The ability to reflect is associated with critical thinking and reasoning ability. And the capacity to be alone is one of the highest levels of development. It's important to know how to self-soothe and be confident of other people's love even when they're not there in front of you.

One of the best places for a shy person to meet people is in a coffee shop. If you are a reader, bring a book and read it there - that gives a guy something to ask you about. Same goes for sketching, writing, or any hobby you can take with you.

America is a noisy culture, unlike, say, Finland, which values silence. Individualism, dominant in the U.S. and Germany, promotes the direct, fast-paced style of communication associated with extraversion. Collectivistic societies, such as those in East Asia, value privacy and restraint, qualities more characteristic of introverts.

A shy kid might look longingly at other kids playing in the schoolyard, afraid and unsure about how to approach them, but an introvert is perfectly content on her own.

I've always been pretty indifferent towards the royal family. I went on a school trip once to Buckingham Palace, and all I can remember is that it was really boring.

I was brought up by the English side of my family, who are very repressed and working class. Absolutely lovely, but very English.

Atticus Finch is, you know, he was just his whole - the business of his modesty and his ability to see tomorrow and to try to buttress his knowledge of what was coming for his kids was something that I'll never - as a father I'm not able to do.

If you want to see mankind fully, look at a family. Within the family minds become organically one, and for this reason the family is total poetry.