Introversion Quotes

“How intense can be the longing to escape from the emptiness and dullness of human verbosity, to take refuge in nature, apparently so inarticulate, or in the wordlessness of long, grinding labour, of sound sleep, of true music, or of a human understanding rendered speechless by emotion!”
― Boris Pasternak, Doctor Zhivago

“Society is commonly too cheap. We meet at very short intervals, not having had time to acquire any new value for each other.We meet at meals three times a day, and give each other a new taste of that musty old cheese that we are. We have had to agree on a certain set of rules, called etiquette and politeness, to make this frequent meeting tolerable and that we need not come to open war. We meet at the post office, and at the sociable, and at the fireside every night; we live thick and are in each other's way, and stumble over one another, and I think that we thus lose some respect for one another.”
― Henry David Thoreau, Walden or, Life in the Woods

“I’ll be honest with you. I’m a little bit of a loner. It’s been a big part of my maturing process to learn to allow people to support me. I tend to be very self-reliant and private. And I have this history of wanting to work things out on my own and protect people from what’s going on with me.”
― Kerry Washington

“Many introverts don't feel as if they know enough about a subject until they know almost everything.”
― Marti Olsen Laney, The Introvert Advantage: How to Thrive in an Extrovert World

“Introverts paradoxically pull away from culture and create culture.”
― Laurie Helgoe, Introvert Power: Why Your Inner Life Is Your Hidden Strength

“There's nothing more exciting than ideas.”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“I went up on the hill and walked about until twilight had deepened into an autumn night with a benediction of starry quietude over it. I was alone but not lonely. I was a queen in halls of fancy.”
― L.M. Montgomery, Emily's Quest

“If personal space is vital to creativity, so is freedom from "peer pressure".”
― Susan Cain, Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking

“We know we only have so much energy for reaching out; if we’re going to invest, we want it to be good.”
― Laurie Helgoe, Introvert Power: Why Your Inner Life Is Your Hidden Strength

“How do we maintain integrity as introverts, and at the same time allow our natural extroverted tendencies to emerge?

The answer: organically. We mosh best when we feel like moshing. The T’ai Chi symbol illustrates that introversion (yin) flows into extroversion (yang) and extroversion flows into introversion. Each specialty houses the nucleus of the other. When the introvert is safe, she can extrovert. When the extrovert is safe, he can introvert.”
― Laurie Helgoe, Introvert Power: Why Your Inner Life Is Your Hidden Strength

“Introverts don't like small talk conversation, but they typically don't mind writing. The more people can "see" you on Facebook, Twitter, Google+, or a blog, the more they will feel like they know you, even though you don't have one-on-one interaction with them.”
― Thom S. Rainer

“Tocqueville saw that the life of constant action and decision which was entailed by the democratic and businesslike character of American life put a premium upon rough and ready habits of mind, quick decision, and the prompt seizure of opportunities - and that all this activity was not propitious for deliberation, elaboration, or precision in thought.”
― Richard Hofstadter, Anti-Intellectualism in American Life

“To express want is to own the desire, to stand in your own reality. The easier alternative is the language of impairment: “I can’t come because I’m run down, overworked, under the gun, tired, sick, or not up to it.” The underlying message is, “I cannot attend because I am impaired,” rather than the more honest and self-respecting response: “I choose to not attend because I prefer the other option.”
― Laurie Helgoe, Introvert Power: Why Your Inner Life Is Your Hidden Strength

“While extroverts tend to attain leadership in public domains, introverts tend to attain leadership in theoretical and aesthetic fields. Outstanding introverted leaders, such as Charles Darwin, Maurie Curie, Patrick White and Arthur Boyd, who have created either new fields of thought or rearranged existing knowledge, have spent long periods of their lives in solitude. Hence leadership does not only apply in social situations, but also occurs in more solitary situations such as developing new techniques in the arts, creating new philosophies, writing profound books and making scientific breakthroughs.”
― Janet Farrall and Leonie Kronborg

“Introvert integrity means going the distance for what we love: moving from apology to acceptance, from acceptance to acknowledgement, and from acknowledgment to activism.”
― Laurie Helgoe, Introvert Power: Why Your Inner Life Is Your Hidden Strength

“For I see not what there is desirable in publick esteeme, were I able to acquire & maintaine it. It would perhaps increase my acquaintance, the thing which I chiefly study to decline.”
― Isaac Newton

“During relaxation we drop our guard. Particularly in conversation. Relaxed conversation leads to openness. And in openness we often reveal what should never be revealed.”
― Edward Carey, Observatory Mansions

“Any human companionship, even the dearest and most perfect, would have been alien to her then. She was sufficient unto herself, needing not love nor comradeship nor any human emotion to round out her felicity. Such moments come rarely in any life, but when they do come they are inexpressibly wonderful - as if the finite were for a second infinity - as if humanity were for a space uplifted into divinity - as if all ugliness had vanished, leaving only flawless beauty.”
― L.M. Montgomery, Emily Climbs

“Most people in politics draw energy from backslapping and shaking hands and all that. I draw energy from discussing ideas.”
― Al Gore

“I would say that introverts make some of the best international philosophers. The less common attribute of the introverted lifestyle - a close societal connection, as such a connection disappears or changes in relevance as the currents of the winds change - leaves too much room for one's own cultural bias. Instead, introverts tend to turn inward, the laboratory of being and all its forms. This is the most accurate study of the individual human being, which is in turn, rather than those affected by cultural limitations, the most universal reflection of human understanding and human behavior.”
― Criss Jami, Killosophy

“In the day school she went to in New York she had long intimate conversations with them all in her imagination, but never in reality.”
― Madeleine L'Engle, And Both Were Young

“Fish held the silence for so long that I had to restrain myself from prodding her. That's never a good idea. Sometimes people hesitate because they don't have the courage to come out with whatever needs to be said; other times they desperately want to speak but can't find the words. Jabbing them prematurely tends to shut them up. Outwaiting them gives them the time to say more than they intend.”
― Adam-Troy Castro, Emissaries from the Dead

“A long mission was ahead of them, and no one wanted to get on anyone else's nerves with unnecessary chatter.”
― Allen Steele, Hex

“Já jsem uctivý a zdvořilý ke každému, ale kdyby lidi věděli, jak těžká mi je tato uctivost a zdvořilost, utíkali by ode mne a prosili by mne, abych jim odpustil, že jejich stín padl na mou cestu.”
― Jakub Deml, Zapomenuté světlo

“And that was true too, that was what the Culverts were like: crucified by their shyness and at the same time contemptuous of the world of ordinary people they couldn't talk to.”
― Tessa Hadley, Sunstroke and Other Stories

“Because Saleem was louder about Islam than I was, he was considered more of a man.”
― Ali Eteraz, Children of Dust: A Memoir of Pakistan

“I can't be on too long before I have to stop. If she hadn't left, you'd both be home right now.”

Victoria’s brow wrinkled.

“I don’t understand.”

“You take energy from people, from crowds, and you expend more. For you, when you’re on, you run like a German engine, no?”

“Right.”

“When you go home after the party’s over and you haven’t had enough attention, you miss it. You crave more.”

“Right.”

“I don’t take in energy like that. People take energy from me. I can be social, I can be on, but I go home for silence and solitude, not because it’s time for the party to end. I don’t want to hear another person’s voice for three days so I can recharge. Like a battery.”
― Moriah Jovan, Paso Doble

“Not only has volume been ratcheted up but expectations have, too. Quiet success--painting a picture, writing a poem, writing an algorithm--is all well and good, but if you haven't become famous doing it, then did it really matter?”
― Sophia Dembling, The Introvert's Way: Living a Quiet Life in a Noisy World

“Jacob opened the refrigerator and stared into it vacantly, with the false purposefulness that lingers for a few moments when a person of a solitary nature is released from the company of a strong personality.”
― Caleb Crain, Necessary Errors

“Osborn was a founding partner of the advertising agency Batten, Barton, Durstine, and Osborn (BBDO), but it was as an author that he really made his mark, beginning with the day in 1938 that a magazine editor invited him to lunch and asked what his hobby was. “Imagination,” replied Osborn.”
― Susan Cain