i feel like there's something i'm
missing here did you guys like have a
meeting or something before i got here
hi everyone paul michaleff here from
asperger's from the inside i make weekly
videos sharing the human side of autism
so make sure you hit subscribe to get
the latest content
so i don't know if you can relate to
this but i often feel as though there's
some kind of
layer of information that everyone else
has access to and i just don't quite get
so i'm thinking to myself how does
everyone else know this where was i
supposed to get this information from
so a common expression to describe this
phenomenon is to say that someone missed
the memo or memo as some of my
colleagues in seattle used to say um so
in this video i'm going to share a
couple of reasons why that is
and just a little bit of insight into my
like the experience on the inside of
what it's like to
exist in a world where often social
information is just on a different
wavelength to to what i can actually
access
um so the first reason that i i think
sometimes i feel like i missed the memo
is because other people copy each other
in a way that i don't necessarily do
instinctually so i remember in preschool
right i must have been maybe three years
old and we were learning a song right a
song with actions and the way this works
for three-year-olds is they play a song
on a recording and all the kids stand
there and the teacher sort of does
actions
and all the kids copy and i have this
memory of watching all the other kids
with fascination going wow they're all
doing the same thing like are you
getting this what's going on here how
how do they know what to do
so i figured out pretty quickly that it
was because they were watching the
teacher and they were copying but
in that first instance there was a there
was a brief moment there where i was
just completely distracted and in awe of
this phenomenon without necessarily
being a part of it and knowing what's
going on ironically
when you don't know what to do in a
social situation it seems as though
everyone else knows what to do it's
probably because they are copying each
other if you're in a in a new situation
that you've never been before and you're
not sure what to do copying the people
around you is a pretty good first step i
even made a video calling it the golden
rule if you're not sure what to do copy
the people around you this is a very
natural human instinct and when everyone
else does it so naturally it looks to me
as if they actually know what to do when
really they're just looking around to
the people around them and copying
so another reason that i might find
myself in this position is because my
instinct of what i feel like doing or
what comes to mind or what you know in
in my thought process
is often
uh different to the majority of people
around me so it's a little bit like when
um for example if if we asked you know
what's your favorite ice cream flavor
and everyone said chocolate and i said
strawberry right there's no inherent
reason why i'm different to that
everyone has different preferences it's
just that if you ask a group of people
there are some types of preferences
where a large majority will have a
particular preference or a particular
way of thinking another good example of
this is ask someone you know a word
association like what's the first
vegetable that comes to mind
right rhubarb was probably not up the
top of your list so if everyone else is
thinking like carrot and potato and i'm
thinking like rhubarb or you know
asparagus then that's that's going to
mean that i see the world and i end up
in a different place to everyone else so
like everyone stepped left and i stepped
right and i'm thinking
how did you know
to step left how did everyone know at
exactly the same time to do exactly the
same thing
and one of the possible answers is it
was instinct they didn't know they just
reacted and it just so happens that my
reaction happened to be different to the
majority and now i'm over here by myself
wondering what i missed and everyone
else has made the same choice
another
assumption
that people often make that that can
potentially be a cause of this
phenomenon
is that it's natural to assume that
other people
are a little bit like you other people
have the same preferences as me think
like me this is actually a really
important developmental stage for
children where they start to develop
what we call theory of mind
recognizing that other people are living
thinking feeling beings just like
themselves and it helps it helps in
social situations to
uh getting you know step into someone
else's shoes and figure out
what they're going through so that you
can understand their behavior and and
get along a little bit better
so that's all great except that the
first
way to start learning theory of mind is
to
assume that other people are like me
other people think like me other people
have feelings like me
and if your thoughts and feelings and
reactions and preferences are
significantly
different to your peers
then what that leads to is
really bad assumptions if i assume that
everyone else
you know likes hugs when they don't like
hugs or likes really loud heavy metal
music when actually that turns a lot of
people off uh or other people like to be
left alone and without being talked to
and they feel really comfortable
um you know
if i'm in kindergarten and i'm doing
what i think the other kids would like
me to do to be friends and that turns
out that actually they would like
something else then my first guess is
going to be wrong and if it's too far
wrong then it's a bit hard to adjust and
i'm getting images of engineering maths
where we're trying to solve
equations numerically and you have to
make a guess and then you kind of
iterate from that guess and if your
guess is
way off then it can be hard to iterate
to find a solution so you need to find a
guess why am i explaining this in maths
terms no one's going to get this
actually a significant number of people
are going to get this and they'll love
it and the rest of you might be
wondering what i'm talking about but you
have to have a good initial guess for
numeric methods to have a high chance of
success of converging on a solution
so if my guess is way off it makes it
difficult to have a second impression
right if people think i'm a little bit
weird but they're happy to keep talking
to me then i get a second chance at a
social interaction whereas if someone
doesn't want to interact with me at all
and doesn't give me that second chance
then there's no opportunity for learning
so
this is partly where the
stereotype of the little aspie
anthropologist comes from because
sometimes it feels like especially when
you've just realized the fact that ah
everyone else around me is actually
quite different from me
um i can i can go into kind of
objective study mode
what are the other people around me
doing what are they thinking how are
they acting and it's almost like
studying them as if they're a different
species
a friend of mine actually asked her
mother when she was six years old am i
an alien not am i adopted not do i not
fit into this family am i an alien am i
not part of this species you know have
you
you know were you abducted and should i
actually belong on a different planet
sometimes they call asperger's wrong
planet syndrome as well and that's kind
of where that
sort of concept comes from if you feel
like you're so different from the people
around you that it's literally like
you've somehow ended up on the wrong
planet
um
so
interestingly um i just remembered
something around the the golden rule of
copying people so last year i ran a
workshop where i ran something called
the social analogy game which is all
about learning
the benefit and value of copying the
people around you and and making
decisions based on what the person next
to you is doing and the whole point of
the game and you can actually see a
video of this on on the a-list hub
resources i'll include a link to that
the whole point of the game is that
you've been given an instruction
and the the catch is if you follow the
instruction while your neighbor is not
following the instruction you're going
to bump into each other so it's actually
not only important to follow what you
know you're supposed to do but it's also
important to recognize what is the
person next to me doing and is what is
following the rules going to cause me to
bump into them
or do i have to modify my behavior based
on the people around me so the fourth
reason why i feel like sometimes i miss
the memo
is that there might legitimately be some
information that has
not landed with me it's just gone over
my head or i wasn't paying attention or
i was focused on something else and
didn't notice what everyone else noticed
a good example of this i can remember in
in primary school i think it must have
been prep in you know i was five years
old in primary school and my teacher
wrote that she thinks i have a hearing
um impediment or something like that
because
when there is background noise
i would not hear the teacher's
instructions i would not understand i
would i would be the person everyone
else would go off and do the thing and
i'd be in the middle going where did
everyone go why are they all doing
something so i clearly missed the memo
on that information
and in hindsight the reason was because
when there is background noise i am very
easily distracted by something else and
i don't necessarily focus on what i'm
supposed to be focusing on in this case
what the teacher is saying to the class
this was actually a very common
experience especially in primary school
i would commonly think at the time how
does everyone know what to do how does
everyone know where to line up at
lunchtime how does everyone know what
homework we've got to do the teacher
just mentioned make sure you get your
homework in on monday i'm like what
homework did you say something about
homework
so
not only was i sometimes missing the
information
but also
due to a lack of friends and social
network i didn't have people around me
to fill in that gap of information you
can imagine if there's a group of five
people you only really need one or two
to hear the instructions and the others
can say ah sorry what was that i wasn't
listening and their friends can sort of
fill them in on what to do and where to
go
and this is part of the you know copying
thing that if your friends know what to
do then you can kind of learn from that
and know what to do as well so the fact
that especially in primary school i
didn't really have friends that would
that would
do that role for me it meant that i was
literally missing information that other
kids were actually getting
so
i might leave it there
i don't know if you can relate to this
phenomenon of feeling as though there's
information that everyone else knows uh
that you haven't figured out where they
know it from yet that sort of makes
sense i hope you know what i mean
um i would love to hear from you in the
comments if you relate to that um and
and what your experience of that is um
otherwise i will see you next week and i
hope you enjoyed this video bye
you