“Living as an introvert in a society and a church that exalts extroversion takes its toll, and shame cuts deep into introverted psyches that are bent toward self-examination.”
This chapter is all about healing. And there can’t be healing without inflicted wounds. McHugh spends the first portion of the chapter dealing with the reality that many who are naturally introverted have felt put off or belittled by others in one form or another. In fact, he states that 49 out of the 50 introverts he interviewed for the book had felt ‘maligned’ for their introversion in one form or another.
One particularly striking statement McHugh says that ‘While extroverts commonly feel loneliness when others are absent, introverts can feel most lonely when others are present, because ours is the aching loneliness of not being known or understood.’ McHugh gives example after example of introverts being wounded by those who misunderstand them: An introverted daughter being pushed by an extroverted mother to become more normal; An extroverted school teacher absolutely destroying an introverted student because he couldn’t answer questions quickly enough for her...
I’ve been wounded in the past as well. I remember my second grade teacher was not very understanding of this. I remember being a little slower to learn/process things in those grades… and I remember that I worked slower than other kids… and I don’t remember it to be because of laziness. Maybe it was because I was trying to be careful to be right… but I worked slower. I remember this teacher forcing me to stay in and finish work during recess. I also remember one day walking into class to see my desk overturned in the middle of the room with all of my stuff in one big pile and she insisted that I needed to find a worksheet that I had not turned in. It was humiliating and frustrating.
McHugh says something important in response to these examples: ‘Finding healing as an introvert will not entail freedom from these characteristics. Healing for us will involve a new way of interpreting our natural personality traits.’ In other words… find out and embrace who you are… and don’t let other’s define who you should or should not be. However, he cautions that we are careful to diagnose introverted patterns wisely. There are some things we do that go too far… there are times when we retreat too much from others… and it actually develops into more unhealthy patterns.
McHugh suggests that while introverts may find some healing by a ‘journey inward’ toward accepting who we are and how we tick… he believes (and I agree) that we won’t find total healing until “we respond to and welcome the indwelling presence of the Creator God who ‘formed my inward parts.’” The great irony for Christian introverts is that ‘our ultimate identity is never found in aloneness, but it is found in relationship to another.’ So in the midst of our introversion… we belong to, should be shaped by, and hopefully can find healing in the midst of a greater community.
While this is not my favorite chapter in the book, I suspect that it can be very powerful to those who approach the book with deep wounds in their past from people who were ignorant to the particular nuances, needs and gifts of a introverted person.
In my next post, I’ll try to summarize and respond to chapter four of McHugh’s book which is entitled: ‘Introverted Spirituality.’
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