5 Secrets of Extraversion
And an origin story
Perhaps one of the most obvious character traits about myself is my extraversion. For me, though, it’s more than just a character trait — it’s my way of life. I govern my wake up, work hours, and bedtime around being an extravert. It’s how I interact with my friends versus my roommates versus my family. It’s why I chose the line of work I’m in. It’s how I choose to weigh my values. Being an extravert is core to nearly every part of my life.
It took me a long time to admit to being an extravert, for a couple of reasons: firstly, I really hate to label myself with an arbitrary identity that seems to carry a different flavor with every self-declared extravert I’ve met. Secondly, I was never outgoing as a kid. I was on the quieter side, had no idea how to navigate social circles in school, and conversing with strangers was a massive mystery to me. How adults spoke to one another was so different from how people my age (at this point, 10 years old) spoke with one another. I couldn’t figure out which script to follow, and there were no books on the shelves of my 2nd grade class for “How to be a Good Conversationalist”. So, I kept a small group of friends who similarly lacked whatever social cues others had and left that for people who knew how to do it better.
Until one day, at age 14, I had enough. I was getting tired of being a quiet person and thought I’d consciously try to break out of my shell and transform myself into someone who I’d be more proud to be. There were multiple steps in this process. I first observed how the more outgoing kids spoke to adults and emulated them. Then I started sitting with other kids at lunch who had traits I admired, versus my current friends who lacked characteristics I wanted to adopt. Then I changed my diet, my exercise habits, and started wearing makeup for the first time. If there was a way to make a smooth transition with all of this newness of lifestyle I was self-imposing at once, I was blind to it, and instead jumped in head-first into being the person who I wanted to be and left the person I was in the dust behind me.
Amazingly, all of these measures worked. In time my personal renaissance that I spurred on at 14 took serious root. By 15 I had developed a new group of friends who I stuck with throughout high school. My dieting worked, and I lost a bunch of weight and visibly looked like an entirely different person. My new morning routine of doing my hair and makeup every day gave me more confidence than ever in the new appearance I wore. Throughout the day, I kept a notebook on me, and became extremely diligent with organizing my daily tasks. I went from being the last person to finish a lap around the field hockey field to becoming an avid runner, which paid off tremendously in the championship game, which I played from start to finish and was awarded the MVP title for my season.
Others came to know the new person I grew into, too. I consequently became known as the one in school who always smiled and said “hi” to people walking by. I relied on my fall-back phrase of “Hey guys, what’s up?!” whenever encountering big groups of people and feeling a pang of intimidation from the many eyes on me at once. Making friends became a quicker process. I strutted with a new aura of confidence and carried myself differently. Whether this was an effect of exiting the last leg of puberty or a product of all of the other changes I made in my life, I was someone new whom I liked much more than my former self. There was no feeling in the world that could compare to that.
Extraversion was a choice I made at 14 years old. And it was the best choice I had made in my life.
Now then, you have my extravert origin story. But I didn’t write this article to reflect on who I was in middle school. I wrote this article to share my learnings from becoming a self-made extravert with you.
You may resonate with these tips or disagree with them. If you have any thoughts at all, please drop them in the comments below!
Now, onto extraversion secrets.
Extraversion Secrets
The first secret I’ll share about extraversion is that it’s not something you’re born with — it’s a choice that you make.
Anyone can choose to become someone who converses with strangers, smiles and says “Hi!” upon passing someone in the hallway, and takes genuine interest in the lives of others. Some people are more predisposed to doing so, but at the end of the day, the only thing that makes someone comfortable with talking to strangers is through practice and repetition.
Secret #1: Extraversion is a choice, not a lucky personality trait.
The second secret about extraversion is that it does not take time to come out of your shell — it takes repetition.
Did you know that upon hatching, a chick will peck its shell hundreds of times to crack it?
That’s right — its tiny, newly formed beaks work tirelessly for about 24 hours. It’s no easy work: each peck requires that they must up all of the energy inside of them and thrust themselves, full force, to make a dent. Chicks know that to break out of their shells they need to commit themselves to the process, that they need to give every instance of entering a new world all of the effort they can muster, and that they need to do it again, and again, and again until they’re able to break free of their old worlds to enter a whole new one.
Becoming extraverted is a bit like this. You need to commit yourself to doing what’s uncomfortable, many times over, if you want to enter a new version of yourself.
What is the equivalent of a peck you may ask? Saying “hi” to the person who gets in the elevator with you. Or complimenting the cashier who’s grabbing your morning coffee. Or asking a friend — yes, someone who you’re already friends with — about what’s been most on their mind the past week for no prompted reason. Then, do it again. And again. And again.
Time does not matter in turning you into someone new — repetitions do. The more you have tiny moments of outwardness toward others, the more tallies you check off under your “extravert” label, the more confidence you have in the next instance you talk to someone.
Secret #2: Repetitions matter. Time is inconsequential.
The third secret about extraversion is that it is not a binary transformation: it’s a gradual evolution. There’s always more layers to becoming a good conversationalist to practice.
Obviously saying “hi” to strangers is something an extravert would be more likely to do than an introvert. But what happens then? Do you ask “how’s your day been?” How do you ensure that the other person enjoys the conversation? How do make them feel like they were glad to have talked to you, even briefly?
If you care about having answers to these questions, then you care to embark on the path of extraversion self-improvement. Becoming a better conversationalist simply requires researching methods for doing so and practicing often. That’s it.
There’s an endless plethora of books, blogs, podcasts, you name it out there that help with conversational coaching. Be your own coach and practice diligently. The beauty of being a student in the art of conversation is that you can virtually never stop learning and never stop improving, and being a great conversationalist is perhaps the greatest skill that any human can possess due to it’s direct correlation to gaining wealth, flowering personal relationships, and ultimately happiness.
Extraversion is a journey, not an on/off switch.
Secret #3: Extraversion is a gradual evolution whose growth rate is determined by dedicated studying and earnest practice (# of repetitions).
The fourth secret I’ll share is that extraversion is not a personality trait. It’s a lifestyle.
We have personality traits and we have lifestyles. And we have an ability to tailor our lifestyle such that it forces out certain traits in us more frequently. In starting the lifestyle we wish we had, the person who we want to become comes out to meet us, and overtime, becomes us.
I shared briefly in this article’s introduction that my life revolves around my extraversion, and I wasn’t kidding. Since choosing that my energy source is in being interested in others, I’ve become someone who plans my bedtime and wakeup time around when those I interact with most will also be awake. I’ve chosen my career path strategically, such that I would be able to knock out many repetitions of conversing with others through the work I do every day.
When you decide who you want to become, it becomes easier to see the kind of lifestyle you need to create.
Secret #4: Extraversion is a lifestyle.
The fifth secret is that extraversion is not all about being more outgoing — really, I would argue, it’s about being more ingoing — aka, turning a “hello” into a conversation.
We tend to think of extraverts as those who can strike up conversations with strangers naturally. Or maybe those who are the loudest in the room. True, these may be tell tale signs that you have an extravert in your midst… though I’d classify this as first degree extraversion. Second and third degree extraversion is where things get more interesting.
First degree = Can you start a conversation?
Second degree = Can you sustain a conversation?
Third degree = Can you make the other person extremely interested in your conversation? Make them feel special? Win them as a friend?
I find it prudent to bring this up now since extraverts have been branded as bubbly, cheery, shallow people: as if they follow the “I’m outgoing” playbook with a subpar capacity for deep thought. They lack the secret ingredient for accessing the second and third degrees of extraversion.
This secret ingredient is so essential I would argue that without it, people are only capable of living an unexciting and uninteresting life… regardless of being an extravert, introvert, or anything in between, in fact.
Can you guess what it is?
You got it — the magic ingredient is curiosity!
Why curiosity, you ask? Well, without curiosity, extraverts are unable to attain their main prerogative: becoming people whose energy derives from connecting with others. We can’t access deep connections to those around us if we’re not genuinely curious about them.
And when I say genuine, I mean genuine — not curious about something out of your own interest in it, but rather for the interest to seek and understand and care about the lives of others around you. To be a genuinely curious person, you need to relinquish your pursuit of being more outgoing and instead strive to be more ingoing.
An analogy I use to describe what ingoing means is to imagine that the conversation you just started is actually a dark cave, and in it are jewels to be discovered. You need to mine the conversation to discover new things about the other person, and to do this, you must be relentlessly curious about the other person. Ask questions, listen to what they say, and then ask more questions. Soon you’ll discover new things about them from which you can use to prompt more questions. Everything you hear in talking to someone is fodder for a new path you can go down. Basically, you’re “going” more “in” to new layers of what makes that person who they are.
There is much more to being a conversationalist than that, but the gist of it is this: so many of us go throughout our days without a stranger giving an ounce of attention, curiosity, or caring towards us. At the same time, people are starving to be recognized. Try making others feel seen with your curiosity — it’s perhaps the greatest gift you can give them.
Secret #5: Extraversion without curiosity is just empty yapping.
I’ve also hinted at a bonus secret of extraversion — it’s not about you, it’s entirely about the people around you. After all, they’re the ones who will give you the label of “extravert” based on the way you act and make them feel. Being an extravert isn’t about how loud your voice is — it’s about how loud you make others feel inspired to be.
And with that, this concludes a briefing on my personal relationship with extraversion. Do you agree or disagree with what I’ve shared so far? Do you also have an extravert/introvert flipping story?
Feel free to drop your thoughts in the comments if you have any. Or, if you want to connect, you know where to find me.
Artwork made with Midjourney <3