You know it’s quite easy to call yourself a perfect person. Someone who doesn’t need any help or doesn’t sometimes struggle with some inner negative feelings or emotions. But deep down if you really want to be truthful to yourself, you know that as human as you are, you are imperfect. And the only reason why you might think that you are not would be because you really have not sat down to dissect yourself. And also thought of why you do some things the way you do them.
The first step to solving a problem is to acknowledge that you have that problem.
Mental Complex
Now when I say mental complex, I mean emotions, thoughts or feelings that are in your head that makes you do things that could hinder your personal growth or your life. I mean self debilitating things that you think of or attitudes you have that are not exactly a perfect representation of who you are. But nevertheless keeps pushing to take over and control your life. And how you actually see yourself.
For me as an introvert, there are some actual mental complexes that I am more prone to. Some I still struggle with and some I can now control before I unintentionally sabotage myself.
Imposter syndrome
Sometimes I look at my work or some of my writings and I don’t actually believe I penned the words down. Like this beautiful writing couldn’t have come from me. I mean I mostly never think I’m that good. Even up to the point of thinking I won’t be able to come up with something as beautiful as that writing ever again.
The fact that I seem not to be able to accept complements sometimes is also a big symptom of Impostor syndrome. Because I always feel like “why are they praising me, anybody could have done that”. Like it’s not that special.
From my perspective, I think impostor syndrome is something Introverts are even more prone to. Because we live in a world that extols the characteristics of being extroverted over the characteristics of being introverted. And depending on the career path you are on as an introvert, you must have at one point in your life tried to play the role or act according to the society’s ideal personality just to get ahead career wise. Which is being a “Pseudo – extrovert”, a word I got from Susan Cain’s quiet revolution.
So when you achieve success through that means, it almost always feel like you don’t deserve it. Because you feel like you were not true to yourself and just got lucky. When in fact it’s just you stretching yourself a bit out of your comfort zone so you can compete with the larger society.
I struggled with this a lot earlier in my life. Especially when it came to me sharing my creative side with the world and also promoting myself.
Although it doesn’t have a strong hold over me anymore. As I now find myself diving into new opportunities even if I feel unqualified for it. And all I did was to openly acknowledge the problem, shared with a few trusted people and I was able to tone it down.
Anxiety
Do you ever get panic stricken sometimes for no reason at all. Your heart just starts racing like something bad is going to happen even when reality says otherwise. Sometimes i find myself unable to sleep at night all because of a fear of something I don’t know. This is another challenge introverts struggle with. Although I don’t think it’s peculiar to introverts alone. Some extroverts also struggle with anxiety.
This should not be confused with social anxiety though. Because not all introverts get shy and nervous in social gatherings. We just get easily drained and tired from too much stimulation with the outside world.
Overthinking
From self reflections to overthinking. It really can just go downhill from there. Because there is a very thin line between them. If you are prone to dwelling on negative past experiences or ruminating on them which leads to you talking down on yourself, you have successfully succumbed to the woes of Overthinking.
Self reflections are supposed to help you learn more about yourself and find ways to improve yourself. But it can quickly become counter productive if you ruminate or overthink on the negative. Our cue as introverts is to try as much as possible not to self reflect till we overthink things and start to worry. Because we have a tendency to look more inward and deeply self reflect, the lines can easily get blurred. Till we cross over into overthinking.
Fear
What is fear? A distressing emotion aroused by impending danger, evil, pain, etc., whether the threat is real or imagined.
For me as a person, I kind of like when things are in a certain order. So naturally, I set schedules for how my day and week is going to run. I feel I have to always prepare myself mentally for whatever I want to do. Meaning I actually have to think and insert myself in that task mentally before I can do them physically.
So anything that veers me off that path causes me to panic in fear. Because I do not like to be caught off guard. Which means spontaneity is not my strongest point and I’m sure most introverts can relate with that.
From overthinking to anxiety to imposter syndrome, they all feed on the emotion of fear. And as introverts, we need to constantly do a check on ourselves and find out the reasons we do certain things so we can achieve personal growth.
Do you have some personal mental complexes you struggle with as an introvert? Please share with me in the comments section.
I’ll love to hear from you.
