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Introverts didn't 'win' lockdown

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Re: Introverts didn't 'win' lockdown

#181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your words do not correspond to my experience either. The extroverts of my job seem to do fairly well doing WFH, they are able to chain their 1h meetings without pauses in-between, and fill-in their whole time doing extrovert stuff. But not me. I'm a hard-core introvert, and the lockdown has been a nightmare to me! I've felt completely isolated and sad, can't get anything done. Often I have to cancel zoom meetings be…

Don't make it someone else's job to take care of your mental health, man. If you feel that bad you need to deal with the underlying reasons why, not just run back to the office.

I'm not asking anybody else to do anything, man. I was totally happy with my work and life before the lockdown, and the lockdowns changed that for the worse, much worse. You may say that I'm "crazy" if you want, but it's just my natural desire to want to be back to what it was like before.

Re: Introverts didn't 'win' lockdown

#182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What universe are you in? April 2020 lockdown left the streets in Manchester dead for the first and only time I've ever seen, I think you might be revising history a bit

In London the parks were full, the ice cream shops were open, and if you think anyone was having their exercise limited to one hour a day you're unfortunately subservient. I have never worn a mask, and I have been on multi-hour rides around London without seeing a single mask. Dog walkers were all stopping for chats, people gathering at duck ponds for chats, parties continued to be had. My condolences to Manchester,…

Although things are re-opening now, I think the shut down in central london was more than you are saying.

I live in central london on a main road and traffic has been really low (relatively) for the last year. Normally even at 4am in the morning there is queueing traffic outside constantly, but even now at 10pm up to 10 minutes might go by without a car. It is a very clear reduction.

I do not believe that you could ride through London in April of this year or last year without seeing a mask. Right now maybe - back last march when the government said we shouldn't wear them maybe.

Things are re-opening now, but during the major lockdowns behaviur changed a lot. I say changed not stopped.

People were allowed out of the house to excersise, so any easy excersise routes (parks, paths, nice walkable streets) have a lot more foot traffic than normal. There is a canal near my home where typically outside commute hours people rarely pass - during deep lockdown it had foot traffic like a commuter station with people queuing to walk down it. But this is a sign of 'lock down' - it is people doing the only behaviur they are allowed to do outside their house.

In terms of open shops during major lockdown - I noticed that in Soho, people would gather with supermarket beers outside the closed nightclubs and street drink together. In fancier areas of town, I saw wine bars selling mulled wine covertly through a crack in the door - looking both ways up and down the street like a naughty school kid selling weed. But again these are changed behaviures that show that the normal version is banned. But I didn't see ice cream shops. Maybe now?

There was a huge uptick in the number of undeground raves - and I also heard this happened in manchester. There were several raves in the mile around my home and we'd find out about them when the police turned up in numbers. These were "break into a shut down shop and turn it into a club" events with hundreds of young partiers, not 8 people turning up for grannies birthday.

Re: Introverts didn't 'win' lockdown

#183
post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree, or at least would point to it being anecdotal. All the online game addicts I know that are still introverted, are less social then they've ever been regardless of whether they still play games. If anything they've become more so, either in games or with some other thing. These people don't have any problem with how much they spend gaming. However my online gaming addict friends, including myself, do have…

There are different kind of online game players. There is an old write-up[1] about MUDs, the ancestors of modern MMORPGs. Players are categorized into 4 archetypes: hearts, clubs, diamonds, and spades, also called socializers, killers, achievers and explorers respectively. Socializers and killers are the extroverts. They play the game for the multiplayer aspect, socializers see the game as a communication platform wh…

I hadn't heard of any of that, so thanks for the link and description. As a recent WoW player, those archetypes are very familiar, and I'd say I'd fit into every category except maybe explorer, but the game has been out for an eternity. The friends I had in mind when I wrote the original comment are definitely just explorers as far as I can tell.

Also, in retrospect I need to apologize for how incoherent my original comment was. I wrote it at 5am just as I am for this one.

Re: Introverts didn't 'win' lockdown

#184
post #9

I'm a physically and socially isolated introvert in a rural county and have been working from home for a decade. About the only difference for me was the occasional need to put on a mask before walking in a store. My greatest inconvenience was very minor: I was turned away from a convenience store for not having a mask with me. Early in the lockdowns I made a trip to the closest big city for a dentist appointment and…

Ultimately I have to count myself a winner. I’m fairly young and with no family (and too nomadic to have deep friend groups in one place), I was able to move out of my house share and back to my parents to work remotely. I got a dedicated home office, free accommodation, and people who didn’t drive me insane. The upshot was a saved tonnes, so when I moved to London in January everything went smoothly.

Re: Introverts didn't 'win' lockdown

#185
post #9

I'm a physically and socially isolated introvert in a rural county and have been working from home for a decade. About the only difference for me was the occasional need to put on a mask before walking in a store. My greatest inconvenience was very minor: I was turned away from a convenience store for not having a mask with me. Early in the lockdowns I made a trip to the closest big city for a dentist appointment and…

> So while I don't count myself as a winner in this, it does seem to be a substantial win to not be one of the losers.

Same. My wife and I actually do live in one of the big cities hit hard by the pandemic (NYC), but ended up having some of the initial restrictions work to my advantage. For instance, having a limited selection of restaurants (order-in only) led to us cooking more and calorie counting again, and we've lost 30 pounds each. We also bought an apartment once the initial hard restrictions were lifted last summer, and I suspect the extreme lack of buyers made us look a lot more attractive to sellers than we would have in 2019 (NYC co-ops are infamous for requiring 2 years of mortgage+maintenance fees in liquid which we certainly didn't have after shelling out a 20% down payment). My wife spent the entire year looking for a job after being laid off in January and COVID made that significantly harder, but I think it did help her finally find a fully remote company a year later - her new employer embraced remote work in COVID by allowing employees to move away from their CA and NY office, now she's helping them expand hiring across the entire US and Canada (she's in HR and they don't use a PEO for payroll, its a surprisingly non-trivial effort). We both prefer working remotely so this was important for us.

Overall I feel good how things ended up for us but considering how terrible its been for huge portions of the world its feels uncomfortable to call it "winning lockdown".

Re: Introverts didn't 'win' lockdown

#186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

well it's not really a binary choice. it's a continuum between introversion and extraversion

I think you missed the point of the comment you replied to. It's possible to be extremely introverted, preferring no explicit social interactions, while still getting a noticable peace and energy uplift from being able to just watch and be surrounded by other people doing their things. Think of someone quiet in a coffee shop or library who never talks to anyone, but likes being there, not for the coffee or the books,…

my point was exactly what you describe. it’s not clear what being introvert means. it’s just a word people throw around. being quiet doesn’t mean you want to live in a dungeon, as you say. everyone is different

Re: Introverts didn't 'win' lockdown

#187
I’m a half introvert/extrovert (Myers Briggs has me leaning towards introvert). I definitely felt less lonely during the pandemic. I lost a lot of “friends” (acquaintances) and gained some truly intimate relationships with a few. I thought it was the best thing that’s ever happened to me. Though this worked because I had a few friends to begin with who wanted to be in a bubble

Re: Introverts didn't 'win' lockdown

#188
post #43

One thing that's not mentionned: a lockdown means you're constantly spending time with the people you live with. That means almost no more moments where you're alone in your home. I know that I get irritable after some time when we go for a family vacation and spend all our time together, because I need some time for myself and some control over my actions. I've never heard about agency in the context of introvert/ex…

This is not true for everyone. If your family members are mentally mature, they should know about your requirements of alone-time.

My parents and SO have always understood this, and I have never had the problem you are describing after my teenage years.

Re: Introverts didn't 'win' lockdown

#189
The article does not speak for me at all.

I massively won lockdown.

1. Gained a totally new skill that got me employment for a modest pay.

2. Learned to paint digitally.

3. Learned to play the piano.

4. Furthered my expertise with two (human) languages.

5. Learned three new programming languages.

6. Spent a lot of time with people I care about.

7. Read about 50 books.

8. Exercised regularly and got into good shape.

For me, lockdown was the ideal situation to live. Absolutely no regret or worries.

It was perfect.

Re: Introverts didn't 'win' lockdown

#190
post #98
post #9

I'm a physically and socially isolated introvert in a rural county and have been working from home for a decade. About the only difference for me was the occasional need to put on a mask before walking in a store. My greatest inconvenience was very minor: I was turned away from a convenience store for not having a mask with me. Early in the lockdowns I made a trip to the closest big city for a dentist appointment and…

Same here. I live in a quiet house far away from everything in the middle of the Swiss Alps. I get the majority of my food from small farmer stalls around me. The most of other things I just order online. Except my partner the only real contact I have right now is my family I see maybe once a month. However they visit me as I don't really want drive down to a busy town. I have no work related contacts either as I lif…

What kinds of projects afford you this, I'm curious?
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