A good friend once described me as being peculiarly down-to-earth for someone with their head so perpetually up in the clouds. I remember laughing, feeling both amused at his creative thought, as well as rather delightedly taken aback by the feeling of being so well summed-up in so few words.
You see, if you’re a person, like me, who can relate to walking the personality line between being an introvert and being an extrovert, then you know all too well the feeling of existing in a space somewhere between the thoughts in your head, and the external world.
As a 20 year old who has spent the past three years of her adolescence-to-adulthood experience in London, England — one of the most fast-pace, bustling and buzzing cities of the world — I’ve come to learn a thing or two about managing my time, inter-personal relationships, and work-play-life balance in a way that preserves both my mental-health as well as emotional sanity. We’re just trying to live our best life, after all, and it’s my hope that these tried and tested tips and tricks can help you as much as they do me.
Hello fellow ambiverts, this one is for you!
1. Don’t over schedule yourself
Have you ever looked at your calendar and felt like your obligations for the week jumped off the page and slapped you in the face? It’s the feeling where you question whether or not you’re remembering the correct number of hours in each day — was I thinking it was 30? 45?! Dear god jesus you’re telling me there are only 24?
Well, whether these commitments are personal, professional, or in the likely case of both being true, us ambiverts have a high tendency to over-schedule ourselves. While certainly half of the time we might crave interaction, and experience major FOMO at the thought of any fun or interesting plans being made without us, we also become all too easily overwhelmed at the idea of facing a full day of social obligations without any down-time or moments of solitude to ourselves.
Thus, key takeaway number one is to learn not to over-schedule yourself — remember that there’s always the chance to make new plans if you find yourself with extra time and social energy on your hands, after all! Your future self will thank you for thinking of your quieter, less ambitiously overeager, introverted side for once.
2. Set your intention for the week(s) ahead
Not completely dissimilar to the pro tip above, strategically organizing your head space is no less important than strategically organizing your calendar when it comes to mentally preparing the duality of your mind for whatever the week ahead may bring.
If you know you have people to see, plans to be made, and events to be attended, it may benefit you in the long-run to remind yourself what you hope to get out of the next few hours, days, or even weeks. By taking a moment to reflect on your intentions and short-term goals for the future, you help yourself avoid the inevitable back and forth with your own brain on whether or not to stay in or go out, and whether to meet the friends or have a 1-on-1 meeting with Netflix, instead.
I know for me, personally, even just giving my introverted side the heads up about the socially busy week ahead, or allowing my extroverted half to come to terms with a few days of cracking on with a solo work assignment makes me feel a whole lot more cared for as a whole. #selfcare.
3. Learn to ask for alone time
This is the one I’m going to need to come back to and re-read a few times after I’ve finished writing it. You see, asking for alone time is not something that comes even remotely naturally to me. Do I often want alone time? Yes. Do I often need alone time? Yes. Do I know how to politely explain to those around me that I’m need this aforementioned alone time? Not yet…
But i’m working on it! And you should too, because you can never get anything you don’t ask for, and knowing when you’ve drained your extroversion battery for the day is just as much about looking after yourself as it is about looking out for those around you. I remember when it first dawned on me that maybe I should be communicating my needs for some solitary reflection before they become glaringly apparent — oops!
Nobody likes a moody ambivert on the wrong side of a social interaction, and learning to talk or text the words, “I’m taking some alone time to unwind,” into existence will help us all, I promise.
4. Get out of your head and into your body
There are times I can feel my extroversion leading the way: I say hilarious things without pondering them for 10 minutes before-hand, I talk to strangers in public without thinking twice, and I seem to walk around this city of mine with a certain degree of happy-go-lucky pizzazz.
Other times this is quite simply not the case: I can feel myself be stuck in a ‘think-y’ mood of sorts, and the stimuli of the external world seems altogether too bright, too loud, too much. It’s not necessarily a bad thing — these moments just have a propensity to make me crave the freedom to turn inwards and just ‘be’ for a while. Oh hi introversion, it’s so nice to see you again.
But what’s an ambivert like me to do when in need of switching gears? Well, the trick that always seems to work for me in these moments I’d quite like to snap out of my introversion is exercise! I can dance, run, work-out, or even just flail around the room for a bit in a process I like to refer to as ‘getting into your body.’ As silly as it sounds, there’s something about raising the rate of your heartbeat in a very physical way that does wonders for coaxing some of my social enthusiasm out of its hibernation.
5. Give yourself time to think
Spacing out in the middle of a busy high-street in London has a tendency to result in collision, amongst others things. I’m not proud to admit that I’ve been known to walk into trees, lampposts, and even innocent bystanders at times when I’ve found myself too caught up in my own thoughts to pay adequate attention to my surroundings. I should also say that this issue becomes significantly further exacerbated when there’s something in particular I’m in need of thinking about — I know I just can’t help it.
Whether it’s concepts for new articles, thoughts of how I’m going to phrase the concluding paragraph of a very important email, or even just the mental rehearsal of recent conversation, any number of these ideas could all be buzzing around my brain at any given moment. I feel an enormous amount of pressure to organize and plan, and when I don’t proactively allocate myself the time to do so, I end up sacrificing precious ‘live in the moment’ moments for some half-assed introverted introspection.
Give yourself time to scribble down the notes you need to remember, sit for 15 minutes with a coffee and get yourself to a place where you can relax without stressing over your un-thunk thoughts. It’s a game changer I will forever swear by.
6. Give yourself time to decide
In a similar vein, tell your extroverted self to calm down with the rapid-fire decision making. In line with the piece of advice about not over-scheduling yourself, it’s highly necessary for us ambiverts to exhibit a certain degree of caution when it comes to making up our plans, just as well as we ought to making up our minds.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with telling your friends, “I’m going to think about it and get back to you if that’s okay,” or “I’m not actually sure I can commit to that yet, can I give you an answer by Friday?” Now, as long as you’re not just arbitrarily delaying your obligations, and you actually stick to your word, people will only respect you all the more for knowing your own decision-making limitations.
So pause — I know part of you wants to have six social plans set up by sundown, but I also know that another part of you might appreciate if you increase your selectivity just a tad, and maybe go over the pros and cons of leaving the house that day for your future, and potentially social depleted, self.
7. Accept the duality of your personality and others will too
If you live in a place where you’re all too familiar with the notion of a rat-race— or even if you just have friends that lean more towards full on extroversion than your contradictory, yet wonderful, self — you’ll understand that plans are always there to be made, and that even when it feels like you’re the only one out of your entire social group that feels the need to go on hiatus for a solid month or two, it’s okay to accept yourself exactly the way you are.
We all have quirks, and ticks, and buttons, and life is just a process of learning to navigate them while trying to have a good time while we’re at it. If you take any one thing away from this article, I hope it’s the confidence to internalize that the sooner you begin to care for your own mental well-being and happiness, the sooner everyone else will too.
So, hey you fellow ambiverts, go out there and kick some ass — or maybe stay inside with a book — because you should know that’s very okay, too.
