Top 100 Susan Cain Quotes
#1. You know that book 'Quiet: the Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking', by Susan Cain? That's like my manifesto. The older I get, the more I think I could be a hermit.
Jessica Raine
#2. The next time you see a person with a composed face and a soft voice, remember that inside her mind she might be solving an equation, composing a sonnet, designing a hat. She might, that is, be deploying the power of quiet.
Susan Cain
#3. Everyone shines, given the right lighting.
Susan Cain
#4. He also suggests "No-Talk Thursdays," one day a week in which employees aren't allowed to speak to each other.
Susan Cain
#5. Flow is an optimal state in which you feel totally engaged in an activity ... In a state of flow, you're neither bored nor anxious, and you don't question your own adequacy. Hours pass without your noticing.
Susan Cain
#6. In our culture, guilt is a tainted word, but it's probably one of the building blocks of conscience.
Susan Cain
#7. What if you love knowledge for its own sake, not necessarily as a blueprint to action? What if you wish there were more, not fewer reflective types in the world?
Susan Cain
#8. I also believe that introversion is my greatest strength. I have such a strong inner life that I'm never bored and only occasionally lonely. No matter what mayhem is happening around me, I know I can always turn inward.
Susan Cain
#9. You will find this hard to believe, but I've never laughed as much as I did when I was a corporate lawyer. When you're working 16 hours a day for months at a time, you get punchy. Everything and everyone seems hilarious.
Susan Cain
#10. Solitude is one of our great superpowers ... Solitude is the key to being able to make effective decisions and then having the courage of convictions to stand behind those decisions.
Susan Cain
#11. If genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration, then as a culture we tend to lionize the one percent.
Susan Cain
#12. All talking is selling and all selling involves talking,
Susan Cain
#13. I am a horse for a single harness, not cut out for tandem or teamwork ... for well I know that in order to attain any definite goal, it is imperative that one person do the thinking and the commanding. - ALBERT EINSTEIN
Susan Cain
#14. Purification and redemption are such recurrent themes in ritual because there is a clear and ubiquitous need for them: we all do regrettable things as a result of our own circumstances, and new rituals are frequently invented in response to new circumstances.
Susan Cain
#15. While extroverts tend to attain leadership in public domains, introverts tend to attain leadership in theoretical and aesthetic fields.
Susan Cain
#16. Conversely, high-reactive children may be more likely to develop into artists and writers and scientists and thinkers because their aversion to novelty causes them to spend time inside the familiar - and intellectually fertile - environment of their own heads.
Susan Cain
#17. introverts like people they meet in friendly contexts; extroverts prefer those they compete with.
Susan Cain
#18. The bias against introversion leads to a colossal waste of talent, energy, and happiness.
Susan Cain
#19. [Introverts,] the world needs you and it needs the things you carry. So I wish you the best of all possible journeys and the courage to speak softly.
Susan Cain
#20. If you force extroverts to pause, says Newman, they'll do just as well as introverts at the numbers game.
Susan Cain
#21. Finally, pay attention to what you envy. Jealousy is an ugly emotion, but it tells the truth. You mostly envy those who have what you desire. I
Susan Cain
#22. She lied to me today," Archie said.
"A teenager?" Susan said with faux surprise. "Lying to an authority figure? Impossible.
Chelsea Cain
#23. We tend to forget that there's nothing sacrosanct about learning in large group classrooms, and that we organize students this way not because it's the best way to learn but because it's cost-efficient,
Susan Cain
#24. (You wouldn't be reading this book if I hadn't convinced my publisher that I was enough of a pseudo-extrovert to promote it.)
Susan Cain
#25. Usually they're carried away by people who are assertive and domineering. The risk with our students is that they're very good at getting their way. But that doesn't mean they're going the right way." If
Susan Cain
#26. The authors whose books get published - once accepted as a reclusive breed - are now vetted by publicists to make sure they're talk-show ready.
Susan Cain
#28. Shyness is about the fear of social judgments - at a job interview or a party you might be excessively worried about what people think of you. Whereas an introvert might not feel any of those things at all, they simply have the preference to be in a quieter setting.
Susan Cain
#29. In other words, introverts are capable of acting like extroverts for the sake of work they consider important, people they love, or anything they value highly.
Susan Cain
#30. Another study, of 38,000 knowledge workers across different sectors, found that the simple act of being interrupted is one of the biggest barriers to productivity. Even multitasking, that prized feat of modern-day office warriors, turns out to be a myth.
Susan Cain
#31. Scores of studies have shown that venting doesn't soothe anger; it fuels it.
Susan Cain
#32. One honest relationship can be more productive than fistfuls of business cards.
Susan Cain
#33. Students take ownership of their education when they learn from one another
Susan Cain
#34. Why are some people talkative while others measure their words? Why
Susan Cain
#35. McHugh helped the students find rhythms in their lives that allowed them to claim the solitude they needed and enjoyed, and to have social energy left over for leading others.
Susan Cain
#36. Or at school you might have been prodded to come "out of your shell" - that noxious expression which fails to appreciate that some animals naturally carry shelter everywhere they go, and that some humans are just the same.
Susan Cain
#37. Our culture rightly admires risk-takers, but we need our 'heed-takers' more than ever.
Susan Cain
#38. It's not that I'm so smart," said Einstein, who was a consummate introvert. "It's that I stay with problems longer.
Susan Cain
#39. Open-plan offices have been found to reduce productivity and impair memory. They're associated with high staff turnover. They make people sick, hostile, unmotivated, and insecure.
Susan Cain
#40. His hypothesis was that extroverted leaders enhance group performance when employees are passive, but that introverted leaders are more effective with proactive employees.
Susan Cain
#41. Those who live the most fully realized lives - giving back to their families, societies, and ultimately themselves - tend to find meaning in their obstacles.
Susan Cain
#42. What is the inner behavior of people whose most visible feature is that when you take them to a party they aren't very pleased about it?
Susan Cain
#43. Solitude is out of fashion. Our companies, our schools and our culture are in thrall to an idea I call the New Groupthink, which holds that creativity and achievement come from an oddly gregarious place.
Susan Cain
#44. One genuine new relationship is worth a fistful of business cards.
Susan Cain
#45. we revere our founding fathers precisely because they were loudmouths on the subject of freedom: Give me liberty or give me death!
Susan Cain
#46. People who tend to [suppress their negative emotions] regularly," concludes Grob, "might start to see the world in a more negative light.
Susan Cain
#47. Aggressive power beats you up; soft power wins you over.
Susan Cain
#48. Here's a rule of thumb for networking events: one new honest-to-goodness relationship is worth ten fistfuls of business cards. Rush home afterward and kick back on your sofa. Carve out restorative niches.
Susan Cain
#49. Who could be happy in a world of podiums and microphones?
Susan Cain
#50. Words are potentially dangerous weapons that reveal things better left unsaid.
Susan Cain
#51. Any time people come together in a meeting, we're not necessarily getting the best ideas; we're just getting the ideas of the best talkers.
Susan Cain
#52. Introverts feel "just right" with less stimulation, as when they sip wine with a close friend, solve a crossword puzzle, or read a book. Extroverts enjoy the extra bang that comes from activities like meeting new people, skiing slippery slopes, and cranking up the stereo.
Susan Cain
#53. Osborn was a founding partner of the advertising agency Batten, Barton, Durstine, and Osborn (BBDO), but it was as an author that he really made his mark, beginning with the day in 1938 that a magazine editor invited him to lunch and asked what his hobby was. "Imagination," replied Osborn.
Susan Cain
#54. That was exactly what happened - the conformists showed less brain activity in the frontal, decision-making regions and more in the areas of the brain associated with perception. Peer pressure, in other words, is not only unpleasant, but can actually change your view of a problem.
Susan Cain
#55. That's why Professor Little, the consummate introvert, lectures with such passion. Like a modern-day Socrates, he loves his students deeply; opening their minds and attending to their well-being are two of his core personal projects. When
Susan Cain
#56. It's never a good idea to organize society in a way that depletes the energy of half the population. We discovered this with women decades ago, and now it's time to realize it with introverts.
Susan Cain
#57. Our culture is biased against quiet and reserved people, but introverts are responsible for some of humanity's greatest achievements.
Susan Cain
#58. It's also vital to recognize that many people - especially introverts like Steve Wozniak - need extra quiet and privacy in order to do their best work.
Susan Cain
#59. Temperament refers to inborn, biologically based behavioral and emotional patterns that are observable in infancy and early childhood; personality is the complex brew that emerges after cultural influence and personal experience are thrown into the mix.
Susan Cain
#60. The word satyagraha implies, Gandhi's passivity was not weakness at all. It meant focusing on an ultimate goal and refusing to divert energy to unnecessary skirmishes along the way.
Susan Cain
#61. When you're more focused in getting your message across than you are worrying about how people are viewing you, that's huge.
Susan Cain
#62. Aggression - Emily is uncomfortable with anger - but
Susan Cain
#63. Introverts just just don't buzz as easily.
Susan Cain
#64. Amazingly, neuroscientists have even found that people who use Botox, which prevents them from making angry faces, seem to be less anger-prone than those who don't, because the very act of frowning triggers the amygdala to process negative emotions.
Susan Cain
#65. For many introverts like David, adolescence is the great stumbling place, the dark and tangled thicket of low self-esteem and social unease. In middle and high school, the main currency is vivacity and gregariousness; attributes like depth and sensitivity don't count for much.
Susan Cain
#66. I think the shyness one feels in childhood is often overcome with time. There are children who hide behind their parents' legs, but you don't see grown-ups hiding behind people. It just doesn't happen. I mean, not that often. People develop social skills over time.
Susan Cain
#67. We have two ears and one mouth and we should use them proportionally.
Susan Cain
#68. We don't need giant personalities to transform companies. We need leaders who build not their own egos but the institutions they run.
Susan Cain
#69. There are only a few people out there who can completely overcome their fears, and they all live in Tibet.
Susan Cain
#70. Though shyness per se was unacceptable, reserve was a mark of good breeding.
Susan Cain
#71. I'm continually amazed by how many people who appear to be extroverts are actually introverts.
Susan Cain
#72. I've never been in a group environment in which I didn't feel obliged to present an unnaturally rah-rah version of myself.
Susan Cain
#73. To advance our careers, we're expected to promote ourselves unabashedly.
Susan Cain
#74. The highly sensitive tend to be philosophical or spiritual in their orientation, rather than materialistic or hedonistic. They dislike small talk. They
Susan Cain
#75. They listen more than they talk, think before they speak, and often feel as if they express themselves better in writing than in conversation.
Susan Cain
#76. I prefer listening to talking, reading to socializing, and cozy chats to group settings.
Susan Cain
#77. The most effective teams are composed of a healthy mix of introverts and extroverts, studies show, and so are many leadership structures.
Susan Cain
#78. Brainstorming had four rules: 1. Don't judge or criticize ideas. 2. Be freewheeling. The wilder the idea, the better. 3. Go for quantity. The more ideas you have, the better. 4. Build on the ideas of fellow group members.
Susan Cain
#79. If you can think of meetings you've attended, you can probably recall a time - plenty of times - when the opinion of the most dynamic or talkative person prevailed to the detriment of all.
Susan Cain
#80. Many people believe that introversion is about being antisocial, and that's really a misperception. Because actually it's just that introverts are differently social. So they would prefer to have a glass of wine with a close friend as opposed to going to a loud party full of strangers.
Susan Cain
#81. Evidence from science suggests that business people must be insane to use brainstorming groups,
Susan Cain
#82. Some animals carry their shelter wherever they go. Some humans are just the same.
Susan Cain
#83. Our schools should teach children the skills to work with others- cooperative learning can be effective when practiced well and in moderation- but also the time and training they need to deliberately practice on their own.
Susan Cain
#84. Don is "a bitter introvert," as he cheerfully puts it - bitter because the more time he spends at HBS, the more convinced he becomes that he'd better change his ways.
Susan Cain
#85. But the same receptivity to experience that can make life difficult for the highly sensitive also builds their consciences. Aron tells of one sensitive teen who persuaded his mother to feed a homeless person he'd met in the park, and of another eight-year-old who cried
Susan Cain
#87. The results have consistently suggested that introversion and extroversion, like other major personality traits such as agreeableness and conscientiousness, are about 40 to 50 percent heritable.
Susan Cain
#88. I was the nicest person you'd ever want to know," Alex recalls, "but the world wasn't that way. The problem was that if you were just a nice person, you'd get crushed. I refused to live a life where people could do that stuff to me.
Susan Cain
#89. Introverts are offered keys to private gardens full of riches. To possess sucha key is to tumble like Alice down her rabbit hole. She didn't choose to go to Wonderland - but she made of it an adventure that was fresh and fantastic and very much her own.
Susan Cain
#90. We like to think that we value individuality, but all too often we admire one type of individual - the
Susan Cain
#91. (Never mind that the assistants were likely interchangeable, while Michelangelo was not.)
Susan Cain
#92. By the time I was old enough to figure out that I was simply introverted, it was a part of my being, the assumption that there is something inherently wrong with me. I wish I could find that little vestige of doubt and remove it.
Susan Cain
#93. The secret to life is to put yourself in the right lighting. For some, it's a Broadway spotlight; for others, a lamplit desk. Use your natural powers
of persistence, concentration, and insight
to do work you love and work that matters. Solve problems. make art, think deeply.
Susan Cain
#94. Men regarded ability in speaking as a peculiar gift, needed only by the lawyer, clergyman, or statesman. Today we have come to realize that it is the indispensable weapon of those who would forge ahead in the keen competition of business.
Susan Cain
#95. Even when the attention focused on me is positive, I am uncomfortable being looked at by a lot of people - it's just not my natural state of being.
Susan Cain
#96. College students who tend to study alone learn more over time than those who work in groups.
Susan Cain
#97. All personality traits have their good side and their bad side. But for a long time, we've seen introversion only through its negative side and extroversion mostly through its positive side.
Susan Cain
#98. Don't think of introversion as something that needs to be cured.
Susan Cain
#99. Solitude matters, and for some people, it's the air they breathe
Susan Cain
#100. I'm not saying abolish group work - I think there's a time and a place for people to come together and exchange ideas, but let's restore the respect we once had for solitude. And we need to be much more mindful of the way we come together.
Susan Cain
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