Positives of autism

Orangegnome said:

I am often not sure what I am good at or can bring to a situation but reading this has helped me see

Ditto

I would say seeing beauty or joy in unusual things. I love this thread, I am often not sure what I am good at or can bring to a situation but reading this has helped me see. 

This is in a magazine: 'The everyday guide to neurodiversity'.

and having an absolutely fab reason to be different!

Tuned up senses :-)  having a brain that i seem to be able to rev harder and faster (in some ways at least...) than a lot of other people

oh and attention to detai   ;-)

Someone started a thread a while back about autistic joy, and I wrote this haiku poem, which explores the things that autistic people get pleasure from:

***************

Absorbed in interests

Immersed in their enjoyment

The world fades away

**************

Enjoying colours

Textures, shapes, movement and form

Sensory pleasures

**************

Enjoying patterns

Language, numbers, dance, music

Deep satisfaction

**************

Nature, animals,

Creative activities,

Deep knowledge diving

**************

Structure and order

Quiet, calm environments

Peace in safe spaces

**************

Accepting oneself

Not social expectation

Brings autistic joy

**************

P0w3rPlut0 said:

Unfortunately I was feeling very negative myself today, but reading this post has lighten and lifted my load. 

️

P0w3rPlut0 said:

My ever so busy mind is the one negative, it never bl**y stops talking to me. 

Ditto.

Unfortunately I was feeling very negative myself today, but reading this post has lighten and lifted my load. 

I believe my organisational skills, attention to detail, seeing patterns or understanding the bigger picture and finally thinking outside the box are all my positive autistic traits.

My ever so busy mind is the one negative, it never bl**y stops talking to me. 

I have been having a good think about this. We are all individual and but here are six things I have come to love about my own autism:

...natural, strong sense of fairness and justice

...the warm glow of hyperfocus

...the pleasure of solving complex problems

...the ease of memory for facts, directions, etc.

...the disregard of forms of social hierarchy 

...the comfort of strong affinity with animals

Absolutely this

Resilience.

Just from my perspective:

Consistant, reliable, predictable, thoughtful, plain speaking, trustworthy, patient, problem solving, seeing the small things, and pattern finding. 

Thank you all.

It's been rather uplifting reading this.

Attention to detail and looking deeper than others might, researching as much as possible. Needing to understand details and question anything that is not clear.

A strong sense of justice and wanting to treat people equally.

I focus intensely on the most interesting things in life and that enabled me to gain qualifications which further enhance my life, and the lives of some others.

I’m reliable, loyal, have a strong sense of justice.

I tend not to use the words ‘nobody’ and ‘everybody’ in phrases like, “nobody does such and such any more” and “everybody is corrupt these days”, as they do not reflect reality and more importantly, they would be assumptions and would be wrong. In that regard, I can be relied on to be factual and not to exaggerate.

Mental arithmetic is my forte, largely due to counting and number pattern making being a repetitive behaviour. Sadly, it hasn’t helped me become proficient in advanced maths. The positive is that mental arithmetic is more useful for day to day life (and paper, pencils and calculators are widely available for the rest).

I find I can use my "special interest" and hyperfocus skills to research things quickly, thoroughly and provide a solid analysis summary at the end - very useful for finding potential solutions to requirements from my employer.

The pattern detecting skill has proved invaluable in my career in IT support as troubleshooting problems requires you to spot what is happening when it shouldn't and there are many places to look for clues on a computer that can find the piece out of place that helps spot the cause.

The systematic thinking skill was also invaluable in reviewing or creating guides for doing things as I would be able to pick up on the areas that everyone else in the team would assume everyone knew. When it came time to train AI to replace the support staff it was my guides that were used to train the system for this reason.

I did find my sense of justice and honesty were stumbling blocks as soon as I moved into management - things get much more grey rather than black and white in these roles and I had a steep learning curve there, but being able to observe and script responses was the most effective way to deal with these

It's often because I didn't know I shouldn't. I'm not mean about it but I'm also not good at keeping quiet to keep the peace. Meaning I will speak up in social situations when myself or someone else is being treated badly 

I often credit Autism/ADHD for my creativity.

In my writings I have developed a unique system that combines the typical paragraph-led style you would see in novels with dialogue reflecting more of a script style. For example, here’s an excerpt from a fantasy/western I’m working on:

Shane puts down the feather duster and lifts a small, bluish bottle from the shelf. He pops off the tiny cork and gives the concoction inside a big whiff. Then he reseals it and asks:

SHANE: Hey, uh… Ma?

Armanda, who is busy mixing up new batches of lotions, does not look up.

ARMANDA: Hm? What, Son?

SHANE: Are you by chance watering down the goods?

She stops and looks up.

ARMANDA: What makes you ask that?

I developed this format of writing SPECIFICALLY with my own ADHD in mind. When I read, it is so much easier to scan for character names in script form than trying to figure out who is speaking when within a paragraph. At the same time, using paragraphs to describe actions and settings is easier than how most scripts handle it. I’m very proud of my writing style and I honestly believe it would be way easier for ND readers to understand.

Me too B, I treat everyone with the same level of respect and talk to them like a normal human being, I couldn't do all that bowing and scraping stuff and I refuse to treat anyone as a lesser being

Needing a deeper understanding of things to work with them, which of course can be a challenge, but in the end it often leads to interesting insights I wouldn‘t have gained without feeling the need to bring some logic behind the fact I‘m learning.