Belonging nowhere
To the op, I find what you write kind of interesting. Do you like belonging nowhere or dislike it? Like and dislike are a form of feeling. Also, desire to be part of something is a form of feeling, and focusing on a certain affect such as the experiencing of belonging nowhere surely exaggerates the experiencing of that. Is the experiencing of it a thought? Generally speaking, even the most factual kind of data processing is infused or periodically fueled with some kind of emotion. The aim for me would be to get them to work together, consciously, on one plane or level and not in a way that is fragmented. Not doing so good at that recently since my boyfriend had the stroke and I got very angry with one social worker who withheld information and is trying to shunt him off into the worst possible nursing home where he would literally probably die. (Do the concepts of "literally" and "probably" even go together?). But this anger is a subject for me to work with and study about myself. I think I will have to die on some level and be reborn psychologically, to not feel this anger.
If you feel cut off from other people, even here, I kind of feel that way, too, and I am pretty sure many others have this alien experience, not just people labeled and/or who label themselves autistic. This said, there is some something kind of gratifying in sharing like people are doing here and most anywhere. I do feel cut off from everyone, but try not to focus on that as there is less of a payoff. I like to dialogue and I love to speak and hear others speak and process the/our voice tones and relate to the feeling of that. Btw I bet if someone talked to anyone as if they were a piece of dog sh-t, they would have a feeling about it. Just free forming. I think on some level you are even lucky to be able to be detached. I could maybe learn something from you.
The beatles song in the last post is gone at youtube. I post another version of Nowhere man. And a 8 hours long audiobook, called Erewhon.
Its a book from Samuel Butler. A dystopian novel, its a story of a world where the things are upsidedown. Its a book from more than 100 years ago.
Bedankt Traven, eindelijk een liedje wat ik goed kan verstaan Bij Scheveningen linksaf, heb je inderdaad een echt nowhere-land. Althans, daar hebben de straten geen naam, om even Bono van U2 te citeren.
The brain behind Nowhere man from the Beatles, John Lennon have made the quote in the picture. If you realise that the road of life is never go exactly the way you have planned, than i realise that my path of life is always sending me to the area of nowhere.
dragonsanddemons
Veteran
Joined: 19 Mar 2011
Gender: Non-binary
Posts: 6,659
Location: The Labyrinth of Leviathan
I too feel like I don't belong anywhere. WP is the one place I can come closest to being myself, but I still distinctly feel like I don't fit in. I also feel like I don't fit in at my social skills group, which consists mostly of others on the autism spectrum. I don't like the feeling of not belonging, but I've accepted the fact that I'm never going to feel like I belong anywhere, at least, not for more than five minutes before I'm proven wrong.
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Yet in my new wildness and freedom I almost welcome the bitterness of alienage. For although nepenthe has calmed me, I know always that I am an outsider; a stranger in this century and among those who are still men.
-H. P. Lovecraft, "The Outsider"
Don't really fit in here nor anywhere else. But at least there are also some people who are really fun. (Of course also not even few who are the opposite.) But it's also a question of your expectations of course. I hoped to met people who are a bit like me but I'm a little bit to unique for that. But at least there are also some people who are nice to talk to.
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I am as I am. Life has to be an adventure!
I've often felt the same way, too. I've always, ALWAYS feel like my personal weirdness has gone up to eleven, making me feel like I'm the odd one out in the eyes of pretty much most people. Although I DO have only a few friends, but still....
In the city of Nowhere i am nobodys property, Erewhon gives me the ultimate feeling of autonome freedom.
Not only the city Nowhere feels nice, also the road to Erewhon feels wonderfull.
David Byrne from Scotland have made a song which is called "the road to Nowhere"
Thank you very much .
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Diagnosed hfa
Loves velcro,
I've never really felt like I've belonged anywhere. Not necessarily in a negative way, more in a neutral way. There have (on VERY rare occasions) been places I've felt comfortable, but not belonged-to.
I assume it's related to never really having been able to spark or form personal relationships. People are people, and I don't mind that, but I can't say I've ever really had a feeling I was part of a group in anything more than name. And I've founded and run social groups. I didn't get anything social out of them; they were just a way to kill time and simulate making connections.
I don't think "consumer culture" per se is what has shattered our sense of community. The problem is that most people have nothing to give them a sense of community, hence no counterweight to "consumer culture."
One big problem is how, in a modern economy, so many people have to move long distances in order to find jobs. In many parts of the U.S.A., people who have lived in a given locale for their entire lives are a small minority. This prevents people from relying on their extended families for various kinds of help that were traditional in the past.
Another problem is how, among the many people who have lost faith in traditional religion, very few have replaced their religious communities by joining non-theistic churchlike groups such as the Ethical Culture Society.
Along with churches, another kind of organization that has faded is fraternal organizations like the Freemasons.
Yet another kind of organization that has faded, to a large degree, is labor unions. The upper middle class still has their country clubs and their professional associations; the rest of us are (for the most part) unorganized.
Be that as it may, most NTs do manage to make at least a few friends during childhood and at least a few more during high school and college. Many manage to build a larger social circle -- however informal, unorganized, and superficial their social ties may often be. Many autistic people do NOT manage to accomplish these things, although some do.
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- Autistic in NYC - Resources and new ideas for the autistic adult community in the New York City metro area.
- Autistic peer-led groups (via text-based chat, currently) led or facilitated by members of the Autistic Peer Leadership Group.
- My Twitter / "X" (new as of 2021)
Do any of us fully "fit in" anywhere, even here? I doubt it.
I participated in lots of oddball subcultures in my younger days. In none of them did I fully "fit in." But most of them -- like the autistic community -- were the kinds of scenes where no one else fully "fit in" either, because they were so diverse that there was nothing to fit in to.
Autism itself is such a varied thing that a group of autistic people can't be something any of us "fit in" with, except (hopefully) in the sense of being accepted for who we are.
In a group of autistic people, I feel that we should not have to worry about "fitting in," beyond being basically considerate towards each other. Insofar as we do "fit in," it needs to be based on acceptance of our differences, not on conformity to some common mold.
We can't be close friends with all or most other autistic people. But it nevertheless seems to me that a group of autistic people is one of the more likely places for many of us to find friends.
Autism alone can't be the basis of a close friendship between autistic people. One needs to find other commonalities too, such as shared interests.
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- Autistic in NYC - Resources and new ideas for the autistic adult community in the New York City metro area.
- Autistic peer-led groups (via text-based chat, currently) led or facilitated by members of the Autistic Peer Leadership Group.
- My Twitter / "X" (new as of 2021)
Sometimes I do too
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"I'm bad and that's good. I'll never be good and that's not bad. There's no one I'd rather be than me."
Wreck It Ralph