There's a great conversation about Introvert v. Extrovert characteristics on an online community that i frequent. Reading the posts has made me realize that i am a classic introvert. I'd suspected that this was the case, but actually admitting that this was part of my personality helped me make be a little more at ease with myself.
I do a lot of things that introverts do. I prefer to be in my office, expressing myself through writing, than in a teleconference. I hate speaking up, and I always have to work up courage to do so, and I often resort to an e-mail as a follow up. Sitting alone and reading by myself is akin to emotional and mental resuscitation, and I absolutely have to be alone after being in a large group of people.
Being an introvert is not a bad thing at all, and in fact, it does not stop you from socializing or being capable of interaction. In fact, I used to participate in activities that involved me being in front of large crowds of people on a regular basis. Mostly, being an introvert means –at least for me—that you need to withdraw in order to recharge emotionally and mentally. Now, there are various degrees of introvertedness, and I am still reading up and doing my research, but the basic characterization of introvertedness is that you need to be alone and that you need to do so to digest and "make sense of" things. And this is the way that you achieve balance.
I always knew that I was naturally shy. I like being shy. I think it is sort of a complement to be called "shy," to be honest. Shy people, I believe, are evaluators of situations, people who take everything in.