Each of us wants to be understood, and respected, and loved. Unfortunately, loving someone isn’t easy when we don’t understand them. In this post, I explain seven ways you can love an introvert along with a brief description of why the action communicates “I love you.”
Give us the gift of silence
Introverts are typically more sensitive to overstimulation than extroverts. High-energy events, noisy environments, and large social gatherings may energize you, but they drain introverts. And once we are drained, we need peace and quiet to recharge our batteries.
When you allow us time to retreat into solitude and quiet, you honor our need to recharge, which is one of the most important ways to show love to an introvert. (Ideally, quiet means an actual absence of noise and other stimuli—as in no talking, no background TV or music, no other humans in the room.)
Honor our need for downtime (even if you don’t understand it)
Being with people drains our energy. Each conversation. Each interaction. And each minute spent in the company of others. As our social batteries get low, we struggle more and more to keep it together. We may still appear our charming public self on the outside, but inside we are not OK. We are increasingly anxious, which will eventually lead to withdrawing, oversensitivity, rudeness, or a complete emotional meltdown. Nobody wants that!
The only solution is time alone to recharge. This is the only way we can restore the depleted energy so we can once again engage with others in a healthy space.
When we know that our spouse or parent recognizes our needs for downtime and honors it, we feel loved, safe, and understood. Conversely, when we receive frowns of disappointment when we seek downtime to recharge, we feel unloved and misunderstood.
Allow us to stay home (sometimes)
One of the classic clashes between extroverts and introverts is going out for a night of fun vs. staying home. What’s going on here?
Extroverts find social interaction energizing. They’re also energized by novelty and places that offer lots of stimuli (concerts, dance clubs, sports bars with tons of TV screens, etc.).
Introverts find all those things draining.
Thus, at the end of a long work week, extroverts long for an evening of fun and excitement to recharge their batteries, while an introvert longs for a quiet evening at home for the same reason.
The solution is to find compromises. Go out sometimes and stay in sometimes. Agreeing to spend the evening at home now and then is communicating love to an introvert who is weary and depleted from a busy week.
Give us time to process before answering
We introverts want to give sincere, insightful answers to your questions, but we often can’t find words to express ourselves without a few moments to get our thoughts in order.
It takes us longer to process our thoughts and feelings than our more extroverted peers. (We think of snappy comebacks only after the conversation has moved on. So frustrating!)
Therefore, be patient with us. Don’t expect an immediate answer to your questions about our feelings, opinions, or anything else personal. For example, don’t expect your introvert child or spouse to answer “How was your day” the moment they step in the door. They need time to think about it before they can give you an honest answer.
And that brings me to a related tip.
Give us warning before interrupting us
If we are reading or in the middle of a task, don’t interrupt us to tell us something. Our brains don’t task-switch as easily as our more extroverted peers.
Therefore, if you want our attention, please give us warning so we can finish our current thought and allow our brains time to reorient to the new task or topic.
For example, say something like, “I need to ask you a quick question” Or, “I need your help with something.” That allows us time to find a mental stopping point and transfer our full attention to you.
Don’t put us on the spot
As the previous tips have pointed out, introverts need longer to mentally process before speaking. In addition, we generally don’t enjoy being the center of attention.
Therefore, introverts hate being put on the spot. Please, please, please don’t volunteer us for anything that makes us the center of attention in public. (We do NOT want to be that volunteer from the audience!)
This applies to even simple things such as being put on the spot to state our feelings on a subject to a group of acquaintances. Therefore, you show love to an introvert when you invite them to chime in rather than volunteering them to speak up without their consent.
Get us talking about something that interests us.
Introverts find small talk boring and draining. While we may listen politely while others talk, we aren’t likely to say much or fully engage.
However, get us talking about a topic we find interesting, and you’ll not only be communicating that you love us, but you’ll also give us an opportunity to let our true emotions and life passions shine through.
Introverts love conversations that go beneath the surface, about topics that matter to us or our loved ones. Join us in those types of conversations and we’ll feel loved and appreciated.
Don’t miss the companion post, 7 Ways to say “I love you” (to an extrovert)
You might also enjoy these related posts on how to understanding introverts and extroverts
More thoughts on loving introverts
To parents of introverted children
Love: bridging the introvert-extrovert gap
An introvert’s guide to travel
Updated 7/25/2024
Hey Lisa! This was sooo good. My daughter is an introvert and I’ve learned how to have a closer relationship with her over the years. These were wonderful insights! One thing she has said to me is “just because I don’t say it, doesn’t mean I’m not feeling it”. That has helped me a lot as I am one to need to “hear” things:). Is there a way I can email your post to her? I would like to get her thoughts? I want to keep it private.
Keep writing….
Patti
You can email her the link, or else try to copy and paste the whole post.
I know I sometimes frustrate people because they don’t know what I am thinking or feeling. All of us need to learn better ways to communicate with others whose brains are different than ours, don’t we?
How did you figure all this out? Obviously you are writing the handbook on how to care and feed me and the other introverts I know.
It takes one to know one, I guess. I am surprised (and pleased) that so many people relate to my ramblings about introverts. If I can encourage others, then I am doing my job!
It is a rare occurrence but I take issue with one of your comments. Number 2 leaves the impression that being sorely aggrieved by interruption is the provence of the introvert. Not so. It’s my observation that when any 2 people are quietly together and one begins to speak, the other is being interrupted. Unless there are those who have truly mastered the art of mindlessness there is almost always an “interrupter” and an “interruptee”. An extrovert is not without moments of serious and productive contemplation so a forced break in his concentration is aggravating and de-railing too. One gets weary of being the designated “interruptee”. I grant it may be a much more serious offense against an introvert than against a more introverted person but what you are getting at amounts to common courtesy we would all appreciate . I like your suggestion about giving a ” heads up” If you are the speaker:
1. Gently get the other person’s attention, giving him a few seconds to change mental gears and turn attention to you.
2. Mention the reason you are interrupting ( remember topic sentences in English 101?). This gives him a chance to get on the same page with you before having to process what you are about to say. It may be wise to ask if now is a good time; if not, when?
3. Proceed with conversation giving the listener time to formulate his responses before expecting more than a blank stare. The time this takes will vary widely from one individual to another. Be patient.
This is a departure from our usual barge-right-in approach, but with practice can become an act of kindness. Perhaps it is a way to say “I love you” to ANYbody.
Good comments.
As others have pointed out, throwing labels like introvert and extrovert around oversimplifies things and leads to stereotypes that are neither correct nor fair. So, forgive me for making it sound like extroverts are always the “interrupters”. We all have our moments, and need to be reminded that the OTHER PERSON’S current activity and agenda are just as significant as ours. We should always tread lightly when interrupting.
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loved the post and the list my son came back home recently with a broken leg after being away from home for over 30 years you can well imagine it was quite an experience for both of us and the knowing the silences were perfectly normal was one lesson that I was grateful I knew about – so you see its not always words that are need to speak of love it comes in our caring and actions and sometimes no action is the best one – don’t disturb the silence – you are still loved even at that time
It is freeing to not be afraid of silence. Fortunately, my family understands silence too (most of them, anyway) I am mulling ideas for a blog post celebrating silence.
This is a very interesting post. I think I am somewhere in between being an introvert and an extrovert. I was able to relate to most of what you wrote here. But my favorite is the silence part, of enjoying it and actually needing it. 🙂
I think in this noisy world we live in, silence is more valuable–and necessary–than ever.
This is useful and funny! Fantastic writing, Lisa. I was compelled to share (on Twitter).
Thanks for sharing. I have always looked at life through the lens of humor, so I am always happy to brighten someone’s day (as well as make them think.)
loved this! I am an introvert and my spouse is very much an extrovert, you are so spot on! I love to just be home and relax and avoid most people on my days off, commune with nature and reading are my two favorite ways to recharge
We introverts need those quiet times to recharge. But sometimes that extroverted spouse is good for us, or else we might spend TOO much time alone. 🙂
Haha, too true 🙂
so how did you know he was the one. his extra energy didn’t annoy you? I am the extrovert and my boyfriend of 2 years is the major introvert, I sometimes feel as if I am the annoyance in his life.
These are all so true about my boyfriend. I never understood what an introvert was like until I started dating my boyfriend 2 years ago. I am about to go out of my mind now b/c I need more affection and emotion from him. So by him acting like this, it’s normal? I was starting to think that he’s losing feelings, but when I ask him he says no, but doesn’t really go on further. He just says it’s all in my head. It has been 2 years and yes, we still do things and bond, but he is just very to himself sometimes…. I guess it’s just normal and I have to accept it. Here’s to forever with my introvert! Thank you so much!!!
Glad I could help. It’s always empowering to understand what someone else’s normal is, isn’t it?
Hello. My boyfriend is an introvert and this has helped me alot to understand him. What i don’t know is how to convince him that i understand him and maintain my love for him.
Much as introverts hate talking about feelings, it is often the best way to reach understanding. Dialogue about what each of you needs to feel loved (but don’t expect him to be able to answer the first time you ask. Give him time to consider his reply.)