Hi @Sprouting_Flowers
I absolutely love and relate to your post - thank you for sharing your experience. Unfortunately, I think people like to conflate 'quietness', 'shyness' and 'introversion' but I've grown to learn that I actually don't think they are the same thing at all. Quietness is quite literally just a lack of noise. It just means that you like to listen instead of talk and are usually a more observant person. I feel like this is a vague term and can refer both to a temporary state or someone's personality (e.g. 'Gary is so quiet today' vs 'Gary is a quiet person'). Shyness is a feeling or emotion in which you feel uncomfortable, self-conscious or nervous around all people or certain people. It is uncontrollable but may not happen in every situation and it may change over time. Introversion is a personality trait and so is generally stable over your lifetime. Introversion just means that you prefer the internal compared to the external and need time by yourself to recharge compared to time with other people. But someone is rarely fully introverted or extraverted (you are usually a mix). Someone can be shy and quiet but still be extraverted. Similarly, someone can be introverted but not shy or quiet. Someone can even be quiet but not shy.
What I'm trying to say, is that for my whole life, I thought these things were the same. I felt that my identity was that I was quiet, shy and introverted and that I would always be like that (because that's what people told me ever since I was a little kid). However, I came to learn that they are not the same thing. I realised that I am quiet, but I'm not actually shy in every situation. In some social situations, I don't feel shy at all. I also realised that I'm probably not 100% introverted. In fact, I don't like being alone at all. So in the end, I decided that I'm actually just quiet and this is not a bad thing at all! There's no point in people talking if there's no one to listen to them - and I'm a listener. Once I realised that, just like you, I had so much more confidence in myself and my identity.
So yes, quietness, shyness and introversion often do go hand-in-hand. But they are not the same thing and I think it is totally okay to identify with one but not the other. People are complex and we are all different 🫶🏼
