Girl Serving in the 'Army'

Tiny Moments Derrick Lin

A small sampling of the ingenious images created by Derrick Lin, an observer of the tiny moments of agency life, figuratively speaking.

1. When we see you after a long day, we might be all irritable and not want to talk

It has nothing to do with you. Outgoing introverts, though still introverts at their core, often need to recharge after a large use of social energy. After a long day of dealing with people, our social batteries are drained and we need to unwind and recover, usually alone.

2. We’re charming creatures and can be the life of the party, but…

You’ll be surprised how much we actually live in our heads. People often confuse us for extroverts, but we’re too introspective and over-think too much to be one.

3. If we like you, we really like you.

We don’t waste our time with people we’re not completely crazy about. If we agreed to go on a date with you, we like you. Take it as a huge compliment.

4. We have times when we’re weird with our phones.

Some days we can talk for hours, but sometimes we’re not so good at replying and talking on the phone. Don’t take it personally - we screen our phone calls, even from our closest friends. Outgoing introverts sometimes hate the phone because it’s all, like, intrusive and tears our minds away from whatever we’re deeply focusing on (and we are always deeply focusing on something). Our mind doesn’t change direction easily. Listening to one thing and seeing something else is a lot of sensory input piled on top of everything that’s already going on in our heads.

5. But don’t worry, in person we’ll listen to you for hours.

We have spectrums of introversion, so we’re good listeners. We’ll always be naturally in tune with how you’re feeling, so we’ll be able to see through any front you put up and make you jump into the deep end.

6. We need to dip our foot in the pool first.

We need time to warm up, so, like, chill. We tend not to outwardly express our feelings and spill our whole life story in the first hour of meeting you. Or the first year.

7. Our energy level depends on our environment.

Yes, we can get annoyed easily. If we vibe with the crowd, we can get our energy from human interactions. But if we don’t, we’ll start to get really introspective and reflective, and tend to withdraw into ourselves. It’s kinda like a hit or miss. We’re very selectively social. But it’s not because we dislike people - it’s actually the opposite. We dislike the barriers like small talk (which often comes with going out) creates between people, and try to avoid it at all costs.

8. You’ll think we are flirty with everyone.

Okay here’s the thing, when we inevitably have to interact with people, we make it seem like there’s nothing in the world we’d rather be doing. It’s ‘cause we’re, like, overly sensitive and so we go out of our way to make other people feel comfortable and happy. We’re intuitive and outgoing at the same time.