Many people are diagnosed as autistic into adulthood. However, it can be a challenge to identify specialists who are trained to diagnose adults. That is why we have compiled a directory of specialists trained to diagnose autism in adults, organized by city.
Core ideas within Buddhist and Daoist spiritual traditions are reflective of the commonalities found across many human scale indigenous cultures. A compassionate frame of love as vulnerable mutual knowing is compatible with a panpsychic relational philosophy. Everyone wants their experience to be taken seriously. We are embodied spirits, compelled to make sense of this world, and we can only do so in good company.
Autistic culture is a world of infinite diversity beyond the neuronormative imagination. Every Autistic relationship is unique, and many of us are traumatised. We need appropriate tools to invest in deeply understanding each other. Cultural metamorphosis requires radically reframing everything we understand about cultural adaptivity in terms of co-creating ecologies of care.
Underneath the surface of internalised ableism, no one wants to be seen and heard by many. Everyone prefers to be understood and loved deeply by a few, and everyone wants to love and help. Continuous dialogues about commitments make life sacred. This is the experience of life as a process of becoming.
Many Autistic people have great difficulties to think of the world in hierarchical ways. From what we know about our evolutionary path as humans, this is a reflection of innate human collaborative cultural capabilities in combination with a much reduced capacity for maintaining cognitive dissonance on an ongoing basis, which in turn can be traced to uncommon sensitivity profiles that fall outside the bell curve of hypernormativity.
Core ideas within Buddhist and Daoist spiritual traditions are reflective of the commonalities found across many human scale indigenous cultures. A compassionate frame of love as vulnerable mutual knowing is compatible with a panpsychic relational philosophy. Everyone wants their experience to be taken seriously. We are embodied spirits, compelled to make sense of this world, and we can only do so in good company.
Autistic culture is a world of infinite diversity beyond the neuronormative imagination. Every Autistic relationship is unique, and many of us are traumatised. We need appropriate tools to invest in deeply understanding each other. Cultural metamorphosis requires radically reframing everything we understand about cultural adaptivity in terms of co-creating ecologies of care.
Underneath the surface of internalised ableism, no one wants to be seen and heard by many. Everyone prefers to be understood and loved deeply by a few, and everyone wants to love and help. Continuous dialogues about commitments make life sacred. This is the experience of life as a process of becoming.
Many Autistic people have great difficulties to think of the world in hierarchical ways. From what we know about our evolutionary path as humans, this is a reflection of innate human collaborative cultural capabilities in combination with a much reduced capacity for maintaining cognitive dissonance on an ongoing basis, which in turn can be traced to uncommon sensitivity profiles that fall outside the bell curve of hypernormativity.
Is ABA therapy harmful for your child diagnosed with autism? What is the right therapy for an autistic child? How do you know if it’s harmful or helping?
Is ABA therapy harmful for your child diagnosed with autism? What is the right therapy for an autistic child? How do you know if it’s harmful or helping?
In the current Aotearoa New Zealand Autism Guideline the existence of Autistic culture is not mentioned with a single word. Understanding Autistic people and Autistic culture is still a secondary concern. Civil society activists and child rights’ defenders from around the world are now joining together to create the Rights-Centric Education network.
The April NeurodiVerse Days of Solidarity catalysed a range of conversations, with many threads weaving through the topic of education. Several topics resulted in in-depth discussion and new emerging ongoing collaborations, which is beautiful to see. Changes towards a more egalitarian culture that deeply fully appreciates cultural, biological, and ecological diversity are changes that improve the lives of all people, re-align humanity with our evolutionary heritage, and help us nurture sacred relationships beyond the human.
In a performance-oriented culture getting ahead is what matters most. Finding ways of meeting the numbers is what matters, being perceived in the right way is what counts. Our society has increasingly cult-ivated performance,technological progress, and the “art” of perception management.
In the current Aotearoa New Zealand Autism Guideline the existence of Autistic culture is not mentioned with a single word. Understanding Autistic people and Autistic culture is still a secondary concern. Civil society activists and child rights’ defenders from around the world are now joining together to create the Rights-Centric Education network.
The April NeurodiVerse Days of Solidarity catalysed a range of conversations, with many threads weaving through the topic of education. Several topics resulted in in-depth discussion and new emerging ongoing collaborations, which is beautiful to see. Changes towards a more egalitarian culture that deeply fully appreciates cultural, biological, and ecological diversity are changes that improve the lives of all people, re-align humanity with our evolutionary heritage, and help us nurture sacred relationships beyond the human.
In a performance-oriented culture getting ahead is what matters most. Finding ways of meeting the numbers is what matters, being perceived in the right way is what counts. Our society has increasingly cult-ivated performance,technological progress, and the “art” of perception management.
Many Autistic people have great difficulties to think of the world in hierarchical ways. From what we know about our evolutionary path as humans, this is a reflection of innate human collaborative cultural capabilities in combination with a much reduced capacity for maintaining cognitive dissonance on an ongoing basis, which in turn can be traced to uncommon sensitivity profiles that fall outside the bell curve of hypernormativity.
In the Western Educated Industrialised Rich Democratic (WEIRD) world we live in what philosopher Guy Debord described as The Society of the Spectacle. The reality presented to us via the media and public social media has been engineered to fit the exacting standards of Homo Economicus®. All the people alive today in Westernised countries, i.e. all the people in WEIRD countries and in the countries aspiring to WEIRD standards, have been born into The WEIRD Spectacle of internalised ableism.
In the current Aotearoa New Zealand Autism Guideline the existence of Autistic culture is not mentioned with a single word. Understanding Autistic people and Autistic culture is still a secondary concern. Civil society activists and child rights’ defenders from around the world are now joining together to create the Rights-Centric Education network.
Slowing down to reflect and relate deeply with the non-human beings that are part of the living planet is an important aspect of life and healing. There is no shortage of small human scale initiatives that re-conceptualise human societies in comprehensible, compassionate, and life affirming ways.
Many Autistic people have great difficulties to think of the world in hierarchical ways. From what we know about our evolutionary path as humans, this is a reflection of innate human collaborative cultural capabilities in combination with a much reduced capacity for maintaining cognitive dissonance on an ongoing basis, which in turn can be traced to uncommon sensitivity profiles that fall outside the bell curve of hypernormativity.
In the Western Educated Industrialised Rich Democratic (WEIRD) world we live in what philosopher Guy Debord described as The Society of the Spectacle. The reality presented to us via the media and public social media has been engineered to fit the exacting standards of Homo Economicus®. All the people alive today in Westernised countries, i.e. all the people in WEIRD countries and in the countries aspiring to WEIRD standards, have been born into The WEIRD Spectacle of internalised ableism.
In the current Aotearoa New Zealand Autism Guideline the existence of Autistic culture is not mentioned with a single word. Understanding Autistic people and Autistic culture is still a secondary concern. Civil society activists and child rights’ defenders from around the world are now joining together to create the Rights-Centric Education network.
Slowing down to reflect and relate deeply with the non-human beings that are part of the living planet is an important aspect of life and healing. There is no shortage of small human scale initiatives that re-conceptualise human societies in comprehensible, compassionate, and life affirming ways.
Underneath the surface of internalised ableism, no one wants to be seen and heard by many. Everyone prefers to be understood and loved deeply by a few, and everyone wants to love and help. Continuous dialogues about commitments make life sacred. This is the experience of life as a process of becoming.
In the Western Educated Industrialised Rich Democratic (WEIRD) world we live in what philosopher Guy Debord described as The Society of the Spectacle. The reality presented to us via the media and public social media has been engineered to fit the exacting standards of Homo Economicus®. All the people alive today in Westernised countries, i.e. all the people in WEIRD countries and in the countries aspiring to WEIRD standards, have been born into The WEIRD Spectacle of internalised ableism.
Our individually unique nervous systems and sensitivities develop and evolve over the course of our lives. 85% of neurodivergent adults often or always feel overwhelmed and misunderstood, and over 60% often or always feel disrespected and unsafe. Our overall sense of wellbeing is determined by alignment between our sensitivity profiles and the ecology of care we are embedded in (or not).
Autistic ways of being are part of a culture that deserves the same respect as any other culture. The key element that holds together all the threads, which has been systematically eroded in Westernised societies: the notion of trust, including the role of trustworthy, sacred relationships within the context of ecologies of care beyond the human. If, as a species, we have one responsibility within the planetary ecosystem, it is to recognise that it is time to set the record straight on the toxicity of a culture that normalises and even celebrates competitive and deceptive behaviour.
Underneath the surface of internalised ableism, no one wants to be seen and heard by many. Everyone prefers to be understood and loved deeply by a few, and everyone wants to love and help. Continuous dialogues about commitments make life sacred. This is the experience of life as a process of becoming.
In the Western Educated Industrialised Rich Democratic (WEIRD) world we live in what philosopher Guy Debord described as The Society of the Spectacle. The reality presented to us via the media and public social media has been engineered to fit the exacting standards of Homo Economicus®. All the people alive today in Westernised countries, i.e. all the people in WEIRD countries and in the countries aspiring to WEIRD standards, have been born into The WEIRD Spectacle of internalised ableism.
Our individually unique nervous systems and sensitivities develop and evolve over the course of our lives. 85% of neurodivergent adults often or always feel overwhelmed and misunderstood, and over 60% often or always feel disrespected and unsafe. Our overall sense of wellbeing is determined by alignment between our sensitivity profiles and the ecology of care we are embedded in (or not).
Autistic ways of being are part of a culture that deserves the same respect as any other culture. The key element that holds together all the threads, which has been systematically eroded in Westernised societies: the notion of trust, including the role of trustworthy, sacred relationships within the context of ecologies of care beyond the human. If, as a species, we have one responsibility within the planetary ecosystem, it is to recognise that it is time to set the record straight on the toxicity of a culture that normalises and even celebrates competitive and deceptive behaviour.
There is an urgent need to catalyse Autistic collaboration and co-create healthy Autistic, Artistic, and otherwise neurodivergent whānau all over the world. Autists depend on assistance from others in ways that differ from the cultural norm – and that is pathologised in hypernormative societies. However, the many ways in which non-autistic people depend on others is considered “normal”. The endless chains of trauma must be broken.
As long as life is framed as a competitive social game failure is guaranteed – because then the suffering of others is simply another great busyness opportunity. A few weeks ago the authors of this article had the wonderful opportunity to hear from from a neurodivergent community in Iceland. We agreed to look for ways of ongoing collaboration.
Terra Vance walks readers through an event that her child experienced differently from other children– from the margins, like a failed audition in being human that illuminates the heartbreaking inevitability of masking and exclusion.
Free printable resource to help you connect to your Core Self and begin to separate your identity from your masks.
There is an urgent need to catalyse Autistic collaboration and co-create healthy Autistic, Artistic, and otherwise neurodivergent whānau all over the world. Autists depend on assistance from others in ways that differ from the cultural norm – and that is pathologised in hypernormative societies. However, the many ways in which non-autistic people depend on others is considered “normal”. The endless chains of trauma must be broken.
As long as life is framed as a competitive social game failure is guaranteed – because then the suffering of others is simply another great busyness opportunity. A few weeks ago the authors of this article had the wonderful opportunity to hear from from a neurodivergent community in Iceland. We agreed to look for ways of ongoing collaboration.
Terra Vance walks readers through an event that her child experienced differently from other children– from the margins, like a failed audition in being human that illuminates the heartbreaking inevitability of masking and exclusion.
Free printable resource to help you connect to your Core Self and begin to separate your identity from your masks.
