Why are many autistic people so minimalistic?

Lynx122

My boss called me and lectured me for 5 minutes about how I've had it so easy with my apprenticeship and I should put in effort at the end. And how it's not fair to others how easy my road has been and stuff like that. Then he said a lot of autistic people are minimalistic and I don't seem to get that if you put in more effort there can also be positive effects because of that. He's supposed to be a coach for autistic people but he doesn't understand the first thing about me so I'll explain it here.

Autism takes up a lot of energy. Processing up to 200 times the data per second that a regular person does. This is why some people with autism excel so much at certain things because they can see the world in higher definition. But it also comes with a lot of drawbacks. The energy it takes to process it and it also makes you more sensitive to negative experiences. Imagine your worst experience and imagine if you experienced it 100 times more intensely both on a sensory and emotional level and it will be stuck in your memory like that forever. This is why a lot of autistic people are very careful with their decision making and don't interact with people that much.

I also like to sleep a lot to recharge :D
I also like to sleep a lot to recharge :D

But back to the minimalistic part. I know that I have a limited amount of energy each day and usually I already have a plan in the morning what I wanna do and it's not a lot. Every day I'd chill if it was up to me :D. But there are things that I need to get done sometimes so I plan how to get those things done in the most efficient way possible with the most free time left over. But the thing is unexpected things can always happen. Autistic people hate unexpected things because it messes up our efficient plans and usually it's bad.

Why are many autistic people so minimalistic?

So if you have limited resources and you have a goal you have to reach will you do more than you have to and expend energy for something that will not benefit you right now, or will you make sure that you can reach the goal that your survival depends upon no matter what and then see after if you still want to do more? That's what it's really about it's a survival instinct. Since i know that unexpected things happen and I know I'm not great at dealing with them and it will take a lot of energy to adjust to the new circumstances the whole plan has to be rewritten to make it efficient again but it will still never be as good as the original.

That's why as a precaution the rest of the energy will always be kept in reserve in case some bullshit comes up at the last second that I have to deal with. It doesn't matter if I had an easy day yesterday or if I could do way more if someone challenged me or if I owe someone a debt of gratitude because they did me a favor or whatever the circumstances are, those things are all irrelevant to my brain that's interested in me surviving the day and not much else.

Survival!!
Survival!!

Even when the tasks become very small and only take a very small amount of energy this behaviour still happens. I don't really know why because at that point it's not really necessary anymore but it's just a habit and I can't break this one. So it's very important to set goals well. When in doubt always demand more of me in the beginning and then reduce the burden if necessary instead of the other way around. Somehow people expect me to react positively when they give me an easy task and then halfway through ask me to do twice as much.

They're like you should be grateful to me for giving you an easy task in the first place but to me I planned my energy for this task and I already used half of it and now I'm gonna need 3 times as much energy as I planned to do this task and then you're telling me to be grateful to you. But if you give me a hard task and then halfway through you tell me I don't have to do one part I will actually be grateful to you because I was trying to figure out how to do everything and now you told me I don't need to worry about one part so you made things easier for me.

I'm not saying this behaviour is always right but imagine if you were starving to the point you were almost dead and you found a store at the last minute and bought yourself some food and you were eating it slowly because your stomach can't even handle food anymore. And then someone comes to you and says you know you could have bought some flowers while you were here I think it's inconsiderate of you not to buy me flowers.

It's a bit dramatic but that's really how it feels for me when people come to me with these random expectations. That's why I look at them with this look like wtf you want from me. Like some things are really so outlandish that if I didn't know that I'm the one that's "different" I'd think they deserve to be slapped for that. Even if I know myself that this approach is not always the best or when I know this task isn't that hard, I could do more it's ingrained in me so deeply that I can't change it.

I hope this clears some things up and I hope people can understand we're really doing our best even if it seems like we're lazy sometimes.

#autism #minimalistic #laziness #EnergyConservation

Why are many autistic people so minimalistic?
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