What Dating Taught Me About Introversion

Quiet Revolutionary Santiago Robledo’s Story 

I’ve always been very reserved with my feelings. I don’t consider myself shy, but when I date a girl, I always regret not being more extroverted. I admire my friends and how they can go out on a date completely relaxed and sure of themselves. Even if things don’t go as planned, the situation doesn’t affect them at all. I’ve seen a few of them being rejected, and straight away, they were asking another girl for dinner. Maybe this is normal, but I was shocked. I need a lot of time to get ready and to think where to go. As an introvert, I have to analyze everything to prepare the perfect plan.

Even if I calculate everything, I stress a little bit. Sometimes, I felt tempted to call the girl and cancel the date with a stupid excuse. My mind feels like it’s working against me. I sometimes think that my date wouldn’t enjoy the things I planned to do, that she wouldn’t like my deep conversation, or that I would ruin her weekend. I worry about her talking to her friends about our date even if I’ve never met them before. I have a lot of negative thoughts that discourage me.

In my hometown, I had different groups of friends: from my school, my football team, and my work. At that time, meeting new people was easier and more natural. But I didn’t know too many people when I moved to the city, which only made things worse.

My first idea to meet new people was to use the social networks, specifically the dating networks. It was the first time I used them. I always thought only desperate people go on those kinds of sites. I felt so embarrassed that I didn’t tell my friends about it so they wouldn’t be able to make fun of me.

I registered on one of these dating networks, and I started to look at the pictures. As an introvert, I didn’t feel comfortable talking about my life on these sites, so I decided to leave a few comments on interesting-looking profiles. Two days later, I checked my messages. Most of the people didn’t answer me, and the one who did asked me for a picture because I hadn’t put one up. That’s when I realized that this kind of site wasn’t for me. I think my introvert character had a lot to do with that.

My introvert personality wanted me to come back to the traditional way of dating girls. I like to meet for the first time in a quiet cafeteria to find out more about the person in front of me. I do my best to bring up interesting subjects so she can enjoy the conversation. A lot of my friends tell me that going to a concert or a night club and drinking a lot works better for them, because they feel uninhibited. But they are extroverted people.

As a result of my experiences, I’ve created a blog, called mundointrovertido.com, to help introverts like me to find their place in the world, because there is not too much information about introversion in Spanish. I hope it will help some others who feel like I do.

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