Uglemor sent me this link earlier, which “analyzes” your blog (first page?). Now, it may be a totally random result that hasn’t even read your page, but it was still fun. The results vary depending on which blog post you get it to “analyze”, but I was surprised each time. Or not, really! I knew I was a doer, I just didn’t think that was an extrovert quality only.
I was scored nearly opposite of what I normally do (INTP). My blog persona apparently is ESFP or ESTP! Whether bogus or not, it still got me thinking about (yes, everybody accuses me of over-thinking, it’s how I solve everything) how we present ourselves online. I do not think (feel?) I’m a fake when I write here, but perhaps the keyword is “write”?
After all, some of my favourite personality books, which I just keep nodding all the way through, are:
It also made me wonder whether one can be an extrovert loner. I do enjoy (select) company when I’m in it, and I definitely don’t try to blend with the wallpaper, but I need to recharge my batteries forever afterwards. And I never seem to get hungry for it, I can just potter about alone for weeks if I’m allowed. I simply do not notice that something ought to be missing. But writing to people, now, that’s the best of both worlds, I get to socialize without the crowd! I worry that people might think I dislike them, or that I’m not interested, but that’s not how it works. I genuinely care that you exist out there, I just don’t wanna have lunch…
Do you show sides of yourself on your blog that you don’t nourish so much in real life? I’m not talking about putting up a mask, I don’t think anybody in “my community”, as WP calls it, are wearing masks. I know I deliberately use it to practice a degree of extrovertness that you don’t see in person, or more expressive rather. I think most people perceive me as guarded IRL, it doesn’t feel natural to me to whoop and dance, my feelings all happen on the inside. Not because they’re secret, I mean, I’m telling you all this and it doesn’t feel uncomfortable. But looking at me you might think I was cold and aloof. (what’s the opposite of expressive anyway? Impressive? ROFLMAO)
I think it’s rather interesting, the different intelligences some say we have, whether we should develop the weak ones or the strong ones (All be middle of the way in everything or specialize and be awesome? Whole and well-rounded or limited and narrowminded?)
So whether or not these internet “tests” are serious or not, I like to play with the ideas from time to time. What it mostly proves to me is that like a horoscope, you can always find something to relate to in every answer, no matter which one you happen to get! And I think everyone automatically becomes more extrovert when blogging – otherwise you wouldn’t be doing it?
Click here to read the results that I got from this test. For my own amusement I’ve coloured in the bits that I think are correct. Even if I still identify just as much with every INTP description I’ve ever read, too! But not on this blog, apparently. I couldn’t find a single random page that would match. (so that I could compare the descriptions. Somebody happen to have an INTP blog and would like to show me the result?)
Perhaps I simply don’t know myself half as well as I think I do. (count the number of times I used the word “think” in this post. I “think” the T is a given…)
Thanks, Sarah, for pointing to this illustration…
Colour Cottage 
I got an error message. I hope this isn’t a bad sign. Lol
LikeLike
When you tested your site? Make sure you don’t have http:// twice, they already put that in, but you also get it when you copy a URL in the browser. So you have to delete the extra set.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Oh okay
LikeLike
That worked!
LikeLiked by 1 person
Well my test result based on both of my blogs was ESFP (the “performer”) which is pretty much the opposite of what I am in real life (I’m a heavily introverted thinker/practical scientist type), so I would love to know how this test works and why it does what it does! Or perhaps I just express my hidden side in my blogs??
I too read Quiet recently and thoroughly enjoyed it, felt much better about myself afterwards because until then I had thought that there must be something wrong with me enjoying and needing to spend so much time alone (but then I do come from Finland “the most introverted country in the world”!). In any case, I was very glad to read your blog post today and know that I am not alone!
LikeLike
Good to hear from you Heidi! Well, your blog name says it all, doesn’t it? (in fact you’re so quiet that I just realized your two last post didn’t make it to my feed. You have to up it a bit! Or scoot me some emails if you like…)
I’m fed up with all this comparing of one another. The extroverts seem to need it, always trying to mirror everybody, checking in to make sure you think the same as they do. And they infect those of us who don’t really give a rat’s **** but enough to stir a feeling of inferiority.
I make it sound like a war, don’t I. It really doesn’t have to be, they can just mind their businesses and leave me alone.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think the whole introvert/extrovert thing is just more pop psychology. People are always going to be more complex and interesting than a this/that analysis. Thanks for the link though, it’s fun to play these things 🙂
LikeLike
Ha, I did it and I got “the performer” also – but the result came in so quickly, I suspect it’s bogus. I can’t imagine any programme being able to analyse a blog page that fast?
LikeLike
Quite! My thought too. But it’s still fun to play with the different concepts, not to take them literally but to take your head for a spin and have a nice discussion.
LikeLike
Yes, actually this whole thing got me thinking a fair bit this morning, so the fun turned out to be a deeper blessing 🙂
LikeLike
So what were you thinking? I’m sure it was something profound as usual.
LikeLike
I had a barking-laugh-out-loud moment in the car on Friday. Husband and I were driving back into town after working all day at the farm, and neither of us wanted to leave. I had a moment of thinking about how I could stay for ages at the farm and be completely content. And then I thought about all the other farmers and homesteaders that we’ve met who think that’s crazy, who insist that the “romance” of a farm wears off after a while. I had a moment of doubt, wondering if I was completely off base thinking that I could live like that. But then I thought that surely there were other people like us in the world. We are not, after all, special snowflakes. And then I realized that of course there are people like us out there in the world. We just haven’t met them because they are happily living as hermits on their own farms. DUH. So it suddenly made sense that the only people we meet are those that are nay-sayers, because they are not the loners. That’s why we meet them. In town. Lol.
I often say now that I like persons very much. I’m just not so keen on people. I’m not afraid of groups or crowds or cities. I’ve just had plenty enough. I want space and quiet. I want to pick and choose when I have to interact. I feel that I can be a better person that way. Someday soon, I hope my life will be set up to support that. Until then, I am happy to be in a smaller, quieter town than I was before.
PS–I LOVE the delicate feminine flower pic.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Exactly, persons not people, well put. And it’s not a phobia, it’s just a need that seems to go deeper and deeper as I age, the more I get it, the more I come out of my shell all of my own accord, but push me and I get cranky and retreat into a corner, lock the door. (omg I’m a snail)
And yes, it’s rather difficult to find friends, since the ones on your wavelength are not the ones eternally inviting you to events that sound absolutely horrible. I always used to wonder why I kept meeting the wrong people. I’ll surely miss the interwebs if they go!
LikeLike
I suspect the blog test is running a simple algorithm that looks at frequently used words. So ‘think’ for example, if used to suggest uncertainty rather than analysis or belief will confuse it. But even were the blog test to be more robust the Myers-Briggs test has pretty much been discredited by serious psychologists … even Jung said about his ‘type’s, on which the test is based, that every individual was an exception.
I do like the notion that we use our blogs to express those parts of ourselves that real life may leave little room for. But I was surprised a while back when a reader referred to my “beloved knitting” because although when I have the opportunity I like to knit there are plenty of other things I’d rather do. Because I write about some things and not others on my blog am I presenting a distorted view of me?
A really interesting post, thank you :o)
LikeLiked by 1 person
And it really would be rather dull if everybody had just one side to them.
LikeLike
Q – We’ve been “discussing” this at my blog. But thanks for the fabulous term: extrovert loner! It’s me.
LikeLike
And there we have it with the labels. Because while I quite comfortably make comments to a stranger in line for the cash register (or is that simply lack of impulse control?), I do mostly float around the introvert end of the scale. The life I lead in my head seems far more interesting than the one outside the windows…. I guess I just refuse to fit in any one box.
LikeLike
Hahahahah. Me to!
LikeLike
Such an interesting post to think about! I didn’t bother with the blog test but I’ve thought a lot in recent months about how my blogging relates to my introversion. I like that, with blogging, I stay pretty much in control of when I interact with other bloggers and how much.
LikeLiked by 1 person
I think it is easier for introverts to be more social online, because we can handle the interactions at our own pace, and stop when we get exhausted. I often find that in person it takes forever to come up with a good response to something, but when blogging if it takes a few hours, that’s okay, I can just share my response when I finally think of it.
Also, I like to think of the introversion/extroversion thing as more of a scale from 1-10. 1 is for people who can handle lots of introvert time (doing solitary things), but not much extrovert time (doing social things). 10 is for people who prefer to spend most of their time being extroverted, and struggle to spend much time at all being introverted. I think I fall somewhere around 3 or 4, though it depends on the day and who I am around.
LikeLike
Yes, I feel like have to speed think and therefore speed talk in a conversation in order to be able to say anything at all before the subject has moved on to something else! Very stressful – and actually makes me come off as very dominant at times. I believe I enjoy the conversations the most where the other party is not afraid of silences…
LikeLiked by 1 person