How introverted are you?

This is another rather personal post that doesn’t really bring any tips or solutions or whatever, just rambling about myself yet again.

I often call myself an introvert, and due to yesterday’s post, I got some helpful feedback, advice and opinions about it, which I appreciate a bunch! Some got me thinking about how introverted I really am, and the sort of behaviours I often adopt when facing different situations.

Maybe I could make a quiz or something—but nowadays most of those websites are just AI slop. I’ll just write and describe what goes through my head, and I’ll let you judge what you think of me in this regard. Obviously, as I’m the source of these descriptions there’s a bias here, but anyway, my interactions in real life and online differ a bit, depending on the context.

First of all, I consider myself to be much more active and outgoing online. After 6 or so years on Mastodon, I am somehow close to 3K followers. There are a lot of duplicates and people who migrated and follow me from multiple accounts, or are no longer active, but the point is that there’s people who have found me interesting and worth talking with, which is cool! Number go up, brain happy.

I love to get comments and (usually) reply to them, I like when my posts get some attention—unless that translates into toxic Hacker News replies—and people are inspired by me or reach out to me about many topics. I have made online friends and I can name many of them, they are real persons and I’ve had some honest chats, some that are only technical or superficial, but many have been really significant and valuable to me too.

As for online gaming, when I was a teenager I would happily spend hours on Monster Hunter Freedom Unite with strangers all over the world, many times I used voice chat and had a lot of fun. There is a YouTube stream archive out there from some small Spanish YouTuber where I played with him for a couple of hours straight! It was epic. A while back I wrote about the Guild Cards I had which contain information of fellow hunters I played with, including a column with the date we last interacted. Thinking about how it’s been almost ten years since then makes me feel very old…

More recently, I haven’t had a lot of issues playing Peak with some friends from the Fediverse and also the TWG Discord server. The game has proximity voice chat, and it’s an essential part of the gameplay to cooperate with each other, I’m rather active, constantly seeking to help (or be helped) by the people I teamed up with, joking and bantering about random stuff. Some of the people I had never even met, but there was always someone I knew, which brought me confidence to be myself. The goofy nature of the game helped to build a chill atmosphere, everyone was super friendly. I did not fear joking around with my teammates a bit nor trolling them a bit (and helping them out afterwards). I died plenty of times myself and got to be a little ghost haunting the surviving players. Haven’t played this game in weeks though but whatever.

Be it Discord, Signal, Threema or XMPP, I don’t have a lot of trouble interacting with groups of people I know, and I am often the one who will try and start a conversation there, by sharing a blogpost I wrote, or something I’m currently doing (right now that means sharing videos of my Tomodachi Life island). The same goes for messaging specific people, I have plenty of chats on Signal that have been going for a long while and that have helped me develop some true friendships I appreciate a lot.

However, I don’t have interest on long-running online threads where I keep being mentioned about things I have nothing to do with. My friends in the Polymaths’ instance often get into “hellthreads” talking about rather deep stuff, or some TV show I don’t know anything about, or politics; and I rarely engage after the first three or four replies—which turn into dozens and dozens by the end of the day—even worse when more random people get involved and things end up blowing out of proportion. It’s usually harmless banter, but the notifications do build up.

I don’t interact much when I don’t care about a topic, and I try to not switch themes on a chatroom until it’s been a while since the last message on Discord. I often stick to one or two channels, and get familiar with a few active users there. A common practice of mine which you may already notice, is that I love to share my blogposts everywhere, and to spark conversations about them. I can’t help it, I do like to have some attention after all, I’ve even been called out on it by the mods of some communities a couple of times, especially when I am constantly sharing progress updates on a game and such (sorry TWG). I’ll often share and photos of books or manga I’m reading, and stuff like that.

Online group calls are very varied and heavily dependent on the group, but the latest ones I joined were for the Homebrew Website Club. The circumstances there have been rather dire for me though, as I am often on a busy place, only able to listen. At the same time sometimes the topic goes to places where I don’t have anything to add. There’s a bit of technical chatter sometimes and I can’t add a lot since I’m unfamiliar with it.

It’s one of those times where I feel kinda out of my league. Even when blogging and playing around with my website is one of the things I do the most, I am really terrible at talking about it. I feel like everything I say is pretty obvious, but I’m sure if any one of them reads this they’d say the opposite. Either way, I’ve not had the chance to talk many times, I enjoy being a listener though.

Where it goes a bit different is in the TWC Discord’s voice chats. There is a reading club and a gaming club, and both hold meetings where there are discussions and everyone gets to share their thoughts! I’ve participated on these for Soul Reaver and Resident Evil 2, and talked quite without many issues. However, there was not a lot of exchange required from me, I said what I had to say during my turn, and then I didn’t provide much feedback, simply listening. There’s also the podcast episode I participated in, which was I still can’t believe I did, I am told it was pretty good, but I am yet to relisten to my own voice, I remember saying my piece and nerviously laughing at whatever my cohosts said during their turn, again, I just enjoy listening.

One-on-one calls with online people have been rather nice. I rarely do these, but it has happened on Discord, with random conversations here and there. I recall one where we just rambled about the PSP for almost an hour, it was quite a fun time though, and I even learned about a couple games that are now on my backlog, like Black Rock Shooter. There was also that one time I watched a movie with a friend I randomly met on some app where you meet random people, and then we talked about manga, anime and videogames for a long while. Tt was one of the few times where I could give all sorts of recommendations, ramblings and suggestions to someone who was pretty new on all of it and had a lot to learn and experience in those hobbies yet.

Perhaps talking comes easy to me when a) It’s about something I’m interested on and b) I don’t need to look at anybody’s face while chatting. These voice calls do have one deterrent though: The language barrier.

I am a bit iffy on my pronunciation and self-conscious about structuring spoken sentences in English. It’s not that I don’t know how, I write these paragraphs without any problem, but the process of saying the words continuously in conversation makes things weird for me. It’s not the main factor anymore though, just something that lingers from time to time.

The more I write this the more I feel it’s just a simple matter of being familiar with the people I talk with. A single common interest or goal is enough for me to hold a conversation and go from there.

But the problem is I don’t like to reach out to someone for the first time. I don’t know how to start conversations in person. I can write something here but I don’t get to just recite it in some public place until someone stops to listen and wants to talk, after all.

Once I am with friends in real life, I have no issue being loud and joking about things and suggesting we play some card game or setup my Switch for some multiplayer fun. But what gets me to actually talk or make friends in the first place? Well, being in a situation where it’s better to interact than not, perhaps?

I think I’ve mentioned before how I’m one of the more senior members in my friend group at church. I live closest to the building, within walking distance, so my house often hosts extra activities: Nintendo Switch gaming, tabletop games and, every once in a while, a session of Land of Eem. Not too long ago my “social battery” ran out rather quickly, I’d even escape home from everyone as soon as we were done, although my friends would walk there too and visit anyway. I rarely said no, but I knew that when I did they would get it, it’s just how we are lol

I don’t really mind having guests, I let my friends use my Switch or play while I am just using my phone, when I don’t really feel like socializing. My home is theirs and I’m happy to have some background noise and sometimes just watch what they do without feeling forced to say a thing.

Honestly that’s just the best for me, to be around people who are happy to have you among them but don’t expect you to force yourself into whatever’s going on. It’s a little weird after all since it makes me a bit of an “outcast” but it’s still cool. Sometimes, I am being grumpy for no reason they will tease and annoy me, but that’s often because I’m at fault and way too unfocused. For example when I agree that I’ll play with them but I keep scrolling and getting distracted on my phone and the like. It’s okay when things are made clear from the start instead of ruining what we had planned, after all.

Either way, I’ve made an effort not to be as grumpy anymore, and switching to more active board games that I bring to church instead of going back home where I can escape to my room and turn into a hermit has helped too.

Of course, I am also a complete hypocrite. When someone in the friend group pulls out their phones, I will very much be annoyed when they use it during a game and. Some times, since I’m the one in charge in my house I get to ban phones out during visits where everyone agrees to play together, except for mine of course.

At work most of the interactions happen during lunch, it’s the same group every day and I don’t really feel like I belong, nor do I feel that I want to. The chatter there is full of gossip, drama, complaining about workmates or the boss or some other topic. Sometimes they’ll talk about current events and things like that, but the focus is never where I’d like it to be. There’s also a lot of teasing and dirty jokes. These are often part of my culture, the kind of thing that gets one cancelled on social media especially in a place like the fediverse, but that’s just how things are here. I don’t feed those conversations, hence why I stick to reading or using my phone, even though I come off as quiet and shy, which I guess I am.

A few times some device I have or thing I do comes into conversation, and even then I’m like “this is going to lead nowhere, I’m only going to look like a show-off”, for example, as cool as the XTEINK X4 is and how I keep boosting posts about it and recommending it online, someone saw me using it at work and I just summed it all up as “it’s an e-reader” and said nothing more.

Basically, when a conversation at work focuses on me or requires my input, I try to make it die down as soon as possible… I don’t like to stand out, I’d rather they keep talking about whatever they saw on Facebook and such.

As an aside, I keep noticing how I do these sorts of dismissive remarks about normal people sometimes so I should make it clear, this is mostly for hyperbole and maybe comedic effect and I know—or want to believe—that most people have plenty of goals, activities and hobbies that bring them joy, and they are obviously not two-dimensional caricatures. Alas, they rarely bring those topics to conversations at work. I am not superior to anyone just because I have niche devices or hobbies, I am not better because I play single-player indie games instead of FIFA or Call of Duty or because of whatever hobby or craft I’m good at, and similar dumb comparisons I make sometimes. Maybe I feel guilty because a part of me does feel some pride about “not being like them” but I know it’s just a silly thing to think okay sorry bye.

In many situations I could have gone on and on about me and my interests—I mean just look at this post’s word count—but at work all I’d get is “ah so you use it to read during work hours”—which yes I totally do—but the teasing is just annoying to me, and I am sure at least one of the people there dislikes me or is jealous of me for some reason. Maybe I should just change my friend group, but I am not that bothered by it. I am used to how things are and I don’t hate the people I’m with, I laugh way too much at some of the random complaints and stories told there, I just don’t really say much myself nor do I want to spend any more time with them outside of work hours.

Then there’s the friends I’ve made ages ago, from high school or from previous places where I used to live. I don’t speak with the vast majority of them, but every once in a while a status update on WhatsApp (yes that’s what I have to use to communicate in my country) will spark a conversation. I don’t share links to my blog to people I know in real life, but I share photos of the games I play or the books I complete. The latest for example was a short chat of 4 or 5 messages with my best friend from University, when I shared the latest Lego I built. We haven’t seen each other in ages, but I did convince him to buy a Miyoo Mini Plus back in the day.

Also, if I know your birthday and I have you on my phone contacts it is very likely that I’ll send you a Happy Birthday message even after years without talking to you, for no reason whatsoever. Fine, maybe if you are a highschool crush of mine there’s a bit of a reason but I’ll shut up about that.

There have been times where I met those friends in real life, and I don’t have a problem talking as if we’ve never stopped! It has always been fun to catch up and see where we are at in life. Sometimes our interests and hobbies have completely drifted off, but I still manage to find common ground most of the time. I can’t recall an old friendship of mine that I would want to avoid nowadays.

Same goes for cousins and family members. I am extremely grateful about how nice my extended family is. There seem to be some issues between brothers here and there, but me and all of my cousins (there are dozens) get along extremely well. The age difference between us all is rather big, but small groups with similar ages are easily made and it’s always fun when we get to reunite during Christmas and the like.

I still don’t really come up with talking topics or anything, but I am happy to go along with what they talk about, and more than pleased when I bring my Switch and my cousins brings it too and we get to do some epic Mario Kart tournament. I happily annoy and tease and play around with my extended family all the time, which is fun.

Almost nobody in my family and real life people I know are aware of my blog. There’s only like five people who know it exists, but nobody is actively keeping in touch with whatever I share here that I know of.

Look at me, writing another blogpost about myself and putting you all through such a ramble. Perhaps I wrote this all for me more than you, but I appreciate if you made it this far. I am shy and introverted, but I also try and interact with the people around me, I am pretty outspoken online and even a bit of a troublemaker, I will barely be able to look at someone in the eyes, and I won’t even notice you if we find each other on the streets. I guess I could keep going on and on, but I don’t want to spend any more of your time. Introvert or no, I’m just another person trying to get by, living on this pale blue dot.

This is day 59 of #100DaysToOffload.