Hey Reader,
In every job or contract role I've ever had, I've always dreaded team meetings.
By the time I’d pieced together what people were really saying, the conversation had already moved on.
If I stayed quiet, colleagues assumed I wasn’t engaged.
If I forced myself to jump in, I stumbled over my words and spent the rest of the day replaying what I 'should' have said.
For years I thought this meant I wasn’t fast enough, confident enough, or good enough.
But the truth was simpler: my brain was just running a different operating system.
Unbound Shift
Most people think introversion is about social preference: liking people less, needing time alone, avoiding crowds.
But that's not what's actually happening in your brain.
Brain imaging shows that introverts have stronger connections between thinking and memory regions. When someone asks you a question in a meeting, your brain isn't being slow or hesitant - it's running the information through longer neural pathways, cross-referencing with past experiences, weighing nuances.
Extroverts process rapidly, driven by dopamine - the reward chemical that makes external stimulation feel exciting.
You? You're likely running on acetylcholine, linked to contemplation and calm.
Different fuel. Different processing speed. Different optimal conditions.
This is why you replay conversations later and think of what you should have said. Your brain was still processing whilst the conversation moved on. It's not social anxiety.
It's depth over speed.
This is why small talk feels excruciating but deep conversations energise you; your brain is literally designed for substance, not surface-level exchanges.
This is why a 'quiet work environment helps you think whilst others need music or chatter. You already have higher baseline arousal in your nervous system: your brain is running at a higher idle speed.
Additional stimulation doesn't energise you, it overwhelms your circuits.
None of this is a flaw. It's your operating system.
And once you understand that - truly understand it at a neurological level - everything changes.
You stop trying to fix yourself. You start designing for how you're actually built.
Unbound Step
This week, I want you to notice one moment where you've been judging yourself for something that's actually just your operating system at work.
Maybe it's:
- Taking longer to respond and calling yourself 'slow'.
- Needing quiet to think and calling yourself 'antisocial'.
- Feeling drained after a day of meetings and calling yourself 'weak'.
- Preferring written communication and calling yourself 'avoidant.'
Just notice it. Name it. See it for what it really is: not a deficit, but a difference in processing.
If you're reading this and thinking "I've been getting this wrong my entire life" you're exactly who I'm creating the Understanding Introversion workshop for.
We're going under the surface and into the neuroscience, the wiring, the patterns that explain why you show up the way you do.
Because here's what I've learned: you can't optimise a system you don't understand.
Once you see your operating system clearly - how your brain actually processes information, why certain environments deplete you whilst others restore you, what your nervous system genuinely needs - you can finally stop blaming yourself and start designing for how you're built.
Find out more and register for the waitlist here.
I'm sharing the link here first, so my subscribers get first dibs.
In your corner always,
Sam 💛
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Sam Sheppard
Introvert Change Strategist
I share practical tools to help you design a life that actually fits.
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