024: Helping Your Introverted Child Navigate Relationships

1 hour, 4 minutes
We want our children to thrive in their relationships; to experience a healthy give and take, to know how to communicate, and to feel the freedom to operate within what comes natural to their personality. The culture sometimes elevates behaviors and personality traits, and even builds social structures around them, making it more challenging for people who don't fit the mould.

In this episode, Ben and Rachel talk about how to recognize introversion in your child and how to teach your child to have healthy communication, enforce necessary boundaries, but also step out of their comfort zone and make connections and enjoy the benefits of establishing healthy relationships.

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We want our children to thrive in their relationships; to experience a healthy give and take, to know how to communicate, and to feel the freedom to operate within what comes natural to their personality. The culture sometimes elevates behaviors and personality traits, and even builds social structures around them, making it more challenging for people who don’t fit the mould.

In this episode, Ben and Rachel talk about how to recognize introversion in your child and how to teach your child to have healthy communication, enforce necessary boundaries, but also step out of their comfort zone and make connections and enjoy the benefits of establishing healthy relationships.

Highlights, Takeaways, & Quick Wins

Don’t compare yourself to your kids and let that determine how you understand their personality.
In social situations, introverts spend energy.
How you go about introducing your child to a social situation is really important—ease them in and gauge how their energy level responds.
Introverts thrive in relationships that are deep and meaningful.
Modeling healthy behaviors when you’re overstimulated as an introverted parent is powerful for your introverted child.
Establish practices that help your introverted child reenergize.
Our introverted children need to feel free to communicate with their friends about how they’re feeling.
When we recognize that our child is an introvert, we can help them to be confident in their unique strengths.
Practicing things that are outside their natural mode helps introverted children feel like they have more control in difficult social situations.

Show Notes

04:00 Ben: I am not an introvert, so growing up and going to public school and church, I was always a person who got a lot of energy from being around other people. I actively sought out opportunities to spend time with groups of people and be involved in activities and that kind of thing. I would go a little bit crazy if I didn’t have the opportunity to spend time with people like that. That’s one of the things I love about the seanwes Community—it’s a really cool place, and I love coming in and hanging out, but what I love even more is being live on the air. The people in the Community get to listen to this show and the seanwes podcast that I’m also on live, and I get to interact with them live, and I get so much energy from that. When the Community has meetups and we actually get together in person, I get so much energy from that. I want to hear from Rachel, what is your experience, as a person who is introverted?
05:22 Rachel: When I was a kid, I didn’t really know myself all that well. I tried to fit in like everybody else did. When you’re in junior high and high school, you just want to be one of the popular ones. I was friends with everybody and I knew everybody, but I had three really good, deep friendships, and most of the time I would just hang out with one of those at a time. I played sports and did band, so there were always group activities, and I never knew why I was exhausted when I was done with an event, even something like a volleyball game. You’re still interacting with people because you’re playing on a court, you’re with your team, and you’re doing all of these things.
06:13 It wasn’t until Ben and I read the book Quiet by Susan Cain that I was able to point to why these things happen. Ben and I were in a band together—we still are, but we don’t play as much as we used to. After the shows, I would be incredibly drained from that, and I could never explain why. “Maybe I didn’t get enough sleep last night,” I thought. When I read this book on introversion, so much of it made sense to me. I had never thought in introvert or extrovert language. We learned a lot about me from that book. I was put in positions where I was a leader, and I had to lead this group of people. I did ministry leadership, I was a journalist for a number of years, and I was constantly meeting people and doing these things. I didn’t know that I was an introverted person.
07:19 Ben: That’s not to say that, as an introvert, being involved in those capacities is something you should avoid, but when you know that about yourself, you know how to be involved in those things and recharge the way you need to.

Recognizing Introversion in Your Child

07:42 This is a really important first step. Sometimes we think we know, or we haven’t done any research and we’re completely clueless. Sometimes there are telltale signs there but we’re attributing them to something else. I want to get into this a little bit, because when we identify introversion in our children, we can help offset some of the energy they’re spending. One of the first important things to realize about introverts is that they’re not always the quiet or the reserved ones. That can be a personality trait and one of the ways their introversion manifests itself, but that’s not the key characteristic.
08:37 Rachel: The way we recognized it with our firstborn was that whenever he had group situations, he would come home and his behavior was out of control. He was out of control with himself. His anger, his emotions, everything was out of control. He would have a meltdown about everything. It became really clear early on to me that he was an introvert, because that was his “help me” behavior. “Somebody please figure out something to do, I’m so overstimulated, I can’t take it anymore. I need somebody to sit me aside and let me regroup.”
09:14 Ben: We need to talk about that and tie it back to the root of what’s going on there. Rachel just said that she recognized that, and one of the things I really appreciated about her as she engaged with our oldest with some of the struggles he was having was that she didn’t compare herself against him and say, “Oh, he has the same personality traits that I do, so he must be introverted.” As parents, in general, when we compare our children to ourselves and try to make assumptions about who they are and what their personality is, we forget that we’ve had years of experiences that shape us.
10:03 In some ways, those experiences have helped us to be more healthy people, and in some ways they can cause us to struggle more with certain things. As an introvert, especially if you’re not aware of it, you may have taken on certain behaviors and personality traits that, though they’re not just inherent of introverts, can be characteristic of introverts. If you see those traits in your children, you could be falsely labeling them. It’s important to be aware of that.

Don’t compare yourself to your kids and let that determine how you understand their personality.

10:44 What’s really going on with introversion vs. extroversion is how we energize in social situations. Extroverts get energy from being in social situations and talking to people. That’s one of the ways that extroverts energize. In social situations, introverts spend energy. It’s like Rachel was saying, when she was playing a show or talking to people at the merchandise table after the show, she was spending energy. Before she realized that she was an introvert, she didn’t know why she felt so drained, but that’s what it was.
11:27 It was the way the energy was flowing in those social situations. The consequences of that manifest themselves in different ways. As an older person who understands what introversion is and what it does to you, it’s a lot easier to articulate that. As a child who doesn’t have a clue what any of those technical terms are, I cam imagine how frustrating it was for Jadon to feel so drained and not know what to do with that or how to articulate it. It manifested itself in behaviors.
12:08 Rachel: It’s almost like you get so incredibly over-stimulated that by the time you get done with that situation—and for him, it was preschool and school—you’re just done. Jadon was just done. He didn’t want anyone else telling him what to do, he didn’t want to interact with anybody all that much, so we had to start building things into his schedule that would allow him to take time away.
12:36 Ben: That’s where you want to focus. People are saying this stuff in the chat, and it’s so true. Hallie says, “Shy does not equal introverted,” and Garrett says, “And you can be extroverted and still need a significant amount of alone time.” That’s true. You can’t just say, “This person is introverted, so they don’t like being around people. They’re shy, reserved, and not outspoken.” Those personality traits may tend to be more prominent in introverts, but it’s not an absolute. It’s not this binary thing. There are varying levels. Some people are right on the line between extrovert and introvert, so sometimes they can seem very extroverted, like they get a lot of energy from being around other people, and sometimes they really do need that solitude.
13:30 Rachel: There’s also this ability we have as human beings to adapt, so when we are introverted people but we’re in a situation, maybe even for a certain period of time, where we have to be extroverted, we get really good at doing that. An example is when an introverted parent has children. I’m a highly sensitive introvert, so having six loud boys, I get overstimulated with sound and touch. Having that has been a struggle, but I’ve also learned to adapt to that. Our children can do the same for a certain period of time, but we have to be careful what we expect them to adapt to, because it doesn’t come all at once.

Understanding Introversion

14:41 Ben: It all boils down to introverts, just like extroverts, being human beings. As human beings, we have a need for relationships. You absolutely cannot say that introverts just prefer to be alone. It’s not a matter of preference—it’s a matter of how they spend and gain energy. It has nothing to do with whether or not they want relationships. They do want relationships. They want authenticity, they want depth, and they need that because it’s a human need. It’s not about being an extrovert or introvert. It’s important to come at this from that understanding. How we introduce our child, who’s an introvert, to relationships is important.
15:34 It’s like Rachel was saying, we can’t just do it all at once. Some children may seem more tolerant than others. Children are naturally curious. They naturally want to be part of what’s going on. Some may be a little more reserved than others and take some time getting into that, but kids love spending time with each other. We definitely don’t want to avoid social situations by default. We can’t say, “Oh, my child’s an introvert, so I’m not going to push them into being involved with sports, an organization, or a youth group.” It’s good for them. It’s beneficial to be part of a group.

How you go about introducing your child to a social situation is really important.

You want to ease them in and as you do, gauge how their energy level responds.

16:25 See how they’re reacting to that situation, see how their behavior might change or adjust, and you can get a good sense of what they can tolerate when you’re paying attention and being purposeful about that. It was great for me to come to that realization, because as a parent who understands the value of our kids being involved in social situations and having relationships with people and groups, working together with a team, and those kinds of things, I naturally want to put them in those situations. Without this understanding, I would do so to the detriment of their ability to engage in those relationships in a healthy way because they would feel so overwhelmed that they would begin to shut down and not make those connections.
17:38 Rachel: If our children are involved in public school, at the age of five, they’re thrown into a situation that’s not like it used to be when we were kids. We had our own little desk and our own little space, but they’re put into a classroom where there are pods of desks. There are five or six other people at your pod, and you’re constantly touching elbows and looking across at somebody because they’re arranged in circles. The reason for this is to encourage group work, but for introverts, that doesn’t work all the time. One of the things that started happening for our kid was that he started acting out in school, because he was so overwhelmed all the time that he didn’t know what to do with his feelings. I had to advocate for him to have a space set aside, either where he could go to regroup or he could just be there if he wanted to in a day.

Our culture values extroverted behavior.

18:53 Ben: Fortunately, people are becoming more and more aware of the difference and the equal value that is offered through people who are extroverts and introverts, understanding that we need to make space and shape our environments to suit both, depending on the situation. It’s probably often going to be necessary that where other people or groups are involved, you might have to step in and help shape that environment. That’s a skill you can also pass on to your child. There is a benefit to being able to adapt to certain situations, but we should encourage our child to stand up for the way they engage with people and that it’s okay to say, “I need a boundary here. If you really want the value out of me that I can bring to this group, I need to have this kind of environment.”
19:59 Rachel: What was cool about that is after he had a desk that was separated, I thought at first that he might feel weird being the only one. Then I walked into his classroom one day, and there were three other desks set aside from the pods. Other kids were like, “I would feel better if I did that, too.” It was really cool to see that happen because our kid was given the opportunity to set a desk aside and say, “I’m not okay with sitting with all of these people all the time.” Whenever we’re brave enough to stand up for ourselves, other people find that they’re also brave enough to stand up.
20:46 Ben: When we recognize that our child is an introvert, it’s important not to give them a pass and say, “You don’t have to be involved in group activities.” There’s so much benefit for them in being involved and getting to work with other people and experience the value that different kinds of people bring. There’s a lot of value to that group, so it’s important to understand that what they have to offer the group is really valuable, and what the group experience has to offer them is really valuable. It’s also important to help our child understand the way they engage relationships.
21:29 Sam asked, “Are there different metrics for relationships when talking about introverts and extroverts?” He went on to open up his question a little bit more and talked about the depth of those relationships. Absolutely. While all people are capable of having deep relationships, introverts thrive in those relationships that are deep and meaningful. There’s little tolerance for shallow relationships. It’s not saying, “If you’re not willing to go deep with me, I don’t care about you,” but it’s really about being efficient. As an introvert, you have more tolerance and spend less energy in a relationship where there is depth and meaning. You spend a lot more energy swimming on the surface.
22:26 Rachel: Our son has expressed this in a way that only an eight year old can. We ask him every day, “Who did you play with on the playground?” We want to know his friends. He’ll say, “I played with these people, but they’re not really my friends.” When we dig into that deeper, we find that it’s because he has a different meaning of friendship than most kids do. For most kids, if you play together, you’re friends. He has this need to be known more than just on a playground. I find that endearing as well as sad, because not a lot of kids are going to engage in a relationship like that at eight years old.

Guard Recharge Time

23:17 Ben: This is something that’s peripheral to fostering healthy relationships for our introverted children. A piece that goes along with that that’s so important is teaching our introverted children ways they can be purposeful about reenergizing.

Establish practices that help your introverted child reenergize.

23:48 Create those spaces. Allow them the time alone that they need, and teach them that it’s okay. In order for them to bring the value they do into the world, they need to have that energy, and they need to protect and defend that time. For our oldest, one thing we did that we kind of went back on was that we gave him his own room for a little while. There are a lot of kids and not enough rooms, so he is having to share a room with his brothers. We offset that by allowing him plenty of time to read and work on stuff on his own.
24:37 We also have special time set aside for him to do that throughout the day. We give him some special time at the end of the day when his brothers are already in bed. We try to give him these spaces, and one thing we haven’t done a great job of—granted, he’s a little bit young—but we can start talking to him now about how that is benefiting him and helping him to recharge. Part of that is being able to recognize when you need to recharge. When we saw Jadon acting out after school, we had an opportunity to tell him, “What you’re doing right now isn’t because you’re really angry about this thing. You definitely feel angry, but…” Help make that connection to the fact that he’s just drained. “You’re drained right now, and you need to go recharge.”
25:43 Rachel: It’s such a hard thing to do, too, because as parents we see that misbehavior, and we want to fix it. We’re getting to the end of our day, too. We’re tired, especially me, being overstimulated. I don’t have as much patience as I normally would. It’s hard to look at that situation and say, “He’s not acting out because he wants to make us mad. He’s acting out for the same reasons that I sometimes yell, because I’m overstimulated and I can’t take anything else.” His whole day has gone like that. I get the privilege of sitting in an office by myself for five hours a day. That feels like recharging. He’s in a school with 100 kids. I can’t even imagine going to lunch in the lunchroom. I’ve gone to lunch with him before, and it’s like this a roar of voices. If you’re overstimulated by a roar of voices, it’s all the time in a school.
26:57 Ben: Especially if there’s no outlet for you to talk about that. I want him to feel the freedom to go to his teacher and say, “I feel really overwhelmed. Is there any way I could go eat my lunch in the nurse’s room today?” In the chat, Hallie said, “A new skill I’ve learned is knowing how to recognize when I need to recharge before I’m exhausted or in crisis mode.”
27:28 Rachel: The hard part is, as parents, we don’t often get the luxury of recharging until kids are actually in bed and asleep. It is very helpful, though, in teaching our kids. There are some moments where three kids are talking to me at once, and I’ll say, “You know what, guys? I’m really overstimulated right now. I can’t hear what anybody’s saying because I feel like I’m about to scream.” It’s helpful for them to hear that, because the ones who are introverts—I think we have at least two—can hear that and see what I do with that. I might just need to walk to the couch and take a minute away from everybody. Sometimes, I walk to the sink and do the dishes, because there’s something about the warm water that’s soothing to me.

Modeling healthy behaviors when you’re overstimulated as an introverted parent is powerful for your introverted child.

28:26 Ben: When you’re talking about preempting this crisis-mode, it’s easier to anticipate the times when kids are going to feel overwhelmed when they’re on regular schedules. Today is a PE day, so they’re going to be in a loud gym with all of the voices echoing everywhere, or today is an art day, so it’s going to be a quieter environment. He gets to focus on his own thing.
29:01 Know those variances and build into those routines some time to recharge when you know, regardless of whether they’re acting out or not, they come home and they feel drained from their day. They need that time to recharge before you have them dive into their homework or go outside and play with their friends again. It’s not one of those things where they recognize that they’re drained. They want to play with their friends, they want to have fun and go do those things, but sometimes we have to give them an opportunity to recharge first so they don’t reach that crisis-mode in the first place.
29:47 Rachel: For the kids who aren’t in school, if you have multiple children, it’s like being in a community all the time. We have three at home right now, and they’re too young for us to know if they’re introverts or extroverts. Being in that community all the time, there needs to be places set up for those kids to take time away. We live in a relatively small house for as many of us as are here. I did some calculations the other day, and it’s about 120 square feet per person. That’s okay, but kids don’t really respect that space. They’re always in each other’s spaces, and it becomes hard for an introvert to be able to function in a place like that. I highly recommend setting aside a certain space that can be their recharge place. We haven’t been great about doing that, but the oldest takes his own little places.

Building Healthy Relationships

31:13 Ben: One of the things that’s really important for us to realize as human beings is that if we want to have relationships with other people, there’s investment. We have to put something on the line. There’s that first step, where you put yourself out there before you get to the really good stuff in a relationship. Even for extroverts, there’s this uncertainty, “If I spend my time and energy on this person, is that going to result in a meaningful relationship that’s going to bring value to both of us?” For our introverted children, it’s important to understand that the energy you spend getting to know a new person or being in a group and getting to know the different peoples’ personalities so you know who you might want to target as a friend, the investment you’re making is one that’s necessary.

As an introvert, you can’t avoid spending your energy if you want to experience deep, meaningful relationships.

32:25 Sometimes, that investment is not going to pan out. When it does pan out, that investment is definitely worth it. We need to help our children understand that and understand the importance of making that investment in the first place. Part of what makes this a little bit easier is when we teach our children to practice traits that don’t come as naturally to them but that will make it easier for them to relate to people and navigate those relationships. Sometimes, it’s going to be necessary for them to be the outgoing person in the room. Sometimes, it’s going to be necessary for them to be the leader, to assert themselves, or to be the one who’s doing most of the talking. Sometimes, it’s going to be necessary for them to make small talk. I would love for Rachel to talk about her experience with small talk.
33:32 Rachel: It’s really kind of awful. I was a reporter for many years, and I really enjoyed going to the contacts’ houses and talking with them about their stories. I really love hearing peoples’ stories, especially when it’s one-on-one and I can really dive into that. Every now and then, there would be people who would just stay on the surface, and I’m not interested in staying on the surface. Sometimes, people who are really good at staying on the surface are also really good at going on and on and on at staying on the surface.
34:07 Ben: It’s stuff that’s not very meaningful, but they can talk at length.
34:11 Rachel: For a really long time. What ends up happening is that I can usually recognize who these people are when they begin communicating with me, and my body just starts almost shutting down. My eyes glaze over, I start seeing spots. It’s almost like I’m about to pass out. It’s like my body is saying, “I know that you’re not going to get yourself out of this situation, so I’m going to do it for you.” It’s really awful.
34:40 Ben: I just can’t imagine. I’ve felt this sense of panic before.
34:45 Rachel: I wonder if that’s what it is. I wonder if it’s panic, like I’m going to be stuck there forever.
34:51 Ben: In that situation, the person is basically a vacuum cleaner. They’re sucking all of your energy, and there’s no end point in sight. Danger! You need energy to survive.
35:06 Rachel: The danger is that you’re going to die. I’m going to die if this person keeps sucking my energy! Honestly, it doesn’t happen with people I know well. I can still care about them enough. It happens with people I don’t know well, and they’re not interested in being known.
35:43 Ben: The skill there is knowing how to work through those conversations and force an end point graciously, without being rude.
35:54 Rachel: That’s what I usually try to do. I break out into a sweat. I feel like I’m going to pass out. I usually make up an excuse or say, “It’s really good to talk to you,” and move on, but some people are really good at not recognizing those cues. It feels like you’re just trapped.
36:19 Ben: You could always fake a phone call. Maybe you’re the person who is listening to this and thinking, “I’ve had that experience before!” or has children who are also introverts and you are concerned for their ability to be in those situations.

Practicing things that are outside their natural mode helps introverted children feel like they have more control in difficult social situations.

36:50 They know that they can turn this thing on if they need to in order to work through this social situation. This also goes back to the ability to recognize when you need to recharge and knowing how to do that. You can be more tolerant of a draining situation if you know that you’re going to be able to recharge later. Like in that situation, when it seems indefinite and you’re not sure when this person is going to stop talking and whether or not you’re going to survive the conversation, it really becomes a stressor, and that compounds the drain of energy. It’s important to help your children be flexible in those situations so that they can use those tools for the good of the relationship and for their own well-being.

The Value of Introversion

37:50 Sean McCabe of the seanwes podcast is highly introverted, but he’s developed these skills that he’s practiced over time where he can come across very extroverted. He goes to conferences and meetings, he speaks and talks to people, and he’s very engaging. That’s not to say that introverts can’t be engaging, but it’s not his natural mode. He’s practiced that so much, but he’ll tell you, he gets to the end of one of those conferences or weekends and he comes home and sits in his beanbag for five days to recover from that.
38:39 There are things that are just true about him as an introvert and an individual that, if he were to try to suppress those, would completely take away from the value he’s able to provide people. It’s really important for us to help our children understand that, as an introvert, they have certain strengths that people who are not introverts don’t have. It’s a good thing, a great thing, and it’s necessary and vital. We need introverts in this world; we need their unique strengths. When we recognize that our child is an introvert, we can help them to be confident in their unique strengths and know that because they’re an introvert and they don’t have to be somebody they’re not in a relationship, they can bring a unique value to that relationship.
39:43 Rachel: Extroverted kids are super fun because they’re so boisterous, they’re loud, and they have so many interests. They talk a lot, they tell you a lot about their days, and introverted kids are the ones who sit back and take it all in. They’re very good listeners. They often have a really streamlined focus on one or two interests that they have, and that’s a super cool thing too, because usually, when they can channel that focus, they’re so far ahead of their peers. They had an earlier start. That needs to be celebrated in our children. A lot of times, with their peers, especially when they’re young—5, 6, 7, or 8, that interest can look weird to other kids.
40:48 Ben: This is a value that’s prominent in our culture, to be interested in a lot of things. Be a jack of all trades! Somebody could come up to you and say, “What do you think about the NASA space program?” and you could have a strong opinion about it and have a conversation, and that somehow makes you a more whole individual, because you’ve got all of these different experiences. When we each own our unique strengths and bring our unique skills, especially a mastery of skills, to a community, and we’re able to collaborate with other people, we achieve that by focusing on one thing and not spreading ourselves over many different things.
41:44 That is what society is built on, people who just focused on one thing, became masters of that one thing, and were able to share that gift with other people in a way that someone who tries a lot of different things isn’t capable of doing because they’re not focused.

Communication is Key

42:16 When it comes to introverts, our introverted children need to feel free to communicate with their friends about how they’re feeling, where their boundaries are, and when they need to take a break from hanging out because they need to recharge. In a good friendship with healthy communication, the friend should be able to understand that. It’s important for our child to be able to articulate what it means and what it looks like for them, as an introvert, to be involved in friendships and social relationships.
42:54 It’s good for the friend to know, “When we have shallow conversation and we’re just chit-chatting, I lose energy a lot sooner. I can’t last as long that way as when we get into a deep conversation.” It’s good for our children to help their friends understand that about them, and then to say, “You know what, I really love hanging out with you, but I have to go recharge.” As an adult who has many friends and a spouse who’s an introvert, it’s so valuable to me to know what Rachel’s boundaries are and to know when she’s reached her limit, because I want her to be energized. I want her to feel like she’s bringing value without completely depleting herself. In the times when I forget that, I really benefit from her reminding me. That’s the kind of freedom we want our children to have in their relationships.

Sometimes, we might need to encourage our children to have a frank conversation with their friends about their need to recharge, and it’s hard for them to articulate that when they’re younger.

44:10 Rachel: Oftentimes, before the adolescent years, probably up to about fifth grade, kids don’t understand the differences between each other. Our oldest will sometimes walk around on the playground dreaming up new books that he wants to write, and that can be seen as weird behavior by other kids. Kids aren’t that great about not letting each other know they think that. I know that our oldest has come home sometimes and said, “Nobody played with me today because they think I’m weird.” It’s valuable to open up those kinds of conversations with our kids and say, “We’re not weird, we’re just different. We find value in different things, and sometimes we’re able to handle the big, boisterous engagement with other people, and sometimes we just need to be alone.”
45:07 Ben: That goes back to spending energy as a way of investing in relationships. We do encourage Jadon to figure out what game they’re playing and ask if he can join and be involved in something that’s a little bit more shallow, just so people can get exposure to him. The amazing things about who he is are the really deep things, and up until a certain age, certain kids have a really hard time getting to that level. Play and the seemingly shallow things that kids do to engage with one another can be the path to deeper relationships, but you’ve got to balance that against knowing when they need to recharge and say, “I’m done playing for now because I need to take a break.”
46:11 Rachel: Ben has a lot of friends, and we don’t have a whole lot of time to get together with our friends. I run a book club and get together the women I consider my friends once a month, but that’s about it. I worry sometimes that our kids are going to look at my relationship with other people and think, “Friendship isn’t really that important, because Mama doesn’t make time for her friends. So why should I?” I’m curious what you would say about that, Ben.
46:43 Ben: Time spent with people is important. We’re also in a situation right now where we’re investing heavily into our relationships with our kids, and that takes a lot of energy from us, too. That leaves Rachel with little energy to spend on friendships outside of our immediate family, but it is very important for her to have those friendships and to have people that she can go in deep with. She does have that kind of relationship with her sister, for example. It’s not necessarily the time she spends with other people, because they see that she spends time with them and fosters those relationships, and there is an example in that. I think it would also be good for her to talk about the other relationships she has in their hearing.
47:36 For example, when we have dinner, one of the things we do is we go around the table and we have everybody list their highs and lows. After a book club meeting night, that next evening at dinner, Rachel might say, “You know, one of my highs was getting to have my book club with my friends and talk to them. We talked about the book for five minutes and then we started talking about all kinds of other stuff, and it was such a fun conversation.”
48:02 Rachel: I think I’ve talked about that with the boys, and they usually say, “I want to start a book club!” I know that’s valuable. I was just curious what Ben had to say, because I feel like some other parents would feel that way, especially when we’re in the young years where it’s like, “All hands on deck!” We can’t do a lot out of the home.
48:25 Ben: Another layer of helping our kids have an open line of communication with our friends is the adults who are in those environments. If it’s in school, church, or some other organization that they’re participating in, it’s great for us as parents to have conversations with the adults in different social situations, and help them understand our child’s introversion, how they interact best with children. If they can understand our child, at some level, the way that we do, they can also be a part of helping our children engage in relationships and being able to recognize when they’ve had too much stimulation.
49:13 They are not just helping our children communicate and get out of those situations, but they are also helping the other children who are there to understand what’s going on. It’s just another layer of assistance that our children need before they have the ability to articulate what they’re experiencing well.

Pay Attention to How Energy Is Spent

49:43 Garrett asked, “Do you think it’s beneficial to sign your kids up for group-related activities—scouting, sports, whatever else is out there—without asking them first, maybe because they’re too young to really know?” At an age where they have more preferences and could be part of the decision making process, you definitely wouldn’t sign them up without talking to them and having a conversation, making your case for whatever it is. When they’re younger, before they can make those determinations for themselves, I think it’s absolutely okay. This goes back to the principle of recognizing how sensitive they are in those situations. Don’t throw them in the deep end, but help them ease in and gauge how their energy is being spent, helping them find healthy ways to recharge.
50:49 Rachel: Pay attention to how they change because of that. If they’re really happy kids at home, and suddenly we sign them up for something and they’re coming home little tyrants, and there’s no other way to explain that behavior, they’re not doing that to misbehave. They’re doing it as a cry for help. Being sensitive to that as parents can help out.
51:19 Ben: Cory Miller asks, “How can my wife and I, who are extroverts, nurture one of our children, who is an introvert, without them feeling like they have to be just like us and how we express ourselves?” There is a natural tendency for our children to mimic our behaviors, and again, there aren’t personality traits that are tied to extroverts and introverts. Some introverts could seem very outgoing and personable and don’t have a problem walking into a room and introducing themselves to other people. Some extroverts may seem shy and reserved.

Some extroverted parents may have personality traits that can rub off on their kids, and that’s okay.

52:17 What’s important to know is how they’re spending their energy and how they’re reenergizing. That’s the most important thing to recognize. If they seem like they are outgoing, personable, get along well in social situations, and talk to lots of people, and you think to yourself, “I guess my child is not an introvert,” but then they get home and they seem drained and fussy and they act out, there might be something going on there. It’s worth looking at that and determining that maybe your child is an introvert who happens to have these personality traits, so you need to help them find a way to recharge.
53:05 Rachel: I was just thinking back to when I was a kid, and my mom was very much the same as I am—very much an introvert. She understood our behaviors. The challenge that extroverted parents have is trying to understand introversion. Ben has an advantage in me, because I understand what’s going on behind the scenes. The challenge for extroverted parents is understanding that. For that, I would point to Susan Cain as a fantastic resource. A lot of people who post on her blog and stuff write about introverted kids and how parents can help them.