Or How Meditation Can Get Your Neurodivergent Self Back Where You Belong
(In the interests of transparency, I’m talking about some books and resources in this neurodivergent blog post. They do have affiliate links attached, where I would earn a bit, if you were to make a purchase)
If you grew up in a time when there was very little knowledge of neurodivergent things, in an environment where the luxury wasn’t there, for those around you to have tolerated it much anyway, there can seem to be only one choice. That choice, which offers you a way out from the admonishments, disapproval and painful rejection, is to get into masking, and coping as best as you can.
Reject Yourself! Incognito Alien
Dr. Devon Price explains the whole mechanism of masking and coping in their informative book. The way I experienced it was: If you want those outside to give you an easier time, and maybe even love and accept you, then you are going to have to reject yourself. The goal of a lot of societies, even today, is to strive to be normal; something Erich Fromm wrote about a long time ago.
When your brain is working in such a whole different way, that you might as well be from a different planet, then your job is to become the visiting alien who shouldn’t get found out. All that wonderful, unique, powerful, unusual stuff about you has to get locked away, really well hidden so that all those painful things people do to you, if they were to see who you really are, don’t happen so much any more.
A Very Real and Terrifying Danger
It’s massively energy consuming and puts you permanently in a, dare I say it, deranged mindset. You’re constantly monitoring every action and every word you utter. You find yourself restraining and minutely controlling all that you say and do. You’re also watching ‘them’. Every subtle clue, slight movement, faint utterance of displeasure, sigh of disapproval, has to be watched out for.
When you’re a kid, nobody knows why you are different; why you think, talk, behave and react in this different way that you do. So, you get to thinking that this people monitoring and studying, and this self-censorship is the best way to ensure your safety from what feels like a very real and terrifying danger.
The Automatic, Merciless, Vigilant, All-Seeing Critic
One one level it is safer. I mean, out there in the physical world. This strategy gets you through childhood, but at the cost of your confidence and your self-esteem. These will go to hell, because you have installed a vigilant, all-seeing, merciless critic inside your own psyche. At some point it goes on automatic, and you forget its even there.
It’s constantly reminding you that you’re never up to standard, that you are always messing up, and that you better try even harder to keep ‘them’ happy and on your side. The vigilant critic has ordered you outside, patrolling the grounds, checking how everyone is perceiving and receiving you, instead of enjoying the glorious palace that you are.
If Only…
You’re always thinking that if you can just get it 100% right, then finally the acceptance to be the real you, will come, and you will be free. Here is the rub: You’ve rejected what’s inside, out of necessity, and you’ve gone outside, maybe even locked the door, and you’re always out there in the scary forest where everybody else is controlling everything.
Interstellar Neurodivergent Space Warrior
A good image of it popped into my head this morning, interestingly while meditating. Picture that you’re in a really cool, highly unusual, one-person spaceship. It’s got all the cool laser, hyperspace, aerobatic and mega-intelligence stuff inside. All your needs are met, it can take you anywhere in the universe; to all the experiences you want to have. However, you are not even in there. No, no, no! You’re standing on the outside, maybe on one of the wings; messing up the flight path.
You’ve got your laser sword waving at every microscopic piece of space debris, and you’re checking through your super quantum binoculars, scanning and searching 360 degrees for any possible threat. Oh! And by the way, you can’t breathe, and the radiation out there is draining your power, and you’re hungry because your space sandwiches are inside the cabin. The solution, simple though it is – and you will never accept or believe it – is to just go back inside your space ship.
Your Wonderful Neurodivergent Self
A big difficulty is that you have been playing this outside game for so long, and you kinda feel like it’s been keeping you safe. You can remember emotionally, in your body, how much it hurt to be your wonderful, neurodivergent self. You never want to feel that way again, even if you could be inside your spaceship, eating your delicious space sandwich, exploring all the cool corners of the universe that were meant for you in this incarnation.
So, what does meditation have to do with all of this?
I’ve been digging into the meditation game for a heck of a long time. Sometimes on, sometimes off. An early book that taught me a lot, and enabled me to experience it a little, was Insight Meditation by Joseph Goldstein. So long ago, it was, that it came with a CD of guided meditations. I once found myself on a Japanese mountain, in a Buddha temple, getting up at 5a.m. for Zazen. To my shame, I had to be carried out, one hour later, because my legs had no feeling left in them. My practice is getting to a stage now, where I can employ it as a reasonably useful tool. What has really changed dramatically a new awareness and understanding about something.
Finding Some Peace
When I manage to bring my energy and attention back inside me, and sometimes even hold it there for a reasonable amount of time, then I do find some peace from the interminable patrolling outside of myself to keep myself safe from ‘them’. It’s becoming clearer and clearer to me, that I don’t even need to do any more of that tiresome patrolling.
An Energy Containing Neurodivergent, Eating Space Sandwiches
Armed with an understanding of my neurodivergent nature, and remaining with my energy contained within myself, I can come home, can have all the power and gadgets of my amazing space-ship, and enjoy my delicious space-sandwiches.. I can relish the growing feeling that it is actually really great to be me, that I don’t need to waste a single drop of energy pleasing anybody. I can feel good about myself because I say so.
Set a course for all the cool places in the universe; warp speed ahead! Make it so!