Hanging out with friends at Siddhu's birthday
Showing posts with label Wellbeing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Wellbeing. Show all posts
Supports, Skills & Society - Integral Adult Autism Conference
Keynote at this conference.
https://integralautism.org/presenters
The Happiness Advantage
I'm reading "The Happiness Advantage" by Shawn Achor and wanted to pen my thoughts on it as I read along. And I'm taking the Happiness Advantage DeCal.
Watch this space for updates as I read more
Introduction:
I would title this Waiting to be Happy, which kind of reminded me in a strange way of Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot. Essentially Acher says we are living milestone to milestone, in the false sense of belief that next milestone will bring us happiness. We think happiness follows success but the reality is the opposite.
Discovering the Happiness Advantage
In this chapter the author writes of how he saw Harvard as a privilege that can open doors, yet many students lose sight of that, complaining incessantly about the workload. In contrast are the children of Soweto township, a majority of whom loved schoolwork, as many were the first in their family to even get schooling.
I can personally relate. Berkeley is a privilege that I truly cherish and appreciate. The privilege comes with workload, but isn't that to be expected if you go to a top university. I was starved of education till age 12. I was in a special education classroom that still taught me kindergarten level skills even at age 12. It was never expected I would get exposure to mainstream academics, get a high school diploma, let alone a college education. College, and that too Berkeley is a privilege, which adds to my self-esteem, my self-confidence, my dignity. It will open different doors, that are closed in special education. So workload is just a one part of the glorious education. Education itself is a privilege. For this starving mind, the search for knowledge can never end.
Berkeley is my magical place, my Hogwarts and a bonus is that it is the birthplace of the Disability Rights Movement. I look beyond the workload to appreciate the high quality of teaching and the way it expands my perspectives in my world view, how it helps me grow personally, and how it nudges me in my future life towards working on social justice issues and hopefully making into reality positive societal changes too.
I liked how Acher termed Positive Psychology as "what makes people thrive and excel" rather than bringing the focus on the unhappy and bringing them back to normal.
I also feel for instance that Autism/Disability is treated as a deficit model which is very devaluing to the autistic. Team meetings during my elementary years of ABA therapy for instance was invariably dominated with a litany of all that I WOULD NOT or COULD NOT do. Wouldn't it be nice if the child, (who is usually present in these meetings to demonstrate said lack of skill) could also hear a litany of what they CAN DO as well. There are going to be areas that we may never catch up on or never learn. Yet in other areas we may just outstrip our NT peers. It is going to be hard to be average.
A parallel to Acher's "Cult of the Average" in the autism space is meeting the milestone of "age-appropriate behavior," which in itself is a moving target as society shifts attitudes.
As Acher's points out we are starved of happiness since we are so focused on the negatives whether it's from external news or internal ourselves. Our brains have been crammed with facts and theory but not how to "maximize the brain's potential to find meaning and happiness".
7 principles
- Happiness Advantage
- Fulcrum & Lever
- Tetris Effect
- Falling Up
- Zorro Circle
- 20 second rule
- Social Investment
Clarifications, not Mistakes
Clarifications, Not Mistakes.
Life is never a straight line even for NTs. When you are autistic & that too nonspeaking, making mistakes will be inevitable - there are very few role models or navigation maps to follow.
So not only are we on Robert Frost’s less travelled road, but we often have to create this road from scratch. What all this means is that, we are going to not just make mistakes, but a ton of mistakes too.
When you think of mistakes as clarifications, it's a chance hopefully, to backtrack a bit, adjust a bit, and get back in there”
-Hari Srinivasan @ ASAN’s “Transitions to Adulthood” Panel, Nov 2020
Creative Workarounds and Silver Linings
https://www.neuronav.org/post/creative-workarounds-and-silver-linings
A reflection for the NeuroNav newsletter
Your health is as safe as that of the worst-insured
Your health is as safe as that of the worst-insured.
The Anion needs to go on (Va)Cation
The Anion needs to go on (Va)Cation
Negative charge, the electrons latch on
Mood deteriorates, ionic bond
I am an anion that needs to go on (va)cation
Hang at the transition metal hotel
Sail continents and be a noble gas
A full valence shell, Non-reactive
That’s (neuro)chemical Equanimity!
ok, this is a chemistry poem. Taking Honors Chemistry this year, so this poem was bound to happen!
In case chemistry seems like a dim entity, here's a layman's explanation of some of the terms used.
Atoms have equal numbers of positive charge protons and negative charge electrons.Atoms can gain or lose electrons in order to form bonds with other elements. Usually they do this in order to complete their electron shells. When an atom loses electrons, it has a net positive charge - called a Cation. On the flip side, when an atom gains electrons, it has a net negative charge - called a Anion.
Noble gases have full outer (valence) electron shells so don't feel the need to react. So they are considered pretty stable.
Transition metals are a group of metals kind of positioned in the middle of the periodic table.
A Hyphenated American in the nth Dimension
I am an “Indian-American;” a hyphenated-American in a land of millions of other hyphenated-Americans. Even the original inhabitants, the “Native-Americans,” have not escaped the hyphen. Over the years the hyphen has become a proud celebration of the American in us and cultural heritage that we add to its salad mix.
Choose Happiness
Abraham Lincoln said, "Most people are about as happy as they make up their minds to be." In other words, our personal level of satisfaction is entirely within our control. Otherwise, why would the same experience disappoint one person but delight another? Happiness is not an accident but a choice.
Is happiness something over which people have no control, or can people choose to be happy?
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Is a glass half empty or half full? Both refer to the same glass of water with the same amount of water, Yet the word empty seems to infer some measure of dis-satisfaction in that something is "lacking". Half-full on the other hand is far more positive, almost implying there is room for growth, that the glass could be full.
Our attitudes and perceptions does determine our state of happiness to a large extent. Life is filled with both suffering and joy. These are unavoidable axioms of life. It's how we choose to handle these situations, that matters. Happiness and sorrow are relative states. One can never truly appreciate happiness or a state of satisfaction without experiencing sorrow.
The
This state of perfect equanimity may be a challenge for most folk of today. But we can choose not to drown in the sorrows that life throws our way.
Look at my own life. My autism affects me in so many aspects of my life. Not being able to talk or having full control of my body is frustrating on a daily basis and many a time I do sink. But I also have so many other talents and the potential to make a difference in my life and that of others. This attitude has to be a conscious choice in order to make our life meaningful and productive.
We can choose to see the fullness of our life instead of its emptiness. We can choose to be happy!
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