Advice you'd give to younger Aspies?

Post Reply New Topic

I'd say to try to act like the other people.
You're probably hurting other people's feelings by intruding on them.
You don't just label somebody a friend.
Don't stare at people. It's rude. On a similar note, realize that just because people aren't looking or saying anything to you about something, doesn't mean that you shouldn't do it. They expect you to understand.
Do things around the community with people from your classes. Sports, clubs,etc.
It's off-putting to talk about your feelings very personally.
Just don't do that.

Practice all you can, particularly up to college. Study people as a Science;
Antropoligy, Phycoligy even Primatoligy. Studying other pack animals can
let you understans to underlying dynamics of human behavior.

Take peoples advice as guidelines not hard rules. Sometimes romaticly you
need to be inside someones personal space for example.

The difference between Quirky and Creepy is putting people at ease. People
love quirky. Clean up, smile and let people know your intentions ; picture kramer
from sienfeild if he always looked series, staring at people from accross the room, creepy right.

There is no correct answer in social situations and NTs do things that a little weird
sometimes too. Don't worry so much about making mistakes and learn to handle them
well eg. "Sorry that joke really didn't work" or "Sorry, I guess I was in your personal space"
Most of the time if you explain your intentions its perfectly fine, not understanding peoples
intentions freaks NT's out so just help them allong.

Most freindly social interaction is play. I think of it as being very like how lion cubs have fun
play fighting without knowing it's practice for the real thing. NT's are like this with social interaction
they love playfuly, sillily playing out emotionaly situaltions but it has to be clear its fake. eg.
Acting annoyed with a girl that she's looking at chest. "My eyes are up here".

Don't really worry about intruding on people unless they are obviously busy. Its acceptable to say "Hi, How are you doing" to anyone. I find it much easier to socialise in a group of about 3-4 including me. At that number there is no responsibilty to keep the conversation going and the group is small enough it wont split. It's easier to get into the group as its forming than enter after.

In Ireland where I live it's generaly understood that a person needs to be able to either Be Funny, Tell a good story or be musical. I'd recomend these to anyone. I do think literary but I filter that but the litteral images can be a good source of humour.
For example: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tNY376o2 ... re=related

Oh and practice you faces: Happiness, Sadness, Anger. I don't bother with the rest and have fun with it. Go all Jane Goodall on their asses.

The only normal people are the ones you dont know very well.

Totally agree ^^ ...study psychology & primatology to understand humans & how to communicate with them. Dogs are also very similar.

However, also be happy to be unique in your thinking, honour your talents & abilities, and know that you have been born into this world to contribute as who you are... not as a copy of anything/anyone else.

ThinkTrees is right. Use what you learn to bring out your true personality not mask it. Use and build on your tallents.

Try to wear nice clothes that look reasonable, and be borderline obsessive about your hygiene and grooming. Also, I'd say used name brand clothes are better than new Walmart clothes. Also wear brighterish colors, too. No black all the time.

As hard as it is, do not sell out on your morals for any reason at all. It never usually works out for "the greater good." Whatever you do, do not "sell out" for anyone, if something feels wrong, don't do it, no matter if other people are doing it, whatever. Might not have as many friends that way, but f**k it. Even if your friends are the nerdiest losers, there's no point in selling out and being miserable to try to move up on a social ladder or fit into a specific group.

Take up some kind of athletic pursuit, to keep you in good shape, it'll keep you mentally sharper and happier, give you a bit of a social outlet if needed, and you might actually be good at it, and opportunities could arise. Individual sports are especially good.

Going along with this, eat healthy as possible. This is really hard, as your parents sorta control your food supply when you're young, but as best as you can, eat healthy.

Get lots of sleep. No 5-7 hours a night crap, get like 9-10 hours of sleep.

Don't do drugs. Self explanatory, but yeah, drugs get you involved with shady people you probably don't want as friends. Yes, individual people that do drugs are sometimes fine, but as a group, forget them.

Try not to be narrowminded. You'll be surprised at the amount of things you might like, or be good at. Like for me, Japanese pop used to be the only foreign pop I listened to, but now I've branched off to Russian, Romanian, French, and Spanish music.

---------------------

This is sort of weird longwinded advice, but this pertains more to the actual disorder. You might end up in life, feeling like you've made a lot of progress socially. That you're now "normal" or "cured." And most people around you just go "oh look, you just needed to come out of your shell" or something similar to that. The thing is, while you might feel like, successful, for a time, there will come another time where you fail in some manner, and then go back to "I must be weird/bad/etc." I guess the answer is like, in your perceptions of yourself, you have to find some happy medium where you can place yourself. You'll not be as charismatic and friendly and popular as those other people ever, most likely. However, that doesn't mean you should never leave the house either. I guess a short way to sum it up is, you need to find a healthy happy medium perception of yourself, and your disabilities, and weirdness, without denying them, but at the same time, not being controlled by "oh, I'm weird, nobody likes me" either. Basically don't say that, but also don't say "I'm fine and everyone is cool with me and thinks I'm great."

I try to get get a little out of my comfort zone, often. But never so much that it freaks me out.
I'm thinking of taking dancing classes, it might cross a few of these things of the list at one.

Accept and love your differences, flaunt them where you can, but recognise the places where doing so will only result in making people angry.
Don't conform to fit the crowd; find you own interests, then find people who share them.
If social skills are a problem, find help from a friend, parent, teacher, counselor, etc. get them to teach you, they are learnable, and knowing them will make everything easier.
Don't use your weaknesses as an excuse not to branch out and try new things; it's hard, but in the end it's generally worth it.
Even if you never get officially diagnosed, learn to understand yourself, be lenient, nobody's perfect, everybody makes mistakes.