Introversion and Ministry

I have been reflecting a lot about being more introverted and being in ministry lately. This has been triggered by the reviews that my supervisor had given me. I do not think that it is entirely inaccurate, but I think that some of it is too much about my personality. I do think that I am capable of adapting my behavior but I do not think I am capable of caring about things that I do not naturally care about. I think in the end that is what it has been boiling down to. I find that repeatedly my strengths tend to be for listening to people in one on one situations and for writing. I feel drawn to teaching and preaching from an introverted perspective because those are the situations in which research and the more thoughtful process is rewarded. During CPE I hated doing cold calls but loved doing crisis counseling. For teaching parish I have dreaded situations that have required all kinds of small talk. In the context of the community that I currently live in I love random one on one conversations that I find that I have. I sometimes feel clausterphobic sharing a kitchen with so many people and lost in a crowd for not feeling like I am truly intimate with anyone. My supervisor from teaching parish seems to be critical of me for not taking leadership on things that just strike me as common sense. I really have been weighing whether or not I truly can be more introverted and be in ministry or if I should consider some other kind of path that wouldn't force me to extrovert myself too much. Truly it will be impossible to find a job where I would not be required to extrovert myself to some degree but I think that some positions could appeal to my strengths as an introvert better than others could. I often feel like I would be able to handle ministry better if I had a romantic partner and a best friend in the vicinity that I lived in. In these questions I found this wonderful blog, www.introvertedchurch.com where this man is doing research on introversion and the church. One of the links I found on there was a link on marketing to introverts. http://topten.org/public/AF/AF633.html which I thought was great. I would agree with 9.5/10 of the items that they listed and felt completely understood. The -.5 would probably be on the statement on phones. While I do get annoid with people who answer their cell phones while I am around, I actually find that as an introvert I often have more of the conversations I thrive off of on the phone instead of in the context of coffee hour, a party and the dorm kitchen. However finding this stuff made me feel understood. Resources definitely worth following.