Jessica Pan's Year of Living Dangerously

Another case of finding the right book at the right moment

Before we begin…

Would your friends describe you as more of an introvert or extrovert? How would you describe yourself? How has being whichever “vert” you are impacted your relationships, jobs, and random experiences as you’ve made your way in the world? Have you ever done something out of character on purpose – on a dare, to test yourself, for the hell of it, or for “research” on a story you wanted to write? How did that work out? 

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How far would you go to change your life?

Photo by Claudio Schwarz on Unsplash

When a person has spent her entire life saying no, avoiding parties, and flees the overtures of strangers saying “I don’t speak English” over her shoulder as she runs away, no one would expect her to climb onto a stage at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival and do a stand-up comedy routine. 

Which is one reason I fell deeply and unexpectedly into

Jess Pan

‘s book I’m Sorry I’m Late, I Didn’t Want To Come: One Introvert’s Year of Saying Yes. I found myself both applauding and cringing as she described one experiment after another she hoped would transform her from a “shy introvert” to someone who could at least hold her own among the extroverts who seemed to be having all the fun. In the course of her year-long journey, she asked total strangers stupid questions (Who is the Queen of England?), used apps to set up “friend” dates, told a story on the stage at London’s Union Chapel for a production of The Moth, took a class called, “How to be Sociable,” which led her to confess to a man she’d never met before that she lived far away from her parents, “and they think I’m happier than I am, and I can’t bear for them to know that sometimes I literally don’t know what I’m doing with my life.” 

She did improv. She booked a “blind” travel weekend and found herself in Budapest in a public bath with another woman who was traveling solo. She did that standup comedy routine not only in Edinburgh where she bombed and then did it again in London and bombed again. She crowned the year by hosting a Thanksgiving dinner for more people than she had place settings. 

The experiments themselves, woven together with helpful insights and information from the literature on introversion and extroversion as well as the many consultants and coaches who helped her along the way, make for fun reading. The real draw for me, however, was Pan’s bravery and vulnerability when it came to describing what brought her to what turned out to be a pivotal year in her life. 

She was lonely. As she entered her thirties, she was an expat married to a Brit living in London without the small group of long-time friends who had sustained her. The loneliness was not entirely new to her. She’d lived with it for years; the price of being terribly shy and uneasy with most social situations. The things that made her a good writer, the ability to stand apart and observe, also made it difficult for her to engage meaningfully with people she did not know. The very idea of speaking publicly or on camera was paralyzing which turned out to be a handicap in an earlier job in Beijing where she worked at a television station. Just the thought of talking to new people was enough to make her stay home where she was in her comfort zone. But, increasingly, the aspects she savored – quiet, long hours to read, write, and binge-watch TV – failed to make up for an increasing sense of isolation and loneliness. Friends and family asked her if she was okay. She seemed depressed. She admits she was. 

“Although I accepted who I was, at this juncture in my life, it was not making me happy. I had taken my introvert status as a license to wall myself off from others… I was too scared to challenge my fears and go out and have the experiences I craved.” - Jess Pan, Sorry I’m Late, I Didn’t Want To Come: One Introvert’s Year of Saying Yes

She wondered if it was possible to change, even as an adult, if she started doing the very things that scared her. In fact, as I read, I felt it was a do-or-die moment for her, a kind of gentle scrape against the rock bottom that awaited if she continued in this way. So she went into the next twelve months committed to scaring herself to death by living as a “gregarious introvert.”

Right book at the right moment

This book was another case of stumbling on the right book at the right time or, more accurately, the right voice. I was introduced to

Jess Pan

here on Substack along with thousands of others when she launched her newsletter It’ll Be Fun, They Said. I found myself reading each of her first three posts in the mornings while I sipped my coffee, before I started work. For those few minutes, I was sitting over coffee with a new friend while she shared the gossip and goings on inside the London bookstore where she works a couple days a week. She’s funny, she’s incredibly observant, she is compassionate and curious. She’s who I am trying to be when I’m being my best self. A writer to her core, Pan knows that every experience holds valuable material whether it's a few hours working in a bookstore or a perilous personal journey. If she’s going to scare herself to death, then she might as well make a story out of it. 

I notice that the universe is sending me lots of stories like these lately. A friend of mine in her forties recently wrote and read aloud an account of a sojourn to a Cyberpunk festival in the desert that she attended alone and came face to face with her history of seeking and failing to make the kinds of connections she needs and wants.

Last week, we talked about Judy Reeves’ memoir in which she, an avowed extrovert, detached from people and places familiar to her because she was driven towards change she could not make any other way. Just this morning, I read this piece by David Brooks about doing the hard but necessary work of truly making another person feel seen which involves paying attention, asking deep questions even of people we don’t know very well, and about being willing to grow. 

Growth is hard. Children grow because that’s what they do. In adulthood, growth becomes more of a choice. 

As I read Jess Pan’s book, so many bits and pieces of my own history flashed before me: my first assignment as a reporter when I was too self-conscious to ask the hard questions I needed to ask and let someone else take the story; all the times I have accepted invitations only to quail at the thought of actually going out; the floundering feeling I used to feel when I attended “networking” events connected with work. There were other flashes too, better ones: the times I went in search of experiences to make material for stories I wrote (tattoo in journalism school, human guinea pig in a magazine story on clinical trials); my stint in improv which I’d done as a kind of dare to myself; and that moment years ago when a mentor and friend looked me in the eye and said, “It’s okay to say no to people or things that don’t matter but you should never say no to yourself.” 

I found myself cheering quietly as I turned the last page Sorry I’m Late, I Didn’t Want To Come: One Introvert’s Year of Saying Yes, not because Pan had a complete transformation. She simply did what people do when they do the very hard work of opening up to the world when the world is hard and scary: she said yes to herself even when it was hard. She grew. And she wrote a great book about it. 

My answers to some of the questions I asked up front

• I don’t know how my friends would describe me but I know Meyers-Briggs and various other personality tests say I lean heavily towards the introverted end of the scale. I function well in groups and with new people for a period of time and then I have to dive beneath the metaphorical covers until my batteries are recharged. I often always resist the idea of going out and then love the actual experience of being out. On the other hand, a good book and some warm dogs lying next to me will keep me happy for days at a time. I have learned to “fake it ‘till I make it” in many social situations but my favorite kind are small, intimate with a chance to talk about a lot of things deeply. My mate and I are compatible in this sense which, in a way, is a detriment to us both. I am usually the one who forces us out the door because it is “good for us.” 

• I love talking to strangers. Most of the time. When I am not deep in my own head or a book, and when my husband hasn’t beaten me to it. 

• Just before the pandemic set in for real, I took a beginner’s improv class. It was one of the most fun, most difficult, most vulnerability-inducing experiences I have ever had. I found myself using a lot of what I learned there in my fiction writing and it was, as Pan notes in her book, a reintroduction to the joy of playing like a little kid on a playground. It also served as fodder for this OpEd piece in the San Diego Union Tribune.

• I’ve recently submitted a story to an organization that, if selected, would put me on a stage reading it out loud to a hundred or so folks I never met before in my life. 

Now it’s your turn! Let’s talk.

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Spark Author Update: Andria Williams’ new novel

The fall has seen one book launch after another from authors in our community. This week, Andria Williams ’s second novel, The Waiting World, hit the shelves. My copy just arrived froom bookshop.org on Tuesday and I’m excited to jump in.

Here’s what novelist David Abrams said about it: 

"Before starting Andria Williams's new novel The Waiting World, clear your calendar because, from the first page onward, this is a story that grabs hold and won't let you go until the very end. Opening on the eve of the Great Depression, The Waiting World follows the lives of servants Nessa, Aoife, and John, who meet while working for rich (but soon, not so rich) Titus McAvoy at his Maine estate. Told from various points of view, Williams tunnels deep beneath the skin of her characters and into the secret chambers of their hearts to dramatically highlight the divisions of race, sex, and class in our society. I won't soon forget this book-it's an instant classic." -David Abrams, author of Brave Deeds and Fobbit

Andria’s first novel, The Longest Night, debuted in 2016 to much acclaim. The road to this novel held some twists and turns which Andria described candidly in our interview with her a couple of years ago. 

We regularly highlight an author from our ranks of subscribers with published books. You’ll find all the authors here at our Spark Authors Page. If you’re an author new to our community, head over there and learn how to add your name and books to the list. Like all the authors on our list, Andria is available for meeting with book clubs. 

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Gratefully,

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