1. First things first, extroversion typically means that you draw your energy from being around other people.
2. Social anxiety is characterized by emotional distress or uneasiness about social interaction.
3. Together, these two make for the worst possible mental battle.
4. The extroverted part of you wants to meet new people constantly.
5. But your brain starts overthinking it and gets paranoid so you avoid it altogether.
And you're left with more thoughts.
6. Every weekend night you stress about wanting to go out and not wanting to socialize.
7. You love it when your phone buzzes from friends who want to hang out.
8. But because of how your brain messes with you, you give off the vibe that you don't want to hang out.
9. Or that you're closed off, when really you're just overthinking every single one of your actions.
10. So you often make a lot of plans to go out and be social, and then get more and more anxious about them as they get closer.
11. You actually want to shout out to the world and be boisterous for once.
12. Before you're aware of being in a crowded place, your head is buzzing with excitement.
13. But immediately you ask yourself, "Whyyyy did I think this would be a good idea??"
14. Whether it's meeting a new person or drawing attention to yourself, your body immediately feels debilitated.
15. Breathing gets hard and your throat gets scratchy as hell.
16. Your body tells you "hell no," and your mind is like "calm the fuck down."
17. And you know it's completely irrational.
18. When you ARE able to relax and calm your anxiety around people, it feels AMAZING.
19. But certain triggers — like being randomly put in the spotlight — have the ability to send you into a full-blown panic.
20. Embodying both sides of the social spectrum makes it harder to explain to others how you feel.
Because "YES, I LIKE PEOPLE: YES, THEY ALSO TERRIFY ME SOMETIMES TOO" makes them go, "huh?"