Quiet Quotes

“Should we become so proficient at self-presentation that we can dissemble without anyone suspecting? Must we learn to stage-manage our voices, gestures, and body language until we can tell—sell—any story we want? These seem venal aspirations, a marker of how far we’ve come—and not in a good way—since”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“How to Win Friends and Influence People is full of chapter titles like “Making People Glad to Do What You Want” and “How to Make People Like You Instantly.” All of which raises the question, how did we go from Character to Personality without realizing that we had sacrificed something meaningful along the way?”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“We like to think that we value individuality, but all too often we admire one type of individual—the”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Introversion—along with its cousins sensitivity, seriousness, and shyness—is now a second-class personality trait, somewhere between a disappointment and a pathology. Introverts living under the Extrovert Ideal are like women in a man’s world,”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

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

“Those who live the most fully realized lives—giving back to their families, societies, and ultimately themselves—tend to find meaning in their obstacles.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“The truth is that many schools are designed for extroverts.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“difference has to do with how the two cultures define respect.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“The Asians were far more likely to accept a proposal from the friendly business manager than from the hostile one;”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“In couples where the man is introverted and the woman extroverted, as with Sarah and Bob, we often mistake personality conflicts for gender difference,”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Her idea of a perfect start to the weekend is a quiet evening at the movies, just her and Greg.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“students take ownership of their education when they learn from one another”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Caucasians, he said, seem to be “less afraid of other people thinking that what they said was too loud or too stupid.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“learned to not worry so much about the outcome,”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“It’s also important for companies to groom listeners”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“And every day, Don wrestles with himself. Should he go back to his apartment and recharge over a quiet lunch, as he longs to do, or join his classmates?”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Don is “a bitter introvert,” as he cheerfully puts it—bitter because the more time he spends at HBS, the more convinced he becomes that he’d better change his ways.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Now that you’re an adult, you might still feel a pang of guilt when you decline a dinner invitation in favor of a good book. Or maybe you like to eat alone in restaurants and could do without the pitying looks from fellow diners. Or you’re told that you’re “in your head too much,” a phrase that’s often deployed against the quiet and cerebral. Of course, there’s another word for such people: thinkers.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Restraint, Gandhi believed, was one of his greatest assets. And it was born of his shyness: I have naturally formed the habit of restraining my thoughts. A thoughtless word hardly ever escaped my tongue or pen. Experience has taught me that silence is part of the spiritual discipline of a votary of truth. We find so many people impatient to talk. All this talking can hardly be said to be of any benefit to the world. It is so much waste of time. My shyness has been in reality my shield and buckler. It has allowed me to grow. It has helped me in my discernment of truth.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Since then, some forty years of research has reached the same startling conclusion. Studies have shown that performance gets worse as group size increases: groups of nine generate fewer and poorer ideas compared to groups of six, which do worse than groups of four. The “evidence from science suggests that business people must be insane to use brainstorming groups,” writes the organizational psychologist Adrian Furnham.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“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. Scientists now know that the brain is incapable of paying attention to two things at the same time. What looks like multitasking is really switching back and forth between multiple tasks, which reduces productivity and increases mistakes by up to 50 percent.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“So the next time you see a person with a composed face and a soft voice, remember that inside her mind she might be solving an equation, composing a sonnet, designing a hat. She might, that is, be deploying the powers of quiet.
We know from myths and fairy tales that there are many different kind of powers in this world. One child is given a light saber, another a wizard's education.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“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. She works well in teams and socializes in groups. We like to think that we value individuality, but all too often we admire one type of individual—”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Scientists now know that the brain is incapable of paying attention to two things at the same time. What looks like multitasking is really switching back and forth between multiple tasks, which reduces productivity and increases mistakes by up to 50 percent.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“If this is true—if solitude is an important key to creativity—then we might all want to develop a taste for it. We’d want to teach our kids to work independently. We’d want to give employees plenty of privacy and autonomy. Yet increasingly we do just the opposite.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Americans found themselves working no longer with neighbors but with strangers. “Citizens” morphed into “employees,” facing the question of how to make a good impression on people to whom they had no civic or family ties.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“in settled populations, people with this same gene form have poorer nutrition. The same traits that make a nomad fierce enough to hunt and to defend livestock against raiders may hinder more sedentary activities like farming, selling goods at the market, or focusing at school.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“the simple act of being interrupted is one of the biggest barriers to productivity.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“Velocity of speech counts as well as volume: we rank fast talkers as more competent and likable than slow ones.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“am a horse for a single harness, not cut out for tandem or teamwork … for well I know that in order to attain any definite goal, it is imperative that one person do the thinking and the commanding. —ALBERT EINSTEIN”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking