Insight into the Introverted Aspie

School is done and I've commuted to my birth town to be here for two weeks. For family and for people I ordinarily would not see, I am here for those people. But I also had another motivation for coming back, and that was to come to my community college here in California to read one book inside and out since I cannot find it elsewhere that I can commute to at the moment. The title of this book is Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking by Susan Cain. 

In reading more of this book today I came across this passage:

"Grant says it makes sense that introverts are uniquely good at leading initiative-takers. Because of their inclination to listen to others and lack of interest in dominating social situations, introverts are more likely to hear and implement suggestions. Having benefited from the talents of their followers, they are then likely to motivate them to be even more proactive. Introverted leaders create a virtuous circle of proactivity, in other words. In the T-shirt-folding study, the team members reported perceiving the introverted leaders as more open and receptive to their ideas, which motivated them to work harder and to fold more shirts.

Extroverts, on the other hand, can be so intent on putting their own stamp on events that they risk losing others' good ideas along the way and allowing workers to lapse into passivity. 'Often the leaders end up doing a lot of talking,' says Francesca Gino, 'and not listening to any of the ideas that the followers are trying to provide.' But with their natural ability to inspire, extroverted leaders are better at getting results from more passive workers."

I find it interesting because I am also an introverted individual. I know of my introvertedness for many reasons--I don't attend school parties for my abhorrence of loud environments, Preference for one-on-one conversations, Preference to think through something before responding, Need for alone time to regenerate myself after extended periods of time, Quiet in class--but I wonder if I respond to my introverted nature the wrong way.

From this study, I see that the introverted person works best when he or she hires engaged workers and listens to them, and from this then makes the best decision. Sometimes I become overwhelmed by my peers to the point of not being able to process information and cannot seem to process them. And yet I am ready to take their ideas and put them on the board and follow their ideas to the end. What does this mean for me? I can be quite passive, but if someone comes up to me and tells me to act in some way or another, I usually will act that way unless if I disagree or think something can be done in a different way; and only is it that when people come to me with ideas that I act outside of how I normally think. As a matter of fact, I've found that it is easier to understand something when articulated to me than when I have to read it. Or whenever people explain something to me...whenever I am not stressed. For it seems that my stress / my anxiety makes trouble now days in understanding something, usually when I am overwhelmed with information. (I will also emphasize that this overwhelming of information comes with "new experiences," but these subside and become routine, and when they do, then I am able to handle them.) But with a withdrawn nature, it seems to be necessary to say that I cannot handle the overwhelming of information well from my peers all at once when tackling a task; the question is not the nature as the nature can only change so far, but the question rather is how to work best with this nature. How can I, with a withdrawn nature, be able to handle overstimulation in social settings where my peers and I were working toward one goal? 

I think this question will become an important one in treatment of Asperger's Syndrome and Anxiety. It is in these situations, social situations and new situations, that my anxiety flares up and becomes problematic in addition to my constant worrying over situations that are not presently occurring and will not occur. However, if I am able to deal with social situations and new situations, then my anxiety will fade away--and so will the worrying. For my worrying comes from these situations; worrying cannot help when (a) the situation is not in front of me and (b) the situation cannot be reasoned through or improved but rather can be only intuitive or has to be experienced in order to understand what to do. 

To Find "Trust" And The Birth Of A Living Memoir

I've learned that I have Asperger's Syndrome this week. For me, this is excellent news; for me, this means I can now go on to live with this condition, acknowledge it, and move on with my life. But I also have an anxiety disorder that I must learn to live with also. 

How should I live with anxiety disorder, though, and Asperger's Syndrome? Well, the Asperger's Syndrome can be improved over in therapy. Improving upon my pre-existing faculties are important to me as I must live with this condition. The anxiety disorder, however, can be treated in many different ways--medication, therapy, or both, or alternative practices. Now, what I've learned about medication is that it cannot cure the problem. Rather, like a drug, take me away from the problem before seeing it again. 

I have to live with this disorder...While medication can help greatly, I am not going with medication on a regular day basis. It's good for certain situations or when my mind seems to quack on forever in regard to something that cannot just go away, but I do not want to have side effects for feeling "normal," a state that I understand to exist when I am relieved of my fears and living as though there will be no new worries for a while. A quiet mind can be sought out, but it cannot be found in this way. Quietness cannot be found in drugs or in medication; while they can be used for emergency fixes, or even for the sole purpose of relaxing around friends and other loved ones, quietness must be discovered and perfect. As an art gallery owner tells me, or at least suggests indirectly to me, my outlook must change on life.

And the way I live my life must change too. The way I interact with my peers must change.

Friending new people with my interests in mind will become important in the upcoming months and years as I learn to live with both of these conditions. But I will say that I cannot meditate there; I cannot be religious to get there or live in accordance to some higher power; I cannot medicate there or rely on short-lived drugs; instead, I must rely on "trust," one of the areas where I am shortcoming. Trust fluctuates with the situation, going up with exposure to the particular person and experience to the particular experience, but there seems to be a need to stabilize this trust across the spectrum of my life. 

Trust cannot be found by itself. It can be found in a relationship. A : B. It is the relationship that explains why two things exist together; "trust" in a relationship can be extended very far. I can say that the same "trust" that forms human relationships also forms our relationships between strangers. And I can say that "trust" forms many more relationships, but the most significant relationship I can find is that of myself and everyday life.

For a person with Asperger's Syndrome, I apply myself directly to the world in front of me; everything becomes attached to us, especially when I am interested in something and decide to pursue the interest fully. So there is no such thing as an intermediate term to separate ourselves from the world. This is lacking and can be learned. Or rather, since it has to be learned, created to meet my needs. I accept that I can be open with people, but I need to learn that I cannot be open about everything, a lesson that has manifested itself into my life since the beginning of the year. Openness can be good and bad depending on the situation; it has to be learned. A person has to decide what to be open and what to be closed about (1). But yet not eradicated or suppressed by the societal norm insofar as it is this openness and this honesty that makes the person with Asperger's one of the most insightful people one has ever come to know. I can be open, but I can be injured and hurt. I can take what happens seriously and then cry in secrecy so as to not worry my friends. I can worry sick about my friends but be forced by others to hide that worry and never make it known to the person or people I worry; it is almost as though I never worried for the other person. Or interacted with that person with this light considered. I am not a person who lacks in these faculties and in these woes; I am me, but I acknowledge that I am different. 

To say I am different can often imply that this difference just is--the difference is fixed between me and others--but it is not a fixed difference, a difference that cannot be lessened in order to allow for more collaboration, more conversation, and more relating with each other. Rather, it is dynamic and changing as one perceives it and develops further the perception; I, at least, live by what I perceive. Sometimes perception is imposed on me, and at other times it is not imposed on me; but yet I live with these different perceptions in relation to my own, often living the other perceptions when I should really be living my own perceptions and being more mindful of what I want in this life. Let these differences, nevertheless, prove to be beneficial for my wellbeing and my welfare, and let a mode of life be found for me, and only me, to abide. I cannot abide by another's perceptions when I can live by my own perceptions.

And let this blog be founded as a memoir. A living memoir. (1)

(1) I want to record what happens in my treatment from this point onward. There are many blogs that describe what it is like to live with this condition. Indeed, I would like to note these things from the perspective of someone who was just diagnosed with this condition. However, I am far more interested in talking about what it means to be treated and what it means to receive therapy. There are myriads of conditions besides Asperger's that too require therapy to treat as to make livable, but to make a condition livable, there has to be different methodologies discussed and implemented. This is the scope of the therapy that I am far more interested in occupying my time with as well as this blog, and that is namely how therapy and myself are making this condition livable.

And why am I interested in this? It applies to me, but therapy is given to many more people for different conditions. I am interested in understanding how I figure out the best treatment for myself, and from my own experiences seeing if anything can be said about therapy in consideration to others and their experiences. But even then, such an answer is incomplete; I hope that my account, despite its incompleteness, gets considered by someone who is wondering the same things and inquires into them.

Lastly, why make these experiences public? This should be private...right? I disagree. What should be private is the specifics of my own life. I will change names around. And I will obscure the identities of people. But what can be public is my own experiences with these details changed. Furthermore, given the description of the fact that I will be amending the details of these experiences so as to obscure identities, this blog is one scope of my treatment as I see it. Writing has always been an ally to me, but I also see that conversation is a remedy too as I understand myself and this condition better. 

Thus I have now established why I write this blog. And let it be that this blog be composed.

The Struggle To See Wholeness

For a year, I've been plagued with problems that seemed to be insurmountable. I never had these problems in high school and community college; the education at those places were parts-based and did not focus on the "whole." And yet to see the "whole" was something I kept striving to see, but in the process I realized my loneliness and my struggles. 

I only told three people of my struggles, and personally I thought I would keep them a secret from people for the longest time. But I do not wish to keep this a secret any longer. It is time I told of my story. But a new story, a story about a young adult who found out he has Asperger's Syndrome.

The following is a link to a website that lists the symptoms of Asperger's Syndrome: http://www.cigna.com/individualandfamilies/health-and-well-being/hw/medical-topics/aspergers-syndrome-zq1008.html


I was told from an early age that I was born with dystonic cerebral palsy, a diskinetic cerebral palsy that affected fine motor ability, coordination, and attributed to the weaknesses found in the left side of my body. Now, there are many different kinds of cerebral palsy--many--but this is the one I have. This form of cerebral palsy also leads to different social behaviors, which explained a lot of things for me and my family who diagnosed me with it. The following is a link to a website that lists the symptoms of Dystonic Cerebral Palsy: http://www.medicalmalpracticelawyers.md/the-major-causes-of-dystonic-cerebral-palsy/.

My family did everything to keep me diagnosed as a person with dystonic cerebral palsy. I could have been diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome potentially much earlier in my life, but there was no need to do that. I was happy; my life as it was never required me to examine the "whole" that I am now seeking. I lived according to the parts. And my life became increasingly dominated by the parts as my way of the world became increasingly narrower and narrower thanks to the increasing stresses of high school and community college simultaneously as well as my other developing interests in looking for an elusive "truth." For by looking for the truth, what I find is this: I narrow my mindset so as to no longer wonder at the world and ask what makes it up or what occurs in that world. I did this, and I became acquainted with my new narrow mindset as a friend as I sought stability to reduce the impacts of what I was finding out about the world around me. 

But then I came to St. John's College in Santa Fe, NM last year in August. Suddenly I am challenged by my tutors to look for the elusive "whole," which I find out is expanding my world-view by forcing me to make a new one. A dynamic world view. Part of this world view has included trusting in people more and the "process," but I have not done this yet; I do not know how to proceed doing this and, furthermore, I am unsure as to whether my peers can guide me "on the process" if I am unaware of what it is. Part of it is also that I need confidence--I have quite significant confidence problems--and thus I rely on my own views to give me that. But yet I am asked to find confidence dynamically, confidence without stability, a confidence that I can generate from within myself at any time. 

I've struggled this year to look at the "whole." And lately whenever I thought of the "whole" and the "parts," I've struggled in looking for those things. I broke down into tears. The situation brought me down to missing some classes so as to deal with this new-found obstacle in my life. It got to the point of breaking down in seminar. It got to the point of writing papers about not being able to see the "whole." Rather, the "part" shined, but not the "whole." I wanted the "whole" and the "part" to shine together, but they have not shown together yet. I could not find that light, unfortunately...I thought I would never see it.

And then I called my father last night. I had to leave my seminar on Aristotle's Poetics because I just saw problems with myself seeing the "whole." I had to leave...and this is why I left. I left to talk to my father and ask him for advice on this issue...and, if I must say, this conversation, this missing of one seminar has really changed my life...and it will be for the much better direction... Most kids, most young adults do not have many opportunities to change their lives, and this is because the state and other pressures control what these kids and young adults become. We emphasize the needs of the state and the needs of others before ourselves in career choices despite the fact that we also emphasize that we should pick what we want to do with our lives. The needs of the state, the needs of others are the needs of "parts" and we, therefore, by examining these needs do not examine the "whole." Instead, we follow and we become what we follow and focus our attention on. We deprive ourselves in the "parts" instead of fulfilling ourselves with the "whole." It is said that we fulfill ourselves in other ways, but it is through the "whole" we get the most satisfaction. And it is in the "whole" that we find ourselves and the world around us...tonight was the first step in a very exciting direction in life. I await my journey to find "wholeness" in my life again.

The Connections of Barefootedness

I was asked a question as I walked back to my room. "Hey, aren't your feet cold tonight?" 

"No," I replied. 

The conversation ended. Just a quick remark, and indeed it is not surprising. However, it is a question that pops up again and again with my recent decision to go barefooted at the college I currently attend. And I do definitely enjoy every experience that comes with barefootedness, accessing the many dirt particles that a white foot black, or maybe gray or brown. I ask, though, why the shock. Most of the students at my college are barefooted, even in class at times. They seem to be proud of this, almost an achievement to walk into a classroom barefooted and learn.

And personally, I agree with this approach. There is something triggered in our minds when we are barefooted. Sensory neurons certainly have to fire on and off, telling me what is sharp or what is as flat as a rug to where I brush off my feet. Or where the cracks in any particular surface are, or where different pieces of glass are on the floor. But I feel these different surfaces. And indeed this is the beginning of my adventures as one who is barefooted, at least at his college; however, I cannot emphasize enough how there is a sense of connection that comes with being barefooted. It is amazing to note the surroundings and the concrete, the soils, the adobe that I trample on with barefoot, the surfaces that I once glided on with tennis shoes. (I do put on sandals when indoors to get food and to receive service from the college.) 

Yet when walking on artificially made surfaces like concrete and adobe, I feel a separation from the ground. I feel like something else. It would not be best to say that I am a virus affecting something that has already existed before--nature--but rather I am invading something sacred. This "something" is my relationship to the natural world. To walk on concrete or on adobe is to surrender almost animality insofar as I realize on my spare but increasing occasions on dirt and other natural surfaces that I am a part of those surfaces and the plethora of nature that rises from them than the buildings arising from our foundations. We give birth to and the dying die on these grounds as though we are coming and going from an extremely long movie in a movie theater. The movie gets so long that we leave because we do not want to be around for the whole thing, or we sit as long as possible for it but somehow fall magically asleep and awake outside the movie theater. We labor on these artificial grounds, recreating the highest temperatures to make the metals that assemble our foundations or work in freezing conditions to preserve what we have received from what we have manipulated of nature's harvests. 

We do much with lots of lazing about; what we do not know is that we laze around because we work to maintain what we need to survive. We make shoes that provide the ultimate perfection for feet, and maybe even the ultimate comfort for them. (Now, if we are talking about heels, I am sure those are so painful. And I am sure footbinding can be a pain too.) But we do not let our feet do the work of repelling the rocks or distributing the shock around the feet equally. There are so many things we try to change that in the end we become lazy. We change so much to enhance our own laziness. At least humans know how to poop and to pee on nature's beautiful skies and oceans with leaving trash around; what we consider disrespectful the Earth considers BO. I don't know how she holds her breath in for that long, lol. But somehow, when we are not lazy, she doesn't have to hold in her breath as we let things progress as is with minimal adjustment to anything. To be not a part of nature's game is to sit above the treelines of the Atalaya and to look over the valleys and say that we can turn a whole valley into a whole city--and we do that as nature introduces erosion and chance into the equation.

And maybe this is why I do not wear shoes and go barefoot instead. I am very interested in seeing and partaking in nature's festivities instead of lazing about.