If you've learned to "fake it"...why do you?

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If you are happy with who you are and how your life is doing, then by all means continue to stare at your shoes and mumble about Star Trek trivia.

But if you're NOT happy, then it's high time to try doing something different.
Faking it is the first step to changing your brain's wiring. Which is the only way you'll ever change.

I would be happy staring at my shoes and well, I don't like Star Trek. My faking has nothing to do about not being happy.

When I got out of school I was so socially inept that I ended up being homeless. If faking it means that I don't have to go back to the streets, then I'll fake it.

Those two statements don't agree with each other.

i fake it so NTs wont bother me as much. "why are you acting so weird,'' etc.

i dunno how effective it is. i get tired. i've sort of given up trying it at work. it's too hard to pretend that i like small talk
or that i'm actually interested in my co-workers.

I "fake it" at work so the manager will stay off my case. It's ironic that I'm an aspie, the only people that would would hire me were customer service clerks. lol. my faking is easily noted by a lot of customers though, they think I'm being a b**** on purpose. I usually get layed off after a year from every job anyway so faking isn't good in the long term. The truth is I'm just an outerspace alien loving freak that can't seem to find a niche, even in the world of the NT nerds.

I don't see it as faking it, I just think of it as being private. No-one else would tell a co-worker their entire life story so why should I? Almost everyone puts on an act in one way or another. I do not disclose my AS because I believe it would hinder my career. What school would employ an autistic person to teach autistic children? I'm not going to test the theory by telling them!

Just thought I'd add a little rant to get it off my chest. No-one at college knows I'm an aspie for reasons I've already mentioned. I have to sit there and listen to my tutor who thinks of herself as "good with autistics" talk absolute rubbish! I really feel like butting in sometimes and correcting her on the trash she is teaching her students. I did try and give her another angle to look at once but she shot me down in flames saying, "I've had a lot of experience with autistics blah blah blah" and made me look stupid in front of the class. I couldn't argue my case without exposing myself so had to let it slide.

That sounds just like my mother a self proclaimed autism expert, when I told her about my AS she said 'well how come I never noticed anything?' I told her it's because she's blind to everything but her own ego.

I notice you're diagnosed Trystania, your job is safe due to the recent change in disability discrimination laws. I'd put that woman in her place if I were you. But then again I am a bit mental.

Faking it well I think calling it faking is a bad thing I prefer to call it maximised negatiation, I have done it it did lead me down a slightl rocky path but I learnt there is truly nothing to fear, my autism whilst having other learning difficulties and being almost blind has made me a semi narcisist becaue you have to be very assertive when I am in meltdown or in a general aspie makes me not assertive and lost when I take a couple of breathes and empty my mind and just ignore everything I can get what I want an being multiply disabled is quite differcult as people treat you ostly like crap.
Faking it has helped me and I think some aspies should actually empty their mind and not fake but negate all and be like a blank slate

It sounds very positive in theory but no employer would admit to discrimination would they? I'm probably being paranoid but really don't want to take the risk. Once they know it's impossible to undo it.

As for my tutor, she doesn't want to be taught, she wants only to be teaching herself. You can't win 'em all. *sigh* Same with your mother probably or has she opened her mind a little more since your diagnosis?

Most of my behavior would be better described as 'amplified'. Of course I've picked up many behaviors through mimicry, and used that as I felt appropriate (the most 'fake' part of my behavior, per se, but even that comes natural). My thoughts and actions are for the most part, my own, but I try to remain desirable to be around. If an NT is around me for days, they'll find me becoming increasingly boring, until I just shut down. It's a huge load to come up with just things to say, and act extroverted; and its not to imply that my successful mingles are consciously directed -- which confuses me the most when trying to solve a way to prevent these shut downs, or at least delay them.

I do have certain situations that I completely fake it though. The biggest one would be around authority figures. I try to present myself as friendly as possible, as any parent or teacher would want their kid to act. However, it's been proving very counteractive; I'll be unable to change this attitude with a manager when I should be getting comfortable around them, and initiate regular conversation. I'll appear shifty to some authority figures because many situations will make me uneasy and make the faked attitude much more transparent. It's something I actually desperately want to control, or even eliminate, but just can't. This fixed attitude towards certain people has especially become a huge problem around adults -- as a teenager and child it has always been a rule to be respectful and courteous towards adults, which is an unconscious ritual. Now that I'm becoming an adult, I unconsciously get locked up in this mode of behavior towards the more older looking peers, which is just all sorts of wrong.

This is going to be a brutal twist. I personally believe those NTs are not being themselves. I said in a previous thread, that you most conform to the culture of the area.

I have found very little individuality in big corporations...

Yes they do.