93% Extrovert

This is my Myers-Briggs Personality Quiz result for how introverted or extroverted I am. Results are pretty clear!

Today I spent all day talking on the phone. Literally, all day. From 8:30am to 10pm. I coached my 1:1 High Performance clients, I coached my Group High Performance Coaching, I called a friend, and I was on the phone for my freelancing. I’m not even exaggerating, it was all day.

And at the beginning of today when I got ready for my day, I thought that would drain me. But after each call, I came away more buzzed and energized than I was when I got on the call. And the times when I did start to feel tired were when I was alone, prepping for the next call. I felt more tired on my lunch break than I did on working. Weird… Why didn’t 14 hours of calls drain me?

Oh yes, it’s because I’m an extrovert. And not just a bit – I’m 93% extroverted (if you want to know your percentage, take my favourite Myers-Briggs personality type quiz here!).

Someone once described it to me like this: Introversion is like a battery, extroversion is like a solar panel. Introverts need to charge up their battery alone, and their battery slowly “drains” in social situations. Extroverts feed off other people for their energy, and it depletes when they are alone.

Even though I’m sleepy and ready for bed after a long day, I still feel energized.

As a kid, people used to ask me where I would get all my energy from. I used to just say “You just make it! You just pull it out of thin air!” But now I know what was really happening – I wasn’t pulling it from thin air, I was pulling it from other people! Even today, if I’m alone for too long (maybe a day without talking to anyone), I lose my energy. I start to feel really exhausted and even in extreme cases, tend towards a depressed mood.

The message here: Set your day up around your energy. Do you need more time alone or time with others? How can you incorporate more of that?

I’m so I’m incredibly grateful that my day involves so much human connection and socializing because that lights me up.

Not about to become a Buddhist Nun meditating in solitude in a cave anytime soon.

(Also, I don’t think I’d suit the bald look, personally.)