Feel like an Extroverted Introvert with Anxiety?

A friend asked me to write about an epiphany she had from a new way to describe a few words we use regularly, and how it really opened up space to look at and think about our social lives a bit differently.
These definitions put the dividing line between Introversion/Extroversion and Social Anxiety.

You've probably heard of the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (ie: test), and if you haven't then you've probably talked about a set of four letters like "ENFJ" or "ISTP". The extent of which the test is applicable is more suited for an academic paper, so for here we'll just focus on some general tendencies to clear things up. You've probably also heard of and felt anxiety, social anxiety, or any of the million variants that anxiety can arrive in.

This blog post is for the many people who don't know if they're an introvert or an extrovert, may feel like they're both, and/or suffer from anxiety - or anyone that knows someone who fits in these categories (hint: everyone knows someone who fits these categories). There's a lot of confusion between the colloquialism "extrovert" being a social butterfly, a charismatic Gaston or Flynn Ryder

The stereotype continues for introverts always loving books and trying to stay away from sunlight if they can

But I wouldn't be mentioning these things if they were accurate.

From discussions with Dr. Vehec at the University of Central Florida, the scale of introversion and extroversion has to do more with where people get their energy from, and not how they spend it as many may think. Extroverts get their energy from external stimuli, and introverts from internal stimuli; the Latin root "vert" means "turn" like in "advert(isement)" or "divert", both "to turn attention". So extroverts turn energy from outside, introverts from within.
Extroverts often get their energy and excitement from other people, social events, open windows on a highway, loud music, etc.

While introverts get their energy and excitement from introspection, reading down rabbit holes, building things, personal hobbies like gardening or cooking, etc. I think one important thing to note is that introverts get excitement from these things too, it's not always a calm, "don't bother me" environment, introverts can be elated when they finish a project.

How does this relate to social anxiety?

More than once I've talked to people who have a constant itch to go out and be social, to get out of the house, but also don't like going outside at unexpected times. A lot of the time, due to the colloquial use of these words thrown around, they may think they're an extroverted introvert, or vice versa, and might start spending time at home to "feed the introvert" side and get more energy to go out with. From the nature of extroversion though, this of course brings up the problem of not having anything at home to get energy from.
Often times, it may be social anxiety that's stopping people from going out, regardless of their energy and excitement income. The focus has been shifted away from anxiety, or excessive worry, and placed on "how much of an extrovert am I?" I don't know if this phenomenon has a name, but I have seen multiple eyes light up with discovery when this last puzzle piece is put together.
Social anxiety can be caused by extraneous stress, a history of bullying, a difficult childhood, an imbalance of brain chemicals, and tons of other things from tons of different sources, and can be manifested as such too. Social anxiety may be avoiding new people, all people, party people, agoraphobia (fear of large or spaces, the opposite of claustrophobia), and tons of other ways as well.

So if reading this stirs up any thought for you or someone you know, I invite you to think about the possibility of being an extrovert that struggles with social anxiety, and there may be another place to focus effort so you can be in your happiest -version (ba dun tss).