Do you live in reality?

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Always.

There is but one reality, and Hawking is its prophet.

I don't know. Reality is what is. It's everything.
I was once at a beach with an aunt of mine and we were watching a beautiful sunset. My aunt commented that witnessing such a grand and beautiful part of nature made her feel small and insignificant. It had the opposite affect on me. It made me feel as grand and beautiful as the sight I was witnessing. I didn't understand how she could say such a thing.
I have heard other people express the same sentiment as my aunt when immersed in the beauty of nature, that it makes them feel small and insignificant, and I have always wondered why I feel the opposite. I think it is because I don't see reality as it relates to me. I just see reality.

But what I mean is, from your own personal perspective, you truly are the 'center' of the world?

All things you are never going to see or hear about is not reality to you, right? Because in order for it to be reality to you, you have to see it or hear about it? But instantly when you hear about it or see it, it becomes your reality.

That's what I mean about living in reality. Your idea of knowing other reality than the one you experience are only thoughts in your head. Thoughts are not 'reality', just thoughts. So you are really center of your own reality. You see it in a different way?

I agree!

But in that case, is it possible for you to be autistic if you always live/are present in reality?

It's more like I live with reality, rather than living in reality.

This is called solipsism, not reality.

From Wikipedia:



Solipsism is really not what I'm talking about. I'm not saying you cannot be sure that the external world and other minds cannot be known and might not exist outside your own mind. I'm saying you can only be sure that the external world that you have experienced yourself (or heard about from others/seen on a video etc.) exists.

I'm not saying your own mind is the only thing you can be sure exists. I'm saying what you experience yourself is your personal true reality. There is also an objective reality, but this is (or should be) different from your personal reality.

When you have seen a red bike on the street, there really was a red bike on the street. That's part of your personal reality and also a part of the objective reality. But if you did not see that red bike on the street, it is not a part of your personal reality, because you will never know it happened (but it is a part of the objective reality!).

When you live in your personal reality, you are truly present in the world. When you (partly) live in the objective reality (i.e. "in your mind"), you are not truly present in the world. You are free to think "Now there's a red bike on the street", but it is not reality, merely a thought in your head.

I believe that is what autism is...believing that the thoughts in your head are actually reality, i.e. not fully living in your own personal reality/not being truly present in the world. Or: not truly living in your own body because you are not "convinced" your own personal reality is the only reality there is. You partly live in the objective reality (that is not your reality) too, because you believe (some) of the thoughts in your head to be the actual personal reality (while they are only a part of the objective reality, just as the red bike you never saw yourself).

So autistics are perceived as "living in their own worlds" because they believe too much in their own thoughts instead of what they actually experience (i.e. they believe (a part of) the objective reality to be their personal reality).

In what way do you comprehend time?

The thoughts in my head are not another reality separate from experience.

The thoughts in my head are my reality because that is the way I interpret the reality that I perceive through my senses.

When I am in my own world, in my own thoughts, I am living in reality. I am always living in reality.

Confusing question is confusing...

I think mostly about my own life because that's what I know the most about and it's what concerns me the most.

I don't know if the question is do I live in reality. The question is can I stand reality? EWveryday, I try to live in reality, and question what the point may be, since the world is no less cartoonish and nonsensical than anything I can come up with. I don't know if I can say I live in reality. Rather, I am just adjusting to it.