0:15

Pushkin.

0:22

I feel like college was a real struggle

0:24

for me.

0:25

This is author Jessica Pan.

0:27

I always felt like, when you

0:29

know college kids would go out and party

0:32

or go to clubs, I thought we were all secretly

0:34

waiting to like come home and then you know, get

0:36

our pajamas.

0:37

Jessica had many close friends in college,

0:39

she couldn't always relate to how outgoing her

0:41

buddies were. Her besties seemed to

0:43

seek out noisy parties and busy dance

0:45

floors, but Jessica was much more at

0:47

home with small gatherings and intimate conversations.

0:51

Jessica's friends adored her, but they couldn't

0:53

always relate to her preferences and just

0:55

assumed Jessica would want to go big. To

0:57

celebrate. When she turned twenty two.

0:59

They threw me this surprise birthday party.

1:02

Friends and family members gathered secretly and

1:04

waited in Jessica's dark bedroom, ready

1:06

to pop out and scream. As soon as she got.

1:08

Home and I walked

1:10

in, there was like fifty

1:12

people staring at me, and

1:15

I burst into tears. It was my worst

1:17

nightmare. That's one of

1:19

the times I felt very much like, Okay,

1:22

I am slightly different from my extroverted

1:24

friends.

1:25

But it wasn't just those extroverted friends.

1:27

Jessica also felt different from the people

1:29

she grew up with.

1:30

I often say that my parents are like the

1:32

two chattiest people in America because

1:35

they absolutely love talking to strangers

1:37

to the point where it is embarrassing.

1:40

You'll be in line for a restaurant,

1:42

or you'll be on the plane or anywhere, and my mom

1:44

is talking to someone, and then my dad's joining in, and there

1:46

it's just, I don't know. They're the complete opposite

1:48

of me.

1:49

Jessica knew her social needs differed from the people

1:51

around her, but she wasn't sure why.

1:54

So when I was growing up, the labels introvert

1:56

and extrovert, they were not these buzzy terms

1:58

that everybody knew about, so I'd never heard of them.

2:01

And I think I found out in my twenties what

2:03

an introvert was, and I immediately recognized

2:06

myself.

2:06

The American Psychological Association defines

2:08

insion as an orientation towards

2:11

the internal, private world of one's inner

2:13

thoughts and feelings, rather than toward the

2:15

outer world of people. Compared to extroverts,

2:17

introverts are more withdrawn, reserved,

2:20

quiet and deliberate.

2:21

Someone who concentrates really well

2:23

is a good listener, likes to be alone,

2:26

gets exhausted, over stimulated by lots of

2:28

people. And I felt really

2:30

seen by that definition. I would never

2:32

raise my hand in a class. That would never happen.

2:35

I would fake sick if there was a presentation

2:37

I had to give. I think I got a solo to

2:39

sing in a choir, and I didn't tell my mom about

2:41

it, and I just pretended that I had a fever.

2:44

I don't even think she knows about that to this day.

2:46

And so Jessica began referring to herself

2:49

as an introvert with a capital I. It

2:51

quickly became a badge of honor. But

2:54

I began to use that label of introvert

2:56

as an excuse to say no to anything

2:59

that gave me any sort of social anxiety.

3:01

Jessica sat out important social events,

3:04

even ones that she knew might be good for her

3:06

or for her career.

3:08

I didn't want to give speeches. I didn't

3:10

want to host parties. I didn't want to lead workshops

3:12

because I thought to myself, no, I'm an

3:14

introvert. Introverts don't do things like that. And

3:16

I was completely limiting who I was and

3:18

who I could become. At times, Jessica

3:21

did question what she was passing up, like

3:23

the time she went to a friend's wedding. The bride

3:25

stood up and she gave this amazing speech, and

3:27

she was crying and her parents were crying, and I

3:29

felt like, why didn't I give a speech at my

3:32

wedding? And I didn't do it because I was

3:34

too anxious. I was scared I would not

3:36

sound articulate. I would be scared that I wouldn't look

3:38

good. I was scared that I embarrassed myself, when actually

3:41

I wish I had done that, because I think the

3:43

benefits could have tremendously outweighed

3:45

the negative consequences.

3:46

But the negative consequences of Jessica's introversion

3:49

became even clearer when she and her husband

3:52

moved to London.

3:53

It's notoriously not the most friendly place

3:55

in the entire world, and it's

3:57

hard to make friends as an adult. And also

4:00

I was a freelancer, so I was working from home, so

4:02

it seemed absolutely impossible to make these connections

4:04

and get out of my shell.

4:06

And that was when Jessica decided to embark

4:08

on an innovative personal experiment, one

4:10

that wound up changing her life forever.

4:13

I was thinking, if I really want to commit

4:15

to this, I have to do this.

4:18

If you've listened to other episodes in this new season

4:20

on getting more social, then you've probably

4:23

already heard about the benefits of connecting

4:25

with other people. Pretty Much every

4:27

study ever done on the relationship

4:29

between well being and social interaction shows

4:31

that more people time makes us happier. But

4:34

what if you, like Jessica dread parties

4:36

and crowds and spontaneous conversations

4:39

with strangers. Are you doomed

4:41

to less happiness than your more talkative friends.

4:43

Or is there a way that the introverts among us can

4:46

also get the happiness benefits that come from

4:48

more social connection. Our

4:53

minds are constantly telling us what to do to be happy.

4:56

But what if our minds are wrong? What if

4:58

our minds are lying to us, leading us away

5:00

from what will really make us happy. The

5:02

good news is the understanding the science of the

5:04

mind can point us all back in the right direction.

5:08

You're listening to the How Happiness Lab with doctor

5:10

Laurie Santos.

5:16

Hi, Laurie, I'm having trouble connecting my

5:18

MC so give me just a sec I.

5:20

Wanted to unpack what psychologists have learned

5:22

about the science of introversion and the unintended

5:24

consequences it can have for our happiness, and

5:27

that meant there was one person in the field I

5:29

really needed to call.

5:30

My computers are rejecting the bluetooth

5:33

connection.

5:33

Sonya Lubermirski is a professor at the

5:35

University of California at Riverside.

5:37

She's the author of the How of Happiness,

5:40

A New Approach to Getting the Life You Want.

5:42

Sonya is a world expert on the science

5:44

of happiness, so not surprisingly, she's

5:47

very much in demand.

5:48

I've been crazy busy, so I'm like, this is like

5:50

I don't even have time to say hi, Like I bet, I'm

5:53

going from one meeting to another.

5:54

I was super grateful that Sonya made time for us

5:57

and that she put up with a few technical problems.

5:59

Do you can you keep talking? It's working that great?

6:02

In order to share a key finding from her

6:04

decades of work in positive psychology.

6:07

After many years of research, we landed on

6:09

this cliche, which is that the key

6:11

to happiness is really connection, and so if you want

6:13

to increase happiness, you want to make people feel

6:16

more connected.

6:17

It really is that simple. You will

6:19

be happier if you interact with more people,

6:22

even if you're an introvert.

6:24

What's interesting is clear if you. Studies have shown that actually

6:26

both extverts and introverts bena

6:29

fit by more social interaction.

6:31

Most introverts predict that social interaction

6:34

will feel exhausting, anxiety provoking,

6:36

and crummy, so they don't engage in this activity

6:38

nearly as much as extroverts do, and

6:41

the science shows that this choice can

6:43

have big negative consequences for introverts.

6:45

Happiness research since the nineteen

6:47

eighties has shown that, on average, introverts

6:50

are less happy than extroverts, presumably

6:53

because they consistently miss out on the well

6:55

being benefits that social connection provides.

6:57

But that leads to an even bigger problem,

7:00

because introversion isn't just some flippant

7:02

label we throw on when we don't feel like going

7:04

to a party. Introversion is one of the

7:06

five core dimensions that make up our person

7:09

the other four being openness, conscientiousness,

7:12

agreeableness, and neuroticism. Psychologists

7:15

have long assumed that these so called Big

7:17

five personality traits are stable.

7:20

They don't change all that much. Across our lifetimes

7:23

or across different situations. If

7:25

you are outgoing and the center of attention as a

7:27

teenager, then psychologists would

7:29

assume that you're still likely to be extroverted

7:31

decades later. But if you spent

7:34

your teen years, like Jessica Pan wishing

7:36

you could run home to be alone, well,

7:38

most psychologists would probably assume

7:40

that you're unlikely to be a social butterfly today.

7:43

But does that mean that introverts are doomed by

7:45

their personality, destined never

7:47

to share the joy of connection that extroverts

7:49

take for granted? Sonia didn't

7:52

think.

7:52

So, what is a trade is basically behavior,

7:55

you know, like when you do something over and over

7:57

again. If I'm like always making my bed and

7:59

I'm organized and I'm always on time, people say,

8:01

oh, Sonia's hi conscientiousness.

8:03

But if you're not high on constanciousness, theoretically

8:06

you can try to make your meetings on time

8:08

and make your bed morning and so the

8:10

same thing for extroversion.

8:12

Sonya reason that introverts could engage

8:14

in what she called volitional personality

8:16

change. If they simply behaved

8:18

in a more extroverted way, maybe

8:20

they could reap the happiness benefits that come

8:22

with having a more extroverted personality.

8:25

To test this theory, Sonya teamed up

8:27

with her graduate student Seth Margolis and

8:29

recruited over one hundred college students to take

8:31

part in a new study. Some of

8:33

these students were naturally introverted, whereas

8:36

others were more extroverted, but all

8:38

of the subjects were randomly divided

8:40

into two groups. The first group

8:42

was told that for the next week they needed

8:44

to be as talkative, assertive, and spontaneous

8:47

as possible. Essentially, they

8:49

had to act extroverted, but

8:51

the second group was told to do just the opposite.

8:54

They were asked to act as deliberate, quiet,

8:56

and reserved as possible. They

8:59

were going to be more introverted. Both

9:02

groups then filled out surveys to measure their overall

9:04

well being and how much positive emotion

9:06

they experienced over the week. So what

9:09

did Sonya find.

9:10

We found that both INTROVERTSI and extroverts

9:13

during the week that they were asked to act more extroverted

9:16

got hugely happier.

9:17

Sonia says the boost and happiness she observed

9:20

in this be more extroverted condition was

9:22

one of the largest effects she's observed in

9:24

decades of studying happiness interventions.

9:27

But just as acting more extroverted had a significant

9:29

upside, Sonya also observed

9:31

an effect of doing the opposite. Subjects

9:34

who were asked to act reserved in shy showed

9:36

statistically reduced levels of well being.

9:39

Acting introverted for a week appears

9:41

to significantly reduce our happiness,

9:44

But Sonia says the most shocking finding from

9:46

her study, especially for researchers

9:48

in the field of personality psychology, was

9:51

that subjects were able to do

9:54

what she asked them to. People

9:56

could change their personality traits

9:58

if they tried, at least for

10:00

short periods of time, and

10:02

that finding was very good news

10:04

to author and introvert Jessica Pan.

10:07

I was like, oh, so we can change,

10:09

we don't always have to be the same, And

10:12

yeah, I found that really freeing.

10:14

When we last left Jessica, she was sad and

10:16

lonely in her new life in the UK, and

10:18

that's when she began reading about the psychology

10:20

of introverts and happened upon Sonya's

10:22

new study. Learning that people could volitionally

10:25

change their personality traits led Jessica

10:27

to try something radical.

10:29

I thought, look, I'm not that happy right

10:31

now In my life and I'm a hardcore introvert.

10:33

What would happen if I lived like the

10:35

other half of the world? What could I gain from

10:37

that?

10:38

Jessica decided to begin her own experiment,

10:40

but rather than behaving more spontaneously

10:43

and assertively for just a week, as Sonya's

10:45

subjects had done, Jessica pledged to act

10:47

like an extrovert for an entire year. Her

10:50

twelve month journey turned into a new book,

10:52

Sorry I'm late. I didn't want to come one

10:55

introverts Year of Saying Yes, and

10:57

Jessica's big Year of Saying Yes didn't just

10:59

involve becoming a bit more talkative. Jessica

11:02

committed to trying out some of the most terrifying

11:04

social encounters.

11:05

Possible, talking to strangers, public

11:07

speaking, doing improv comedy,

11:10

things like that. That were my nightmares.

11:11

And as you'll hear when we get back from the break, Jessica

11:14

found that pushing herself to make every social

11:16

connection possible required getting more

11:18

vulnerable than even she expected.

11:21

I would need to just go for it and embarrass

11:23

myself again and again and again.

11:26

The Happiness Lab We'll be right back.

11:34

So I had this massive fear of talking to strangers

11:36

I just couldn't do it.

11:37

Introvert Jessica Pan was ready for an

11:40

entire year of extraverting, but

11:42

where should she start. Jessica figured

11:44

that some expert advice might help her.

11:47

First call went out to psychotherapist

11:49

and Boston University professor Stefan

11:51

Hoffmann.

11:52

He specializes in exposure

11:54

therapy, so he'll have his patients

11:57

do really humiliating things like

11:59

stand on the street and just sing, or

12:02

ask someone on the subway for like two hundred

12:04

dollars, things where they are guaranteed

12:06

to be rejected.

12:08

Jessica explained to Stefan that she was terrified

12:10

of putting herself out there, especially

12:12

with people she didn't know.

12:14

If I was approaching a stranger, my heart

12:16

would raise. I'd feel like I was gonna

12:18

throw up. I just had so much anxiety

12:20

around it. Stuffan didn't advocate

12:23

baby steps. He wanted Jessica

12:25

to dive head first into the social deep

12:27

end. And he said, okay,

12:29

so you live in London and you're

12:31

scared of strangers. It's what I would have you

12:33

do is I would have you ask a really

12:36

stupid question to a stranger. I would

12:38

have you go up to somebody and say excuse

12:40

me, is there a Queen of England? And

12:43

if so, what's her name? And

12:45

as soon as he said this, I wanted to throw up and

12:47

I was thinking, there's no way I'm going.

12:49

To do that.

12:50

Steffan was making Jessica ask strangers

12:53

pretty much the dumbest question you could pose

12:55

to a Londoner because back then everyone

12:57

knew that there was in fact a Queen of England

13:00

and her name was Elizabeth. It was an encounter

13:02

that was set up to make Jessica look as stupid

13:04

as possible, but as Stefan explained,

13:06

that was kind of the point.

13:08

Look, you know, no one's going to fire you,

13:10

you're not going to get arrested, your husband's

13:13

not going to leave you, you're not going to get thrown

13:15

in jail. So you're just going to look

13:17

a little bit stupid.

13:18

And to compound her discomfort, Jessica

13:20

headed to one of London's least welcoming

13:22

locations.

13:25

So I think one of the most awkward places to talk

13:27

to a stranger in London is on

13:29

the underground because people they don't want

13:31

to be bothered.

13:32

Jessica was ready to push herself, just like

13:34

steffanhead advised, so she sought out

13:36

the least approachable stranger she could find.

13:39

She picked a busy looking businessman in an

13:41

expensive suit.

13:42

I was like, excuse me, and he was

13:44

like what? And I

13:46

said, is there a Queen of England?

13:49

And he was like the Queen of England? And

13:51

I said, yeah, who is

13:53

she? And he said it's Victoria

13:56

and then he walked off.

13:58

That wasn't the answer she was expecting.

14:01

Victoria hadn't been queen for over one hundred years.

14:03

Was the man walking Jessica giving a stupid

14:06

answer to her stupid question. Jessica

14:08

wasn't sure, so she flagged down another scary

14:10

looking businessman and posed the same question

14:13

again, and he also said Victoria.

14:15

And I didn't know if it was they were just messing with me

14:17

or what was happening. But then I flagged

14:19

down a few more women and they told me it was Elizabeth.

14:21

Looking idiotic in front of total strangers

14:24

in a noisy, dirty subway station might

14:26

not sound like fun, especially for

14:28

an introvert, but the experience left

14:30

Jessica feeling elated.

14:33

I felt like I could fly.

14:35

I felt insanely exhilarated

14:38

because it was so embarrassing,

14:40

and there were other people listening. It was my

14:42

worst fear, and Stefan

14:44

was right. Nothing bad happened to take

14:46

her extroverting to the next level. Jessica

14:49

tagged in yet another expert, one

14:51

who may sound kind of familiar if you've

14:53

listened to other episodes in this special season.

14:55

Should call him Nick? Or what should I call him?

14:57

I'm Nicholas Epley, you can call me Nick.

14:59

Nick is a professor of behavioral science at

15:01

the University of Chicago's Booth School

15:03

of Business.

15:04

I had read his research that said that when

15:07

two commuters are forced to talk to each other,

15:10

they are happier than they would have anticipated.

15:12

You might remember this study from an episode we ran

15:15

in our very first season entitled

15:17

Mistakenly Seeking Solitude. In the

15:19

experiment, Nick found passengers who

15:21

were about to hop on a train from the Chicago

15:23

suburbs on their way to work.

15:25

We gave them an envelope that had a five

15:27

dollars Starbucks gift card in it, which turns out

15:29

to be the most valuable incentive that we know

15:31

on the planet. People will do anything for a five dollars

15:33

Starbucks gift card, including doctor strangers

15:36

on trains.

15:36

Nick then told one group to spend the entire train

15:39

ride enjoying their solitude. They weren't

15:41

allowed to talk to anyone, which is

15:43

pretty much what most of us usually do.

15:45

And almost nobody talks to strangers on the

15:47

train.

15:48

But Nick asked a second group of commuters

15:50

to do something a little more radical. They

15:52

had to spend the entire train ride talking

15:54

to someone.

15:55

We asked them to try to make a connection with

15:57

the person who sits down next to you this morning

16:00

on the train. Try to get to know something about him

16:02

or her. So they were going to have a conversation after

16:05

the ride. Nick surveyed the commuters to find out

16:07

how they were all feeling. The results

16:09

were striking. People who were forced

16:11

to spend their entire train ride talking to strangers

16:14

felt happier than the ones that were told to enjoy

16:16

their solitude.

16:18

When I first read that research, I was like, what

16:20

is he talking about? That sounds insane

16:22

to me. Nick says that Jessica's

16:24

not the only one with that reaction.

16:27

I get a lot of pushback on this because the expectations

16:29

are so strong.

16:31

Nick has even tested these mistaken expectations

16:33

directly. In a second study,

16:35

subjects were asked which would feel better talking

16:38

to some random stranger on the train or

16:40

just enjoying the ride in silence. People

16:43

overwhelmingly thought that being in the talkative

16:45

condition would suck. They predicted

16:47

the exact opposite of what Nick's results

16:50

showed. Like Jessica, most

16:52

of us think that connecting with strangers will

16:54

feel awkward, but we're

16:56

wrong.

16:57

That's not what people's experience actually is.

16:59

Nick's subjects also mispredicted how much

17:01

the stranger they chatted with would enjoy the

17:03

experience of being talked to.

17:05

That is, they underestimated how

17:07

social other people were. And notice

17:09

that belief then becomes a kind of self fulfilling

17:12

prophecy. If I think, Glori, you don't want to

17:14

talk to me, then I'll

17:16

sit down next to you at a conference,

17:18

say I won't talk to you. You will

17:20

sit there and we'll not talk to me.

17:22

You'll look to me, and because I'm not talking to you,

17:25

you will infer that I'm not interested in talking to you either,

17:27

And we'll both then sit there in silence,

17:29

next to each other, and we will both

17:31

then confirm our expectations that talking

17:34

to you would have been unpleasant. We don't ever get data

17:37

that would tell us that those beliefs are wrong because

17:39

we don't try it.

17:40

But author Jessica Pan was ready to try

17:42

it. She met with Nick and quickly realized

17:45

that he really practices what he preaches.

17:47

Nicholas has no issue talking to strangers.

17:49

Nick talks with people on trains and

17:51

planes and buses. He chit

17:54

chats with waiters and baristas and

17:56

cafes and cashiers at his local

17:58

grocery store.

17:59

We know all of them now, often

18:01

by name. They know our kids, and

18:04

that's fun. Once you start the conversation, it's

18:06

pretty easy to make it go. That's not hard. It's

18:08

starting that's hard. It's like a speed bump at

18:10

the top of a hill, and you have to get

18:12

over this speed bump to actually get things

18:15

going.

18:15

Speed bump. What Nick thought of as a

18:17

bump in the road, felt like a mountain to an

18:20

introvert like Jessica.

18:21

I felt like he could not relate to my anxiety

18:23

at all, and I couldn't relate to his total

18:26

nonchalance about chatting with people.

18:28

But Nick did share one fact about social

18:30

connection that put Jessica a little

18:32

more at ease.

18:33

He said, look, Jessica, nobody

18:36

waves, but everybody waves

18:38

back. Like, you have to be the first person

18:40

to make a move, and if you do that, almost

18:43

one hundred percent of the time people will If

18:45

you wave to someone, they'll way back. You say hi to someone, they'll

18:47

say hi back.

18:48

Jessica began to realize how rarely

18:50

she put in the work to make that all important

18:53

first move.

18:54

So I feel like in the past,

18:56

I'd go to a party and I'd linger in

18:58

the hallway or the doorway. I wouldn't

19:00

want to go fully in. I would hover

19:03

near the cheeseboard or the drinks and

19:05

the kitchen, or look at my phone,

19:07

and then.

19:07

I would probably leave. But if Jessica

19:10

was committed to being the one to open a conversation,

19:13

what she wondered should she start talking about?

19:15

Are there particular topics that are more effective

19:18

for really connecting people. In

19:20

the rare cases in which Jessica did talk with

19:22

someone new, she usually stuck

19:24

to the easy stuff, what Nick calls

19:26

shallow or surface talk.

19:28

Surface talk is like we talk about our commutes

19:30

or what we had for dinner, or the weather. And

19:33

deep talk is our hopes and our dreams

19:35

and our fears, and so much of our

19:37

life is rooted in just doing surface

19:39

talk. You know, you could see the same person every day for

19:41

ten years and you might not actually know what's

19:43

going on with them because you literally just talk about

19:46

very topical things.

19:47

But Nick has found that there's a much more effective

19:49

style of conversation if your goal is

19:51

to truly get to know someone, to truly connect.

19:54

It's what he and other researchers have called

19:56

deep conversation.

19:57

It's sharing our human experience

19:59

of struggling and loneliness and things that actually

20:02

bring us together.

20:03

In one study, Nick asked people to engage

20:05

either in shallow talk talking about

20:07

the weather or their favorite TV shows,

20:10

or in deep talk. And the deep talk conversation

20:12

starters were pretty heavy, things

20:14

like can you describe a time that you cried

20:16

in front of another person? And if

20:19

you could undo one mistake you've made in your

20:21

life, what would it be?

20:23

And these deep conversations go much

20:25

better than people expect they will, and they're

20:27

much less awkward than people expect.

20:30

People pretty dramatically underestimate

20:32

how much they are going to enjoy deep

20:35

conversation.

20:37

Armed with all of Nick's advice, Jessica threw

20:39

herself into the conversational deep end.

20:42

She signed up for a professional networking event,

20:45

and rather than hiding away in the corner like she'd

20:47

normally do, she immediately headed

20:49

over to a group of people, started chatting

20:52

and, going against all her instincts,

20:54

took the conversation deeper.

20:56

I felt like people really

20:58

responded to that, and they would sort of go, oh,

21:00

this person's here.

21:02

To be real, to be honest, to actually

21:04

make a connection. Jessica went from

21:07

feeling like a shy wallflower to the

21:09

life of the party. I could visibly see

21:11

the difference in people's faces. They were having

21:13

that dopamine hit two because we were

21:15

connecting, we were laughing, we

21:17

were bonding over something, and I

21:20

realized that we all have the power to

21:22

steer the conversation into something deeper.

21:25

But Jessica knew that talking was only half

21:27

the battle. She had succeeded in

21:29

initiating deeper conversation, but it

21:31

couldn't be a one way thing.

21:33

You need to make a person feel like they're being listened

21:35

to, not just waiting for my turn

21:37

to talk or my turn to share my story, but

21:39

actually listening to them and being a part of

21:41

what they're saying. People like feeling

21:44

paid attention to it. Really is this

21:46

underrated magic skill that we

21:49

can all have, and that really transforms

21:51

how they treat you because they like being treated that way.

21:53

They like being treated special. Jessica

21:56

left the event feeling over the moon. She had

21:58

proven to herself that she could not only talk

22:00

to strangers, but also that it felt

22:02

great. Her experiences inspired

22:04

her to go even more hardcore in her

22:06

quest to extrovert.

22:07

I'm very much at all enough person, So I

22:10

thought, if I'm going to do this insane year

22:12

of torture and extroverting,

22:15

then I'm not going to leave anything out.

22:17

Exactly what torture was Jessica planning

22:19

for her introverted self.

22:21

It felt like, Okay, if I can survive that, then

22:23

I can survive anything.

22:25

You'll find out when the Happiness Lab returns

22:27

in a moment.

22:38

I think. I always thought that to be a

22:40

good public speaker, you need to have total

22:42

confidence when you get on stage and before

22:44

you even do the thing.

22:46

All if you're an introvert. Jessica Pan had always

22:48

hated speaking in.

22:49

Public when actually it's

22:51

so obvious, but you have to be scared

22:53

to do it. And then when you survive, that's where

22:55

that confidence comes from, because you survive

22:58

doing the scary thing.

23:00

So for the pinnacle of her ear of acting like

23:02

an extrovert, she decided to push herself

23:04

to the limit.

23:05

And I thought, okay, So the final step

23:07

in this is to perform for

23:10

an audience where they're often

23:12

encouraged to heckle you.

23:14

Jessica was going to try stand up

23:16

comedy. She signed up for a comedy course,

23:18

but when it came time for the first class, she

23:21

was terrified, so terrified

23:23

that she climbed into bed and assumed the fetal

23:25

position.

23:26

Is that not what other people do? That

23:28

feels really natural to me.

23:29

Hoping somehow to muster the necessary

23:31

courage. But that first comedy class

23:33

went well, and in a few weeks it was time

23:36

to perform for real.

23:37

The first show I did was with

23:39

my other fellow classmates and our friends

23:42

and our partners and this pub

23:45

downstairs in central London, and I

23:47

was so nervous. I felt like, I don't

23:49

know, I felt like I was on fire or something.

23:52

And in a way, Jessica was on fire. She

23:54

got a ton of laughs.

23:56

The first performance went really well.

23:58

My friend and I decided, let's go to the Edinburgh

24:00

Fringe Festival, which is like the

24:03

Epicenter of comedy and let's

24:05

perform on an open mic night.

24:07

Performing in front of a small crowd of friends and supporters

24:09

at a low key gig isn't quite the

24:11

same as getting up on stage at the premier

24:14

comedy festival in the world.

24:16

It did not go as well.

24:18

Jessica now admits that she was a bit unprepared

24:21

for Edinburgh. In that particular act.

24:23

I talk about living in England

24:25

and loving living in England, and I forgot

24:28

that Edinburgh is in Scotland,

24:30

and I was like, yeah, loving and I love it

24:32

here. And it was like an audience full of Scottish

24:34

people who were like boo, like,

24:36

get off the stage, You're not in England And for

24:39

a delicate, shy introvert, that's

24:41

enough to kill you. But I

24:44

didn't actually die.

24:45

Jessica had made it through her year of living

24:48

extrovertedly. She'd embarrassed

24:50

herself on a tube train, talked candidly

24:52

with strangers at parties, taken a

24:54

comedy class, and had bombed in front

24:56

of an angry crowd at the Edinburgh Fringe

24:58

Festival. But in spite of it all,

25:01

she'd still emerged unscathed.

25:03

The lesson from the year is that I learned a

25:05

lot, and nothing really bad happened

25:08

to me.

25:08

Jessica hasn't quit her day job to become a

25:10

stand up regular, but she does still

25:12

practice many of the social skills she learned

25:15

during her year long experiment.

25:16

I would say one of the biggest lessons from the

25:19

year was to go deeper and be

25:21

vulnerable and be willing to do it.

25:23

First, most people want to talk

25:25

to you, and most people are nicer

25:27

than we imagine in our heads, because I think we build

25:29

up these big, scary judgments

25:31

that oftentimes don't even exist.

25:34

Jessica now uses a series of go

25:36

to social hacks to overcome her introversion,

25:39

little rules that she puts into effect whenever

25:41

she feels daunted by a scary situation.

25:44

The first involves breaking her usual

25:46

cycle of avoidance. If she's invited to

25:48

a party, she goes, and she even

25:50

tries to show up early.

25:52

If you show up late, everybody looks

25:54

like they're already in those little clicks and circles,

25:56

and you feel like you can't join in, and it's

25:58

so intimidating. But if you're the first person there,

26:01

like the second person there, it's not as scary.

26:03

But Jessica also warns that you shouldn't

26:05

underestimate the discomfort you might initially

26:08

experience doing something, and this means

26:10

you need to give yourself a little self compassion

26:12

and patience.

26:13

You know, when you go swimming and you get in the water, it's absolutely

26:16

freezing, but then your body adjusts to it and

26:18

it doesn't feel so bad. I mean that's a cliche

26:21

metaphor, but I think it really works. Like after

26:23

you break the ice with one person, it's

26:25

not as scary with the second one, and it's not scary

26:27

with the third one, and by the fourth you know you're the life

26:29

of the party.

26:30

Jessica has learned to appreciate the benefits

26:32

of social connection, but the extroverted

26:35

habits she now engages in regularly haven't

26:37

fully dismantled her true personality.

26:39

I'm definitely still an introvert, like I

26:42

definitely prefer to be at home or in a

26:44

small group of people. But I now

26:46

know I can give a speech, I can talk to a

26:48

stranger.

26:48

And that hard won social confidence that came

26:51

from this year long experiment has had a

26:53

big impact on Jessica's well being.

26:55

I had more friends, I

26:57

had less anxiety, I you know

26:59

in my neighborhood. Now I talk to tons of people, I

27:01

recognize lots of people. It feels like this small

27:03

little village in central London. I

27:06

was a lot happier by the end of the year.

27:08

When Jessica first encountered the extroverted

27:10

psychologist Nick Eppley, she was floored

27:12

by the ease with which he talked to complete strangers

27:15

and how quickly he struck up friendships with the

27:17

workers he met in stores and cafes. Jessica

27:20

didn't think she'd ever be that comfortable in getting

27:22

to know strangers herself, but a year

27:24

into her experiment, she had really changed.

27:27

A barista in her local coffee shop was

27:29

one of the first to notice.

27:30

And he said, I remember when he used

27:32

to come in here, like a long time ago. And I was like, yeah, I remember

27:35

that too. And he said, you didn't talk it to us

27:37

ever, like anybody, and I was like, yes,

27:39

that's correct. And he's like, now you're like friends

27:42

with each other and I was like, yeah, exactly. And you

27:44

know, I didn't say here's the book

27:46

and here's why, but he had noticed

27:48

it. And it was really strange

27:50

to be perceived as an extrovert

27:52

and by the end, I just thought, I don't even

27:54

recognize myself. And I don't mean like that

27:57

I was pretending to be someone else or that

27:59

I wasn't being true to myself,

28:02

But it was more like, I haven't let

28:04

these fears and anxieties shackle me

28:06

to the person I've always been. I felt

28:08

like I had grown and I had changed.

28:11

The science shows that we can all enjoy the well

28:14

being boost that comes from social connection, no

28:16

matter what our personality type is. But

28:18

to get those social connection benefits, we

28:21

need to actually connect with the people around us,

28:23

whether we know them well or not. So

28:25

why not push yourself and get a little more

28:27

social You could talk to a local

28:30

cashier or a barista, or

28:32

the person sitting next to you on your commute, and

28:34

when you dive into conversation, try

28:36

to push past the shallow stuff and get

28:38

to topics that feel a little deeper. And

28:41

remember psychologist Nick Epley's insight

28:43

that not everyone waves, but people usually

28:46

wave back. I hope this episode

28:48

has given you some tips on how to extrovert

28:50

a bit more, even and perhaps

28:53

especially if it doesn't come to you naturally,

28:55

And I hope you'll join me again next week. For

28:58

more in our series on getting more Social,

29:00

next time on the Happiness Lab with me

29:02

Doctor Laurie Santos. The

29:13

Happiness Lab is co written and produced by Ryan

29:15

Dilly. Our original music was composed

29:17

by Zachary Silver, with additional scoring,

29:20

mixing and mastering by Evan Viola. Jess

29:23

Shane and Alice find offered additional production

29:25

support. Special thanks to my agent,

29:27

Ben Davis and all of the Pushkin crew. The

29:29

Happiness Lab is brought to you by Pushkin Industries

29:32

and me, Doctor Laurie Santos.