Aspies "Experience the world differently" from NTs

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What does this mean and how do aspies experience the world differently? It's something that seems to be big in autism. Also, how do we have trouble, "making sense of the world?".

I've been told this and I never understood what it meant and how it's different for me than anyone else. I was told I see things different and think different and experience things differently. To me that is experiencing the word differently.

But when I read online and also in real life when I hear about what people would think and how they think and how they act, I can tell how different my thinking is than theirs. People just keep shocking me. Also the fact when my husband tells me "Most people wouldn't get this upset" over something. To him I get upset over little things when to me they are big things.

i think we experience it with less social/cultural influence, if that makes sense.

basically, i think that we tend to be unaffected (to an extent) by cultural expectations and practices that take root in most people from childhood forward, so our out-look on the world might be more down-to-earth--we can't comprehend that certain things are inappropriate because appropriateness is determined culturally. in the end, i think it's an incredible and equally dooming gift.

edit: i also wonder if this is a direct symptom of the condition or a result of social deprivation due to rejection (maybe someone here will know?). since the amount of social interaction every person with AS experiences obviously varies, it's not surprising that there are discrepancies between our views/opinions (i guess you can just lurk in some of the threads, one person might say "i don't understand why people do this," and then someone else can say "oh, well i can explain that, isn't it obvious? as for me, i don't understand why people do THIS.") when it comes to understanding certain things, if it really is a consequence of being exposed to the culture less and in different areas (not necessarily geographical areas). so would someone with AS who was somehow accepted into his/her peer group from early on have a more "typical" and culturally-influenced view of the world? or would social expectations still be lost in translation no matter how much exposure he/she had? sorry, asking a question in a question thread.

I remember in school the special ed teacher telling me that I think differently, and that a lot of people would try and tell me I'm ret*d but I'm not. I just think differently. Whenever I respond with that people always roll their eyes and groan.

I wasn't in special ed though, she just happened to be my neighbor.

What I have noticed is that my focus is different than that of the rest of my family. Sometimes I am completely unaware of things that are "big events" for them, like the fact that the winter festival of our village will be taking place next weekend. Other times, I notice things they are completely oblivious about like the fact that there is a woodpecker sitting on our front lawn. It may not be important if there is woodpecker or not, but how can you look at a green lawn and not notice a black-white-and-red bird sitting in the middle of it?

Because I notice different things than they do, I think about different aspects of what is going on around us and I draw different conclusions. In some cases that does not really matter as they regard my conclusions as valid and sensible, but sometimes they just look at me in a way that tells me that they are at a total loss. It happens the other way around as well.

I can imagine that people that get caught with a little bird sitting on their front lawn when there is a winter festival about to take place may appear somewhat weird to people who are used to everyone being so excited about the winter festival they just don't notice that bird, but I do not think that makes it less "valuable" to think about the bird. It's just a different way of seeing things.

A simplistic analogy is the difference between English and Cantonese. Both are human languages that communicate human ideas. But there are things that have no accurate translation between the two.

You could say that autism has a different language built on a different set of perceptual and processing tools. The result is something than can be translated to the NT world, but never perfectly. And because autism is a minority "language" the burden of translation falls mainly on the autie.

according to several resources that I have read as well as my own personal experience, Autistic people tend to see things from the bottom up and NTs see things top down. In other words we see details first and only then see the big picture. My shrink was fascinated when I showed him how I perceive the world and his comment was, "So it is like the forest/tree anaolgy?" I replied that it is similar except I see bark first, then I see branches, then leaves, the veins in the leaves, etc... Some days it takes 15 itterations to get to tree... THEN we can talk forest. But do know that by the time I am talking forest that I know a LOT more about the forest than an NT will even want to know. It's just different.

IF you all want to see the way I think:
http://ultimatesuperset.blogspot.com/

yes, I agree with kfisherx; that the details come first and are synthesized into a coherent structure.

Apparently NT minds perceive the whole picture first, and then can draw their attention to details.

I do not understand how the whole-picture process is supposed to happen, but I am a thinker of the detail sort.
Likewise, I assume that whole-picture thinkers would struggle to understand how I think.

The whole-picture method allows the mind to bypass the details, creating mental space for er, "fun" things like easy social interactions. Human interaction is prioritized, and tends to be considered the "real world".

The detail method may involve delay in getting to the whole picture, as the details must first be processed.
For example I can understand a complex social interaction, but only some time after it has taken place. It takes me longer because I process the details of the entire environment, plus the human factors, and later get to the layers of emotion etc. Even though I enjoy some interaction with other people, it is not easy and is not my priority.

I guess that this is what is implied by the phrase "difficulty making sense of the world"... the time delay in processing and the different priorities gives an impression of struggling to make sense of the world.