People With Autism Make Rational Decisions

According to Medical News Today, "People with autism-related disorders are less likely to make irrational decisions, and are less influenced by gut instincts, according to research funded by the Wellcome Trust. "

Find the full article at this link.

Lately, I have been "grieving", as it were, over my lack of emotion. Emotional situations become very disturbing, grief leaks out slowly over time, and I wish I could experience emotions as the neurotypicals do. I'm not even sure what that means.

I have discovered that, for me personally, my emotions will come out in a song. For me, everything is a song. Music is a gateway into my emotions that I can't get to through the typical route. I wrote an instrumental song just after my father died. It's called "Kiss Upon The Brow". The last time I saw my father alive, I gave him a kiss on the forehead. That mix of emotions came out in a melody. It is with me forever.

The same happens with lyrics or when I paint. I guess I understand now what people mean when they say they must "express themselves". Do they mean what I mean? I suppose it is wise for me to set aside expressive time in my week so that I'm able to create and capture those emotions.

Now that I'm unemployed and working from my basement, I have music playing at a suitable volume. It makes me feel calm and focused. I used to think that it helped just because it kept me distracted from the noise in my brain. Maybe it is the emotional subtext that I need. Perhaps music for me is the emotional equivalent of crutches for a guy with a broken leg?

I'm no neurologist, so I only have guesses and intuition.

Speaking of intuition. The article noted above makes it sound like people in the Autism Spectrum don't have intuition. That may be true, but I experience intuition for many or most of my decisions. I start with intuition and work back to logic. My version of intuition is devoid of emotion though. My intuition space is filled with timeless principals for living. When confronted with a decisions there is a part of my brain that queries through these principals (i.e. procedures), and reacts first based on a principal. Perhaps that's not really intuition.

Principal led living seems better to me than intuition, but my wife makes decisions based on emotion and intuition and does just as good of a job as I do. In fact she and I share the most important principals for our lives. Hers seem to encoded into both an emotional part of her brain as well as a logical part.

O.K., this post is rambling. I apologize if you were hoping for wise advise. Just some musing today.

Adam