being in your own world

Post Reply New Topic

I think I posted something about this earlier. Anyway, I have this thing that I am constantly in my own world and don't know what's going on around me. In fact, I could go to the same restaurant or movie theatre in my neighborhood for years and never know the exact street it's located on. I know how to get to these places and streets are numbered here, but I couldn't tell you the exact number.

Also, I couldn't tell you what date (sometimes what month) it is.

It's not that I am overwhelmed and am trying to escape anything. I like crowds and I like noise. Quiet makes me feel alone. However, I am just not interested in the physical world around me. My mind can to into itself on its own, without me even being aware of it.

Has anybody else experienced this?

I live in my own head/world a lot.

Yep, in my own little world, and very often wearing an expression that makes people say, 'cheer up, it might never happen', even when I'm feeling content. Hopeless with directions and street names and the like.

Same here.

I once asked a relative if I was supposed to walk around grinning like the joker from Batman or something. I guess people have not heard of quietly contented.

When people say that to me I reply: "it already has"

In response to such a comment I often think "that is what worries me", given that I spend much of my time worrying about not having a boyfriend.

there is a world outside of my own world!?

Yes. It is a strange, noisy, complicated world inhabited by alien beings buzzing around like a colony of bees. It is sometimes fascinating and sometimes confusing as observed from inside of a bubble.

I don't know if I've ever been "out" of my own head. I can't imagine any other state of being.

I use music to help me go into my own world. I always have my IPod in when I am not at work and I sometimes get frustrated when my colleagues want to walk back home with me (I live in on site staff accommodation) as I know that it's rude to listen to music when walking with someone else but I really want to withdraw into my own little world following a stressful shift at work.

I think it's a response to not being content with one's social life. It's social interaction that makes you interested in the world around you. When the kind of social interaction NTs like is not always good for us, we retreat to our own worlds.

Hmmm, yes, interesting. I find it hard to keep 'in the moment' during conversation because I find much conversation boring, so even in social situations I feel that I'm in my own little world a bit, trying my best not to let it show.

Retreating to a fantasy world in your head while out in the public or doing work is not just an aspie thing, NT's do it as well. It's called "autopiloting" and it's just another means for someone to adapt to there environment. autopiloting works like this. Lets say you have to do a boring and repetitive task or you are in any situation where you have to perform but the performance is lacking in stimulation. The first thing you do is You analyze the environment and the work that is in front of you and then you start programming your body much like programming an industrial automation robot to perform the tasks that are in front of you. You set a few alarms To alert you if there's any trouble and then you drift off in to your fairy fantasy world or what ever you do inside your head to fulfill your stimulation needs. If an alarm goes off because something does not go according to your preprogrammed plan it can take you a few seconds to snap out of your fantasy world to address the problem that caused the alarm to go off. The alarms will annoy you and that's why you keep tweaking and refining your program plan to make the alarms less and less until you can stay a longer in your fantasy world longer without interruption.


Just like qawer said. The reason why us Aspie's like to retreat into our fantasy world more frequently is because the things that NT's like to do are just boring and do not stimulate us worth crap. I mean think about it, How many of us Aspies give a sh!t about professional sports.

Qawer's insight is right on the money. The only thing that is going to bring an Aspie out of his world into the real world are people whom he deems worthy of love. They are the only reason why I dared to explore the world beyond the prison-dimension of my mind.
Now I can go back and forth between the world and my mind as I please. But the people I love: they are my "get out of jail free" card!

Yes, and do you find that you either love someone, love them deeply, or are indifferent to them? Personally I tend not to merely 'like' people, there are fewer gradations between indifference and love for me.

Yes. The people I merely like I don't want to spend much time with.