_{Huhhhhaha I think I'd better read this again. [link]}

Being an introvert can be difficult. During school, I dealt with it by focusing on classwork to the exclusion of any extracurricular or social activities... and now--when I thought I had matured enough to be comfortable with myself, it appears I am doing the exact same thing, just with work.

If I ignore something long enough, my brain takes the hint and resets--does the mental equivalent of sweeping things under the rug--and then all the little nagging obligations that wrack me with guilt are cleared away. So if I wait long enough, this will stop bothering me, but right now it is distracting me quite a bit; I feel pretty awful.

I never thought I should have to apologize for who I am, but living in an extroverted world requires a minimum amount of upkeep to maintain accepted social norms. I think all of my best friends by necessity had to be introverts, simply to understand and/or forgive me for the distance I constantly find myself retreating to. (And there are varying levels of introvertedness; I'm not trying to use it as an excuse, exactly, simply to explain: I score 100% introverted, so I am a bit of an extreme case here. )



I've been working a lot. A lot. Way more than any sane person should, certainly. I've been going nonstop since the beginning of the month. 9-5 but also taking on additional projects that I squeezed in at night. And they actually made me go in to the office (so + another 7-8 hours commuting, if you're counting!).  Eight hours of sleep every night but still waking up exhausted. Had my last retail shifts, which meant no recovery time on the bookended weekends...

So I find myself performing triage on the correspondences I have piling up. It's not going so well. When I finally had a day free (at the end of an 85-hour workweek ), I had no energy--the amount of emails/messages that had accumulated left me wanting to bury my head back in the sand. I feel like my patients are dying.

I have met so many wonderful and really interesting people on here. I've started/participated in a lot of great conversations. But I'm pretty much always the one that leaves them hanging. I'm falling even further behind on replying to comments, or commenting on anyone else's work/journals/etc. It makes me feel like shit.

When I found out about INTPs, it was like a huge relief for me: there wasn't something wrong with me. I thought for awhile I had avoidant personality disorder or possibly schizoid personality disorder... and not saying I don't fit the criteria for both/either of them, but it's definitely possible that INTP traits have just manifested in me in an extreme way. But there is actually a personality type that matches me... not necessarily a disorder.

I've gotten so many new watchers lately ( ), and I feel like I'm letting everyone down by not posting more, especially since I have no idea when I can safely open for commissions without risking my sanity or the use of my hand. (When I finally do have some time free--you know, some actual consecutive days in which I can recover--I have a ton of art almost ready to submit, yay.)

I don't know what I'm trying to say, here. I guess I mainly just want to apologize for being such a horrible correspondent and/or updater, and try to alleviate my guilt somewhat. The last thing I want is anyone to think I'm unappreciative or stuck-up or off frittering all my time away while I ignore everyone... because the truth is, I really do appreciate everyone on here and it's amazing to get comments and favorites, and especially to be invited to participate in some great discussions... I just wonder if I don't come across as a jerk by not replying to everything (or taking weeks to do so >_>; )--but then, I am horribly insecure and think about things way too much. I know I've given this a lot more thought than anyone else lol; I could very well be the only one that notices/cares.

But I do care. So, THIS. xD I feel a little better now. And because it saved me in so many ways, I also am trying to pimp out the Meyers-Briggs Type Indicator on everyone in the hopes they will find it as helpful as I do... or at least as interesting. (Great tool for character profiling, btw!)

I think everyone should have at least a passing familiarity with it... maybe we could all understand/accept each other--and maybe ourselves-- better.

"the underlying assumption of the MBTI is that we all have specific preferences in the way we construe our experiences, and these preferences underlie our interests, needs, values, and motivation"


edit/update 5/22: SOOO MANY HUGS YOU GUYS WOW!! I really only wrote this entry to make myself feel better haha but you all made me feel a million times better than I could have hoped; I wasn't even expecting that at all -- so thank you for taking the time to give me support/encouragement-- I think you've managed to give me the impetus to limp through the rest of the week to the weekend. ;D

_{SO MUCH I EVEN RESET MY MOOD FROM 'GUILTY' TO 'RELIEVED'}