Autistics and 'Rigid' Thinking

So many autistics are regularly accused of "rigid thinking".

I am going to try to head in the opposite direction.

Adamant Thinking. There may be little in it for you, but there may be a lot in it for others.

Being decisive, choice-laden, unfloppy, certain about what we've planned, want to see or believe --- these are normally luxuries reserved for non-autistic people, while trashy terms such as obsessive, rigid, fixated are reserved for autistics.

A most unsurprising and uninspiring lack of empathy, y'know, from the side of the neuro-equation that not only seems to lack empathy towards us, but nastily and rigidly often says it is autistics who have cornered lack the empathy.

We get damned for any desire we have for...

■ predictability and surety

■ routines/rituals/rules/reiterations

■ anger over wrongly unmet expectations

■ avoiding being thwarted or frustrated

■ requiring good plans are followed through on

■ preferring less spontaneity and more notice & permission.

The way we think can also

■ make us strive to achieve - way past any average effort

■ help us handle inevitable chaos and uncertainty

■ handily pre-indicate what we'll likely prefer/expect

■ stop us being overwhelmed and made to not function

■ keep us with a sense of control - feeling respected

■ avoid restriction/constriction (nothing to do with rigidity)

■ manifest valid levels of neurodivergent-centrism

■ bring some assurance to other folk's lives too.

Instead we are told we are being...

■ selfish and self-centered,

■ demanding,

■ stuck or stubborn,

■ unwilling,

■ uncaring or thoughtless,

■ aggressive, or

■ immature.

It helps to...

■ try to understand

■ respect the brain difference as being equal

■ take the lead and choose to co-regulate when upset

■ notify variations to plans well ahead of time

■ resolve anxiety, not the different way of being

■ invite them to swap places arguing against what they want, but straight after you've argued their case boldly for them, if you DARE.

It is another thing to be rigid about something one is wrong about, and all humans are daily the subject of that personal error/challenge, autistic or not.

It's not automatic that being flexible, bendy, easy, detached, easily influenced, uncommitted, are the only good things to be pursued in life, or that these are necessarily somehow the great basis for good mental health.

~ ʎllɐǝɹƃ uɥoɾ