Neurodivergent people learn to betray what we’re certain are our own needs in hopes of fitting in. But we’re never certain that we’ll actually get it right when we change for others. There’s also the fact that we often misunderstand what we need to change in order to get it right too. And people aren’t afraid to inform us if we haven’t too. I’m never sure if I’ve changed enough and whether I’ll be able to keep it up if I need to change again. There’s not much worse than waiting in uncertainty because we’ve learned the risk to guess wrong is often just too high.
The liminality of this is so true - and applies to so many areas of our lives. I think that is such a large part of the anxiety and stress we live with: the precarity of "what if this is the time I get it wrong/they read me wrong?" And with so many of those instances already loaded up in/from our past, ready to play on a loop at the drop of a hat on particularly bad mental health days, another one becomes more and more costly. It sucks 😓🤔😮💨
Sep 3, 2022·edited Sep 3, 2022Liked by Sandra Coral
I absolutely hear you. If we determine resilience-building by activities that exercise our different survival skills *without* wearing out our foundation(al resources), then uncertainty/liminality is at best an extremely small/high tolerance part of that. It absolutely cannot be a day to day, week to week, component of how we strengthen/nurture ourselves.
I think of it in strength training terms: there are (usually low to medium) weights you'll do the majority of your exercise repetitions on, and then there are (high) weights you'll do 1-2 repetitions on. That's because if you use the latter weights for the former repetitions, you *will* fail* sooner and harder, and possibly injure yourself or burn out (physically and, or, mentally). As a result you won't build endurance, and therein strength, as well, as quickly, or as sustainably as if you increase your weights steadily.
I think the same can be said for the growth we speak of - and btw I think we do need. I just think how we go about it needs to be re-thought right? It certainly needs to be constructed and executed with ND people in mind - like anything we have and do in order to survive this hellscape of capitalism we call life.
Just as we frankenhack (a term Seth Perler uses I think) study, work, personal care, and other areas of our lives, so too will we need to take what's useful from the mainstream/NT ideas of resilience-building/growth and bend, solder, and fill in the gaps to be meaningful and robust for us.
*Fail in this context means to be physically unable to complete an exercise, and is a term used in different exercise regimens (e.g. exercise til fail).
uncertainty
The liminality of this is so true - and applies to so many areas of our lives. I think that is such a large part of the anxiety and stress we live with: the precarity of "what if this is the time I get it wrong/they read me wrong?" And with so many of those instances already loaded up in/from our past, ready to play on a loop at the drop of a hat on particularly bad mental health days, another one becomes more and more costly. It sucks 😓🤔😮💨
I absolutely hear you. If we determine resilience-building by activities that exercise our different survival skills *without* wearing out our foundation(al resources), then uncertainty/liminality is at best an extremely small/high tolerance part of that. It absolutely cannot be a day to day, week to week, component of how we strengthen/nurture ourselves.
I think of it in strength training terms: there are (usually low to medium) weights you'll do the majority of your exercise repetitions on, and then there are (high) weights you'll do 1-2 repetitions on. That's because if you use the latter weights for the former repetitions, you *will* fail* sooner and harder, and possibly injure yourself or burn out (physically and, or, mentally). As a result you won't build endurance, and therein strength, as well, as quickly, or as sustainably as if you increase your weights steadily.
I think the same can be said for the growth we speak of - and btw I think we do need. I just think how we go about it needs to be re-thought right? It certainly needs to be constructed and executed with ND people in mind - like anything we have and do in order to survive this hellscape of capitalism we call life.
Just as we frankenhack (a term Seth Perler uses I think) study, work, personal care, and other areas of our lives, so too will we need to take what's useful from the mainstream/NT ideas of resilience-building/growth and bend, solder, and fill in the gaps to be meaningful and robust for us.
*Fail in this context means to be physically unable to complete an exercise, and is a term used in different exercise regimens (e.g. exercise til fail).