Act Like an Extrovert When You Need to
By: Peter Vogt
Tags: Beyourself, Self Improvement, Life Lessons, Personal Development, Introvert

My brother Mark says he can flip a metaphorical switch inside himself to become an extrovert-on-demand.

“It’s like what happens to performers just as they put on their costume to play ‘superstar’ on stage,” he tells me. “The costume has a magical effect, like you’ve been granted superpowers.”

Mark is a fine actor, it turns out, so convincing I’m sure many of the people in his life think he really is an extrovert.

But he isn’t. He’s near the middle of the introvert-extrovert spectrum, though likely leaning a bit closer to the introverted side.

If he needs to jump into the proverbial phone booth and become Super Extrovert for his job as an IT consultant, or for his role as son-/brother-in-law in his wife Judith’s extended Cameroonian family, he just does it. And he does it well.

Mark’s method is commonplace among introverts. I have my own version of it too, and I use it all the time.

But is it a good life strategy? Is it effective? And most important of all, is it healthy?

Yes, I’ve found — as long as I’m temporarily modifying only my behavior, for a purpose that matters.

As long as I’m not trying to permanently change my very self.

“Acting Out of Character”

In his fascinating 2016 book Me, Myself, and Us: The Science of Personality and the Art of Well-Being, psychologist Brian Little, himself a strong introvert, introduces the concept of acting out of character.

It’s what I’m imagining myself doing when I take on the role of extrovert: I am, quite literally, acting — and the “out of character” aspect of Little’s phrase means, in this context, that I’m merely behaving differently than I typically do.

But “acting out of character” can be viewed through another contextual lens too, Little says: The words “out of” also connote acting because of, as in the phrase “she acted out of compassion.”

“So when I use the phrase ‘acting out of character,’ it means two different but equally powerful ways of explaining a pattern of behavior,” Little writes.

“It simultaneously means people are acting inconsistently with what we have come to expect [from them] and that they are doing it because of something in their character, because of the values they wish to express.”

This is the healthy and quite normal way I periodically become an ad hoc extrovert.

Sometimes, as Little suggests in Me, Myself, and Us, I’m motivated to do so by love; I socialize with my wife at her high school reunion when I’d rather stay home and read a book.

At other times, again per Little, I’m motivated by professionalism; I’m willing and able to sell my books in a crowded exhibit hall because I believe so strongly in the topic I’ve written about.

What I call situational extroversion, then, is reasonable and sensible: I’m doing something different, temporarily and purposefully, because I care about other people or I have goals I want to accomplish in this extroverted world I live in.

What I call existential extroversion, on the other hand — being someone different (or trying to), being an extrovert (or trying to) when I’m not — is another matter.

I Gotta Be Me

In her bestselling 2012 book Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking, author and former lawyer Susan Cain describes a panel she was once part of for an event at Harvard Law School.

With her on the panel were an environmental advocate named Jillian and a trial lawyer named Alison. Both were introverts who sought Cain out for career advice after the event was over.

Jillian, Cain writes, loved her job, especially the research and writing aspects of it. She struggled when she had to make presentations or lead meetings, though, so she simply asked Cain how she could do better in those situations.

Alison, conversely, oozed unhappiness. The next logical step in her career path was to pursue a general counsel position at a major corporation. But “her heart,” Cain writes, “clearly wasn’t in it,” and she had come to believe what she’d frequently been told: that she simply didn’t have the right personality for the job.

What could she do to change who she was, she asked Cain.

There’s a crucial difference between Jillian and Alison.

Jillian wanted only to be better at leading and speaking.

Alison, Cain emphasizes, wanted to be somebody else.

I emulate Jillian. It isn’t always easy to do. But the alternative is far more difficult — and downright dangerous.

Being somebody else — or trying to be and inevitably failing — goes nowhere good. I’ve experimented with this toxic strategy more than once in my life, and the result each time has been debilitating anxiety and depression.

I can only be who I am. And a non-negotiable part of who I am is my natural tendency toward introversion.

So yes, when I need to act extroverted, temporarily and for a good cause, I suit up and take the stage.

But when I’m done, I shed my costume and makeup and return to regular programming— just like my brother Mark does.

“I don’t have to feel bound to the persona I’ve taken on,” he stresses. “I can cast it off after the performance and go fishing or running or shooting at the archery range.”

Alone. With no audience.

Because the show’s over — and the curtain must drop.