Highly intelligent people often have mental health issues because they can ascertain the way the world is on a much higher level, which leads to feelings of despondency.
I suffer Mega-Depression and believe now rather strongly that I am 'On the Spectrum' as they say. I feel distinctly different from most people; like I am looking up and down at them at the same time. It's surreal and disorientating if nothing else. Now, the 2 most striking features of me as a person in my mind are the following; that is my remarkable degree of: a). Depression b). Depression c). Intelligence abovespeculation as incorrect or anything of the like. but this is my personalwould to some degree account for the correlation we are Icontributor, as an isolating and quite highly stressful condition). miraculous, as the body is, finds a way to help compensate for / deal with this. One way it does so is to become MORE INTELLIGENT (perhaps GREATLY so if the depression is a MEGA-depression straight out of Dante's INFERNO, LIKE MINE HAS BEEN). Why greater intelligence? To increase one's ability to engage in what I refer to as 'psychological detoxification'; or to use more colloquial terms; ' working your shit out' or simply 'processing.' The way I think of it, simply but the greater your intelligence, the greater your ability to work through psychological problems (and become the Buddha). People who live ever so comfortably in their heads, simply do not require this ability NEARLY as much. A working hypothesis anyhow.
The problem with very intelligent people is they appear like crazy people to dumb people. And that observation I have made with others being misunderstood or unable to even grasp what they said giving that this person is nuts look... Be it with me and even with non spectrum highly intelligent people but sadly people tend to roll eyes and express their feelings to your paradigm and ideas are the issue and not anywhere near normal to those on the spectrum especially when we tend to rant when it is a subject matter we are completely obsessed with
Highly intelligent neurotypicals seem very well adjusted and generally very happy with life. While they are perfectly capable of matching aspies in depth of thought and intellectual exploration, they rarely do when they're not being required to. NT's who graduate near the top of their ivy league classes who then go on to occupy very influential roles at extremely prestigious work places still prefer to bond over the same stuff that "dumb people" in social or recreational settings. Maybe the trick to NTs’ happiness is that they can turn off the high intelligence off when they don't need to use it, thereby sparing them from despondency but that’s just speculation
I was called"Professor" since I was 10. After a time I learned to use smaller words when talking with most people. I began to feel it was wrong to "show up" other people. It was very lonely trying to act like everyone else. Which I was doing so I would not feel so lonely. I still do this now in my fifties.
I can relate. I had the same problem, starting with my sister, who was seven years older than me. I did not want to compete with her, but whether I did or didn't, she saw it as an underlying issue between us, and never stopped acting superior towards me. The result was the invisibility cloak that I took on so I could disappear into the woodwork. I wore it for decades!! Can't blame her, that's the way it was/is. I can only deal with my own belief system about myself now that we're both grown. And that with a lot of help from others who can see it too.....
I like your invisibility cloak image! That’s exactly what I have used for … well, about 60 years now, and invisibility also requires silence and a second defense line of disguise in case the cloak slips at any moment.
I was always the adult narrator in plays in elementary school. My kindergarten teacher wanted to hold me back because I "didn't have all my beans," as she put it. My parents wouldn't hear of it, and I got no assistance except from a kind first-grade teacher, who pretty much recognized where I was at. She tried to draw me out, and made a pretty big impact on my development. I went back and visited her after I had graduated from college. I don't think she remembered me, but I wanted to thank her for being such a helpful, understanding person.
I was called a know it all I had learned a higher vocabulary. People also called me a stuck up. So I just kept quiet and to myself. Mental health regulation was something I should have done moreso when I was in high school. I'm in my 20s right now. I just felt I never really belonged in social situations.
The giftedness may mask and hide the aspergers so no one understands that you are autistic. And that’s the curse. The blessing I guess is that the giftedness makes you function even with your problems. But again...that’s the curse. No one sees you for who you really are. And if no one helps you develop your skills, that is, if no one realizes that your gifted, you’re not gonna get any help with exploring the benefits of that, either. So, like it’s been for me: school super boring because I was way ahead of the others even though I was younger. Had to just sit there and could never advance (70’s). And I couldn’t POSSIBLY have autism or adhd, right? Because I had all of these inner RESOURCES!! And I was so SMART! Well, what good did that do me? Yes, now, at 49, I’m mad. I’m sad. I’ve missed so much. I could’ve done so much.
Omg. I’m 49, and this sounds strange, but I only realized a few days ago that I’m definitely on the spectrum. I don’t want to write my life story down, but I do want to say that it gives me comfort knowing you are out there and my age. I’m going to have to build my life from scratch at this age. I’m terrified. I’ve given good enough face I thought, and have had my pride keep me warm. But I’ve always been a ghoster, blocked over 400 contacts, gotten off social media. I’m just learning what I am, finally. I wish you the very best of luck. Please, take care.
Christina I was only diagnosed because I brought it up to my psychiatrist who said she came to the same conclusion but didn't want to tell me because there was no "cure" for it. I am 37 and was just diagnosed, looking back at my life it makes perfect sense. I am in the top .001 percentile when it comes to cognitive tests yet my life is filled with failures, suicide attempts that left me paralyzed for years in different limbs, at 4 years old I was tracking hurricanes and was obsessed with meteorology, I never got to become one but I learned everything about it and I run a meteorology website non-profit today. I dropped out of high school in 11th grade on the first day before the teacher walked in. I just got up left my bag and never returned. Went 1 year later took all 5 GED tests at once in college passed them all easily, took 13 college courses in all things I loved, political science, biology, statistics, cellular biology, microbiology,general psychology,abnormal psychology, child psychology, philosophy, none of them adding up to a degree. I have a GPA of 3.9 due to taking a 0 in a bio exam because my then fiancee also in the class was having a bipolar meltdown. I currently have no degree, was 100% paralyzed in my left hand due to an attempt on my life, now only 10% paralyzed when doctors said I would be 30% paralyzed minimum because I did everything they told me to do for their x number of times and I did it until I couldn't. After cutting my ulnar nerve (funny bone ) in half, the pain for the next 2 years was unbearable, I thought of amputation many times, was on huge doses of painkillers, then doctors turned against chronic pain patients because of the "drug crisis" and fell through the systems cracks all the way to ending up in a methadone clinic where a doctor who was arrested 1 years after I was there had poisoned me when I came in on 25mg equivalent by raising my dose to 90mg and then I spent 4 years fighting myself down to 1mg which is where I am stuck at now. I I live with nerve pain every day, and other pain, a failed back surgery at 28 due to a very physically demanding job and running my own business at once. Now I am on disability, I have no idea where my life is going, I am still trying to get off the meds the doctors overdosed me with which caused unimaginable pain in my body that would make me pass out regularly or vomit on a daily basis for 2 straight years. I come from a broken family, nobody understood my gifts and nobody was there to figure out what was wrong with me. As a result I was given over 20 different anti-depressants over a 27 year period, leading to 18 suicide attempts on the meds which had severe side effects 4 of those attempts leaving me clinically dead, 1 requiring a 3 pint blood transfusion. It's been 5 years since I have done anything to myself. Everyone around me my whole life said one of two things when I they got to know me slightly, 1) "Where did you go to college" or two "You were put here for a purpose" yet none of the help came with any of these words from friends, family or anyone. I only realized that my depression, panic attacks and history of suicidal ideation were all symptoms of what my psychiatrist diagnosed me with 2 years ago. Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder which stems from the violence toward me from my alcoholic ex-father and from having Aspergers and my communication being so naturally large in vocabulary that convincing someone of something knowing I am right, I didn't realize they couldn't even understand the language I was speaking or they did and knew I was right so they hit m for it. This led to decades of broken communication that made life worse for everyone. There is so much guilt, sadness, anger at myself for not recognizing this sooner. accepting who I am has helped to start change my life back in the right direction. I am 37 years old. Like the wonderful video creator who is practically at my age, I also has a name in school everyone said to me because of my extremely high intelligence. My name is Beau pronounced Bo like Bo Jackson, so whenever I gave a correct answer in class, I would always hear Bo knows, as in Bo Jackson knows baseball and football, "Bo knows". To this day, I still hear it, it hasn't ended. The main point I'm trying to make is it's never too late, once you know who you are you can change the parameters of the world around you to sync better with who you are as opposed to syncing yourself through masking to the world around you. Yes we all missed out on perhaps being Elon or Bill Gates because we didn't know about this until now, but perhaps we would never have made it to now if we had known back then what we know now. Maybe we wouldn't have challenged ourselves and fought so hard to be 'normal' which on the outside appears to be like we had to use 10 times the energy to do anything that a ntypical would, yet the truth is, we are 10 times stronger because we did use the energy and we are here today, alive and aware of the power that lies within us if we only choose to put the effort into ourselves now, that we spent putting into others for most of our lives. If we do that, we will rise up and our lives will be equal to or better than the average person which for me would be the greatest achievement I could bring to myself and the world. A functional me where my gifts can be unleashed to their full potential..
Christina same. Though I was in the 90’s/00’s. I was in special Ed diagnosed with learning disabilities but I was pushed into college on my own. They ripped my IEP right before my eyes so I had no assistance when I went to college. I lost my scholarships when I had a breakdown and failed Environmental science due to being ghosted by my lab team. Nobody knew that I had disabilities and I got no advocacy. They took my money though
I’m so lucky and grateful to have used my aspiness to own my own business! No one can fire me and if i don’t like someone, i don’t have to work with that person. 😺 If you’re on the spectrum and can freelance work or manage to do entrepreneur stuff, then count yourself blessed!! Much 💗
@Asmr&Me Amazing!! Isn’t it worthwhile? We’re so good at our special interests that we can hopefully 🙏 turn them into professions. People often don’t care about our idiosyncrasies, if we’re amazing at what we do. Much blessings!!
I have always been self-employed, it suits me just fine. I've earned 160 university credits, never went for any specific occupation, what I determined for my employment has absolutely nothing to do with a college course.
I realized I had to "dumb down" myself in high school. I was already struggling with my grades because of how uncomfortable I was at school and at home both, so it wasn't that hard. People didn't want me to be smart, they wanted me to keep making them laugh. I remember I tried really hard on a test and got people saying, "I can't believe that guy got higher scores than us! Jeez", like I was some kind of idiot. Later on in life, I realized also about people wanting to win. Male competitiveness is a foreign concept to me, I just don't get it. Whenever someone would compete against me with a special interest that allowed for it, they typically weren't impressed, just annoyed that I did so well. I even had one person stop being my friend over it. Life is really nonsensical.
Man, when you said they called you "Perfect," it really resonated with me. That wasn't the word for me, for me, unfortunately, it was "smart." I knew what "smart" meant. My brother would call me "Einstein" as an insult. Smart meant that people thought I was on a different level than them. Smart meant talking to me was difficult. Smart meant there was no point in arguing with me if we disagreed, and that we were going to disagree. Smart meant I had unrealistic expectations of my peers. Smart meant I didn't fit in. And to be clear, they were calling me smart, it wasn't a jab, it wasn't slang, it wasn't like my brother calling me "Einstein," it was genuine praise of my intelligence and my analytical skills, but to me, smart just meant that I wasn't normal, and that I wasn't going to be treated normally, and so I didn't want to be associated with that word.
Thanks for calling me out like that (joking, it's fine i know how it feels). All jokes aside, this pretty much sums up my entire scholastic career. Everyone would say how I was so smart, but all I really wanted was someone that I could talk to at my speed. It didn't even have to be the same person for each thing, so long as I had someone. Sadly, that never happened for any of the special interests I found in school. It felt like talking to a wall
In junior high school the kids started calling me EJ - Einstein Junior. They weren't saying it in a bullying sort of way, but rather as a term of respect. I was still terribly socially awkward and introverted, would hyper focus on my interests, and never really felt like I fit in, but it made me feel kind of good when I'd here EJ.
Same here. For the same reasons, I refused to discuss my intelligence with anyone until I was in my late 30s. In private, I'm actually quite comfortable with my intelligence and don't have any ego about it. I can't take credit for it any more than I can take credit for being 6' tall. I know I'm objectively smarter than the majority of people, but that doesn't at all translate to feeling "better" than them. The problem is that _other people_ are threatened by "smart" because they see it through the lens of superiority. I was classified as gifted when I was a kid but due to autism, my grades and behavior didn't match. My teachers were constantly giving me the "not living up to your potential" speech. The way it felt to me was that they were calling me superior and inferior simultaneously. I didn't want to be either. I just wanted to be me. So many of my personality traits fall into the very top percentile points of rarity. Being labeled "gifted" wasn't an ego boost. It was just ANOTHER reminder that I'm not like most people. I grew up in the hood too - where there's an extra layer of stigma against "smart". Very early on I had to learn masking techniques so I didn't stick out so much. Even though I was hyperplexic, I had to really dumb down my vocabulary and use lots of slang around my friends. Now as an adult, I can go into a recording studio with all of my pothead musician friends and seem like I totally belong there. ..but then I could go sit down with a professor of 20th century history and have an academic-level conversation. That kind of duality can really mess with you after a while. My artsy friends don't understand my obsession with research, data, and history. My nerd friends don't understand my artistic, free spirited side. ..and most of society doesn't know how to deal with me from either perspective. I have to compartmentalize all the time.
I can totally relate. I was in my 50's before I realized why my peers glared at me any time the teacher said our tests would be graded on a curve. I also came to learn what an outlier is, and am grateful they were willing to throw those out. My classmates liked me helping them study, but they didn't like curves.
I was " Perfect Girl" . No matter what peoples showed me, i learned so fast, that soon i was left with no friends. Kids seen, that they aren't that special, because i was copy - pasteing their " Talents", better than they did..... I was hated. Badly hated, until i learned that my ability is not, gift or curse, but are my responsibility ower others. I started seek smarter "mind fights ". Every time i loose, or win, i learn. Next time i will be smarter......and now...i just do things i Love, learn for myself, and i have friends, cuz they know, i will get their back safe. 👌
Dita Dīķe I love it when others are good at things, but not if they copy me. Authenticity and integrity are my most important components. You gotta come up with your stuff yourself, and then we can meet at the same level and exchange innovative ideas.
@@Kamiljont now i use my own skills and ideas.👌 You are totally corret, cuz it was not good way to learn, and it doesn't help improve us. I transformed my copy talent into reading. Foto - memory. Brillinant when copy is needed. Medicine uz education when is no need for creativity, perhaps, only in rare situations.
@@DitaDike1993 Wow, thanks for your friendly response! I totally understand. There are always many perspectives, and i suppose we grow out of "mirroring" people and becoming more and more "ourselves"? Subjectively I don't "copy" or "imitate" others, but I do learn from others, so it's a fine line...
I can't tell you with words, how much you've helped me, Paul. My name here, came from the fact that my mother always attributed the worst motives she could to my behaviors.... and then treated me accordingly. I spent 30 years, constantly masking, FOR HER. Now that I know what's going on, I've decided to stop doing that, whether she likes it or not. So the other morning (4th of July and I'm in America), for the first time, I spotted the beginning of her little abusive, cyclical, game, for the first time in my life..... and for the first time I was able to shut her right down. 30 years of her pathological tyrrany, ended on independence day! Thank you, sooooooo much!
Wow.. that sounds just like my dad, who I let go when I was 33. Good for you!! Feels good to get free of someone else's deep seated insecurities and suspicions.
@@aikou2886 it’s a blessing because I have an incredible talent with math that I wouldn’t have with a NT brain. I also am able to have more compassion and understanding than I would without this condition. Finally, I’m able to give advice about this and answer questions that I would not be able to without this
An issue I see in the workplace is that once you have a good performance, you will start getting more and more responsibilities, until you are pushed over your limit and may lack the ability to recognize it and seek help. Then the quality of your work start decreasing and since your self-worth perception is strongly tied to the quality of your work, you start questioning yourself and it throws you in a downward spiral of anxiety and feeling useless.
When you are really good at something, people don't want to play with you any more. When you blitz exams at school or uni, bouncing out of the exam room smiling and feeling good, they hate you for it. When you are at work and "flex", without thinking, you make them feel bad. You end up isolated by your own giftedness. And if you try to play down, they just feel insulted, and still don't want to play.
Having PDD-NOS, I have always been good at memorizing facts and data. In the 80’s there was a game called Trivial Pursuit. At the time I was only a high school graduate, and the social circle I was in were all college graduates. I do remember them saying I wouldn’t know a particular question because I wasn’t a college grad. I would answer it, and disappointment them. I would beat them often, and soon no one wanted to play with me. That did hurt. Eventually I moved out of state.
Being "gifted" definitely contributed to my isolation. And doing well in school sure didn't mean success in the real world. The teachers left me alone because of my grades, so I flew under the radar and didn't get the support I needed. My adult life has been a disaster. Honestly, I'm surprised I'm still alive.
@@garyhintz6721 I remember Trivial Pursuit. I only ever got to play it once. I certainly wasn't trying to make people feel stupid, nor even trying to win, and I'm not even very competitive by nature. I was just enjoying it so much I forgot myself. Unfortunately I realised too late that this was not a good thing, and was not going down well. No-one wanted to play it with me again after that.
@@SarahDale111 I did well in school too, straight A student until I was 15, then I dropped out, much to the horror of everyone. In hindsight, I realize the social pressure was unbearable. The stress of trying to fit in was overwhelming. Then I made one bad life choice after another, was abandoned by my parents and became a walking target for every abusive, controlling person out there. The inner shame of wasting my potential has also been a heavy burden to carry. But when you grow up with no support or understanding from anyone, it's not surprising, I'm also surprised I'm still alive.
"Perfect". You don't realize how much it meant to me to hear you say that it stung or hurt to be called that. I honestly didn't know why it would and still does bother me when someone calls me that. Your description of the feeling is very helpful. Thank you.
My guess of why it'd hurt, is because my mind would instantly react with a whole bunch of evidence against it. It's like how, if you feel unattractive, someone calling you pretty can make you feel worse, because you don't believe it for one ("they're just trying to be nice"), and secondly it reminds you of all the reasons you don't believe it. So it does more harm than good, regardless of the other person's intentions But I'd say "perfect" is even worse. It gives you pressure, more room to fail/fall, and it's also just completely unrealistic (not to mention subjective)
Oh and lastly it's a judgement. Even if it's meant to be positive, they are looking at you, and determining your worth (since we view perfection as a good thing) and expressing that judgement to you
@@syl59281 I have never thought that way... So I would ask you, how would be better to praise or to show that I admire sth in you? I'm a kind of artist, so I look at the world and people and it makes me joy that I can admire them. Just feel happy that a flower smells great or a human has cool abilities or nice dress... How to say that in non offensive way? :)
@@syl59281 I've noticed that a lot of salespeople are now saying "perfect" for the most ridiculous stuff--like "Fill out your name." You write down your name and they say "perfect." It doesn't bother me particularly. It just seems dumb.
Is reading body language in my own way and feeling other people's mental tones in my head a gift or a curse? I always know when you think I'm crazy. I know when you're not talking to me, but talking for you. I get to see into everyone and it's not just the judgment, i can see how much pain people are in, even when they're hiding it. There's so much pain in our minds today. It looks like a mental plague. It seems everyone is trapped in an illusion. -gift- unable to be brainwashed Extremely perceptive and highly alert to changes in my surroundings. And i can recognize intangible patterns of behaviors, speech patterns, someone's consistency. There's more but I'll be back. Our curse is the blessing, we had to suffer to force us to overcome our fears, and what we are weak too, will one day become your greatest strength. This is a spiritual trajectory my friends.
@@kevinbissinger of course. I get what you’re getting at but…. I can’t be brainwashed. I can be told lies, it worked when I trusted that people knew what they were talking about. Hypocrisy is something quite special, projection is even more interesting to look into. Congruency, or consistency is another fun thing to think about in relation to someone divergent considering if I step out of my routine, my mental state goes as haywire. But congruency… ugh, how do I act human again? Constantly learning new things that I absorb into my behavior so unless you know me well, you’d think I’m in the wind. But brainwash, that fired you up. Sorry bro, I instinctively don’t believe in anything… I’ve got to prove it too myself. I’ve lived around people who are manipulative and gaslight. You think you know me, but you’re just irritated. Good luck buddy
I, too can resonate with this. I don’t feel quite to the level you do, Good Knight, or maybe I’m just suppressing it. I admire your strength. Brainwashing doesn’t work with me either, which I attribute to being on the autism spectrum. I was raised to be brainwashed one way, but all of my being pushed back even when I didn’t know why. IMO, that is a true gift, to be able to protect yourself from being controlled.
The first thing I thought when I saw the title of this video (before watching, of course) was how my sensory "giftedness" can be a blessing and a curse. I am a super-taster, and a super-recognizer, I have a steel trap memory, mild synesthesia, vocal flexibility (mimicry), and am very sensitive to smells. This makes me an exceptional cook; I can discern small amounts of "secret" ingredients in restaurant dishes, and recreate them at home after only eating said dish once, sometimes months afterward. I can identify smells immediately, and detect odors before anyone else in the room. If the building was on fire, I'd probably start evacuation before the smoke alarms went off. The people I talk to at wine tastings are the sommeliers, not the guests. I can compare color shades, hues and tints and match them perfectly. My mom is a graphic designer, and she asks me for help all the time. I can remember and recognize faces with extreme accuracy, and remember the names of actors, athletes, politicians, (any celebrity really), and can distinguish between Koreans, Vietnamese, Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Russian, Turkish, Mongolian, Indian, Pakistani etc. Show me a face, and I'll tell you their ethnic makeup. I'm great at trivia games, and I'm also a very good mimic. I have no trouble sounding native when speaking foreign languages; accents and tones are no problem for me. All that being said, I am cursed to never be able to enjoy my mother's cooking. It's not abysmal- other people like it fine- but most of the time it nauseates me. I feel really bad about it. 😞 I find I'm disappointed quite often with my food in average restaurants, and can't just enjoy with everyone else. I am unable to eat chilli, broccoli cheese soup, fish tacos, gumbo, or meatloaf unless I'M the one that made it. (That's my list of risky public food🚫) Similarly, if someone sprays air freshener or Lysol, has a scented candle burning or a Glade plug in, I will either vomit, get a headache, or have an asthma attack. Someone's mild BO can make it so I am never able to be in the same room with them, and I can smell hundreds of crotches just entering a public restroom. Some people, I can smell what they ate the night before. Rancid hand lotion literally makes me panic.😵 I have argued many times over colors that are radically different to me, but everyone else thinks they are the same color. Half the time nobody knows who I'm talking about because I remember obscure appearances of public figures, or bring up a famous person or painting that resembles an actor, etc or make a joke about what someone looks or sounds like that falls flat because no one has ever heard of or can remember the thing I'm comparing to. It's a curse because I'm isolated in my sense of humor, my culinary enjoyment (food should be enjoyed with friends and family, gathered around a table- it IS social), my literal ability to stay in the same room with others; my thoughts, my memories, my opinions, my sensations are always my own- never understood or shared. No one feels what I feel, tastes what I taste, sees what I see, remembers what I remember, smells what I smell, hears what I hear. It makes it impossible to relate to anyone, and it bears the added curse of everyone assuming I'm "overreacting" about every sensation I feel. It's a curse because more often than not, I'm uncomfortable while everyone else is fine. I studied Chinese in university and am now bilingual. I work as an interpreter, and people who I speak Chinese with on the phone are always somewhat mistrustful and suspicious when I show up to the job as a big ol' white lady. They always say "No, we want the Chinese lady we spoke to on the phone." It takes a while to convince them that I AM the lady they talked to on the phone. 😖 I am living with my mom while my own house is being renovated, and I had to throw out all of her decade-old lotions and creams and buy her new because the entire house would smell like rotten corpses and petroleum every time she'd shower or wash her hands.😫 She loves the diffusers and the candles, too. I finally told her "just pretend I'm pregnant", and she finally understood how these smells were affecting me. She still continues to microwave leftover fish, however. 🤢 I would say that having ESP (extreme sensory perception) is a double-edged sword, for sure.
Thanks so much for sharing! The part about smells really resonates with me. I guess it's artificially scented candles or potpourri that give me a massive headache & make my teeth hurt. I could never walk down the candle/potpourri aisle at the craft store or walk into a Yankee Candle Co store. Perfume doesn't affect me as severely for some reason. Also, I can smell people's insides or guts, I guess. Usually it smells like awful salami or just death or stale air if I'm close enough to catch a whiff of their breath. I don't eat meat, so I thought it might be due to that, but I wasn't always vegan & could still experience these awful smells coming from certain people. It's unbearable, but others don't seem to notice.
I’m a very creative person and enjoy doing art and writing however when it comes to socialising as someone with borderline Asperges syndrome I find it very draining and extremely hard. I can’t give eye contact or make small talk so I end up just zoning out which can be embarrassing. I’ve now learned to adapt but in a world where communication is important this is one negative that I’ve had to live with
I have a mind file for small talk. I usually 'cut 'n' paste' from a mental bag of scrabble tiles. I use an appropriate 'voice file' or 'sound file' to zing things along a bit. The occasional raise of a eyebrow, a shrug and a sage saying. Most of these are part of my mental 'desktop' or, as Daniel Dennett would have it 'A Benign User Interface'. I've been using this method for many years. Amiability and politeness also helps sweeten things along. I can't get along with antagonism or negativity. I absorb it far too easily, then I'm processing it for days and have to shut down. I try to avoid those that look trouble. A friend of mine said once that he could detect my cogs whirring and ratcheting as I would analyse people before deciding to make first contact. Fortunately, I am old enough to read the more challenging ones by general demeanor, body language, vocal patterns, etc. I can also immerse myself by drawing abstracts in a sketchbook, sitting peripherally, listening or cogently observing people, with a pot of coffee and one or two books or magazines - my sentinals - that are also part of my library/BUI/desktop.
I relate to this. Creativity seems to be the basket i have all my eggs in. But in social situations i often feel like a ghost. Except for my small group of like minded oddballs
I feel eactly the same as you. This video made me cry. A lot of time has passed since I felt such flow of emotions from thinking about my past and realising there are people out there like me who can support me, and make my life feel worth living.
My mother even spanked me once for trying to eat with the left hand. No hard feelings. I know she will never understand that and I can't relate to her either. she has come to accept me and my "flaws" with the passing of time.
This episode is by far the best one in my opinion. I thank you so much. I was diagnosed late and never figured why I was being alienated for excelling at work, consistently solving complex engineering problems in my area of interest most times in a matter of days/weeks instead of years when compared to my peers, and often in a save-the-day situation. And those are with self taught knowledge versus the level of training my peers had to go through. Obviously your video resonates to not just myself but also with what my kids are going through as well. Kudos to you; you are helping all aspies, and keep up the great work!
Blessing at first, curse later. Being able to go through everything up until high school with no problems, just intuition and passively paying attention, getting good grades and such, then you get into high school and suddenly have to start actively paying attention, you can’t just intuitively guesstimate everything and be correct 98% of the time anymore. You now have to study, which you’ve never learnt how to do, as you’ve never had the need to do so. this is where I’m currently at, about to take my final assignment exam of whatever it’s called, As luck would have it, I just hit a massive burnout for the first time ever
Tall poppy syndrome... It hasn’t appeared until lately, when I started loving myself, after my divorce, and feeling capable and good at things, this started happening to me. And became so painful and just anytime I felt good about myself, I was hated. It’s weird. Not only bullying, but even violence. I don’t get it. Am I supposed to make myself small, or life will be about fighting? Luckily, I seem to have found a few ”sane” people who can take it when I feel good or when I act a little akward. So they are that social shield you talked about earlier.
It's called a crab pot and Brene Brown describes this phenomon in her work. The Courage of Imperfection. I think the truth of the matter is, is that we dont want to feel less than our peers. If one peer manages to escape, it is easier for people to bring them down than to do the work and lift themselves up. And my own sollution to that.. is to break off those connections that take you down. Trim the dead branches from your life. It may sound egocentrical. It may sound mean. It may sound awful, but honestly, there are only so many hours in a day and energy is limited. I am blessed with a group of friends that I deeply admire for their social skills and the abillity to express themselves. They are a lot better than I am and that's ok. I can learn from them and be there for them when they need me. My talent lies elsewhere.
You probably got i a narcissistic relationship they can appear autistic at times but have different motives for the same behaviors. Another big reason i think alot of people res respond badly to autistic people
@@shaunjackson1142 I think that is an interesting point that you are raising. I found that autistic people can be complete and utter sweet hearts that want to connect to people but have difficulty doing that, can be bitterly dissapointed in the world and respond to that by lashing out. Some people are gentle, kind and patient. Those people will find loyal friends in those that are gentle, kind and patient, regardless whether they are autistic or not. To have a friend, you must first be a friend. Making and maintaining friendships is skill that can be taught and can be refined. My autistic friends are some of the most welcoming and supportive people that I know. Then there are those that gave up on forming relationships and either content themselves on being alone or start influencing/manipulating people for just their own benefit. However, I think that the most important reason that people respond badly to autistic people, is because autistic people react different to neurotypical behavior. It is a different wavelength that requires work from both parties to atune to. The different parties lack a natural understanding from each others point of view. Narcism is a beast in and of itself. Narcism is rooted in insecurity and fear. The behavior that follows can be ruthless and hurtful. Throw in autism and good lordy Lord, you are in for a painful ride.
Shaun Jackson Yes. I find that people mirror themselves in me, but thinking that what they see is narcissism, why they behave that way, and put it on me. People cannot tell the difference, or do not want to know the difference. Maybe they can not answer to my honesty and they then make me a mirror of what they wish to see... like I’m a wishing well. Because maybe I don’t put up a sheild the way others do...they think I answer to the vain side of themselves?
this really resonated with me, i was being called perfect and all sorts of other words that put me on a pedestal as an insult too... and even when i complained about it, people were jealous of me because they want that ego stroke as well and cant see the alienation that causes it. alas no single person to talk about your problems with. thats why the negative sides of being gifted need to be addressed without any strange ego complexes!!!
I am seeing this exodus of old friends, relatives and community members at an age where I can't begin again to forge relationships. It is fortunate that Aspies enjoy their own company. Their energy comes from being in a private safe space. I have never heard anyone describe this as you have in this video. Thank you Paul.
I feel as though I'm not allowed to ask for things, and I'm scared of being in a relationship. But knowing I'm not alone helps me feel better. Thank you.
I guessed “perfect” before you said it Paul!!! Being called Little Miss Perfect or Perfect Bree was something I dealt with in intimate relationships. Thank you for this! 💫
Thanks for the video! I always had good grades in school and never really got to brag about it because it would alienate me from those I wanted to hang out with. I'm glad that other people share the same experiences!
Wow this has brought so much together about one of the reasons I struggled to make friends in high school and college. My reasoning at the time was that if I become super talented and stand out at something, then I would earn people’s respect. Lots of people respected my skill, but they all kept their distance. I never connected the dots in this way before. Thanks for the insight!
Oh man, yeah word "PERFECT" really stung me whole life, drained my energy, provoking me to stand out of all no matter what the situation is.....its burning me out n now l feel the hunger for admiration has gotten me lost my inner as a human...l'm good for everone except for myself n my close ones...
Gifted people generally struggle in school and are bullied not only by the other students but by teachers. The bullying continues into adulthood, and occurs especially in the work place. The intellectual side overshadows the hypersensitivities and traits which are common to ASD (roughly 35% overlap of traits) and ADHD (overlap roughly 30%). To be gifted is to be alone and constantly misunderstood and have different needs no one will recognize unless in a child who is identified and given assistance. You have hide, blend in near perfectly, because adults are threatened the most and career sabotage and shunning becomes a reality. Some of the best help I have found has been from tips from the ASD community. Thank you for bringing up "Perfect", it is a word used just before others decide to cut themselves out from speaking to me and it always hurts. The other name that comes up is "Robot", and that is because of delay in personal emotion processing but still having instant ability to feel and know what others are feeling. There is no shutoff, so others emotions are entirely draining. When bullied, all the obvious traits go on display and that's when others out you publicly. Sometimes having to blend in has gone on for so long you forget the best of yourself. I am a gifted female and your work has been great for helping me untangle some of the traits I have that are not covered well or rarely mentioned in gifted information. I actually feel less alone as there are more people with shared traits out there than I thought. Thank you for doing the work you do, it is appreciated.
I think it’s great you mentioned your sports ability, from childhood I had “chasey skills”good spatial awareness and anticipation skills watching cues in traffic, crowd movement, body movement. I ride motorcycles as a form of relaxation and can manage the level of sensory input that requires, I also became a qualified dive master in scuba diving. I can cook to a high level, I’m good a physical things. Even had my reflexes measured by a physician who said they’re at a rate equal to a practised professional sport person without me making an effort. I struggle with studying subjects I don’t mesh with ie, chemistry, algebra. I just don’t “get it”. I really wish I could find a UNI specialty that I could study so I would have a degree to my name. I’ve seen autism videos that says autistic people aren’t particularly well coordinated and don’t agree with that to be used as a measure.
Wow this is me! First time I've seen this anticipation and spatial awareness spoken of. I use it in sports and day to day life e.g dodging people traffic to get through rush hour as quickly as possible.
Really appreciate these thoughts. I have taught myself to be non-competetive to the point where I can't enjoy most competitive activities. When I win, all I see is someone else feeling bad. For this reason, I really enjoy things with indirect conflict, where you are competing against a system or a status rather than directly against another player. Things like modern european style board games and disc golf are good examples.
Same!! I killed the competitive side of me in middle school when I realized no one likes someone who wins all the academic contests. Then I entered a bimbo stage where I played a little dumb and wore skirts (btw I’m a girl) and things were WAY easier for me. Sad that that was the only coping mechanism I could think of lol I’m still a bit bimbo-like now at 25 because it’s the only thing that’s ever worked for making friends and finding partners
As far as I remember Ive never had a thirst for victory, just for doing my best and thinking others would enjoy the victory more than me since I was over empathetic to them feeling negative things for starting to lose
See I really enjoy the idea of friendly rivalry. It is actually really enjoyable to have competitive activities with someone that can discuss the ways for each of us get better.
I identify so hard with this - I have had to work extra-hard in life to NOT alienate people by being better at certain things than them. I found that teaching and forming partnerships where I can lift people up really helps. Still, it's lonely at the top, because I am too anxious to form meaningful relationships with people I really look up to. I feel too awkward all of the time. Not worthy.
(This is a long rant, my apologies) I definitely feel like this sometimes. I'm multi-talented in the arts, I can paint, draw, sculpt, carve. I can play cello and compose on the computer and analyze music theory. Thankfully, none of my friends make me feel like I'm "too good" ... Though, it's partially because i rarely pull out the stops around my friends. I'm a music major, but most of my friends aren't music majors. often when I tell people about my major they go off about how talented I must be. They hear me play I feel a distance between me and them, and they say I'm talented. And I *am* talented, if it was hard work alone then I would not nearly be as good as I am. Unfortunately, while I could boast about my talents, I cannot say the same for my academics. I was homeschooled most of my life and I did well in high school. I didn't really start struggling until my sophomore year college. I cannot for the life of me be motivated to do research projects in English and history classes. All I can think about is, "But this is all pointless. Why am I writing this when the only demand is a teacher wants to read it". Why does the teacher always disagree with me that there's inadequate information on my topic. I know for a fact that I could write a *lot* about something with a 3-5 sources, more than I could write about something with 10 sources. I can synthesize information but that's too many sources for me. And then theres NO real demand or reason for my research to be done. The teacher is not offering me a hypothetical situation that would demand I write this paper, it's just "because you need to be able to do this. its standard" By the end of the paper I hate it so much that I would never want anyone else to read it anyway. It's worthless and I hate it. But you can't graduate college without writing research papers. I've said to myself so many times, if only I could replace English class with math class. I know so many people who are bad at math and grade at English. They have such a higher chance of graduating because of that. It's not fair for me! I know I'm bad at research, so I would never go into a research field! I shouldn't have to forfeit my college degree because of that failing.
@Spookywood 'net My own difficulty is that I spent an extreme amount - most of my adult life - as a sole carer. Art and drawing was my siege wall against the stress of that and the ambition of eventually being able to enjoy that to the full spurred me on. Now time has released me from the caring role, I have C-PTSD on top of the Asperger's and an essential - inherited from my grandmother - tremor in my hands. Basically, that to which I was so looking forward is being teared ruthlessly from my grasp. I am trying to hang on to the hope that something will reign in the tremor properly. At the moment, the hateful thing destroys the exhilaration, my dance, which was me, within that world. Having that robbed from me seems that fate is having a laugh.
@Spookywood 'net In my experience you are seen as a show off so you become easily outsided,I wish it was different.more power to you for being an authentic person
Thank you so much for sharing this,, I really feel heard bc it’s the truth. School can be difficult at times bc people hate when I’m doing good. I’m very competitive and there’s been times where students literally walked out of the class bc they were mad I was getting the answers right. But you validated what I was thinking, that I can’t lessen myself, I can’t BE normal. It’s not my fault for being gifted in some things, it’s just sad w relationships bc everyone turns on me at school when they see me doing good.
I have found that my intuition is my super power. It’s never been wrong and I so want to be wrong it upsets me! I’ve never been wrong about people, places, all kinds of things like that. I so want to be wrong so I can go and learn from it! I want to learn!!!
This has brought back so many hidden and long-concealed memories of my life growing up that I've got tears streaming down my face. Funny how I can see that's irrational and yet the more you said, the stronger my reaction.
My autism may have put a curse on my driving and when growing up in my adolescent, I lacked close friends and had sociopaths taking an advantage of me posing as my close friends since I didn't know how to socialise. Since I have settled down, my autism had been a massive blessing, using my repetitive behaviour as a tool for maintaining employment as a full time cabinet maker, capable to run my own autistic UA-cam channel and be able to live independently. I also great with socialising other people who are severely autistic and I have a great social bond with this person at Different Journeys autistic social meetings.
So relatable. It was interesting when you mentioned ping pong (table tennis). I'm ambidextrous. I easily play ping pong with either hand. I rake, sweep, brush my hair, shave, brush my teeth, with both hands. My dad "caught" me raking and sweeping with the "wrong" hand, or trying to switch up writing, and would not allow me (in his sight) to use my left hand. In baseball, with friends, I batted slightly better left than right. When dad was my coach, the one time he allowed me to try to show him I could bat left handed, rather than allowing me to use the pitching machine, he removed it and put the best pony league pitcher up. Of course I failed miserably. Why, I wonder, was my dad so obsessed with disallowing my ambidexterity? I literally have no idea which hand is supposed to be the "right" for sweeping and raking, to this day, and I'm 52. I was told I was "gifted" in 3rd grade. It wasn't a gift. Academics didn't help me understand play. To this day. My own and only brother literally waved me away when I was trying to talk about these things, when I asked him if he'd watched any videos I have shared, because I lack a formal Asperger's diagnosis. I can't even engage with him, because he, and mom, refuse to recognise the real issues I have, as if, "everyone feels that way sometimes." Sure. Sometimes. They don't get, or seem to care, that for me, it's all times. This is like walking around wearing an inflatable fat suit nobody else can see, bumping into things others easily avoid, while they watch me and, what, think I'm pretending for attention or sympathy? I don't understand others' obsession with forced handedness, nor their willful blindness to disabilities in otherwise "normal" people. Does it just make their lives easier, imagining, "It's all in your head."? It certainly doesn't make it easier for me, especially when I need and ask for help.
Tall Poppy Syndrome! My biggest curse. My brother beat me up every time I had a good report come home from school. I excelled at school. It was my "safe place" but also contributed to the abuse I received at home. It was a vicious cycle. Because I was doing great with my schoolwork, nobody saw the signs of abuse, either. But I loved school, so I wasn't going to let my teachers down either. I learned to hide my reports until my brother wasn't around. I never knew there was a term for this.
I excelled in math, art and music, read at a high level at a young age, and was good at all the puzzle games esp Tettis/Tetris Attack was my favorite and no one could beat me at that specific game. I was called a "Know-It-All" and have heard "Shut up" so many times we could play a drinking game and be blacked out within minutes lol. Also I heard "F You" so many times, mostly from guys who supposedly liked me. I am highly creative, can draw and write and I also make jewelry and design accessories. Ironically, I was making a journal about how iam good at complex things that most NT people can't do, but when it comes to basic things, I can barely "function" yet many people cannot and will not believe it is even possible. When you are so good at the "hard" stuff, how could you possibly struggle with the easy things???? That's what they truly believe and why it's so difficult for "HF" Aspies/Autists. Because we often need help too. Thank you for sharing your experiences, this is immensely helpful. 👍🏽💕
My two cents: the blessing for me has been knowing deep matters thoroughly, while the curse has been people whom I live with ostracizing me because I won't placate to their controlling nature.
I'm only just beginning to look into getting diagnosed (aged 24), after falling down the old rabbit hole of looking up everything possible to do with Aspergers and finding many relatable symptoms and childhood stories. The one from this video would be the "Perfect Paul" moment - I was called "Mr Perfect" by my family! I've always been a massive perfectionist and had to get everything right either in the intellectual area of school or practical things at home, i.e. calling my brothers out when they didn't do something correctly with their homework or housework. I feel quite well-adjusted now, apart from finding a 9 to 5 a horrible way of living, but knowing whether I have Aspergers would help make sense of a lot of my life.
Look at the state of politics in America. A person with half the social skills it takes to make it will outdo someone who is extremely smart and has expertise. We do not value intelligence and competency at all which is why we are in the sad state we're in now.
We (as a people) not only don’t value intelligence or competency anymore - we actively disdain it. While simultaneously telling everyone that it’s worth more and more money and they should be willing to go further and further into debt to get it. And then not hiring them if they don’t have it and haven’t had to acrue that debt. It’s senseless.
I will also say being gifted at school can back fire. I found school easy all the way up to year 12, I rarely found it challenging or interesting. I also never developed a study ethic as I always got the work done in class. When year 11 came around the level of difficulty or work increased significantly and I was not prepared. I ended up getting asked to leave school, the result of this was 6 years of unskilled jobs until I decided I needed to go to University to have my intellectual talents recognised and utilised. I am actually now a teacher as I thought I might try and capture kids like me not being challenged early in their schooling, however it is harder than I thought, especially as I struggle forming connection with students and motivating them, the talented students I do see only want to do the work they need to to get by.
I am now in the position that I don't like the career my degree led me and I would like to go back and study IT, however I know have a family and kids. Teaching is currently supporting my family. I would like to be able to teach and study and look after my family but I don't have the spoons
For me my word was "innocent" which was tossed around a lot in my early high school years. That I had never dated (and still haven't since; 12 years have past), that I didn't understand the innuendos tossed around, that I didn't cuss and refrained from doing so (I just really didn't like it), that I had never done drungs or drank and never wanted to, that I didn't like parties and that I was out of the loop on so many social things associated with maturing; for all this I was considered "innocent" and something my friends "needed to protect". At first it was something that made it so the older kids in band hung out with me since I wasn't friends with any of my classmates since I had just moved to the area less than a year prior and I was just considered too wierd or awkward. It felt nice to hang out with the older kids but this branding of "innocence" and "cuteness" really took away my sense of agency and removed any ability of mine to take myself seriously enough to work myself up to trying to socialize let alone initiate relationships or friendships with my peers: thid infantilization meant there would always be something I wasn't privy to that would forever be outside my understanding. Despite being surrounded by friends in the high school band collective, my "innocence" was just a reminder of how lonely I really was. Then with my classmates I was no better when I'd show my intelligence with my tests, essays, reading comprehension, information retention, and class participation but could not keep up with any of the "busy work" and would procrastinate or just not do entire projects because I was such a jumbled mess when it came to work outside of class. On the academic side, and this had been the case since elementary school, it was always the whole "you are so smart but if you just APPLIED yourself..." thing. "Brilliant but lazy" as Otto Octavius says in Spider-Man 2. But of course just like Peter Parker, I had a whole life's worth of conflict hiding within me out of sight to observers; my secret struggle. "Calm waters" my mom calls it.
My grades skyrocketed when I was most depressed (couldn't fit in socially after numerous moves, family dealing with consequences of DV, could only focus academically -- even with my worst subject, mathematics, I managed to get tests in the 90s). It was only when I was experiencing psychosis in college that my grades faltered. I had to drop a course because its weekly quizzes were too fast paced, still...I failed no course. Despite the brain fog, the overwhelm, my brain still manages to retain enough information to pass exams. I appear to be well and privileged, but I felt that I've been falling through cracks all my life. Apparently ASD runs in my maternal side and we all have experienced significant trauma that led to some degree of alexithymia. I don't believe IQ has anything to do with us, it's the bottom-up processing and hyperfocus that supercharges our capabilities.
Omg! The isolation bit! And perfectionism. And being placed in a gifted class but struggling at school. I can’t believe no one questioned it. If I was gifted, why was I not at the top of my class? But no one seemed to question it.
This definitely was my case. Teachers used to call me a wonderchild in elementary school and I was considered gifted. I didn't even study much but my grades were high, I had a natural ability for languages, I don't remember a time I would actually sit and study English, for example, I kind of just got it (it was a foreign language for me). I was also very good in maths, history, and basically all other classes, and also have a talent for art. I finished high school with straight A's in all centralized exams I took. So basically I graduated with A's without even putting in effort of actually studying and... absolutely no social skills. I was always the odd one out and to this day didn't understand what was wrong with me. I have no trouble of expressing what I know and think in my head by writing, but when I try to express my opinion or insight verbally, nothing even comes out. But when I am telling someone about things I'm particularly interested in, I can't stop talking and delving into details those poor people even haven't heard of. Been bingeing on your channel since yesterday and going to continue to. Really good information and helps to understand myself more. Thank you.
I 100% agree about perfectionism being a sort of compensation mechanism. In my own personal work, I've recently come to the realization that my own perfectionism has been a major component of my masking - at least on a subconscious level. I've come to believe that I adopted it as a way to create this "perfect" image of myself that creates a blind to prevent others from seeing my struggles and shortcomings. And, hilariously enough, my perfectionism has even come to plague my attempts to overcome it! "I'm trying to overcome my perfectionism, but I'm just not doing well enough." At least there's a bit of absurdist humour in that lol.
Paul I don't usually comment in your videos but I really enjoy them because you're the one UA-camr that I have found talks (with no clickbait) about Asperger's. I have Asperger's and I'm really grateful that your channel exist so I can feel related with something in daily life. I just wanted to tell you...the last part when you talk about that word, hit me hard. When you said it, It sounds so painful and sad that makes me remember the times I feelt the same way. Have a good life Paul, thank you for everything. And despite everything and everyone I still think that Asperger's a gift.
As a recently diagnosed autistic, I find I’m learning new things more and more everyday. Tall Poppy Syndrome is what I’ve lived with for my Entire Life, but I wasn’t able to understand it until seeing this video. Thank you! Every bit of information helps me understand myself more everyday. 🙏🏽😊
I was misdiagnosed with high functioning autism. It turned out to be giftedness, my parents always told me to “accept who you are” and i kinda grew into the body of someone with autism, right now i know that i am sociable and I have peoples skills but back then I was scared of social interactions and especially when teachers or parents were near by telling their child i was autistic. I had special needs in my class, I clearly didn’t need them nor was I keen to having them, that sped worker was like my crippling exoskeleton. I knew I was smarter than others and often tried to adapt to their understanding of things and not just blurt out how quantum mechanics work, my mum read on giftedness and high cognitive potential and it turned out i was perfectly fine and just within the 99th percentile. So if you have been diagnosed with high functioning autism but you don’t feel “different” socially, please consider re diagnosis since giftedness is being more and more studied and comprehended.
This is very true, teachers should have seen this in me, I had bad grades, couldn't act right, could not learn like others, so I've learned more In life , than school.
I wrote a string trio earlier this year. I don't need praise because my talent has already been confirmed multiple times by experts in the field. But when I share the music with my friends, all of a sudden not a single person wants to listen to my music anymore. They simply ignore me. And I need the emotional sharing with my inner circle of close friends to keep me motivated. I was expecting that I could get my music performed at my friend's place. FINALLY after all these years! Now what?
I can so relate to this! The versatility and being good at so many things; even playing badminton with my left hand. The Tall Poppy - Never heard of this before, but yes, the jealousy. I've been told once that I remind people of their inadequacies. But I'm just being myself...
It is more of a curse. Being bullied at school, having less friends, difficulty in finding a suitable job are the highlights of an aspie life. Guys, don't deceive yourself into thinking this is more of a gift than a curse. The number one skill needed to survive in real life is communication skills which aspies lack and because of this, will be either unemployed or underemployed. Perfectionists or those who get lost in small details will fall behind in life. Aspergers is definitely a disability!
I've often heard that I didn't have to work for anything, earn my grades at school, etc. It's said to mean that I don't understand adversity and that my success is mere luck. As an autistic person, though, I work much harder than others in areas that go unseen. I work very hard to compensate for executive dysfunction, manage my sensory processing differences, and keep my mask on. To anyone who thinks life is easy for me, I hope they learn to understand that everyone struggles differently, and that I can't help what my strengths are.
This makes sense to me. When I was in grade school, I ran into 'Tall Poppy Syndrome' or as people where I grew up called it 'Tall Nail Syndrome' because if a nail is sticking up above the level of the board, what happens? It gets hammered down until it is flush with the rest of the nails. I struggled with anything that required me to use hand-eye coordination or to read small print and line things up (such as symbols in a math problem for example) because of my life-long vision problems that had slowed my development in many ways. I didn't know that I was autistic at the time because this was the 70's in a very small town in the American Midwest, so people didn't know about such things back then. You were either 'normal' or you were a 'weirdo' or worse and were ignored if you were lucky, or bullied if you weren't. One of the few strengths I had was a phenomenal memory for things that I had heard. I could hear something just a few times, once if I was really concentrating, and remember it perfectly. This really came in handy when it came to singing and playing instruments. I couldn't read or write very well because of my vision problems, but I could hear and sing very well. I was in choir and band at school and at church. The other kids, I found out later, were very jealous of the way that I could listen to the music director sing something, or play it on the piano, or even to hear it on the radio or a record and be able to sing it back almost perfectly without any practice. Just a little practice, and I could perform the song well enough to win talent contests and get very high grades in music. I couldn't read sheet music though because the pages were an almost indecipherable jumble of blurry, doubling images to me. I had to concentrate so hard to see the page correctly, that I didn't have any mental capacity left over for remembering what each note sounded like as I read it. If I tried to sing or play an instrument while looking at the pages, I couldn't read it. The other kids teased me something terrible about that because some of them could read sheet music fairly well. Most of them couldn't memorize very well though and it took them ages to learn a song well enough to perform it without sheet music, while I had no problem with that. I never gave them a hard time about not being able to memorize music easily, so they figured that they could make themselves feel better about their inability to sing or play by ear through teasing me about my inability to sight read. This jealousy of theirs really got bad when we started doing contests where the judges wanted the kids to perform without sheet music. This was a real struggle for my classmates, but second nature to me. I got top scores way before any of them did through the years of middle school and high school. It took me a while to figure out how to channel this ability into other areas of my life where I had trouble, but I finally did by the time I was in high school. I would record myself reading things that I was supposed to memorize for tests and then listen to these tapes over and over again wearing headphones and writing it back down again just like I took notes in class lectures to help me focus on what the teacher was saying. Few other people could read my notes, but I could and that was what mattered. I was so glad when they taught us how to use typewriters in high school! After that, I started typing up all of my assignments. Trying to write well enough by hand so that the teacher would even grade it was torture before that. We had teachers who would give us assignments back and make us do them again if our penmanship was poor, then they'd reduce our grade for being late after we finally got it written down better. Writing neatly took all the concentration I had, so I had to write everything twice - once to the get my thoughts down, and again to make it gradable. Anyway, I used my ability to remember by listening to create audible flash cards of a sort. This worked very well for memorizing things in science and history, so I started doing much better in those classes. Being able to type really helped my English grades as well. Math was still hard and it would take me hours to do my math problems because I had to cover up everything on the page except for the problem with a sheet of paper with a hole cut in it, then rewrite the problem very carefully on my answer sheet, then try to remember what the teacher had said about how to do that kind of problem, sometimes having to record myself reading the chapter about it in the book and listening back to that (because reading took so much concentration that I often didn't comprehend what I was reading at the same time). I would spend a lot of my free time in upper middle school and early high school on weekends, evenings and even during the summer, just trying to learn this stuff. My mom even hired a retired schoolteacher she knew to tutor me in math and English because she wasn't very good at math nor spelling herself. I think my mom paid her with having her eat meals with us while she was at our house. School was a real struggle, but I managed to get good enough grades to get scholarships for college. In college, all that hard work I had to do in order to make learing in school work for me paid off because I had become able to practically teach myself - something that some college professors wanted us to learn by the time we graduated anyway. Here, I already knew how. I had scraped by in public school - my low grades in math bolstered by my high grades in music and art. In college, however, I got A's and B's. It amazed people back home when my mom showed them my college grades. I sang in one of the student center churches and for fun in college, but decided to follow my fascination with plants and become a botanist rather than a professional musician because everybody I grew up around told me that being a musician isn't a very stable, good paying job. Who knows, maybe I'd be a famous singer or something now if I had grown up around people who encouraged me to pursue that. It's alright though because I really enjoy being a professional gardener and landscaper. I probably would have really struggled with all the sensory overload of concerts, travelling on tour etc anyway. I can't stand noisy crowds. Even in high school music and stage play contests where the crowd was well under 100 people (most of whom were rather quiet compared to crowds I've been in when visiting big cities), I had to ignore everything past the edge of the stage and focus on the director in order to avoid being overwhelmed by it all.
This reminds me of a book we have at home Super Dooper Jezebel, by Tony Ross. Worth a read. Also I often think about his book The Three Sillies in terms of ASD/NT dynamics.
This is exactly me. Except the jealousy unfortunately came from my family. I don't like talking about it with others because it sounds conceited to claim you were a victim of jealousy. So I was mostly alone in my suffering. It built up over the years I presume and then I experienced betrayal that almost broke me :( I constantly toe the line between wondering if it is me or others that is the problem. But as a person I am so idiosyncratic (and not always in a good way) that it is impossible to for me or anyone trying to help me to know with any certainty. I have had to come to terms with living in social purgatory. I am getting better at accepting that I cannot judge myself or others in the same capacity as most. But there are days where the uncertainty and loneliness catches up with me. I have to live to my full potential but the cost has been extremely steep. But we go on.
I once got fired from a job for performing too well. The supervisor said I made the other employees look bad. Just prior to that, they were very pleased with me for helping them pass their inspection after they failed previously.
Thanks Paul, this was a really good topic that isn't often touched upon. I hope you now have friends who love you for who you are & build you up & not tear you down. Totally get the "really competitive" & it deterring others because they know you'll beat them & they just don't want to play because of the ability you have. People have said "your so arrogant!" When all I did was play at my ability level. You deserve the success you have in what you are doing now as well & it must be very satisfying to be helping others understand AS 👌 Your plant is looking really happy & healthy 🌿 Take care 🙋♀️ & just letting you know my Husband would really enjoy a table tennis game with you as he excels in playing it as well 🏓 ( he plays holding the paddle the way Asians do - it looks awesome!!! )
I wish I could show this video to my therapist because she just doesn't understand my perspective on this. Unfortunately, in my case I'm not academically gifted. People think that autistic means either lower end iq, non verbal, no eye contact, non functioning OR very high iq, book smart, just socially awkward and bad at communication. I'm somewhat mid iq. So my struggles are that I can't really find or hold a job very easily because I'm not really good at anything while I also find it incredibly difficult forming friendships and building work relationships, but I'm not low functioning enough for it to be noticeable right away, so often people think that I'm just being difficult or an asshole on purpose. I also have gravitated to individualistic sports where your results speaks for themselves because it's much easier for me when my failure or success is attributed to myself alone rather than a team. But I also find it very difficult to find training partners, because even in sports like boxing or MMA, you need training partners and coaches to get better, you can't just hit the bag. I realise that trying to find any kind of understanding or sympathy for my "condition" is falling on deaf ears and is often viewed as an attempt to manipulate or gain sympathy, so I just try to navigate a very harsh and hostile world by my self. Suicidal thought are just in the back of my mind constantly and it is hard to fight them off when you feel like you're useless, broken and don't deserve love or respect. In short, autism for me had been a curse, I don't know if I ever felt blessed. My parents don't even know I'm autistic and feel the way I do. Edit: also, at work, sometimes it's really hard even if you are the guy that does the job really well, if people don't like you, they will find reasons to make your work seem subpar or that your actually doing less than you could be. Management often doesn't know what's actually going on and really on a couple of "people" to snitch on everyone, making me the easiest target because I'm often the last one in and the one that is unaffiliated to any of the groups.
I'm not sure if I'm gifted or just good at tests (tried the Mensa test for fun and was told I'm in the top 2% percentile) but I do know there are some things I do well. Whilst I consider that a privilege, I'm now finding out how much of a curse it can be. I'm in work and widely considered one of the best performers of the team but ultimately, this leads to other people slacking off. Time and again, I find myself having to force my mind into hyperfocus to finish the work others were supposed to have done. I'm in severe autism burnout now, partially because of work stress. I need at least 6 weeks off work but can't afford to take this time off. My wages don't allow me to have any savings and my aptitude for calculations has made it very clear that £900 in SSP and Universal Credit will just about cover my bills but leave me without food. So, long story short, being highly intelligent and/or gifted can be amazing but it also makes you very much aware of the ways in which it is a curse.
I got diagnosed with Aspergers at 9 years old (which for child is reasonably late), I believe my giftedness hid some of the obvious autistic traits (a word very often used by adults to describe me was bright). When I moved from primary to secondary school I didn't understand why one week some of my friends (all neurotypical) and I would be invited to some event and then a couple of weeks later my friends would be missing for a day, the day after I'd ask where they'd been they'd say 'oh an event with Mr/ Ms (teacher in charge of the gifted programme)' occasionally they might add 'actually I'm surprised you didn't come along'. For context most of the friends I'm talking about here were gifted in the same areas I was so in theory anything they got invited to I should've as well
Thank you, Paul! Usually, people would say that the curse is the fact that ‘we are handicap’. But you said it right. The curse is the envy we see jealous’ hearts feeling from us, from our talents; the curse is the loneliness of not having someone on our level to talk to, to play with. Yet the blessing is indeed a privilege. Thank you, Paul! Both things need to be reinforced in our mindset: we are privileged; and this loneliness and ‘persecution’ are its price. Still, it is so very good to know that people like you are around. Especially for people like me, an adult woman, diagnosed just recently. I watch your professorial videos in which you describe in a serious manner many of our most ridiculous mannerisms, and suddenly I see myself cracking of laughter. Thank you, Paul! There is no envy or jealousy; there is no loneliness or persecution. Watching you is pure privilege!
Thank you for this video- I've only just realised at the age of 38 that I am most likely on the spectrum too (and funnily enough work in a similarly technical field). As one of those humans who is gifted at well, pretty much anything I try, I related immensely to your video and your school experience. Conversely, I spent 3 hours with a friend yesterday and had to come home, put on my PJs and spend just as long winding down on the couch- but no one would know that if they didn't live with me. Thank you for sharing your story.
School was very strange when I was way ahead of my classmates intellectually, but I would always be the last one to turn in assignments or get homework done because I'd be either spacing out or obsessing and getting stuck on details of the assignment, taking things too literally, or trying to have perfect penmanship or other things that didn't really matter that nobody else seemed to care about. Ultimately I stressed out a lot and was a solid B student throughout most of school because I would ace tests but only turn in about 70% of assignments, so it balanced out.
A gift combined with a person's traits determines whether it will be a curse or a blessing how you understand it and use it is what often determines the outcome. I have what is called High intelligence Asperger's Syndrome High singular IQ, analytical thinker high cognitive skills, I lack empathy and the ability to connect or bond on most levels. I realised at an early age mid 20s that I couldn't go on hating the world and all those in it, I needed something that justified my existence. To have a gift and not use it either in a good or bad way is a waste so I set about forging a path that made a big difference.
I once had a manager who taunted me with “look at me, I’m little miss perfect Deborah” in front of colleagues at a conference. To be fair she was drunk, but once my shock at her words had dissipated I ran & hid in my room for the rest of the conference.
Highly intelligent people often have mental health issues because they can ascertain the way the world is on a much higher level, which leads to feelings of despondency.
Indeed, and currently it is doubly hard fighting against the acquiescence of so many to the narrative of the scamdemic.
I suffer Mega-Depression and believe now rather strongly that I am 'On the Spectrum' as they say. I feel distinctly different from most people; like I am looking up and down at them at the same time. It's surreal and disorientating if nothing else.
Now, the 2 most striking features of me as a person in my mind are the following; that is my remarkable degree of:
a). Depression
b). Depression
c). Intelligence
abovespeculation as incorrect or anything of the like. but this is my personalwould to some degree account for the correlation we are
Icontributor, as an isolating and quite highly stressful condition).
miraculous, as the body is, finds a way to help compensate for / deal with this. One way it does so is to become MORE INTELLIGENT (perhaps GREATLY so if the depression is a MEGA-depression straight out of Dante's INFERNO, LIKE MINE HAS BEEN). Why greater intelligence? To increase one's ability to engage in what I refer to as 'psychological detoxification'; or to use more colloquial terms; ' working your shit out' or simply 'processing.'
The way I think of it, simply but the greater your intelligence, the greater your ability to work through psychological problems (and become the Buddha). People who live ever so comfortably in their heads, simply do not require this ability NEARLY as much.
A working hypothesis anyhow.
The problem with very intelligent people is they appear like crazy people to dumb people. And that observation I have made with others being misunderstood or unable to even grasp what they said giving that this person is nuts look... Be it with me and even with non spectrum highly intelligent people but sadly people tend to roll eyes and express their feelings to your paradigm and ideas are the issue and not anywhere near normal to those on the spectrum especially when we tend to rant when it is a subject matter we are completely obsessed with
Highly intelligent neurotypicals seem very well adjusted and generally very happy with life. While they are perfectly capable of matching aspies in depth of thought and intellectual exploration, they rarely do when they're not being required to. NT's who graduate near the top of their ivy league classes who then go on to occupy very influential roles at extremely prestigious work places still prefer to bond over the same stuff that "dumb people" in social or recreational settings. Maybe the trick to NTs’ happiness is that they can turn off the high intelligence off when they don't need to use it, thereby sparing them from despondency but that’s just speculation
@@CuriousInquiror spot on...thats exactly what I have found too...I'm glad to hear others that see what I see.
I was called"Professor" since I was 10. After a time I learned to use smaller words when talking with most people. I began to feel it was wrong to "show up" other people. It was very lonely trying to act like everyone else. Which I was doing so I would not feel so lonely. I still do this now in my fifties.
I can relate. I had the same problem, starting with my sister, who was seven years older than me. I did not want to compete with her, but whether I did or didn't, she saw it as an underlying issue between us, and never stopped acting superior towards me. The result was the invisibility cloak that I took on so I could disappear into the woodwork. I wore it for decades!! Can't blame her, that's the way it was/is. I can only deal with my own belief system about myself now that we're both grown. And that with a lot of help from others who can see it too.....
I like your invisibility cloak image! That’s exactly what I have used for … well, about 60 years now, and invisibility also requires silence and a second defense line of disguise in case the cloak slips at any moment.
I was always the adult narrator in plays in elementary school. My kindergarten teacher wanted to hold me back because I "didn't have all my beans," as she put it. My parents wouldn't hear of it, and I got no assistance except from a kind first-grade teacher, who pretty much recognized where I was at. She tried to draw me out, and made a pretty big impact on my development. I went back and visited her after I had graduated from college. I don't think she remembered me, but I wanted to thank her for being such a helpful, understanding person.
I was called a mad/crazy professor in school
I was called a know it all I had learned a higher vocabulary. People also called me a stuck up. So I just kept quiet and to myself. Mental health regulation was something I should have done moreso when I was in high school. I'm in my 20s right now. I just felt I never really belonged in social situations.
The giftedness may mask and hide the aspergers so no one understands that you are autistic. And that’s the curse. The blessing I guess is that the giftedness makes you function even with your problems. But again...that’s the curse. No one sees you for who you really are. And if no one helps you develop your skills, that is, if no one realizes that your gifted, you’re not gonna get any help with exploring the benefits of that, either. So, like it’s been for me: school super boring because I was way ahead of the others even though I was younger. Had to just sit there and could never advance (70’s). And I couldn’t POSSIBLY have autism or adhd, right? Because I had all of these inner RESOURCES!! And I was so SMART! Well, what good did that do me? Yes, now, at 49, I’m mad. I’m sad. I’ve missed so much. I could’ve done so much.
Oh dude, You have no idea how identified I feel just reading the first sentence.
Imagine the rest...
Omg. I’m 49, and this sounds strange, but I only realized a few days ago that I’m definitely on the spectrum. I don’t want to write my life story down, but I do want to say that it gives me comfort knowing you are out there and my age. I’m going to have to build my life from scratch at this age. I’m terrified. I’ve given good enough face I thought, and have had my pride keep me warm. But I’ve always been a ghoster, blocked over 400 contacts, gotten off social media. I’m just learning what I am, finally. I wish you the very best of luck. Please, take care.
Thanks for your comment Christina, I identify with what you wrote too. I'm also at the stage of trying to work through my anger.
Christina I was only diagnosed because I brought it up to my psychiatrist who said she came to the same conclusion but didn't want to tell me because there was no "cure" for it. I am 37 and was just diagnosed, looking back at my life it makes perfect sense. I am in the top .001 percentile when it comes to cognitive tests yet my life is filled with failures, suicide attempts that left me paralyzed for years in different limbs, at 4 years old I was tracking hurricanes and was obsessed with meteorology, I never got to become one but I learned everything about it and I run a meteorology website non-profit today.
I dropped out of high school in 11th grade on the first day before the teacher walked in. I just got up left my bag and never returned. Went 1 year later took all 5 GED tests at once in college passed them all easily, took 13 college courses in all things I loved, political science, biology, statistics, cellular biology, microbiology,general psychology,abnormal psychology, child psychology, philosophy, none of them adding up to a degree. I have a GPA of 3.9 due to taking a 0 in a bio exam because my then fiancee also in the class was having a bipolar meltdown. I currently have no degree, was 100% paralyzed in my left hand due to an attempt on my life, now only 10% paralyzed when doctors said I would be 30% paralyzed minimum because I did everything they told me to do for their x number of times and I did it until I couldn't. After cutting my ulnar nerve (funny bone ) in half, the pain for the next 2 years was unbearable, I thought of amputation many times, was on huge doses of painkillers, then doctors turned against chronic pain patients because of the "drug crisis" and fell through the systems cracks all the way to ending up in a methadone clinic where a doctor who was arrested 1 years after I was there had poisoned me when I came in on 25mg equivalent by raising my dose to 90mg and then I spent 4 years fighting myself down to 1mg which is where I am stuck at now. I
I live with nerve pain every day, and other pain, a failed back surgery at 28 due to a very physically demanding job and running my own business at once. Now I am on disability, I have no idea where my life is going, I am still trying to get off the meds the doctors overdosed me with which caused unimaginable pain in my body that would make me pass out regularly or vomit on a daily basis for 2 straight years.
I come from a broken family, nobody understood my gifts and nobody was there to figure out what was wrong with me. As a result I was given over 20 different anti-depressants over a 27 year period, leading to 18 suicide attempts on the meds which had severe side effects 4 of those attempts leaving me clinically dead, 1 requiring a 3 pint blood transfusion. It's been 5 years since I have done anything to myself.
Everyone around me my whole life said one of two things when I they got to know me slightly, 1) "Where did you go to college" or two "You were put here for a purpose" yet none of the help came with any of these words from friends, family or anyone.
I only realized that my depression, panic attacks and history of suicidal ideation were all symptoms of what my psychiatrist diagnosed me with 2 years ago. Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder which stems from the violence toward me from my alcoholic ex-father and from having Aspergers and my communication being so naturally large in vocabulary that convincing someone of something knowing I am right, I didn't realize they couldn't even understand the language I was speaking or they did and knew I was right so they hit m for it.
This led to decades of broken communication that made life worse for everyone. There is so much guilt, sadness, anger at myself for not recognizing this sooner. accepting who I am has helped to start change my life back in the right direction. I am 37 years old.
Like the wonderful video creator who is practically at my age, I also has a name in school everyone said to me because of my extremely high intelligence. My name is Beau pronounced Bo like Bo Jackson, so whenever I gave a correct answer in class, I would always hear Bo knows, as in Bo Jackson knows baseball and football, "Bo knows".
To this day, I still hear it, it hasn't ended. The main point I'm trying to make is it's never too late, once you know who you are you can change the parameters of the world around you to sync better with who you are as opposed to syncing yourself through masking to the world around you. Yes we all missed out on perhaps being Elon or Bill Gates because we didn't know about this until now, but perhaps we would never have made it to now if we had known back then what we know now. Maybe we wouldn't have challenged ourselves and fought so hard to be 'normal' which on the outside appears to be like we had to use 10 times the energy to do anything that a ntypical would, yet the truth is, we are 10 times stronger because we did use the energy and we are here today, alive and aware of the power that lies within us if we only choose to put the effort into ourselves now, that we spent putting into others for most of our lives. If we do that, we will rise up and our lives will be equal to or better than the average person which for me would be the greatest achievement I could bring to myself and the world. A functional me where my gifts can be unleashed to their full potential..
Christina same. Though I was in the 90’s/00’s. I was in special Ed diagnosed with learning disabilities but I was pushed into college on my own. They ripped my IEP right before my eyes so I had no assistance when I went to college. I lost my scholarships when I had a breakdown and failed Environmental science due to being ghosted by my lab team. Nobody knew that I had disabilities and I got no advocacy. They took my money though
I’m so lucky and grateful to have used my aspiness to own my own business! No one can fire me and if i don’t like someone, i don’t have to work with that person. 😺 If you’re on the spectrum and can freelance work or manage to do entrepreneur stuff, then count yourself blessed!! Much 💗
@Asmr&Me Amazing!! Isn’t it worthwhile? We’re so good at our special interests that we can hopefully 🙏 turn them into professions. People often don’t care about our idiosyncrasies, if we’re amazing at what we do. Much blessings!!
I have always been self-employed, it suits me just fine. I've earned 160 university credits, never went for any specific occupation, what I determined for my employment has absolutely nothing to do with a college course.
I realized I had to "dumb down" myself in high school. I was already struggling with my grades because of how uncomfortable I was at school and at home both, so it wasn't that hard. People didn't want me to be smart, they wanted me to keep making them laugh. I remember I tried really hard on a test and got people saying, "I can't believe that guy got higher scores than us! Jeez", like I was some kind of idiot.
Later on in life, I realized also about people wanting to win. Male competitiveness is a foreign concept to me, I just don't get it. Whenever someone would compete against me with a special interest that allowed for it, they typically weren't impressed, just annoyed that I did so well. I even had one person stop being my friend over it. Life is really nonsensical.
Man, when you said they called you "Perfect," it really resonated with me. That wasn't the word for me, for me, unfortunately, it was "smart." I knew what "smart" meant. My brother would call me "Einstein" as an insult. Smart meant that people thought I was on a different level than them. Smart meant talking to me was difficult. Smart meant there was no point in arguing with me if we disagreed, and that we were going to disagree. Smart meant I had unrealistic expectations of my peers. Smart meant I didn't fit in. And to be clear, they were calling me smart, it wasn't a jab, it wasn't slang, it wasn't like my brother calling me "Einstein," it was genuine praise of my intelligence and my analytical skills, but to me, smart just meant that I wasn't normal, and that I wasn't going to be treated normally, and so I didn't want to be associated with that word.
Thanks for calling me out like that (joking, it's fine i know how it feels). All jokes aside, this pretty much sums up my entire scholastic career. Everyone would say how I was so smart, but all I really wanted was someone that I could talk to at my speed. It didn't even have to be the same person for each thing, so long as I had someone. Sadly, that never happened for any of the special interests I found in school. It felt like talking to a wall
In junior high school the kids started calling me EJ - Einstein Junior. They weren't saying it in a bullying sort of way, but rather as a term of respect. I was still terribly socially awkward and introverted, would hyper focus on my interests, and never really felt like I fit in, but it made me feel kind of good when I'd here EJ.
"Smart meant I had unrealistic expectations of my peers." I felt that.
Same here. For the same reasons, I refused to discuss my intelligence with anyone until I was in my late 30s. In private, I'm actually quite comfortable with my intelligence and don't have any ego about it. I can't take credit for it any more than I can take credit for being 6' tall. I know I'm objectively smarter than the majority of people, but that doesn't at all translate to feeling "better" than them. The problem is that _other people_ are threatened by "smart" because they see it through the lens of superiority. I was classified as gifted when I was a kid but due to autism, my grades and behavior didn't match. My teachers were constantly giving me the "not living up to your potential" speech. The way it felt to me was that they were calling me superior and inferior simultaneously. I didn't want to be either. I just wanted to be me.
So many of my personality traits fall into the very top percentile points of rarity. Being labeled "gifted" wasn't an ego boost. It was just ANOTHER reminder that I'm not like most people. I grew up in the hood too - where there's an extra layer of stigma against "smart". Very early on I had to learn masking techniques so I didn't stick out so much. Even though I was hyperplexic, I had to really dumb down my vocabulary and use lots of slang around my friends. Now as an adult, I can go into a recording studio with all of my pothead musician friends and seem like I totally belong there. ..but then I could go sit down with a professor of 20th century history and have an academic-level conversation. That kind of duality can really mess with you after a while.
My artsy friends don't understand my obsession with research, data, and history. My nerd friends don't understand my artistic, free spirited side. ..and most of society doesn't know how to deal with me from either perspective. I have to compartmentalize all the time.
I can totally relate. I was in my 50's before I realized why my peers glared at me any time the teacher said our tests would be graded on a curve. I also came to learn what an outlier is, and am grateful they were willing to throw those out. My classmates liked me helping them study, but they didn't like curves.
I was " Perfect Girl" . No matter what peoples showed me, i learned so fast, that soon i was left with no friends. Kids seen, that they aren't that special, because i was copy - pasteing their " Talents", better than they did..... I was hated. Badly hated, until i learned that my ability is not, gift or curse, but are my responsibility ower others. I started seek smarter "mind fights ". Every time i loose, or win, i learn. Next time i will be smarter......and now...i just do things i Love, learn for myself, and i have friends, cuz they know, i will get their back safe. 👌
Dita Dīķe I love it when others are good at things, but not if they copy me.
Authenticity and integrity are my most important components.
You gotta come up with your stuff yourself, and then we can meet at the same level and exchange innovative ideas.
@@Kamiljont now i use my own skills and ideas.👌 You are totally corret, cuz it was not good way to learn, and it doesn't help improve us. I transformed my copy talent into reading. Foto - memory. Brillinant when copy is needed. Medicine uz education when is no need for creativity, perhaps, only in rare situations.
@@DitaDike1993 Wow, thanks for your friendly response!
I totally understand. There are always many perspectives, and i suppose we grow out of "mirroring" people and becoming more and more "ourselves"?
Subjectively I don't "copy" or "imitate" others, but I do learn from others, so it's a fine line...
I can't tell you with words, how much you've helped me, Paul. My name here, came from the fact that my mother always attributed the worst motives she could to my behaviors.... and then treated me accordingly. I spent 30 years, constantly masking, FOR HER. Now that I know what's going on, I've decided to stop doing that, whether she likes it or not. So the other morning (4th of July and I'm in America), for the first time, I spotted the beginning of her little abusive, cyclical, game, for the first time in my life..... and for the first time I was able to shut her right down. 30 years of her pathological tyrrany, ended on independence day! Thank you, sooooooo much!
Good for you!
Wow.. that sounds just like my dad, who I let go when I was 33. Good for you!! Feels good to get free of someone else's deep seated insecurities and suspicions.
I think it depends on if I'm having a good day or a bad day. Today, having Autism is a blessing. I'm trying to feel that way every day
If you don't mind me asking, why is it a blessing?
@@aikou2886 it’s a blessing because I have an incredible talent with math that I wouldn’t have with a NT brain. I also am able to have more compassion and understanding than I would without this condition. Finally, I’m able to give advice about this and answer questions that I would not be able to without this
An issue I see in the workplace is that once you have a good performance, you will start getting more and more responsibilities, until you are pushed over your limit and may lack the ability to recognize it and seek help. Then the quality of your work start decreasing and since your self-worth perception is strongly tied to the quality of your work, you start questioning yourself and it throws you in a downward spiral of anxiety and feeling useless.
Amen 🙏
When you are really good at something, people don't want to play with you any more. When you blitz exams at school or uni, bouncing out of the exam room smiling and feeling good, they hate you for it. When you are at work and "flex", without thinking, you make them feel bad. You end up isolated by your own giftedness. And if you try to play down, they just feel insulted, and still don't want to play.
Having PDD-NOS, I have always been good at memorizing facts and data. In the 80’s there was a game called Trivial Pursuit. At the time I was only a high school graduate, and the social circle I was in were all college graduates. I do remember them saying I wouldn’t know a particular question because I wasn’t a college grad. I would answer it, and disappointment them. I would beat them often, and soon no one wanted to play with me. That did hurt. Eventually I moved out of state.
I have to one-under what everyone says or they get passive aggressive with me.
Being "gifted" definitely contributed to my isolation. And doing well in school sure didn't mean success in the real world. The teachers left me alone because of my grades, so I flew under the radar and didn't get the support I needed. My adult life has been a disaster. Honestly, I'm surprised I'm still alive.
@@garyhintz6721 I remember Trivial Pursuit. I only ever got to play it once. I certainly wasn't trying to make people feel stupid, nor even trying to win, and I'm not even very competitive by nature. I was just enjoying it so much I forgot myself. Unfortunately I realised too late that this was not a good thing, and was not going down well. No-one wanted to play it with me again after that.
@@SarahDale111 I did well in school too, straight A student until I was 15, then I dropped out, much to the horror of everyone. In hindsight, I realize the social pressure was unbearable. The stress of trying to fit in was overwhelming. Then I made one bad life choice after another, was abandoned by my parents and became a walking target for every abusive, controlling person out there. The inner shame of wasting my potential has also been a heavy burden to carry. But when you grow up with no support or understanding from anyone, it's not surprising, I'm also surprised I'm still alive.
"Perfect". You don't realize how much it meant to me to hear you say that it stung or hurt to be called that. I honestly didn't know why it would and still does bother me when someone calls me that. Your description of the feeling is very helpful. Thank you.
My guess of why it'd hurt, is because my mind would instantly react with a whole bunch of evidence against it.
It's like how, if you feel unattractive, someone calling you pretty can make you feel worse, because you don't believe it for one ("they're just trying to be nice"), and secondly it reminds you of all the reasons you don't believe it. So it does more harm than good, regardless of the other person's intentions
But I'd say "perfect" is even worse. It gives you pressure, more room to fail/fall, and it's also just completely unrealistic (not to mention subjective)
Oh and lastly it's a judgement. Even if it's meant to be positive, they are looking at you, and determining your worth (since we view perfection as a good thing) and expressing that judgement to you
@@syl59281 I have never thought that way... So I would ask you, how would be better to praise or to show that I admire sth in you? I'm a kind of artist, so I look at the world and people and it makes me joy that I can admire them. Just feel happy that a flower smells great or a human has cool abilities or nice dress... How to say that in non offensive way? :)
@@syl59281 I've noticed that a lot of salespeople are now saying "perfect" for the most ridiculous stuff--like "Fill out your name." You write down your name and they say "perfect." It doesn't bother me particularly. It just seems dumb.
Is reading body language in my own way and feeling other people's mental tones in my head a gift or a curse?
I always know when you think I'm crazy.
I know when you're not talking to me, but talking for you.
I get to see into everyone and it's not just the judgment, i can see how much pain people are in, even when they're hiding it. There's so much pain in our minds today. It looks like a mental plague. It seems everyone is trapped in an illusion.
-gift- unable to be brainwashed
Extremely perceptive and highly alert to changes in my surroundings.
And i can recognize intangible patterns of behaviors, speech patterns, someone's consistency.
There's more but I'll be back. Our curse is the blessing, we had to suffer to force us to overcome our fears, and what we are weak too, will one day become your greatest strength. This is a spiritual trajectory my friends.
I feel this way, too.
Microexpressions are hard to hide, and hard to see. Some can pick up on them really well.
I resonate with this comment so much... I can feel it all
@@kevinbissinger of course. I get what you’re getting at but…. I can’t be brainwashed. I can be told lies, it worked when I trusted that people knew what they were talking about. Hypocrisy is something quite special, projection is even more interesting to look into. Congruency, or consistency is another fun thing to think about in relation to someone divergent considering if I step out of my routine, my mental state goes as haywire. But congruency… ugh, how do I act human again? Constantly learning new things that I absorb into my behavior so unless you know me well, you’d think I’m in the wind. But brainwash, that fired you up. Sorry bro, I instinctively don’t believe in anything… I’ve got to prove it too myself. I’ve lived around people who are manipulative and gaslight. You think you know me, but you’re just irritated. Good luck buddy
@@goodknight9627 I love how he deleted his comment. Let me add a mic drop to your reply 🎤⬇️
I, too can resonate with this. I don’t feel quite to the level you do, Good Knight, or maybe I’m just suppressing it. I admire your strength. Brainwashing doesn’t work with me either, which I attribute to being on the autism spectrum. I was raised to be brainwashed one way, but all of my being pushed back even when I didn’t know why. IMO, that is a true gift, to be able to protect yourself from being controlled.
The first thing I thought when I saw the title of this video (before watching, of course) was how my sensory "giftedness" can be a blessing and a curse. I am a super-taster, and a super-recognizer, I have a steel trap memory, mild synesthesia, vocal flexibility (mimicry), and am very sensitive to smells.
This makes me an exceptional cook; I can discern small amounts of "secret" ingredients in restaurant dishes, and recreate them at home after only eating said dish once, sometimes months afterward. I can identify smells immediately, and detect odors before anyone else in the room. If the building was on fire, I'd probably start evacuation before the smoke alarms went off. The people I talk to at wine tastings are the sommeliers, not the guests.
I can compare color shades, hues and tints and match them perfectly. My mom is a graphic designer, and she asks me for help all the time. I can remember and recognize faces with extreme accuracy, and remember the names of actors, athletes, politicians, (any celebrity really), and can distinguish between Koreans, Vietnamese, Chinese, Japanese, Thai, Russian, Turkish, Mongolian, Indian, Pakistani etc. Show me a face, and I'll tell you their ethnic makeup.
I'm great at trivia games, and I'm also a very good mimic. I have no trouble sounding native when speaking foreign languages; accents and tones are no problem for me.
All that being said, I am cursed to never be able to enjoy my mother's cooking. It's not abysmal- other people like it fine- but most of the time it nauseates me. I feel really bad about it. 😞 I find I'm disappointed quite often with my food in average restaurants, and can't just enjoy with everyone else. I am unable to eat chilli, broccoli cheese soup, fish tacos, gumbo, or meatloaf unless I'M the one that made it. (That's my list of risky public food🚫)
Similarly, if someone sprays air freshener or Lysol, has a scented candle burning or a Glade plug in, I will either vomit, get a headache, or have an asthma attack. Someone's mild BO can make it so I am never able to be in the same room with them, and I can smell hundreds of crotches just entering a public restroom. Some people, I can smell what they ate the night before. Rancid hand lotion literally makes me panic.😵
I have argued many times over colors that are radically different to me, but everyone else thinks they are the same color.
Half the time nobody knows who I'm talking about because I remember obscure appearances of public figures, or bring up a famous person or painting that resembles an actor, etc or make a joke about what someone looks or sounds like that falls flat because no one has ever heard of or can remember the thing I'm comparing to.
It's a curse because I'm isolated in my sense of humor, my culinary enjoyment (food should be enjoyed with friends and family, gathered around a table- it IS social), my literal ability to stay in the same room with others; my thoughts, my memories, my opinions, my sensations are always my own- never understood or shared. No one feels what I feel, tastes what I taste, sees what I see, remembers what I remember, smells what I smell, hears what I hear. It makes it impossible to relate to anyone, and it bears the added curse of everyone assuming I'm "overreacting" about every sensation I feel. It's a curse because more often than not, I'm uncomfortable while everyone else is fine.
I studied Chinese in university and am now bilingual. I work as an interpreter, and people who I speak Chinese with on the phone are always somewhat mistrustful and suspicious when I show up to the job as a big ol' white lady. They always say "No, we want the Chinese lady we spoke to on the phone." It takes a while to convince them that I AM the lady they talked to on the phone. 😖
I am living with my mom while my own house is being renovated, and I had to throw out all of her decade-old lotions and creams and buy her new because the entire house would smell like rotten corpses and petroleum every time she'd shower or wash her hands.😫 She loves the diffusers and the candles, too. I finally told her "just pretend I'm pregnant", and she finally understood how these smells were affecting me. She still continues to microwave leftover fish, however. 🤢
I would say that having ESP (extreme sensory perception) is a double-edged sword, for sure.
Thanks so much for sharing! The part about smells really resonates with me. I guess it's artificially scented candles or potpourri that give me a massive headache & make my teeth hurt. I could never walk down the candle/potpourri aisle at the craft store or walk into a Yankee Candle Co store. Perfume doesn't affect me as severely for some reason. Also, I can smell people's insides or guts, I guess. Usually it smells like awful salami or just death or stale air if I'm close enough to catch a whiff of their breath. I don't eat meat, so I thought it might be due to that, but I wasn't always vegan & could still experience these awful smells coming from certain people. It's unbearable, but others don't seem to notice.
@@cremebrulee84 I'm a super-smeller too. It's irritating sometimes. 😭🤮🤣
There are so many people in your position Paul, thank you for shining a light on it and giving us your perspective.
I’m a very creative person and enjoy doing art and writing however when it comes to socialising as someone with borderline Asperges syndrome I find it very draining and extremely hard. I can’t give eye contact or make small talk so I end up just zoning out which can be embarrassing. I’ve now learned to adapt but in a world where communication is important this is one negative that I’ve had to live with
I have a mind file for small talk. I usually 'cut 'n' paste' from a mental bag of scrabble tiles. I use an appropriate 'voice file' or 'sound file' to zing things along a bit. The occasional raise of a eyebrow, a shrug and a sage saying. Most of these are part of my mental 'desktop' or, as Daniel Dennett would have it 'A Benign User Interface'. I've been using this method for many years. Amiability and politeness also helps sweeten things along. I can't get along with antagonism or negativity. I absorb it far too easily, then I'm processing it for days and have to shut down. I try to avoid those that look trouble. A friend of mine said once that he could detect my cogs whirring and ratcheting as I would analyse people before deciding to make first contact. Fortunately, I am old enough to read the more challenging ones by general demeanor, body language, vocal patterns, etc. I can also immerse myself by drawing abstracts in a sketchbook, sitting peripherally, listening or cogently observing people, with a pot of coffee and one or two books or magazines - my sentinals - that are also part of my library/BUI/desktop.
I relate to this. Creativity seems to be the basket i have all my eggs in. But in social situations i often feel like a ghost. Except for my small group of like minded oddballs
I feel eactly the same as you. This video made me cry. A lot of time has passed since I felt such flow of emotions from thinking about my past and realising there are people out there like me who can support me, and make my life feel worth living.
I did exactly the same thing with tennis and table tennis as a kid.
My mother even spanked me once for trying to eat with the left hand. No hard feelings. I know she will never understand that and I can't relate to her either. she has come to accept me and my "flaws" with the passing of time.
and being called perfect undervalued the times when I was sincerely asking for pardon and or recognizing my faults.
This episode is by far the best one in my opinion. I thank you so much. I was diagnosed late and never figured why I was being alienated for excelling at work, consistently solving complex engineering problems in my area of interest most times in a matter of days/weeks instead of years when compared to my peers, and often in a save-the-day situation. And those are with self taught knowledge versus the level of training my peers had to go through. Obviously your video resonates to not just myself but also with what my kids are going through as well. Kudos to you; you are helping all aspies, and keep up the great work!
Blessing at first, curse later.
Being able to go through everything up until high school with no problems, just intuition and passively paying attention, getting good grades and such, then you get into high school and suddenly have to start actively paying attention, you can’t just intuitively guesstimate everything and be correct 98% of the time anymore. You now have to study, which you’ve never learnt how to do, as you’ve never had the need to do so.
this is where I’m currently at, about to take my final assignment exam of whatever it’s called, As luck would have it, I just hit a massive burnout for the first time ever
Tall poppy syndrome...
It hasn’t appeared until lately, when I started loving myself, after my divorce, and feeling capable and good at things, this started happening to me.
And became so painful and just anytime I felt good about myself, I was hated.
It’s weird.
Not only bullying, but even violence.
I don’t get it. Am I supposed to make myself small, or life will be about fighting?
Luckily, I seem to have found a few ”sane” people who can take it when I feel good or when I act a little akward.
So they are that social shield you talked about earlier.
i think i can relate to this
It's called a crab pot and Brene Brown describes this phenomon in her work. The Courage of Imperfection.
I think the truth of the matter is, is that we dont want to feel less than our peers. If one peer manages to escape, it is easier for people to bring them down than to do the work and lift themselves up.
And my own sollution to that.. is to break off those connections that take you down. Trim the dead branches from your life. It may sound egocentrical. It may sound mean. It may sound awful, but honestly, there are only so many hours in a day and energy is limited.
I am blessed with a group of friends that I deeply admire for their social skills and the abillity to express themselves. They are a lot better than I am and that's ok. I can learn from them and be there for them when they need me. My talent lies elsewhere.
You probably got i a narcissistic relationship they can appear autistic at times but have different motives for the same behaviors. Another big reason i think alot of people res
respond badly to autistic people
@@shaunjackson1142 I think that is an interesting point that you are raising. I found that autistic people can be complete and utter sweet hearts that want to connect to people but have difficulty doing that, can be bitterly dissapointed in the world and respond to that by lashing out.
Some people are gentle, kind and patient. Those people will find loyal friends in those that are gentle, kind and patient, regardless whether they are autistic or not. To have a friend, you must first be a friend. Making and maintaining friendships is skill that can be taught and can be refined. My autistic friends are some of the most welcoming and supportive people that I know.
Then there are those that gave up on forming relationships and either content themselves on being alone or start influencing/manipulating people for just their own benefit.
However, I think that the most important reason that people respond badly to autistic people, is because autistic people react different to neurotypical behavior. It is a different wavelength that requires work from both parties to atune to.
The different parties lack a natural understanding from each others point of view.
Narcism is a beast in and of itself. Narcism is rooted in insecurity and fear. The behavior that follows can be ruthless and hurtful.
Throw in autism and good lordy Lord, you are in for a painful ride.
Shaun Jackson Yes.
I find that people mirror themselves in me, but thinking that what they see is narcissism, why they behave that way, and put it on me.
People cannot tell the difference, or do not want to know the difference.
Maybe they can not answer to my honesty and they then make me a mirror of what they wish to see... like I’m a wishing well.
Because maybe I don’t put up a sheild the way others do...they think I answer to the vain side of themselves?
this really resonated with me, i was being called perfect and all sorts of other words that put me on a pedestal as an insult too... and even when i complained about it, people were jealous of me because they want that ego stroke as well and cant see the alienation that causes it. alas no single person to talk about your problems with. thats why the negative sides of being gifted need to be addressed without any strange ego complexes!!!
I am seeing this exodus of old friends, relatives and community members at an age where I can't begin again to forge relationships. It is fortunate that Aspies enjoy their own company. Their energy comes from being in a private safe space. I have never heard anyone describe this as you have in this video. Thank you Paul.
I feel as though I'm not allowed to ask for things, and I'm scared of being in a relationship. But knowing I'm not alone helps me feel better. Thank you.
It is amazing that you know me so well and you live on the other side of the globe. Thank you for all that you do!
I guessed “perfect” before you said it Paul!!! Being called Little Miss Perfect or Perfect Bree was something I dealt with in intimate relationships. Thank you for this! 💫
Your history with tennis and table tennis is like a mirror to my history. Thank you for sharing!
Thanks for the video! I always had good grades in school and never really got to brag about it because it would alienate me from those I wanted to hang out with. I'm glad that other people share the same experiences!
Wow this has brought so much together about one of the reasons I struggled to make friends in high school and college. My reasoning at the time was that if I become super talented and stand out at something, then I would earn people’s respect. Lots of people respected my skill, but they all kept their distance. I never connected the dots in this way before. Thanks for the insight!
Oh man, yeah word "PERFECT" really stung me whole life, drained my energy, provoking me to stand out of all no matter what the situation is.....its burning me out n now l feel the hunger for admiration has gotten me lost my inner as a human...l'm good for everone except for myself n my close ones...
Yeah, I felt this on a cellular level... You're not perfect. You're a human being...
Not every human is being.
@@jonanderson4474 Not every being is human. Your point?
My point is:
Don't forget to be. While you know you're "only human"
@@jonanderson4474 I wouldn't be here, mortally, if I wasn't being.
You help me so much to understand myself. Thank you! Please keep on doing your chanel here.
Every one of your videos has something specifically for me. Thank you.
Gifted people generally struggle in school and are bullied not only by the other students but by teachers. The bullying continues into adulthood, and occurs especially in the work place. The intellectual side overshadows the hypersensitivities and traits which are common to ASD (roughly 35% overlap of traits) and ADHD (overlap roughly 30%). To be gifted is to be alone and constantly misunderstood and have different needs no one will recognize unless in a child who is identified and given assistance. You have hide, blend in near perfectly, because adults are threatened the most and career sabotage and shunning becomes a reality. Some of the best help I have found has been from tips from the ASD community. Thank you for bringing up "Perfect", it is a word used just before others decide to cut themselves out from speaking to me and it always hurts. The other name that comes up is "Robot", and that is because of delay in personal emotion processing but still having instant ability to feel and know what others are feeling. There is no shutoff, so others emotions are entirely draining. When bullied, all the obvious traits go on display and that's when others out you publicly. Sometimes having to blend in has gone on for so long you forget the best of yourself. I am a gifted female and your work has been great for helping me untangle some of the traits I have that are not covered well or rarely mentioned in gifted information. I actually feel less alone as there are more people with shared traits out there than I thought. Thank you for doing the work you do, it is appreciated.
This resonates so much back to going through school. I enjoy this channel so much, I cannot describe it
I think it’s great you mentioned your sports ability, from childhood I had “chasey skills”good spatial awareness and anticipation skills watching cues in traffic, crowd movement, body movement. I ride motorcycles as a form of relaxation and can manage the level of sensory input that requires, I also became a qualified dive master in scuba diving. I can cook to a high level, I’m good a physical things.
Even had my reflexes measured by a physician who said they’re at a rate equal to a practised professional sport person without me making an effort.
I struggle with studying subjects I don’t mesh with ie, chemistry, algebra. I just don’t “get it”.
I really wish I could find a UNI specialty that I could study so I would have a degree to my name.
I’ve seen autism videos that says autistic people aren’t particularly well coordinated and don’t agree with that to be used as a measure.
Wow this is me! First time I've seen this anticipation and spatial awareness spoken of. I use it in sports and day to day life e.g dodging people traffic to get through rush hour as quickly as possible.
Really appreciate these thoughts. I have taught myself to be non-competetive to the point where I can't enjoy most competitive activities. When I win, all I see is someone else feeling bad. For this reason, I really enjoy things with indirect conflict, where you are competing against a system or a status rather than directly against another player. Things like modern european style board games and disc golf are good examples.
Same!! I killed the competitive side of me in middle school when I realized no one likes someone who wins all the academic contests. Then I entered a bimbo stage where I played a little dumb and wore skirts (btw I’m a girl) and things were WAY easier for me. Sad that that was the only coping mechanism I could think of lol I’m still a bit bimbo-like now at 25 because it’s the only thing that’s ever worked for making friends and finding partners
As far as I remember Ive never had a thirst for victory, just for doing my best and thinking others would enjoy the victory more than me since I was over empathetic to them feeling negative things for starting to lose
See I really enjoy the idea of friendly rivalry. It is actually really enjoyable to have competitive activities with someone that can discuss the ways for each of us get better.
I identify so hard with this - I have had to work extra-hard in life to NOT alienate people by being better at certain things than them. I found that teaching and forming partnerships where I can lift people up really helps. Still, it's lonely at the top, because I am too anxious to form meaningful relationships with people I really look up to. I feel too awkward all of the time. Not worthy.
This was a straight from the heart and must have been incredibly difficult to compose let alone deliver. Thank you that you muscled through anyway.
(This is a long rant, my apologies)
I definitely feel like this sometimes. I'm multi-talented in the arts, I can paint, draw, sculpt, carve. I can play cello and compose on the computer and analyze music theory.
Thankfully, none of my friends make me feel like I'm "too good"
... Though, it's partially because i rarely pull out the stops around my friends. I'm a music major, but most of my friends aren't music majors. often when I tell people about my major they go off about how talented I must be. They hear me play I feel a distance between me and them, and they say I'm talented. And I *am* talented, if it was hard work alone then I would not nearly be as good as I am.
Unfortunately, while I could boast about my talents, I cannot say the same for my academics.
I was homeschooled most of my life and I did well in high school. I didn't really start struggling until my sophomore year college. I cannot for the life of me be motivated to do research projects in English and history classes. All I can think about is, "But this is all pointless. Why am I writing this when the only demand is a teacher wants to read it". Why does the teacher always disagree with me that there's inadequate information on my topic. I know for a fact that I could write a *lot* about something with a 3-5 sources, more than I could write about something with 10 sources. I can synthesize information but that's too many sources for me.
And then theres NO real demand or reason for my research to be done. The teacher is not offering me a hypothetical situation that would demand I write this paper, it's just "because you need to be able to do this. its standard"
By the end of the paper I hate it so much that I would never want anyone else to read it anyway. It's worthless and I hate it. But you can't graduate college without writing research papers.
I've said to myself so many times, if only I could replace English class with math class. I know so many people who are bad at math and grade at English. They have such a higher chance of graduating because of that. It's not fair for me!
I know I'm bad at research, so I would never go into a research field! I shouldn't have to forfeit my college degree because of that failing.
100% with you Paul. When my abilities get challenged I crumble. I am use to being the best at certain things and it allows me to see myself as useful.
I’ve been good at most things I’ve done in my life. This is a great video, thank you!
I’d swap my talents to be normal and social
I feel like that a great deal. From the outside, looking on and thinking that "hey, that looks good . . . fitting in".
@Spookywood 'net My own difficulty is that I spent an extreme amount - most of my adult life - as a sole carer. Art and drawing was my siege wall against the stress of that and the ambition of eventually being able to enjoy that to the full spurred me on. Now time has released me from the caring role, I have C-PTSD on top of the Asperger's and an essential - inherited from my grandmother - tremor in my hands. Basically, that to which I was so looking forward is being teared ruthlessly from my grasp. I am trying to hang on to the hope that something will reign in the tremor properly. At the moment, the hateful thing destroys the exhilaration, my dance, which was me, within that world. Having that robbed from me seems that fate is having a laugh.
@Spookywood 'net In my experience you are seen as a show off so you become easily outsided,I wish it was different.more power to you for being an authentic person
I wish for a social life. Then i think about how much they don't think. Then i think, my tribe is out there, And you're all right here!
@@goodknight9627 they dont think lmao ,love this
great video.im not as gifted as you but i so relate to many of the issues.
Thank you so much for sharing this,, I really feel heard bc it’s the truth. School can be difficult at times bc people hate when I’m doing good. I’m very competitive and there’s been times where students literally walked out of the class bc they were mad I was getting the answers right. But you validated what I was thinking, that I can’t lessen myself, I can’t BE normal. It’s not my fault for being gifted in some things, it’s just sad w relationships bc everyone turns on me at school when they see me doing good.
I have found that my intuition is my super power. It’s never been wrong and I so want to be wrong it upsets me! I’ve never been wrong about people, places, all kinds of things like that. I so want to be wrong so I can go and learn from it! I want to learn!!!
This has brought back so many hidden and long-concealed memories of my life growing up that I've got tears streaming down my face. Funny how I can see that's irrational and yet the more you said, the stronger my reaction.
My autism may have put a curse on my driving and when growing up in my adolescent, I lacked close friends and had sociopaths taking an advantage of me posing as my close friends since I didn't know how to socialise.
Since I have settled down, my autism had been a massive blessing, using my repetitive behaviour as a tool for maintaining employment as a full time cabinet maker, capable to run my own autistic UA-cam channel and be able to live independently. I also great with socialising other people who are severely autistic and I have a great social bond with this person at Different Journeys autistic social meetings.
So relatable. It was interesting when you mentioned ping pong (table tennis). I'm ambidextrous. I easily play ping pong with either hand. I rake, sweep, brush my hair, shave, brush my teeth, with both hands. My dad "caught" me raking and sweeping with the "wrong" hand, or trying to switch up writing, and would not allow me (in his sight) to use my left hand. In baseball, with friends, I batted slightly better left than right. When dad was my coach, the one time he allowed me to try to show him I could bat left handed, rather than allowing me to use the pitching machine, he removed it and put the best pony league pitcher up. Of course I failed miserably. Why, I wonder, was my dad so obsessed with disallowing my ambidexterity? I literally have no idea which hand is supposed to be the "right" for sweeping and raking, to this day, and I'm 52. I was told I was "gifted" in 3rd grade. It wasn't a gift. Academics didn't help me understand play. To this day. My own and only brother literally waved me away when I was trying to talk about these things, when I asked him if he'd watched any videos I have shared, because I lack a formal Asperger's diagnosis. I can't even engage with him, because he, and mom, refuse to recognise the real issues I have, as if, "everyone feels that way sometimes." Sure. Sometimes. They don't get, or seem to care, that for me, it's all times. This is like walking around wearing an inflatable fat suit nobody else can see, bumping into things others easily avoid, while they watch me and, what, think I'm pretending for attention or sympathy? I don't understand others' obsession with forced handedness, nor their willful blindness to disabilities in otherwise "normal" people. Does it just make their lives easier, imagining, "It's all in your head."? It certainly doesn't make it easier for me, especially when I need and ask for help.
Tall Poppy Syndrome! My biggest curse. My brother beat me up every time I had a good report come home from school. I excelled at school. It was my "safe place" but also contributed to the abuse I received at home. It was a vicious cycle. Because I was doing great with my schoolwork, nobody saw the signs of abuse, either. But I loved school, so I wasn't going to let my teachers down either. I learned to hide my reports until my brother wasn't around. I never knew there was a term for this.
Thank you for this perspective Paul. I appreciate it
I excelled in math, art and music, read at a high level at a young age, and was good at all the puzzle games esp Tettis/Tetris Attack was my favorite and no one could beat me at that specific game. I was called a "Know-It-All" and have heard "Shut up" so many times we could play a drinking game and be blacked out within minutes lol. Also I heard "F You" so many times, mostly from guys who supposedly liked me. I am highly creative, can draw and write and I also make jewelry and design accessories. Ironically, I was making a journal about how iam good at complex things that most NT people can't do, but when it comes to basic things, I can barely "function" yet many people cannot and will not believe it is even possible. When you are so good at the "hard" stuff, how could you possibly struggle with the easy things???? That's what they truly believe and why it's so difficult for "HF" Aspies/Autists. Because we often need help too. Thank you for sharing your experiences, this is immensely helpful. 👍🏽💕
Yes, I can relate to you so much.! People tell me that I am so smart how can I have problems with easy everyday activities. I can't explain it.
My two cents: the blessing for me has been knowing deep matters thoroughly, while the curse has been people whom I live with ostracizing me because I won't placate to their controlling nature.
Thank you what a wonderful channel.
I'm only just beginning to look into getting diagnosed (aged 24), after falling down the old rabbit hole of looking up everything possible to do with Aspergers and finding many relatable symptoms and childhood stories. The one from this video would be the "Perfect Paul" moment - I was called "Mr Perfect" by my family! I've always been a massive perfectionist and had to get everything right either in the intellectual area of school or practical things at home, i.e. calling my brothers out when they didn't do something correctly with their homework or housework. I feel quite well-adjusted now, apart from finding a 9 to 5 a horrible way of living, but knowing whether I have Aspergers would help make sense of a lot of my life.
Everything you say resonates with me.
It has been a long and difficult journey.
Thank you so much for your honesty. It has really helped me to understand and empathise with my autistic friends and family.
your videos help me a lot. thank you Paul, please keep up the good work.
Look at the state of politics in America. A person with half the social skills it takes to make it will outdo someone who is extremely smart and has expertise. We do not value intelligence and competency at all which is why we are in the sad state we're in now.
As the average intelligence level decreases, this is a natural effect, though tragic nonetheless.
We (as a people) not only don’t value intelligence or competency anymore - we actively disdain it. While simultaneously telling everyone that it’s worth more and more money and they should be willing to go further and further into debt to get it. And then not hiring them if they don’t have it and haven’t had to acrue that debt. It’s senseless.
You are SO right!
That's the left right paradigm
Everyone is getting oppressed and woke now the vail has been lifted,. I believe
I will also say being gifted at school can back fire. I found school easy all the way up to year 12, I rarely found it challenging or interesting. I also never developed a study ethic as I always got the work done in class. When year 11 came around the level of difficulty or work increased significantly and I was not prepared. I ended up getting asked to leave school, the result of this was 6 years of unskilled jobs until I decided I needed to go to University to have my intellectual talents recognised and utilised. I am actually now a teacher as I thought I might try and capture kids like me not being challenged early in their schooling, however it is harder than I thought, especially as I struggle forming connection with students and motivating them, the talented students I do see only want to do the work they need to to get by.
I am now in the position that I don't like the career my degree led me and I would like to go back and study IT, however I know have a family and kids. Teaching is currently supporting my family. I would like to be able to teach and study and look after my family but I don't have the spoons
Thank you so much Paul, you have comforted me in a way that no one else has all my life! Much love, all the way from 🇬🇧❤
Fantastic channel. Thank you for making these videos!
For me my word was "innocent" which was tossed around a lot in my early high school years. That I had never dated (and still haven't since; 12 years have past), that I didn't understand the innuendos tossed around, that I didn't cuss and refrained from doing so (I just really didn't like it), that I had never done drungs or drank and never wanted to, that I didn't like parties and that I was out of the loop on so many social things associated with maturing; for all this I was considered "innocent" and something my friends "needed to protect". At first it was something that made it so the older kids in band hung out with me since I wasn't friends with any of my classmates since I had just moved to the area less than a year prior and I was just considered too wierd or awkward. It felt nice to hang out with the older kids but this branding of "innocence" and "cuteness" really took away my sense of agency and removed any ability of mine to take myself seriously enough to work myself up to trying to socialize let alone initiate relationships or friendships with my peers: thid infantilization meant there would always be something I wasn't privy to that would forever be outside my understanding. Despite being surrounded by friends in the high school band collective, my "innocence" was just a reminder of how lonely I really was.
Then with my classmates I was no better when I'd show my intelligence with my tests, essays, reading comprehension, information retention, and class participation but could not keep up with any of the "busy work" and would procrastinate or just not do entire projects because I was such a jumbled mess when it came to work outside of class. On the academic side, and this had been the case since elementary school, it was always the whole "you are so smart but if you just APPLIED yourself..." thing. "Brilliant but lazy" as Otto Octavius says in Spider-Man 2. But of course just like Peter Parker, I had a whole life's worth of conflict hiding within me out of sight to observers; my secret struggle. "Calm waters" my mom calls it.
Thank you for this message Paul. It resonated with me. I hope you have a happy day.
My grades skyrocketed when I was most depressed (couldn't fit in socially after numerous moves, family dealing with consequences of DV, could only focus academically -- even with my worst subject, mathematics, I managed to get tests in the 90s). It was only when I was experiencing psychosis in college that my grades faltered. I had to drop a course because its weekly quizzes were too fast paced, still...I failed no course. Despite the brain fog, the overwhelm, my brain still manages to retain enough information to pass exams. I appear to be well and privileged, but I felt that I've been falling through cracks all my life. Apparently ASD runs in my maternal side and we all have experienced significant trauma that led to some degree of alexithymia. I don't believe IQ has anything to do with us, it's the bottom-up processing and hyperfocus that supercharges our capabilities.
So much in this video resonates really deeply. It’s been educational.
This was very helpful. Thank you, Paul.
i related to this so much. thank u for this.
Omg! The isolation bit! And perfectionism. And being placed in a gifted class but struggling at school. I can’t believe no one questioned it. If I was gifted, why was I not at the top of my class? But no one seemed to question it.
This definitely was my case. Teachers used to call me a wonderchild in elementary school and I was considered gifted. I didn't even study much but my grades were high, I had a natural ability for languages, I don't remember a time I would actually sit and study English, for example, I kind of just got it (it was a foreign language for me). I was also very good in maths, history, and basically all other classes, and also have a talent for art. I finished high school with straight A's in all centralized exams I took. So basically I graduated with A's without even putting in effort of actually studying and... absolutely no social skills. I was always the odd one out and to this day didn't understand what was wrong with me. I have no trouble of expressing what I know and think in my head by writing, but when I try to express my opinion or insight verbally, nothing even comes out. But when I am telling someone about things I'm particularly interested in, I can't stop talking and delving into details those poor people even haven't heard of. Been bingeing on your channel since yesterday and going to continue to. Really good information and helps to understand myself more. Thank you.
I 100% agree about perfectionism being a sort of compensation mechanism. In my own personal work, I've recently come to the realization that my own perfectionism has been a major component of my masking - at least on a subconscious level. I've come to believe that I adopted it as a way to create this "perfect" image of myself that creates a blind to prevent others from seeing my struggles and shortcomings. And, hilariously enough, my perfectionism has even come to plague my attempts to overcome it! "I'm trying to overcome my perfectionism, but I'm just not doing well enough." At least there's a bit of absurdist humour in that lol.
Paul I don't usually comment in your videos but I really enjoy them because you're the one UA-camr that I have found talks (with no clickbait) about Asperger's.
I have Asperger's and I'm really grateful that your channel exist so I can feel related with something in daily life.
I just wanted to tell you...the last part when you talk about that word, hit me hard.
When you said it, It sounds so painful and sad that makes me remember the times I feelt the same way.
Have a good life Paul, thank you for everything.
And despite everything and everyone I still think that Asperger's a gift.
As a recently diagnosed autistic, I find I’m learning new things more and more everyday. Tall Poppy Syndrome is what I’ve lived with for my Entire Life, but I wasn’t able to understand it until seeing this video. Thank you! Every bit of information helps me understand myself more everyday. 🙏🏽😊
I was misdiagnosed with high functioning autism. It turned out to be giftedness, my parents always told me to “accept who you are” and i kinda grew into the body of someone with autism, right now i know that i am sociable and I have peoples skills but back then I was scared of social interactions and especially when teachers or parents were near by telling their child i was autistic. I had special needs in my class, I clearly didn’t need them nor was I keen to having them, that sped worker was like my crippling exoskeleton. I knew I was smarter than others and often tried to adapt to their understanding of things and not just blurt out how quantum mechanics work, my mum read on giftedness and high cognitive potential and it turned out i was perfectly fine and just within the 99th percentile. So if you have been diagnosed with high functioning autism but you don’t feel “different” socially, please consider re diagnosis since giftedness is being more and more studied and comprehended.
It may also be possible that autism comes in many forms.
This is very true, teachers should have seen this in me, I had bad grades, couldn't act right, could not learn like others, so I've learned more In life , than school.
I wrote a string trio earlier this year. I don't need praise because my talent has already been confirmed multiple times by experts in the field. But when I share the music with my friends, all of a sudden not a single person wants to listen to my music anymore. They simply ignore me. And I need the emotional sharing with my inner circle of close friends to keep me motivated. I was expecting that I could get my music performed at my friend's place. FINALLY after all these years! Now what?
Both. Responsibility comes with intelligence.
I can so relate to this! The versatility and being good at so many things; even playing badminton with my left hand. The Tall Poppy - Never heard of this before, but yes, the jealousy. I've been told once that I remind people of their inadequacies. But I'm just being myself...
It is more of a curse. Being bullied at school, having less friends, difficulty in finding a suitable job are the highlights of an aspie life. Guys, don't deceive yourself into thinking this is more of a gift than a curse. The number one skill needed to survive in real life is communication skills which aspies lack and because of this, will be either unemployed or underemployed. Perfectionists or those who get lost in small details will fall behind in life. Aspergers is definitely a disability!
John, all the data statistics I have studied confirm what you say about unemployed,underemployed etc.
It makes me so sad to agree w this...but in my case it is definitely true. Heartbreaking so many ppl struggle
I've often heard that I didn't have to work for anything, earn my grades at school, etc. It's said to mean that I don't understand adversity and that my success is mere luck. As an autistic person, though, I work much harder than others in areas that go unseen. I work very hard to compensate for executive dysfunction, manage my sensory processing differences, and keep my mask on. To anyone who thinks life is easy for me, I hope they learn to understand that everyone struggles differently, and that I can't help what my strengths are.
This makes sense to me. When I was in grade school, I ran into 'Tall Poppy Syndrome' or as people where I grew up called it 'Tall Nail Syndrome' because if a nail is sticking up above the level of the board, what happens? It gets hammered down until it is flush with the rest of the nails. I struggled with anything that required me to use hand-eye coordination or to read small print and line things up (such as symbols in a math problem for example) because of my life-long vision problems that had slowed my development in many ways. I didn't know that I was autistic at the time because this was the 70's in a very small town in the American Midwest, so people didn't know about such things back then. You were either 'normal' or you were a 'weirdo' or worse and were ignored if you were lucky, or bullied if you weren't.
One of the few strengths I had was a phenomenal memory for things that I had heard. I could hear something just a few times, once if I was really concentrating, and remember it perfectly. This really came in handy when it came to singing and playing instruments. I couldn't read or write very well because of my vision problems, but I could hear and sing very well. I was in choir and band at school and at church. The other kids, I found out later, were very jealous of the way that I could listen to the music director sing something, or play it on the piano, or even to hear it on the radio or a record and be able to sing it back almost perfectly without any practice. Just a little practice, and I could perform the song well enough to win talent contests and get very high grades in music.
I couldn't read sheet music though because the pages were an almost indecipherable jumble of blurry, doubling images to me. I had to concentrate so hard to see the page correctly, that I didn't have any mental capacity left over for remembering what each note sounded like as I read it. If I tried to sing or play an instrument while looking at the pages, I couldn't read it. The other kids teased me something terrible about that because some of them could read sheet music fairly well. Most of them couldn't memorize very well though and it took them ages to learn a song well enough to perform it without sheet music, while I had no problem with that. I never gave them a hard time about not being able to memorize music easily, so they figured that they could make themselves feel better about their inability to sing or play by ear through teasing me about my inability to sight read.
This jealousy of theirs really got bad when we started doing contests where the judges wanted the kids to perform without sheet music. This was a real struggle for my classmates, but second nature to me. I got top scores way before any of them did through the years of middle school and high school.
It took me a while to figure out how to channel this ability into other areas of my life where I had trouble, but I finally did by the time I was in high school. I would record myself reading things that I was supposed to memorize for tests and then listen to these tapes over and over again wearing headphones and writing it back down again just like I took notes in class lectures to help me focus on what the teacher was saying. Few other people could read my notes, but I could and that was what mattered. I was so glad when they taught us how to use typewriters in high school! After that, I started typing up all of my assignments.
Trying to write well enough by hand so that the teacher would even grade it was torture before that. We had teachers who would give us assignments back and make us do them again if our penmanship was poor, then they'd reduce our grade for being late after we finally got it written down better. Writing neatly took all the concentration I had, so I had to write everything twice - once to the get my thoughts down, and again to make it gradable.
Anyway, I used my ability to remember by listening to create audible flash cards of a sort. This worked very well for memorizing things in science and history, so I started doing much better in those classes. Being able to type really helped my English grades as well. Math was still hard and it would take me hours to do my math problems because I had to cover up everything on the page except for the problem with a sheet of paper with a hole cut in it, then rewrite the problem very carefully on my answer sheet, then try to remember what the teacher had said about how to do that kind of problem, sometimes having to record myself reading the chapter about it in the book and listening back to that (because reading took so much concentration that I often didn't comprehend what I was reading at the same time). I would spend a lot of my free time in upper middle school and early high school on weekends, evenings and even during the summer, just trying to learn this stuff. My mom even hired a retired schoolteacher she knew to tutor me in math and English because she wasn't very good at math nor spelling herself. I think my mom paid her with having her eat meals with us while she was at our house.
School was a real struggle, but I managed to get good enough grades to get scholarships for college. In college, all that hard work I had to do in order to make learing in school work for me paid off because I had become able to practically teach myself - something that some college professors wanted us to learn by the time we graduated anyway. Here, I already knew how. I had scraped by in public school - my low grades in math bolstered by my high grades in music and art. In college, however, I got A's and B's. It amazed people back home when my mom showed them my college grades. I sang in one of the student center churches and for fun in college, but decided to follow my fascination with plants and become a botanist rather than a professional musician because everybody I grew up around told me that being a musician isn't a very stable, good paying job.
Who knows, maybe I'd be a famous singer or something now if I had grown up around people who encouraged me to pursue that. It's alright though because I really enjoy being a professional gardener and landscaper. I probably would have really struggled with all the sensory overload of concerts, travelling on tour etc anyway. I can't stand noisy crowds. Even in high school music and stage play contests where the crowd was well under 100 people (most of whom were rather quiet compared to crowds I've been in when visiting big cities), I had to ignore everything past the edge of the stage and focus on the director in order to avoid being overwhelmed by it all.
This reminds me of a book we have at home Super Dooper Jezebel, by Tony Ross. Worth a read. Also I often think about his book The Three Sillies in terms of ASD/NT dynamics.
Excellent video
This is exactly me. Except the jealousy unfortunately came from my family. I don't like talking about it with others because it sounds conceited to claim you were a victim of jealousy. So I was mostly alone in my suffering. It built up over the years I presume and then I experienced betrayal that almost broke me :( I constantly toe the line between wondering if it is me or others that is the problem. But as a person I am so idiosyncratic (and not always in a good way) that it is impossible to for me or anyone trying to help me to know with any certainty. I have had to come to terms with living in social purgatory. I am getting better at accepting that I cannot judge myself or others in the same capacity as most. But there are days where the uncertainty and loneliness catches up with me. I have to live to my full potential but the cost has been extremely steep. But we go on.
I once got fired from a job for performing too well. The supervisor said I made the other employees look bad. Just prior to that, they were very pleased with me for helping them pass their inspection after they failed previously.
Great work Paul.
Thanks Paul, this was a really good topic that isn't often touched upon.
I hope you now have friends who love you for who you are & build you up & not tear you down.
Totally get the "really competitive" & it deterring others because they know you'll beat them & they just don't want to play because of the ability you have. People have said "your so arrogant!" When all I did was play at my ability level. You deserve the success you have in what you are doing now as well & it must be very satisfying to be helping others understand AS 👌
Your plant is looking really happy & healthy 🌿 Take care 🙋♀️ & just letting you know my Husband would really enjoy a table tennis game with you as he excels in playing it as well 🏓 ( he plays holding the paddle the way Asians do - it looks awesome!!! )
12:52 I will use this at my next interview. 😁
Story of my life right there.
Great, thanks Paul, nice insights
You are lovely! Thanks for sharing!
I wish I could show this video to my therapist because she just doesn't understand my perspective on this.
Unfortunately, in my case I'm not academically gifted. People think that autistic means either lower end iq, non verbal, no eye contact, non functioning OR very high iq, book smart, just socially awkward and bad at communication.
I'm somewhat mid iq. So my struggles are that I can't really find or hold a job very easily because I'm not really good at anything while I also find it incredibly difficult forming friendships and building work relationships, but I'm not low functioning enough for it to be noticeable right away, so often people think that I'm just being difficult or an asshole on purpose.
I also have gravitated to individualistic sports where your results speaks for themselves because it's much easier for me when my failure or success is attributed to myself alone rather than a team. But I also find it very difficult to find training partners, because even in sports like boxing or MMA, you need training partners and coaches to get better, you can't just hit the bag.
I realise that trying to find any kind of understanding or sympathy for my "condition" is falling on deaf ears and is often viewed as an attempt to manipulate or gain sympathy, so I just try to navigate a very harsh and hostile world by my self.
Suicidal thought are just in the back of my mind constantly and it is hard to fight them off when you feel like you're useless, broken and don't deserve love or respect.
In short, autism for me had been a curse, I don't know if I ever felt blessed. My parents don't even know I'm autistic and feel the way I do.
Edit: also, at work, sometimes it's really hard even if you are the guy that does the job really well, if people don't like you, they will find reasons to make your work seem subpar or that your actually doing less than you could be. Management often doesn't know what's actually going on and really on a couple of "people" to snitch on everyone, making me the easiest target because I'm often the last one in and the one that is unaffiliated to any of the groups.
I'm not sure if I'm gifted or just good at tests (tried the Mensa test for fun and was told I'm in the top 2% percentile) but I do know there are some things I do well. Whilst I consider that a privilege, I'm now finding out how much of a curse it can be. I'm in work and widely considered one of the best performers of the team but ultimately, this leads to other people slacking off. Time and again, I find myself having to force my mind into hyperfocus to finish the work others were supposed to have done. I'm in severe autism burnout now, partially because of work stress. I need at least 6 weeks off work but can't afford to take this time off. My wages don't allow me to have any savings and my aptitude for calculations has made it very clear that £900 in SSP and Universal Credit will just about cover my bills but leave me without food. So, long story short, being highly intelligent and/or gifted can be amazing but it also makes you very much aware of the ways in which it is a curse.
I got diagnosed with Aspergers at 9 years old (which for child is reasonably late), I believe my giftedness hid some of the obvious autistic traits (a word very often used by adults to describe me was bright). When I moved from primary to secondary school I didn't understand why one week some of my friends (all neurotypical) and I would be invited to some event and then a couple of weeks later my friends would be missing for a day, the day after I'd ask where they'd been they'd say 'oh an event with Mr/ Ms (teacher in charge of the gifted programme)' occasionally they might add 'actually I'm surprised you didn't come along'. For context most of the friends I'm talking about here were gifted in the same areas I was so in theory anything they got invited to I should've as well
Thank you, Paul! Usually, people would say that the curse is the fact that ‘we are handicap’.
But you said it right.
The curse is the envy we see jealous’ hearts feeling from us, from our talents;
the curse is the loneliness of not having someone on our level to talk to, to play with.
Yet the blessing is indeed a privilege.
Thank you, Paul! Both things need to be reinforced in our mindset: we are privileged; and this loneliness and ‘persecution’ are its price.
Still, it is so very good to know that people like you are around. Especially for people like me, an adult woman, diagnosed just recently.
I watch your professorial videos in which you describe in a serious manner many of our most ridiculous mannerisms, and suddenly I see myself cracking of laughter.
Thank you, Paul! There is no envy or jealousy; there is no loneliness or persecution. Watching you is pure privilege!
Thanks for this video, Paul. It really resonates with me and obviously with many others, too.
Thank you for this video- I've only just realised at the age of 38 that I am most likely on the spectrum too (and funnily enough work in a similarly technical field). As one of those humans who is gifted at well, pretty much anything I try, I related immensely to your video and your school experience. Conversely, I spent 3 hours with a friend yesterday and had to come home, put on my PJs and spend just as long winding down on the couch- but no one would know that if they didn't live with me. Thank you for sharing your story.
School was very strange when I was way ahead of my classmates intellectually, but I would always be the last one to turn in assignments or get homework done because I'd be either spacing out or obsessing and getting stuck on details of the assignment, taking things too literally, or trying to have perfect penmanship or other things that didn't really matter that nobody else seemed to care about. Ultimately I stressed out a lot and was a solid B student throughout most of school because I would ace tests but only turn in about 70% of assignments, so it balanced out.
Good topic
A gift combined with a person's traits determines whether it will be a curse or a blessing how you understand it and use it is what often determines the outcome. I have what is called High intelligence Asperger's Syndrome High singular IQ, analytical thinker high cognitive skills, I lack empathy and the ability to connect or bond on most levels. I realised at an early age mid 20s that I couldn't go on hating the world and all those in it, I needed something that justified my existence. To have a gift and not use it either in a good or bad way is a waste so I set about forging a path that made a big difference.
I once had a manager who taunted me with “look at me, I’m little miss perfect Deborah” in front of colleagues at a conference. To be fair she was drunk, but once my shock at her words had dissipated I ran & hid in my room for the rest of the conference.