The Boy in the Cut-Out Photograph or Unlearning the Playground Rules
For anyone who has ever been told they're "too quiet."
A ghost from 23 years ago, found in a box of old papers. A small portrait I had cut out myself, taken on my first day of secondary school. For the longest time, I couldn't remember why I kept it. But holding this picture of the boy I was, the memory returned, not as a flood, but as a quiet, familiar ache.
I was a quiet observer by nature, more comfortable watching the world than being at the center of it. On the playground, that stillness was treated not as a state of being, but as a problem to be solved. 'What's wrong with you? Are you alright?' The questions were constant, and their subtext was clear: your quiet is making us uncomfortable.
So, I learned to perform. I’d invent excuses, improvise a more 'acceptable' mood—anything to put others at ease. It was the beginning of a long lesson in self-abandonment, learning to quiet the voice inside me to appease the noise outside.
That habit of moulding myself for others followed me for years, a low-grade anxiety humming beneath the surface. I never had the words for it until, years later, I stumbled upon Susan Cain's book, Quiet. Reading it felt less like learning something new and more like remembering something I had always known.
Suddenly, a lifetime of feeling 'different' was reframed. I wasn't antisocial or broken. I was an introvert. And I had been navigating a world that, for centuries, has placed the extrovert on a pedestal. My experience wasn't a personal failing; it was a quiet collision with a culture that speaks a different language.
With this new lens, I started seeing it everywhere. Society operates with an unspoken bias for the extrovert ideal. It’s in the open-plan offices that celebrate constant collaboration, and in the classrooms that reward the quickest and loudest student. We equate leadership with charisma, and confidence with being the most talkative person in the room.
There is nothing wrong with this way of being; its energy is vital and builds much of our world. But in putting it on a pedestal, we have unintentionally cast a shadow over another, equally powerful way of existing. The quiet power of the introvert - the deep focus, the rich inner world, the observant creativity - is so often left unseen, waiting for the noise to die down.
So I'm keeping this picture on my desk. It’s a reminder of that boy who didn't have the words for who he was. It’s a quiet promise to him that he doesn't need to perform anymore.
And it’s a reminder to myself that the most valuable contributions are often made not in the spotlight, but in the quiet moments of deep thought. It's an invitation to honour my own nature, and perhaps, to create a little more space for the other quiet people in the room to do the same. We don’t need to change who we are, only find the courage to bring our true selves out of the shadows.
Trust the hunch. Find the story.
Antoine
