The Impulse To Be Social Vs. The Desire To Be Alone

There are people who absolutely hate having to interact with other people. Whether it's due to asociality, shyness, misanthropy, social anxiety, or some other expression of introversion, those people all seem to have one thing in common.

A dread of people like me. 

In fact, I probably owe a lot of those types a boatload of apologies for interjecting myself into their lives, all uninvited like.

The thing is, I love people - all types of people. I love social gatherings where I can meet and talk with a large number of people, and I love one-on-one interactions. I love being able to engage with people who have something to teach me or who desire to learn from me. 

I am without compunction when it comes to initiating conversation or being the recipient of a conversational gambit.

The people who intrigue me the most are those that are hiding in corners at parties, or burying themselves in books on planes. With rare exception, those people all have interesting stories to tell and particularly interesting world views. Plus, all the reading they do usually means they are fairly well-educated, or at least well-informed.

Which, when my penchant for spending hours drawing, painting, writing or reading is taken into account, is somewhat puzzling, as just about every personality profile or psychological characterization of the artistic/creative type concludes that those traits are system archetypes of introverts.

But I'm hardly an introvert. Sure, there are times when I fall into the role of the introvert, when I want to be alone to draw/paint/read, etc., and there are even exceptions to the pursuit of an interaction with someone when I'm in a social setting, but that's usually when I'm either too tired or when the conversation turns decidedly antagonistic, either towards me or another person.

However, for the most part I enjoy being with people, and I absolutely thrive on being involved in most social gatherings - I state "most" because, well, politics really aren't my bag. I find politics and politicians dull as dirt, so I avoid political gatherings.

Again then, a boatload of apologies to those I have imposed upon when they would much rather have been left alone - but truth be told, I can't remember even one of those people not being fairly interesting once the conversation got rolling.