Does an NT life seem boring to you?

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No, but aspie life is boring.

A lot of you guys say that you wouldn't change being an aspie or autistic for the world. Maybe you have a stronger outlook than me. Sure, aspies have gifts. Mine would probably be a deeper level of thinking, seeing as though i've lived my life from an alternate perspective. However, I would give it up in a heartbeat if only to live normally because like it or not, more than ninety nine percent of the world is neurotypical.

Not to say my life is too far from normal. I have many good friends, even have wit and charm. However, I look at my family and they are very similar to one another in terms of what they have. They all have great social skills, very persuasive nature, highly intelligent, very witty and funny and have a good grasp on the way things are. Me and my father (who is not diagnosed but how I know is almost certain) have all of these but on an entirely different level. Hard to explain, but we are the oddballs out, although nobody thinks any less of us because of it. Sure, my social skills aren't terrific like theirs, but when I talk, people generally take interest in what I have to say. I'm a very intelligent guy, and everyone whose met me would agree. However, as far as the rest of my family goes, I don't quite measure up to their standards.

If I didn't have asperger's, would I be better off? Certainly. Would I be the social butterfly the rest of my family is? Probably. But would I be as deep and thoughtful as I am now? Probably not. I would be analytical, as I am now, and would have much insight to share, but it would be insight that is right in front of their eyes. Things they already know, but can't put their finger on as opposed to the things nobody would've ever thought of. That is my gift. However, would I give it up in a heartbeat to be a neurotypical? I wouldn't think twice. Call me the minority.

It isn't all that bad sometime, if it was I think I would give up.

If I either was in a steady relationship or didn't need no one I would be much happier then any NT

Um watching my family who are all nts except my bro who is adhd, their life seems yes more boring then mine but their life seems so easier also.

No. They seem to get laid more.

I agree with the part about the minorities and outcasts being the "fiercest" in defending themselves. I think, when provoked, I tend to verbally abuse and be the bully I despise in others. The difference is what provokes me.

I am not provoked by someone just because they do not fit an established "norm". For example: because of their gender, race, religion, appearance, whether they have an ASD or are an "NT" or something else.

I tend to go by how they treat me and how they treat others who are different from the norm. I may be "lacking empathy" in some ways, but I definitely do not lack it for any outcast or minority.

So, if they treat me bad or someone else I have empathy for bad, I tend to become quite fierce. Yes.

so what do you do for fun?

I play online games first of all.
Mostly mmorpgs, sometimes strategy wargames and first person shooters.
Second i watch every war movie/serie that ever comes out.
But also some discovery and national geographic, for good documentarys on any kind of weapon or war dicumentary.
Than there are the weekends where i usually hang with my gf and some friends.
We play playstation, watch good movies and drink lots of beer in the process.
Once like every half year someone convinces me to go out, this usually just ends up being pretty dissapointing though.
Just talking and listening to music is boring when your not really doing anything your interested in.

The same here... I think a lot about what should I do about my life, and I've been fine since I've realized that I don't care about "normal" expectations.
I'm much more satisfied doing the things I really want to do, like reading my stuff and playing computer games, than strugling for positions and money.
I know that my NT family doesn't like it because they think I'm wasting my life, but I don't really feel that I want to do something differently than I do now.
I have a job that pay my bills, and I like to be free to do whatever I want, whenever I want. What I do today is fine for now, and if I change my mind... well... let's wait and see when and if it happens.

LOL. In full agreeance. My life as an AS trying to be NT was not really "boring" however, more like stressful, exhausting. Now I accept that there are different things I do that are completely normal for how I'm wired, and really don't care what anyone else says. We aren't all the same, so no point in comforming to a "norm." I find I've been sort of "liberated" from my own little prison cell, and can enjoy myself. Being cloistered was my life for some time, it was my own freedom. Letting people in did me in, and putting myself out there was putting myself in a prison cell. Funny how that works. I don't feel ashamed if I don't want to "hang out," and I feel alright about how people percieve me, even if it is in a negative way. And still, I socialize better now knowing about AS, better than any time before when I was pretending to be NT. "Know thyself" is a statement I now live.

Incomprehensible, sometimes. Though I wouldn't say boring. I find that I'm often in conflict between what I know I want to do and what my brain will let me do (and I'm someone who pushes her brain up against a wall and kicks sense into it a fair bit.). Travel, for example. I can go away by myself, but I have certain things I hate, like being in an environment where people are eating around me and I can't leave. This makes long distance flights so far impossible.

I don't think I'd want to be different from who I am, though. I can't imagine not being able to learn things at speed, or writing stories and creating characters and basically seeing and feeling the world in such vivid emotional and visual technicolour. I'm always amazed when someone says they can't see/hear/feel something, or when something that seemed obvious to me to figure out is taking other people a long time to decode.

Working where I do, I see people on all levels of the spectrum and I know there are people who have it a lot worse than me. I definitely wouldn't want their lives. Sure, I have challenges in mine, but I think I'd still rather have those challenges than be just like everyone else, mooching through life without really valuing anything in it properly.

Everything I achieve, I value. Even if my achievements are not as amazing as flying round the world or whatever, they're still special things to me and they make my life worth living. I wonder how many NT people take for granted their lives without realising it...

I do accept though that I am well adjusted and with a supportive family. I wasn't diagnosed till I was 22 or 23 (26 now) and that has pros and cons. I think I've lived a "normal" life for as long as I have (only through my own eyes), so I understand how their world works and can function within it to a fair degree. Unfortunately that also means that when I do have problems, there's no help to fall back on (for example, I can only work part time, so my finances are limited and I can't claim any kind of tax credit/rail concession/etc in the UK without claiming disability living allowance, which I have no reason to claim)

I don't think NT people are happier or sadder than Aspie/Autistic people. They just have a different world view. And I'd rather have this world view than anyone else's

Apple

Stressful was the first word that I thought of to describe what it would be like to have to live a completely "normal"/NT life for me. But it goes beyond that. It would just be... wrong. Not for the people who live that because they want to and it fits them, but for me. I think I literally could not live in that world, let alone do it convincingly. It's like telling a cat to be a fish. It's so illogical that I don't want it, even if it would be easier by some standards if I did aspire to live like that. There are things I want, some of them more conventional (like friends and a soulmate) and some of them less widespread (like significantly changing the world), and it's best that I spend my time trying to get and achieve them rather than wasting my time trying to be normal, when normal has no appeal for me.

Yes, definitely.

Many of my coworkers consider fun to be nothing more than going to a bar to drink and hang out with their friends. Apparently, they do this exact same thing just about every weekend. And they say aspies are overly obsessed with routine! In general, they lack intellectual curiosity and are instead obsessed with people—people they know and even people they don't.

I'm an NT, reading this because of a family member. What just struck me in this exchange is how the worst arguments I get in with good friends are in email. You misread something that someone writes, and you fire off a nasty comment back, and suddenly you're in the middle of a heavy spat.

I realized years ago this happened because the communication is fast, but it lacks all of normal signals we give off during face to face communication. All of those clues and hints to what's behind the words.

Now I was wondering if it isn't a good way for me to try to understand what Aspie social experience is like. I mean, the difficulty in reading those signals. Just a thought.

To be clear, I'm just trying to understand, not put down or judge (since this is, after all, like an email, and could be misinterpreted....)

Mastik, that's a pretty apt observation. It might lend some perspective in how the world could be perceived by creating artificial barriers, yes.. Although the issue is deeper in many respects, at a process level.


M.

NTs can have very interesting emotional lives. However, their intellectual lives are often deeply, horrendously boring.

It's a draw.