Understanding your life once and for all

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I would have loved to have this knowledge a lot earlier.
So now I pass it on to you in the hope it might help some of you guys.


The purpose of life is merely existence/survival which implies natural selection of the human species.

A healthy everyday life of a human being is only concerned with participating in the selection process. This means working, seeing people, exploring one's talents, etc. etc. Basically everything that could possibly be linked to a better survival opportunity for you.

The better you are doing in the selection-process, the happier er you going to be. It is natures way of ensuring that the genes of the strong individuals are passed on to the next generation.
The worse you are doing in the selection-process, the more depressed are you going to be. It is natures way of ensuring that the genes of the weak individuals are not passed on to the next generation.

In order to do well in the selection process you have to think about yourself and only think about others if it in the end benefits yourself. You should always be your own first priority.

The basic problem with autism is thinking too little of oneself and too much about one's surroundings. Hence, autistic individuals are going to do badly in the selection-process, which nature punishes with depression and an unhappy existence. This happens when an individual does not put himself as his own first priority.

If you want to have a happy life in spite of the fact that you have autism, you have to act against your autistic nature and act a lot more self-centered than nature originally designed you to.

No-one truly knows what life is about, all we can go on is that which we calculate based on what we can see and experience. There could be so much more that we don't see or perceive (for one thing look at how feeble our eyes and ears are compared to other animals).

You could also argue that there is an ultimate reason behind out need to survive, which we do not yet understand. So in that case it's not the survival we should be concentrating on but that mysterious end goal.

There are more than enough selfish people on this planet already, without advocating the rest of us join in as well. Aspies/Auties have many traits to be proud of and I for one won't be compromising myself. Trying to fit in with everyone else has brought me nothing but misery.

I believe we have many valuable contributions to make to the world - as ourselves, we could be the saviours of humankind!

That is some really terrible advice. Telling us that the only way we can be happy, is by being completely selfish and, much worse, go against our 'autistic nature', so basically don't do anything that makes us feel comfortable and actually happy. Wow...
Look around, if we're talking about how 'nature originally designed' us, we don't need to change anything at all. Every life form that exists today, does so because it is good enough.
Always being your own first priority is a sure fire way to make people hate you. Despite the selfishness of others, if you're more selfish than they are, they will eventually stop being your friend, girlfriend, boyfriend and so on, until eventually, you can't form any new relationships, which was hard enough to do in the first place.

You are right. We will never truly know what the purpose of life is. But the purpose of the life you are actually living right now is exactly survival, that's all I am trying to point out. What else than a happy life could we desire? It is in that regard I am talking about the purpose of life.

I am just saying we should not fool ourselves. By the end of the day, you cannot get around the fact that life as it is is going to reward you with happiness or punish you with depression depending on your actual life-situation.

I am not advocating being selfish in the ultimate sense. Those people are simply not admirable, actually the opposite. But autistics have a tendency to think too little of themselves. That is the point I am making. You should not necessarily try to fit in with everyone else. But you should be selfish enough to decide what it takes for you to get a happy life and not just pretend someone is going to offer you that happy life. You have to make a selfish, conscious decision about your life.

If being the saviour of humankind is what does it for you, then doing that in the end is your selfish decision. It really is just one of the ways to play the game of selection. But one must decide on something.

I really do not disagree with you.

Perhaps my words were not chosen carefully enough. What I mean is that you should think of yourself as very very important. If you don't, you will never get those friends, girlfriends and boyfriends.

Thinking of yourself as very very important really is just the same as actually loving yourself. That might very well be your autistic self.

Ah. If only we WERE animals. Then everything you speak of would be good, solid advice. Sadly, we're not, as much as we try to act like animals or think like them.

A good point. I am not suggesting we should act completely like animals. But as an autistic I have a tendency to not act animalistic at all. That is a huge problem if not changed, and will without any doubt result in an unhappy life. Because in the end, we are also animals.

I agree with what you just said I have trouble choosing the rights words too, so I understand.

I think depression comes more from having unrealistic perspectives than absolutely not doing well.

There are very successful people who suffer or have suffered from depression. Mozart, Newton, Lincoln, Churchill, Brad Pitt, Uma Thurman, Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry, Christian Bale, Buzz Aldrin, Woody Allen, Ellen DeGeneres, Charles Dickens, T.S. Eliot, Harrison Ford, William and Henry James, Brian May, J.S. Mill, tragically Heath Ledger and Gary Speed. Even Queen Elizabeth II! These people weren't made to feel good, even though they were highly successful.

There are people living right on the breadline (or even below) in countries with no welfare system or even public education, who are perfectly content with their lot. Less extremely, there are people in Western countries who manage their money well despite not having a great deal, have good personal relationships but aren't at the top of the tree, and are very happy.

It's guys and girls like you on this forum I actually really like, but the world dictates we are wrong. It is an everlasting dilemma for me.

I would love to live in a world where the less you acted animalistic, there more happy you got. In this world, it is the opposite.

No matter how wrong the world says it is to be autistic/non-animalistic, I will never agree with it. True love really is contained in the non-animalistic.

You are right. What I meant with the term "doing well in the selection-process" is really to think/act non-autistic. I guess the successfulness of the people you mention can be ascribed to some form of autistic thinking. You might say they were successful, but if they were not happy, would you still claim they were succesful? But well, some people say that happiness really is depression for the most clever, so in that sense it might be turned around.




They are happy because they do not think autistic. In that sense they are doing well in the selection-process.

If you mean we are animals in the biological sense of the word, then perhaps you have a point. Neglecting the things that make us happy and biologically healthy and capable of reproduction and proliferation will lead to a depression. But you're missing an incredibly huge point; that the things that many autistics are depressed about have nothing to do with acting animalistic, but have a lot to do with an absence of the self-realization that we all desire, that is far from physiological, evolutionary, or biological needs.
I, for example, since I can only refer to myself, am quite happy without marrying and reproducing (quite an animalistic act). It doesn't make me unhappy, and most likely will not. If it does, it will not make me as unhappy as if I did not pursue a higher purpose - in my case, using my intellectual work to further good in the world. Failing at that would devastate me; not having offspring....not so much. You have to define "acting animalistic," and you have to realize that the majority of people are sad because their higher desires are left unfulfilled, neurotypicals and autistics included.

Hmm you are sure deadest on this natural selection and autism thing aren't you? also are you ESL? just curious as your writing style is quite repetitive...anyways I don't agree with you at all anymore...I did but now I don't.

What if you don't see any value in what the average person sees value in? ...and you are happy?

I am aware that we do not all have the same desires and needs. I am not implying you cannot have a happy life if you don't reproduce etc. etc.

But I really question your view that self-realization is



In the end, I think self-realization is just another animalistic desire. It might be more "complex" than the need for food and shelter, but it is basically nothing more than another kind of animalistic need. It is really another way of playing the selection game and convince yourself (perhaps also others) that you do well in that game. That makes you feel your life has a purpose.

My point was actually quite trivial, but may not be trivial for a depressed autistic soul. My message was that in order to get a happy life you need to fulfill your needs, you need to make a selfish, conscious decision about what a happy life for you means. And then act accordingly. You cannot stay passive and expect that someone comes along and saves you from your troubles. This requires that you think of yourself and your life as very important and that you make yourself your own first priority.

The alternative is depression and suicidal thoughts that unfortunately seem to be fairly prevalent in the autistic community. It is really sad, not least because autistic people are usually the most warm-hearted people around.

I'm not really sure what you are trying to say here. Are you saying that we should just have good self-esteem?

I was not until recently, but now I am. Nothing in this world seems to contradict it? Life is just meant to promote life.



If you are asking whether English is my second language, then YES! (sorry it is a loooong time ago I had written English in school )




If you are happy, then that is great! The thread was simply a piece of advice for those feeling depressed...I should probably have noted that..whoops