I don't know how to find a sense of self/identity

I’ve suffered from anxiety and autism all my life.  

Autistic people tend to focus on one specific interest.  When you say “I don't know what I enjoy.”, this is not true.  For you, walking is something that you enjoy and is a specific interest.  For me, flying aeroplanes on a free online flight simulator is a specific interest.

Friendships are important in the long run because without friends, you will feel lonely eventually.  Friends make us feel less lonely and give us support and advice when we are going through tough times.  So, it is not unhealthy to rely on friendships and human connections are essential for happiness.  You can be happy in your own company and many autistic people are happier and less anxious in their own company.  However, to be completely happy, you need to have friends.  You won’t know who you are when you are alone because friends are what makes us complete.

know exactly what you mean, it just feels like "something you do" or "existing", and if someone asks what you like etc, you truly have no answer for it, and then they dont understand, can see in face before next word, and then, yeah, its an, im dunno, never known any different i suppose 

and yep, about being in your own being different from with others, im pretty certain i wouldn't have the public outbursts i can have when im on my own, if i was with someone, i think even what i see as sensory overload things, i think eases a lot more if not alone.

and, well, im sorry i cant give you any advice, i wish i could and that would mean id have a way myself to work this crap about myself out, and, as lonely as my life now is, its always revolved around others, the routine of others, putting others first, doing things for people just, for no particular reason, i dunno, its supposed to  not be a healthy way to live, i can tell you that much.

but, when its all youve known, how do you tell it yourself? and how do you go about, i dunno, changing things? i suppose 

First of all, it might be good to get tested for allergies. What appears as a food disorder might be related to keeping the body from danger. I was forced to eat things I was severely allergic to and then despised for being rail thin when I should've been taken to an allergist. Nothing changed until l ended up in a critical state. Much better now, though.

Discovering/Recovering the sense of 'self' is a thing many go through in their 20s. And it can seem like getting back to that being we were when young, thus the term 'inner' child. 

I have a theory that Autistics go about this in a different way than NeuroTypicals, first because we already feel like a mismatch in society and are confronted by feeling isolated quite often, and that sense can be intense. This is a type of conflict and perpetual conflict with no resolution can create hopelessness. One needs to apply learned rules, as simple as learning the rules to a video game, to get to the next level or break through a ‘wall’.

Erich Fromm wrote a few books, which I recommend to everyone, the first is the Art of Loving followed by The Revolution of Hope. They are about becoming the self in relationship with the world around. 

Whether introverted or extroverted, we are Relational Beings. And many Autistics might be missing practical skills required for investing in relationships.

It is important to spend time getting to know our-selves, and understanding the nature of the self, being human, is like any science. Learn the rules, and apply them. Practice them. The critical thing to note is that, improper use of our nature of being will produce a bad result, a user error, but unlike math, it might not block or ruin the rest of the formula until years later. But we don’t learn in a vacuum. So, I need to practice a rule of kindness in a group setting. Seconding on the hiking group. Or mycology group or gardening group... And practice rules of kindness. The rule being a priori (theory), working out the measurements and application in experience. 

Hume believed we are made of Sense Perception, without which, there is no self. Kant took the matter of Being further and introduced the Categorical Imperative, that the Self in it's best state is one capable of reasoning and adherence to a sense of Duty. Now - this sounds a bit unattainable. But actually, Kant’s proposal is that need not be slaves to our Passions, though our innate passions might be slaves to our senses. Or simply put, we are not slaves to our emotions. But free to reason through them and choose to do what is right over what is simply nature or immediate. 

What this makes me think is that, by applying principles or values which help us Grow into our being - such as being reasonable, responsible, disciplined, and not all at once, but as a long-term trajectory with a sense of becoming and that of becoming with purpose, is quite possibly the best way of uncovering our ‘inner’ self. 

This is possibly more of an uncovering, like peeling off layers of socialised nuances which don’t actually fit with who we are internally. For instance, a simple task of setting a time to pop outside each day. Depending on your mobility, it may look different, but let’s just say it’s to go for a short walk. Or a simple task of making the bed. Unlike NeuroTypicals, these don’t bring a sense of ‘accomplishment’, but a walk reinforces a deeper respect of our human-ness, our biology, while making a bed can be about practicing kindness to the self as a forward-paying gift. Small, seemingly insignificant, but effective. And if we can learn in small steps to be kind to ourselves (not selfish, kindness takes effort, selfishness is effortless), we can easily be kind to others. 

The NT socialised layers, like ‘scales’ we’ve acquired, are a collection of cruelties. Our natural response to them perpetuates a very self-defeating survival-mode. So as we grow into our being, they slide off. They simply don’t fit and slowly become more pointless and apparent as we Grow. 

The end result is that humans feel more comfortable trusting those who Make an Effort, or aren’t Lazy. And earning trust is a valuable skill. Lasting relationships require a continual investment of kindness, intentionality and respect. Learning to respect the self is difficult, but consciously affording respect to another in small ways can help us learn to apply this internally. 

While yes, I agree like Dawn mentioned, we don't forge our inner self, but it could be years of treasure hunting and that may require work.

I feel like this is maybe too much, so feel free to interrogate all of this! 

We are the descendants of many millions of years of social primates, so finding fulfilment by interacting with others is genetically hard-wired. Having said that, most autistics need a lot of alone time to recover from the exhaustion of social interactions. I enjoy being on my own, I have a lot of interests and read a great deal. If you like researching things - I do too - why not try putting your acquired knowledge to use and edit Wikipedia articles that interest you?

And all of the above is ok.

I am pretty happy in my own company, but no one wants to live in complete isolation and I don't either. And we all need people we can rely on in life, and for whom we are that friend relied upon in tough times. Trying new things is good, but we don't need to do it a second time if we didn't like it and it is perfectly ok to prefer to sit and chat. Researching stuff certainly can be a hobby (don't get me started on family history, I'll bore the world to death), as can walking and it's good for you. Have you a local hiking club?

Our identities are not something we need to forge, but come up from within. We just are. We don't necessarily have to label it, though we can if we like. And we all have facets of our being, things we didn't know we were capable of, until life pushed us there. Identity is always a journey of discovery about ourselves and others.

Where identity issues can become unhealthy is when either other people want us to be something we are not, or we feel we have to be other than we are in order to please others or fit in and by dint of being autistic, most of us have run into that one many times. The key is don't do what makes you uncomfortable.

I'm sorry you've had eating disorders. That must be awful. Don't feel you have to answer; asked for reflection...but was that partly to do with needing to fit in too? 

In the end we should do the things we like, alone and/or with people we like doing them with, however simple or adventurous they may be. If that's not making us happy, then it's not 'us'.