarter than the reticent—even though there’s zero correlation between the gift of gab and good ideas.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Overarousal interferes with attention and short-term memory—key”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“So what was the dierence between Alison and Jillian? Both were pseudo-extroverts, and you might say that Alison was trying and failing where Jillian was succeeding. But Alison’s problem was actually that she was acting out of character in the service of a project she didn’t care about. She didn’t love the law. She’d chosen to become a Wall Street litigator because it seemed to her that this was what powerful and successful lawyers did, so her pseudo-extroversion was not supported by deeper values. She was not telling herself, I’m doing this to advance work I care about deeply, and when the work is done I’ll settle back into my true self. Instead, her interior monologue was The route to success is to be the sort of person I am not. This is not self-monitoring; it is self-negation. Where Jillian acts out of character for the sake of worthy tasks that temporarily require a different orientation, Alison believes that there is something fundamentally wrong with who she is. It’s not always so easy, it turns out, to identify your core personal projects. And it can be especially tough for introverts, who have spent so much of their lives conforming to extroverted norms that by the time they choose a career, or a calling, it feels perfectly normal to ignore their own preferences. They may be uncomfortable in law school or nursing school or in the marketing department, but no more so than they were back in middle school or summer camp.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Moses, for example, was not, according to some interpretations of his story, the brash, talkative type who would organize road trips and hold forth in a classroom at Harvard Business School. On the contrary, by today’s standards he was dreadfully timid. He spoke with a stutter and considered himself inarticulate. The book of Numbers describes him as “very meek, above all the men which were upon the face of the earth.” When God first appeared to him in the form of a burning bush, Moses was employed as a shepherd by his father-in-law; he wasn’t even ambitious enough to own his own sheep. And when God revealed to Moses his role as liberator of the Jews, did Moses leap at the opportunity? Send someone else to do it, he said. “Who am I, that I should go to Pharaoh?” he pleaded. “I have never been eloquent. I am slow of speech and tongue.” It was only when God paired him up with his extroverted brother Aaron that Moses agreed to take on the assignment. Moses would be the speechwriter, the behind-the-scenes guy, the Cyrano de Bergerac; Aaron would be the public face of the operation. “It will be as if he were your mouth,” said God, “and as if you were God to him.” Complemented by Aaron, Moses led the Jews from Egypt, provided for them in the desert for the next forty years, and brought the Ten Commandments down from Mount Sinai. And he did all this using strengths that are classically associated with introversion: climbing a mountain in search of wisdom and writing down carefully, on two stone tablets, everything he learned there. We tend to write Moses’ true personality out of the Exodus story. (Cecil B. DeMille’s classic, The Ten Commandments, portrays him as a swashbuckling figure who does all the talking, with no help from Aaron.) We don’t ask why God chose as his prophet a stutterer with a public speaking phobia. But we should. The book of Exodus is short on explication, but its stories suggest that introversion plays yin to the yang of extroversion; that the medium is not always the message; and that people followed Moses because his words were thoughtful, not because he spoke them well.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“We know from myths and fairy tales that there are many different kinds of powers in this world. One child is given a light saber, another a wizard’s education. The trick is not to amass all the different kinds of available power, but to use well the kind you’ve been granted.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Introverts are offered keys to private gardens full of riches. To possess such a key is to tumble like Alice down her rabbit hole. She didn’t choose to go to Wonderland—but she made of it an adventure that was fresh and fantastic and very much her own.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“our Charlie Brown moments are the price we have to pay to bang our drums happily through the decades.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“The Internet’s role in promoting face-to-face group”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“He also suffered from a certain amount of what he calls “reputational confusion,” in which he became known for being over-the-top effervescent, and the reputation fed on itself. This was the persona that others knew, so it was the persona he felt obliged to serve up.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“As an introvert might be expected to do, he’d prepared thoroughly for the speech, not only rehearsing his remarks but also making sure he could cite the latest research. Even”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“You may be so busy trying to appear like a zestful, reward-sensitive extrovert that you undervalue your own talents, or feel underestimated by those around you. But when you’re focused on a project that you care about, you probably find that your energy is boundless.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“A software engineer named Tom kicks off, describing with great passion his relief at learning that there was “a physiological basis for the trait of sensitivity. Here’s the research! This is how I am! I don’t have to try to meet anyone’s expectations anymore. I”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“shy and introverted people might choose to spend their days in behind-the-scenes pursuits like inventing, or researching, or”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“our reverence for alpha status blinds us to things that are good and smart and wise. For”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“sometimes they’re highly empathic. It’s as if they have thinner boundaries separating them from other people’s emotions and from the tragedies and cruelties of the world. They tend to have unusually strong consciences. They avoid violent movies and TV shows; they’re acutely aware of the consequences of a lapse in their own behavior. In”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“The highly sensitive tend to be philosophical or spiritual in their orientation, rather than materialistic or hedonistic. They dislike small talk. They”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking