This is a subject that has been a constant source of fascination to me for a while now.
Particularly after Ben gave me this book as a gift. Quiet the power of Introverts in a world that can't stop talking. Written by Susan Cain www.quietrev.com/quiet-the-book/
From the title I knew that I was going to get along with this book and draw much from it.
I've always known that I have the disposition of being introverted but didn't really fully understand what it was other than being quiet and sometimes misunderstood for being shy.
Several years ago a friend of mine introduced me to Myer Briggs a personality test that can be easily completed on line to determine what kind of personality type you are. This test derived of Carl Jung's theories and consists of 16 different types.
'The theory of psychological type was introduced in the 1920s by Carl g. Jung. The MBTI tool was developed in the 1940s by Isabel Briggs Myers and the original research was done in the 1940s and '50s. This research is ongoing, providing users with updated and new information about psychological type and its applications. Millions of people worldwide have taken the Indicator each year since its first publication in 1962.'
from http://www.myersbriggs.org
http://www.myersbriggs.org/my-mbti-personality-type/mbti-basics/
Some personality types are more common than others. This test is often something that you may be required to do if you work for large corporate companies and the traits that will deemed favourable will be team player, confidence and extroverted personalities.
However, sometimes this comes down to who has the loudest voice and those who must be heard as opposed to what is actually being said.
The overiding element of this test is to determine whether you are an introvert or an extrovert, based around how your energy levels run.
This may not be what we immediately associate with these two words. It's often perceived as quiet or confident the test also hi lights how you make decisions and how you think. This is divided into abstract and concrete thinking processes.
An introverted person can be confident but they will feel exhausted in large groups of people, whereas an extroverted person will feel energised by the large group.
Having completed this test myself I came out as INFJ this is the rarest type with only 1% of the population.
I must admit when I read this it made complete sense. I could begin to be a little kinder to myself and understand why I feel certain emotions at a particular time or place. Where my intolerance comes from when I'm surrounded by people who are constantly talking and fail to understand the notion of an edit button and my hyper sensitivity to noise. I also realised that it's nothing to do with being anti social it's about being able to think.
The reason I'm writing this is that introversion or the ideas of introversion is continuously filtered into my own work. Living in a society that rarely allows us to stop and be still I feel it's increasingly important to make people stop.
I don't want to talk about this too much now as I want to expand on how these ideas are currently impacting on contemporary architecture and design in my next post.
In the mean time here are a few interesting links around this subject,
and a link to a book recently published, written by Pete Mosley: The Art of Shouting Quietly
A perfect book for the quieter creative person.
http://www.create-the-good-life.com/slow_movement.html
http://www.quietrev.com
http://shoutingquietly.com