Up until last year, I thought people treated me poorly because I was different. I blamed them for making me feel worse. I tried hard to act normal but I wasn't perfect and still got criticized. Since I couldn't change how people treated me, I thought there was nothing I could do about it. The diagram below represents how I used to think:
What I learned
After I learned more about feelings and what causes them, I realized people reacted negatively because they misinterpreted why I acted the way I did. I felt worse because I misunderstood that (I thought they were reacting to my behavior instead of their interpretation of it). When I expressed my feelings, people didn't realize I was upset because I thought I was treated poorly due to thinking I was different and that I felt that way for as long as I can remember. They just thought I was upset because I was rebuked for something minor and gave me advice based on why they thought I was upset.
When I thought back to the times when people responded negatively, I realized they may have misunderstood me. I realized my feelings were normal and that I wasn't fundamentally different than other people. I was no longer convinced that most people were intolerant and judgmental.
I found it hard to believe I had been misunderstanding people my entire life. I decided to stop masking and be myself. After a year of being myself I confirmed that many of the unwanted emotions I experienced were due to misunderstandings.
Here's what I think now (new changes in yellow):
Some examples:
Many people don't make eye contact when they're lying. Since my eye contact was poor, people didn't trust me. It wasn't because I was different. It was because they were treating me the same way they treat everyone else.
Many people miss things in a conversation when they're not listening or paying attention. Since I processed information more slowly, I often missed things and people got frustrated and impatient. They thought I wasn't paying attention because they treated me the same way as everyone else. If I got upset, they thought it was because I was rebuked for not paying attention. Since that's common, they thought I was being too sensitive and told me to get over it.
Conclusion:
Over the last year, I socialized more since I no longer had much anxiety. I learned that most people are tolerant of differences because they know everyone is unique. I was surprised how different non-autistic people were from each other and how common misunderstandings occurred among people who weren't autistic. It's not a big deal now when people react negatively to something I say or do because I know it's probably just a misunderstanding and they aren't attacking me for being different. When I explained the situation a few times after I was misunderstood, I found that most people were very understanding.
Now that I realize no one treats me differently because of my autistic traits, it's much easier to know when I'm misunderstood and how others misunderstand me because it's usually based on the reason most people would act the way I did. If I don't know, I can always ask. If anyone wants to read about others things I learned, you can click on my username, then Profile Page, and select Blog Entries to read posts I made about self-esteem, being yourself, how to reduce sensitivity to criticism, and alexithymia / understanding emotions.
What I learned
After I learned more about feelings and what causes them, I realized people reacted negatively because they misinterpreted why I acted the way I did. I felt worse because I misunderstood that (I thought they were reacting to my behavior instead of their interpretation of it). When I expressed my feelings, people didn't realize I was upset because I thought I was treated poorly due to thinking I was different and that I felt that way for as long as I can remember. They just thought I was upset because I was rebuked for something minor and gave me advice based on why they thought I was upset.
When I thought back to the times when people responded negatively, I realized they may have misunderstood me. I realized my feelings were normal and that I wasn't fundamentally different than other people. I was no longer convinced that most people were intolerant and judgmental.
I found it hard to believe I had been misunderstanding people my entire life. I decided to stop masking and be myself. After a year of being myself I confirmed that many of the unwanted emotions I experienced were due to misunderstandings.
Here's what I think now (new changes in yellow):
Some examples:
Many people don't make eye contact when they're lying. Since my eye contact was poor, people didn't trust me. It wasn't because I was different. It was because they were treating me the same way they treat everyone else.
Many people miss things in a conversation when they're not listening or paying attention. Since I processed information more slowly, I often missed things and people got frustrated and impatient. They thought I wasn't paying attention because they treated me the same way as everyone else. If I got upset, they thought it was because I was rebuked for not paying attention. Since that's common, they thought I was being too sensitive and told me to get over it.
Conclusion:
Over the last year, I socialized more since I no longer had much anxiety. I learned that most people are tolerant of differences because they know everyone is unique. I was surprised how different non-autistic people were from each other and how common misunderstandings occurred among people who weren't autistic. It's not a big deal now when people react negatively to something I say or do because I know it's probably just a misunderstanding and they aren't attacking me for being different. When I explained the situation a few times after I was misunderstood, I found that most people were very understanding.
Now that I realize no one treats me differently because of my autistic traits, it's much easier to know when I'm misunderstood and how others misunderstand me because it's usually based on the reason most people would act the way I did. If I don't know, I can always ask. If anyone wants to read about others things I learned, you can click on my username, then Profile Page, and select Blog Entries to read posts I made about self-esteem, being yourself, how to reduce sensitivity to criticism, and alexithymia / understanding emotions.
Last edited:
