NTs don't understand why I want to learn something

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I was forced to be taught braille because I was born with a rare low vision disorder & my voc rehab counselor sent me to a training facility for people with low vision to learn life skills & learning braille was part of the program. I s#cked with learning it & I did not see the point cuz my eyesight is good enough for me to read up close & it's not degenerative. I always s#cked with learning things in skewl & on my own due to learning disabilities. I can defiantly relate to the NTs who don't understand why people want to learn things in general.

I think it’s cool you want to learn Braille. If you lose your vision, you’ll be prepared. Plus it helps you relate to humans that read it too & it’s good exercise for your brain. Those poor “NT” folk don’t know what they’re missing.

Gné! In addition to being false (something Aspies don't like) this answer will trigger more questions. Like "Then you should also learn Chinese : China is becoming a major world power and Chinese may be needed sooner than you think. Furthermore, Chinese is the most spoken language un the world! Did you consider learning French and Spanish and Portuguese? These languages are also spoken in America, from Québec to Argentina. Esperanto is an international language..." And so on.. Soon our friend will have to learn NASAese, Catmeow, Dogwoof and Martian.

This kind of thing happens to me too. My question is for NTs who say that: why wouldn't you learn something?

Most NTs are boring and are happy knowing the few things that they do know

People are often surprised that I do multiple creative things, treating me like I'm crazy to want to have a wide skill set, especially when they seem niche

Also, I feel like sometimes (even though we may find it strange) people are jealous

I think learning Braille is really cool as well as being multi-lingual. You should be proud of yourself.

Thank you so much

Yes OP, I have also observed this revulsion in NTs towards learning something new - even more so when it's a challenging subject like Braille for example, as you mentioned.

When it comes to information I can't seem to get enough which is why I'm constantly reading almost every hour of the day and NTs seem to be content with allowing their brains to rot in front of the boob tube.

Interesting, isn't it?

And a lot of the time age seems to be the main excuse for not learning anything in the NT world.
In what universe is age a factor to determine whether you should learn or not?
I can understand that studying a language, for example, might take a while to accomplish, but age should not be of that importance here...
This sounds to me like pure idleness.

To quote kraftiekortie: "Just learn it, baby!"

Reply, "Intellectual curiosity is what separates us from the lower animals."

In my opinion, nothing separates us from lower animals. Humans are just arrogant.

I largely agree, but I thought it was a good sarcastic reply to an annoying question.

Last edited by Benjamin the Donkey on 05 Jun 2018, 9:18 pm, edited 1 time in total.

I think what sparked my interest is that I was at whitewater kayak practice on Saturday and it was one of the days that we have our blind students. I thought to myself, here I am helping blind kids learn something, I then thought it would be really fun for me to learn something that they have to learn. I will often also kayak with my eyes closed to see what it might be like for them. And I have found that sometimes when I am learning a new skill, removing the visual sensory input, helps me learn the skill because I am relying on my other senses more like feeling and hearing the way the water responds to my paddle and boat. I also have always wanted to learn Braille because my dad is legally blind and one year for Christmas we bought him some DR Seuss books in Braille. They are also in Latin which he is fluent in. I also want to learn Latin. I think for me, it's a way to feel closer to my dad and to the blind kids that come to kayaking.

Interestingly it only took me a couple of hours to learn the alphabet by sight. I will be starting to learn the abbreviated versions once I am used to reading sentences in longhand. I don't have access to actual manuscripts but I will see if the library has any manuscripts for kids because they will have bigger bumps. Eventually I will be able to get to the smaller bumps. But I am really enjoying learning it so much. It is inspiring me to want to learn many more languages.

That's just it.

If you just told folks what you told us in that above post no one would think it was strange at all.

Just tell folks "My dad was blind, and also right now I am involved with a group that takes blind folks kayaking". NTs would "get it" that you have known blind folks up close. And They wouldn't think it odd that you would want to learn to read braille.

Interesting because the person who asked me why I wanted to learn Braille knows those things about me. He also knows my dad. In fact I had just told him that I had just come from kayak practice.

I love learning new things. Not anything specific either, just knowing more is fun.

I do find it frustrating though that I have trouble learning. The ADD already makes it difficult, but I have very poor retention and sometimes the simplest things can confound me. Such as simply reading, or following steps to do something.

It hasn't stopped me from trying though.

Hmmmm..

I guess you could still, like...remind the person of the above facts. If he still thinks that you're somekindawierdo then its not just that he is an NT, its something off about that person.