Found a cure for stress, anxiety, sensitivity to criticism

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I don't know how to unmask. I have done it since I was about five or six. When I was fragile with the last burnout I was glitching between masking and unmasking and when I was unmasked, it felt like I was five or six years old and also I felt naked.
So while masking, I am scared people will find me out if I can't keep masking, but as I triple mask, and have been masking for so long I do not know how to stop.

I would love to stop but I would have to learn how to live all over again and at the moment I am fragile so I would not be able to try even if I knew how.

The third mask I wear I do take on and off, but the other two I would have to re-learn all my life again to unmask.

Agree but it is also important to weigh up criticism. (Constructive criticism).

If it is useful to you, take it on board.

If it is not useful to you, discard it.

Know the difference.

My boundaries are weak so I take it all on board and the destructive stuff too. Not all constructive criticism is useful. Telling a shy person to break out of their shell in a new place when they usually are extroverted & that's how they find comfort - helpful. Telling someone who's got boundaries and the boundaries aren't very secure & they're aspie or an introverted NT to 'break out of their shell' isn't helpful.

My idea for this is - be around people like yourself. For those of us who are very borderline aspie, this is quite easy. Just mix with gentle, introverted types. It's probably harder further along the spectrum, tbf.

That's sad, I wish I had advice other than 'find people who won't judge you if you do seem 'naked'' but I started to do it later on, as an adult, and I was able to break out of the situation after my break down so I'm not 100% sure if this works or not.

Would your family judge you if you were 'naked'?

Is there a way to unmask and be yourself when you're having 'alone time'? How much 'alone time' are you able to have?

Been there.

In high school, I wrote a short story about a cat who wanted me to drop my mask off. She scratched, and scratched more, never believing it's my true face, until she was scratching bare bone, still claiming it's not my true face... I had no idea about the spectrum or masking or anything like that back then but that's what I was feeling when trying to understand who I was.

My therapist helped me really a lot. Yes, I was sometimes like a toddler when removing the mask. She guided me through emotional milestones of toddlerhood in my thirties.

I think the complexity with classical conditioning is it assume everyone is the same and will respond the same way. It basically selects nurture over nature. How does autism affect how conditioning works. There are also other co-morbidities with autism that makes this complex.

Naturally, you cannot argue with success, but I am not sure it will be even across the spectrum (no pun intended).

The de-conditioning method I posted is also used to treat PTSD since classical conditioning is involved so that may be why it helped you be yourself. I''m hoping what I posted will help people be themselves when they're younger so they can start feeling better and enjoying their life more sooner.

One reason people mask is to avoid painful emotions that may have been unbearable when they were being themselves. Those emotions can be caused by classical conditioning if people responded in a way that resulted in you feeling rejected or that there was something wrong with you.

You don't have to start being yourself all at once. Instead, you can gradually start being yourself by expressing an opinion about something, disagreeing with someone, or being less vigilant about hiding differences that might result in criticism.

When people react negatively, make a note of whether you feel worse about yourself or other people.

If you feel worse about yourself and think you're a loser or worthless, your mind likely associated criticism with feeling inferior. To de-condition that response, tell yourself often and before gradually being yourself that no one is perfect, everyone has problems, flaws, weaknesses, etc. and that none of them make you less worthy than anyone else. Remind yourself those interpretations are overgeneralizations and that those weaknesses are only part of what makes up who you are as a person. You don't have to tell yourself you're amazing or anything you don't think is true. You just need to know that none of your flaws make you inferior to help de-condition that response to criticism.

If you have negative thoughts about other people after being criticized (such as thinking the world is full of mean or intolerant people who bully you to make you feel worse or that you don't care what anyone thinks about you), then your mind may have associated criticism with rejection, being disliked, unloved, or unwanted. To de-condition that response, tell yourself often and before gradually being yourself that people might be misunderstanding you, having a bad day, or just uncomfortable because you act differently. You don't have to tell yourself the world is full of wonderful people or anything you don't think is true. You just need to think about and acknowledge other reasons people may react negatively to help break the link your mind formed between criticism and rejection (or being disliked, unloved, or unwanted).

Conditioned responses that have been strengthened by a lifetime of experience usually don't go away overnight so don't give up if you still feel worse after being criticized (or whatever else you're trying to de-condition). You probably will still feel just as worse but if you're persistent, you'll gradually feel less worse over time. Eventually, the association may break and it won't bother you anymore although you may still feel worse around some people if your mind associates them with people whom you've had particularly bad experiencess.

That happens when the root cause of the anxiety isn't addressed. Using your example, it may be a fear of death or a general fear that something bad might happen. That's why overcoming anxiety about one cause of death leads to another.

If you feel alone and rejected in a world full of bad, intolerant people who are different than you, it's almost impossible to not have generalized anxiety because it's scary to live in a world where you feel like you're different and don't belong. Realizing that you're not different and that no one has a problem with unique aspects of yourself can greatly reduce that anxiety.

How is this controversial? Is it because people don't want to get better or be reminded of their deficits?

Is there a cure for intellectual dishonesty?

Yes. Unfortunately, it's against the rules to post it.