Fellow hermits unite!

Heh, silly topic heading aside, any other autistic folk finding themselves falling into the old grouping of would-be hermits? I'd say we're a bit of a sub group, more leaning towards the mid to high functional. I expressed in a previous thread how my need to have every route of a conversation, every answer, possibility and the likes has effectively closed off the vast majority of public outings, that I find myself confined to my home. In the past I'd argue this would have been life destroying, but given this age of technology, I've finally been able to jump beyond the constraints that come with physical social interaction and sublimate it with forums and so on.

Don't get me wrong, I imagine in the long term this will induce negative issues, but in our lives we're always in a uphill battle, fighting for the lesser of two or many more evils in finding ways to cope with our own oddities that came with out silly minds. But hey, lets make the most of it while we can! 

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  • I've been the extremely reclusive type all my life. When dealing with the outside world gets a bit much, I often fantasise about really heading for the hills and finding myself a cave somewhere to hole up in (quite possibly why I took to caving as a hobby years ago; and hence my username).

    One thing which has always mystified me is why this is deemed to be acceptable if one is doing it for religious contemplation, yet the secular equivalent is so frowned upon. No medieval mythological tale would be complete without a long-bearded cave-dwelling hermit seer to provide the hero with the wisdom necessary to complete their quest. I certainly don't claim that my reclusiveness has resulted in profound wisdom, but I simply don't see why gregariousness is presumed to be the only acceptable mode of living. I do wonder how many of the hermits, ascetics, and anchorites of old were really so devoted to their religious dogmas, or whether many were really just aspies who wanted to get away from civilisation and saw that a different kind of "masking" might allow them the opportunity!

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  • I've been the extremely reclusive type all my life. When dealing with the outside world gets a bit much, I often fantasise about really heading for the hills and finding myself a cave somewhere to hole up in (quite possibly why I took to caving as a hobby years ago; and hence my username).

    One thing which has always mystified me is why this is deemed to be acceptable if one is doing it for religious contemplation, yet the secular equivalent is so frowned upon. No medieval mythological tale would be complete without a long-bearded cave-dwelling hermit seer to provide the hero with the wisdom necessary to complete their quest. I certainly don't claim that my reclusiveness has resulted in profound wisdom, but I simply don't see why gregariousness is presumed to be the only acceptable mode of living. I do wonder how many of the hermits, ascetics, and anchorites of old were really so devoted to their religious dogmas, or whether many were really just aspies who wanted to get away from civilisation and saw that a different kind of "masking" might allow them the opportunity!

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