Show threadCyclone DuskJul 10, 2018

@Elizafox I for one have only gotten by on a kind of personalized take on radical acceptance:
1. nobody wants to hear from me;
2. all opinions of me are already negative;
3. therefore none of them have my best interest at heart;
4. therefore none of their criticisms have merit;
5. therefore I have nothing to lose.

So I just talk. I don't block people who disagree with me. I think the blocking, itself, is unhealthy.

Show threadCyclone DuskJul 10, 2018
@Elizafox I dig it :3 and i respect that! wanting to learn, wanting to grow, that's what being alive is *for*, in my opinion. I know we don't all have the same tools for interfacing socially... and in the case of those who live with autism, especially so. I'll acknowledge, it's definitely a pickle, and I can't pretend to have solutions. But ... how do i put this... it's kind of an equation for me. I approach painful social interactions from the angle of trying to balance/neutralize
Show threadCyclone DuskJul 10, 2018
@Elizafox For example: someone insults me.
I extrapolate the implications of whether they're right or wrong to check to see whether or not these two results even differ in the first place. It surprised me how often it turned out that I'd have the same outcome whether someone is right or wrong. If it's an identity, like that, then the whole thing zeroes out. I'm able to comfortably dismiss the entire interaction without engaging because it makes no difference in my life.
Show threadCyclone DuskJul 10, 2018
@Elizafox ... do you feel torn between wanting to value other people's experience as a learning aid on the one paw, which renders you vulnerable to their disdain, vs. protecting yourself from cruelty on the other paw, which may incidentally involve devaluing and marginalizing the exprience of others, perhaps...?
Show threadCyclone DuskJul 10, 2018
@Elizafox I'd like to do more than merely assure you that it's not a lost cause ^^; but i'm at a loss as to how, other than to say that I think everyone finds a balance. I admire your approach though, that you WANT to learn. That's the best way to go about it. Took me forever to figure out that the only way out is through and that the sooner I immerse myself in it the sooner i can adapt. But if I can recommend anything, it's mindfulness... esp. with regard to forming bad habits.
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@Cyclone_Dusk Mindfulness is literally something my therapist wants me to work on, heh.
Jul 10, 2018 at 11:34pmWeb
Show threadCyclone DuskJul 10, 2018
@Elizafox I hope it won't fall into that pit of therapy buzzwords that sound like they're supposed to mean something but just devolve into a misshapen word salad XD because that one in particular definitely HAS some pretty intensely relevant meaning in it!
Show threadCyclone DuskJul 10, 2018
@Elizafox mindfulness, in practice, in my experience, most often culminates in moments where i step back, blink, and really NOTICE what i'm doing. NOTICING when I'm about to reinforce a destructive behavior in myself. It's one thing to look back on something after the fact and think "oh dammit, i did it AGAIN." It's another thing entirely to get that weird whiff of deja vu like smelling salts and rushing back to your senses realizing "... wait. I'm about to do that thing again...!"
Show threadCyclone DuskJul 10, 2018
@Elizafox one of the best things the human brain does is pattern recognition. like that's one of its most highly optimized functions. patterns of our own behavior can sink beneath our awareness, becoming part of our autopilot, being handled by our default mode network. Big lesson for me this year: my default mode network is not ME. The habits and impulses i've cultivated, on purpose or not, are like their own little animals over which i am responsible.