Not a recluse

Where is the dividing line between healthy and unhealthy intro-version? When does preferring your own company morph into being a self-absorbed recluse?

I've always been an introvert. I'm very content being on my own, though I do also like a certain amount of social contact (just a bit), to prevent too much self-absorption and to be inspired by other people's ideas and attitudes.

I'm also a gregarious person, meaning I enjoy mingling with crowds of people because it feels safe and cosy. I like watching and listening to them. But I don't want to talk to all these people (how on earth could I?), I just like them being around.

Because I like my own company, I'm not good at making friends. The need isn't urgent enough to trigger the necessary socialising and making connections. So I have loads of online and offline acquaintances but no close friends apart from Jenny.

I'm not a misanthrope. I don't detest other people. I don't prefer animals to humans (yet). I don't have some sort of perpetual grudge against humankind. I'm interested in other people and their foibles and hang-ups and idiosyncracies. I'm just not curious enough (nosy enough?) to actively befriend them.

So am I a healthy or unhealthy introvert? Do I spend too much time on my own? Am I too self-absorbed? Am I too detached from other people? Do I have reclusive tendencies? What's the yardstick exactly?

I would define an unhealthy introvert as someone who hardly ever leaves the house, who basically dislikes other people, who maybe is afraid of them and thinks they're up to no good, who shuns their friendly or solicitous gestures.

Hopefully I'm a long way from such a desperate lifestyle.

Lost for words

People sometimes say that my shyness, my tendency to be tongue-tied with other people, is due to my being too self-conscious.

I don't know about that. What exactly is "too much" self-consciousness anyway? If anything, I think I'm probably not self-conscious enough. I'm more than capable of blurting out something stupid or insensitive without realising, or of saying the complete opposite of what I'm really thinking or feeling.

To my mind, the more self-conscious people are, the better. The more aware we are of how we're behaving, how we're affecting other people, what sort of impression we're making, the more likely we are to treat people decently rather than nastily.

Even if we're talking total self-absorption, that's not so awful either. Okay, so the person might be jabbering away about themself, but at least they're not planning a shooting spree or a mass beheading. The worst they can do is bore you to tears.

I think my shyness is due more to the assumption that other people won't accept me for what I am. If I just gabble away freely, sooner or later someone will object to something I've said and there will be an unpleasant exchange. People take offence at the strangest things, and I can't predict what they will be. So I find myself listening rather than talking so as to avoid sudden umbrage.

My shyness is probably also a reaction to wasting so many hours of my life listening to people confidently holding forth on things they know absolutely nothing about, or things that have already been dissected ad nauseam by all and sundry. I hesitate to add yet another ill-informed or superfluous opinion to the surrounding hubbub.

And at the end of the day, I'd just rather be a shrinking violet than a pompous windbag.

Brushed aside

It's easy to overlook human frailty. If we're able-bodied, healthy and mentally alert, it's easy to be impatient and insensitive towards those who aren't.

We don't always understand the limitations and failings that other people are struggling with, and sometimes it's all too tempting to believe they're exaggerating their problems and don't really need as much help as they make out.

How often I see people intent only on their own personal pleasures or urgent tasks rushing through the streets in a self-absorbed bubble, with no time or tolerance for those who are physically impaired, slow-witted, confused or otherwise not as capable as those around them.

How often I see reports of lonely elderly people forgotten about by their neighbours, disabled people forced onto the sidelines, mentally ill people treated as work-shy frauds, and wonder when we're going to have a bit more compassion and consideration.

I think the worst offenders aren't ordinary individuals, who can be astonishingly generous and sympathetic when prompted, but politicians to whom the weak and vulnerable are frequently nothing more than a tiresome embarrassment to be hidden away and ignored. Or told they're leeching off the state and should get off their arses.

A couple of years ago there was an elderly man living in the house next door. I didn't think about him much, I assumed he was happy enough doing his own thing, whatever that was. Then I heard he had died of chronic liver disease as a result of heavy drinking.

I thought that maybe if I'd been a bit nosier, a bit friendlier, he would still be alive. I was maybe just as oblivious as so many other people. The truth is, he was out of sight and out of mind.