This week is my annual get away for a writer’s retreat.  I find myself looking forward to it each year.  It is a time when a group of my friends who love to write gather together in solitude. I know that does not make much sense–but in actuality we each have our own room where we write to our heart’s content and only come together for an evening meal. Some of us are night owls and some are early birds. The flexibility of only coming together for dinner allows us the freedom to work in our own time frames.

My friends (who are all introverts) are great at getting right to business and accomplishing many of their goals during the week.  They write goals and state their BHAG (big, hairy, audacious goal). They are good at eating frogs. Which means they get the hard things done first and then  focus on the rest of the things they want to do.

And then, there is me–the one and only extrovert in the group. While introverts get energized by having down time, people like me are energized by being around other people. My favorite time of the day is dinner, when we all get together and share. I can tell the rest of the group (who are too polite to say it out loud) are yearning to get back to their writing. And I am ready to talk. And talk. And talk.

All of the commentaries, research, and study guides that accompany many of the introverts in the group are not for me.  Nope!  Just let me have a computer and my Kindle and I am good to go. Well, somewhat. And those goals? Well. I write them and then get sidetracked with other things that were not even in my goals. And eating frogs? I get so distracted by the little things that I keep putting off the big, important things. That is what extroverts like me do.

One of the problems with being an extrovert is that I don’t always think things through. I tend to be a little more impulsive and have great ideas, but am not so good at implementing them.  So it helps to have my introvert friends  because they keep me grounded and ask hard questions sometimes. They keep me accountable.

The differences of an introvert and an extrovert are many. The fact of the matter is, I absolutely adore my introvert friends. They are wonderful, godly women who are there for me through thick and thin.  They have stood by my side for years and they are my safe haven friends. I always feel like I receive so much more from their friendship than I give. For an introvert, trust must be earned and I feel privileged that they have trusted me with their joys and their sorrows, their heartaches and their celebrations. As an extrovert I have had to learn to allow them time to process their thoughts and not get offended because they don’t give me an answer right away. Because if we don’t know already, we should know that introverts like to be able to think things through and consider all angles before drawing conclusions.

Yep the differences between introverts and extroverts are real but it makes life so interesting to have both around and I wouldn’t trade my introvert friends for the world!