I've spent the last couple of years at the two bottom levels of that scale. It took me an embarrassingly long time to realize one of the root causes: my wife and I have fundamentally different personalities that are at odds with each other.
My wife is an extrovert. She is energized by going out, visiting places, doing things, meeting people.
I'm an introvert. I get energized by staying in, reading a book, watching a movie, spending time by myself.
This creates tension every weekend when we need to negotiated what to do. This friction is weary by itself, but then the outcome almost always makes someone unhappy. Most weekends rather than recharging for the rest of the week, I end up more tired than I started.
Not sure how well this will generalize but if you find yourself in those bottom steps it's worth it to do some introspection and audit how you spend your time.
Friends of mine are mixing weekends. They do one together followed by one each doing things by their own they want to do. So the introvert can e.g. stay home and refresh while the extrovert is again meeting people.
accept it, and enjoy the fact that it is making your life better. You could be dating an introvert and you could both be looking at your computers over the weekend.
If her extroversion isn't strictly social, maybe you kind find activities that allow you both to recharge.
A camping trip for example could allow you an opportunity to read, and enjoy nature, and give her the opportunity to explore (hike, kayak, forage, etc.)
If that doesn't work you may also just consider doing different things on most weekends, and making explicit time for each other for a nice dinner, a movie, or something more traditionally 'dating'.
We’re opposite in a lot of things we prefer:
- They love traveling w/ crazy schedules, bouncing around timezones for a week or two at a time.
- Sleeping and waking late.
- Going out late partying with friends.
- Spin classes or yoga with club music blasting.
- When not doing the above, they stay home doing literally nothing but watching Netflix or reading in bed for days on end.
They are either fully on, or fully off. I find this exhausting and/or boring as hell, depending on what mode they’re in.
I prefer the opposite in a lot of ways:
- Staying local, maybe taking a day or weekend trip every few months, and international trip once a year.
- Waking and sleeping early
- Time alone every day
- Working on personal projects or hobbies
- Lifting weights or exercising while listening to stimulating lectures or books.
- Having hours-long meals with friends or family once or twice a week.
We’ve found that instead of trying to do things we don’t like to appease the other. We find things that overlap for us and make it a point to do them together whenever possible:
- Cooking some meals at home
- Walking our dog around the neighborhood
- Going on day or weekend trips once in a while.
- Meals w/ friends and family, when I peel off to go home after, when they go meet up with friends to burn the midnight oil.
Wait till you have kids. Or rather: folks who don't have kids yet, recognize that when you do you pretty much lose your weekends to doing things with them. Especially so when you have more than one. I'm not saying this is a bad thing, but it does seem to be a thing that people don't really appreciate until they're knee deep in it.
This often leads to the sort of deep tiredness described in this post for introverted parents.
Find myself there as well somehow though I wouldn’t call my partner 100% extroverted, Im the onr more on the introverted side. To me a mind trick is to attempt a balance. For instance to realize that it would do me good to be outdoors during which I could still do my introverted stuff (introspection) during which I also do some phisical exercise. I just can’t be 100% within my head all the time, I still have to interact with them from time to time or escape for a walk from time to time. Some times Im out with my family and realize the energy is too good to be missed, this moment has to be taken advantage of, so I join in whatever we’re doing. I usually reserve one day a week of complete me time during which I paint completely isolated from others and distractions. Just knowing there’s an escape valve I can sacrifice a day for another. Im also getting a some dose of introverted recharge while working, while doing repetitive work on autopilot but I have to
admit there’s a bit of energy drain there too with the necessary socialization.
> This creates tension every weekend when we need to negotiated what to do.
Is it necessary to negotiate? Why can't each of you do whatever they want to do?
"Fine you go out I'll read a book" or perhaps "I'd generally rather read a book than go out, but I'd like to spend this time with you, so I'll go out with you to visit places".
My wife is an extrovert. She is energized by going out, visiting places, doing things, meeting people.
I'm an introvert. I get energized by staying in, reading a book, watching a movie, spending time by myself.
This creates tension every weekend when we need to negotiated what to do. This friction is weary by itself, but then the outcome almost always makes someone unhappy. Most weekends rather than recharging for the rest of the week, I end up more tired than I started.
Not sure how well this will generalize but if you find yourself in those bottom steps it's worth it to do some introspection and audit how you spend your time.