Being Shy Is Just a Bad Habit, and You Can Break It With Regular Practice
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Re: Being Shy Is Just a Bad Habit, and You Can Break It With Regular Practice
#2This comment nails it:
"""Please read "Quiet - The power of introverts in a world that can't stop talking" by Susan Cain
Saying its a habit is saying that you can easily overcome it. I don't feel it's a choice, do you know how many times I thought about ending my life because I hated being born an introvert and shy?
This article might as well be called: If you are shy, its you're fault, stop being lazy and change.
Once gays are accepted the biggest issue is probably going to be that introverts dont feel accepted in this extravert world."""
The conflation of terms like shyness and introversion (etc) has been discussed before, so I'll leave that one alone. The last two sentences of the comment are more interesting. If you are shy, is that necessarily bad? And is it your "fault"?
The other issue applies as well. It's not OK to fire someone because of their gender, race, sexual orientation, religion, etc; but firing someone because they are "shy" or "introverted" or "not a people person" seems to be perfectly acceptable and legal. Shouldn't that be considered discrimination as well? (Assuming that "being good with people" isn't a requirement of the job.)
Re: Being Shy Is Just a Bad Habit, and You Can Break It With Regular Practice
#3This comment nails it: """Please read "Quiet - The power of introverts in a world that can't stop talking" by Susan Cain Saying its a habit is saying that you can easily overcome it. I don't feel it's a choice, do you know how many times I thought about ending my life because I hated being born an introvert and shy? This article might as well be called: If you are shy, its you're fault, stop being lazy and change. On…
> This article might as well be called: If you are shy, its you're fault, stop being lazy and change.
There seems to be a tendency to conflate someone saying "You can change X" and "If you suffer from X, you're a lazy and bad person." That's not productive. It's an emotional response to a logical issue. pg goes into depth about these responses in the article "Keep Your Identity Small": http://paulgraham.com/identity.html
A huge percentage of people can improve their social skills to practice, and we as a community can accept that without taking it as an insult to anyone who has weak social skills.
Re: Being Shy Is Just a Bad Habit, and You Can Break It With Regular Practice
#4This comment nails it: """Please read "Quiet - The power of introverts in a world that can't stop talking" by Susan Cain Saying its a habit is saying that you can easily overcome it. I don't feel it's a choice, do you know how many times I thought about ending my life because I hated being born an introvert and shy? This article might as well be called: If you are shy, its you're fault, stop being lazy and change. On…
I like being an introvert; I wouldn't change that for anything. I have learned not to be shy, to function in social situations. I think that's what the article means, learning to function, but unfortunately people will continue to confuse shyness with introversion and assume you can change either. It annoys me the number of times people have told me I need to "stop being a lone wolf" or "come out of my shell." That would get a two-word answer nowadays.
"Before you diagnose yourself with depression or low self-esteem, first make sure that you are not, in fact, just surrounded by assholes."
Re: Being Shy Is Just a Bad Habit, and You Can Break It With Regular Practice
#5That's a rather ableist point of view. Being shy may be a "habit" for some people, but some of us actually have anxiety disorders.
Re: Being Shy Is Just a Bad Habit, and You Can Break It With Regular Practice
#6This comment nails it: """Please read "Quiet - The power of introverts in a world that can't stop talking" by Susan Cain Saying its a habit is saying that you can easily overcome it. I don't feel it's a choice, do you know how many times I thought about ending my life because I hated being born an introvert and shy? This article might as well be called: If you are shy, its you're fault, stop being lazy and change. On…
> This article might as well be called: If you are shy, its you're fault, stop being lazy and change. There seems to be a tendency to conflate someone saying "You can change X" and "If you suffer from X, you're a lazy and bad person." That's not productive. It's an emotional response to a logical issue. pg goes into depth about these responses in the article "Keep Your Identity Small": http://paulgraham.com/identity.…
Well hold on though – there's a big difference between saying "you can change X" and "X is just a bad habit". A habit is supposed to be something you can overcome with a relatively trivial amount of practice and persistence, and that is why there's a stigma about having them.
Yes there are treatments for social anxiety, but labeling a medically recognized disorder as a "habit" is demeaning and not cool.
Re: Being Shy Is Just a Bad Habit, and You Can Break It With Regular Practice
#7This comment nails it: """Please read "Quiet - The power of introverts in a world that can't stop talking" by Susan Cain Saying its a habit is saying that you can easily overcome it. I don't feel it's a choice, do you know how many times I thought about ending my life because I hated being born an introvert and shy? This article might as well be called: If you are shy, its you're fault, stop being lazy and change. On…
I'd like to risk being facetious and suggest that "being good with people" is a requirement for most good jobs, the ones where it's not are the first that get outsourced/replaced with robots/laid off.
Re: Being Shy Is Just a Bad Habit, and You Can Break It With Regular Practice
#8its a survival technique.
Re: Being Shy Is Just a Bad Habit, and You Can Break It With Regular Practice
#9This comment nails it: """Please read "Quiet - The power of introverts in a world that can't stop talking" by Susan Cain Saying its a habit is saying that you can easily overcome it. I don't feel it's a choice, do you know how many times I thought about ending my life because I hated being born an introvert and shy? This article might as well be called: If you are shy, its you're fault, stop being lazy and change. On…
> This article might as well be called: If you are shy, its you're fault, stop being lazy and change. There seems to be a tendency to conflate someone saying "You can change X" and "If you suffer from X, you're a lazy and bad person." That's not productive. It's an emotional response to a logical issue. pg goes into depth about these responses in the article "Keep Your Identity Small": http://paulgraham.com/identity.…
Ironically, this thread has degenerated in to exactly what pg is describing. People are binding their identity to their preferred style of social interaction.
"I'm an extrovert..." "Oh well, I'm an introvert"
Re: Being Shy Is Just a Bad Habit, and You Can Break It With Regular Practice
#10Earlier quoted context omitted.
> This article might as well be called: If you are shy, its you're fault, stop being lazy and change. There seems to be a tendency to conflate someone saying "You can change X" and "If you suffer from X, you're a lazy and bad person." That's not productive. It's an emotional response to a logical issue. pg goes into depth about these responses in the article "Keep Your Identity Small": http://paulgraham.com/identity.…
Well hold on though – there's a big difference between saying "you can change X" and "X is just a bad habit". A habit is supposed to be something you can overcome with a relatively trivial amount of practice and persistence, and that is why there's a stigma about having them. Yes there are treatments for social anxiety, but labeling a medically recognized disorder as a "habit" is demeaning and not cool.
> A habit is supposed to be something you can overcome with a relatively trivial amount of practice and persistence, and that is why there's a stigma about having them.
I haven't heard this connotation of habits being easy to change before. There's such a huge industry around developing good habits or getting rid of bad ones, and Google shows more results for "changing habits is hard" than "changing habits is easy".
The author also didn't address Social Anxiety Disorder, just shyness, which is not a medically recognized disorder. Again, I think this is a case of reading too much into what the author says because people are emotionally attached to the subject.