Have you ever thought about this?

[desecration]

When I was a kid (up to about 12 or so) I was very outgoing, crazy extroverted. I remembered this the other day and it got me thinking and reflecting on my life. Are kids more extroverted? Was I an extrovert who lost his way? It's an interesting question. Have you ever thought about this?

When I was going through adolescence I changed more into this introverted person I am today. Part of me really wonders if my path was different would I have still changed? Adolescence was a really hard time for me and I was bullied in middle school and high school. I guess I wonder if I'm an introvert or just a damaged extrovert.

Do people become more of themselves as they grow into adolescence or are we most like ourselves as kids? (no pressure usually, free, spontaneous etc.)

What's your personal experience with this?

 

[Hitoshi-San]

I was a bit of a shy kid up until the time I was 12, so maybe it's the opposite for me? By no means was I ever super painfully shy but I was literally an ice queen and just not all that talkative.

Hell, even now I'm not all that chatty and crazy around people I just met unless I really really click with them. For me a part of coming out of my shell was meeting people that I could make more of a connection with.

This depends more on where you get your energy from as opposed to how outgoing you are. So maybe with you it's more a matter of being worried about opening up to people again because of middle/high school?

I might be wrong but I'm pretty sure once an introvert always an introvert and once an extrovert always an extrovert.

 

[indra]

I, for one, find you quite bold.

 

[Hawthorne]

I think we're more instinctive and unfiltered as children. As we get older, we often internalize ideas of propriety, how things should be, how we should behave often without even realizing it. Even the most individualistic people can lose track of where everything else ends and where they begin.

It's arguably a beneficial social adaptation but it's also super dull to me. At least it results in fairly interesting mid-life identity crisis stories.

Oh, and I was really loud and assertive as a kid but bottled a lot of it as a teenager. I'm mostly passive now unless something interests or requires direct action on my part.

 

[Opal]

I'm sure we all grow differently, but my arc was somewhat similar; near the end of grade school, the heaviness of reality sort of hit me, and I became much more pensive and cautious. I wish I relished that part of childhood more, but it added a lot of complexity and patience to my worldview, and I feel better equipped to understand others and their struggles for having spent that time so immersed in the world's pain.

To say we have a "true nature" that we deviate from over time kind of implies that experience, and all we derive from it, is somehow false. We aren't born omniscient, and while the past may feel more pure, we adapted to reality to become who we are. I think, regardless of what the MBTI and Socionics say, we can rise to meet reality in ways that are... atypical.

 

[prplchknz]

I was shy and quiet i still am but way way way way less so i don't know