Was I better off ignorant?

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Hi! I'm new to WP and very happy to have found people who make sense and think like me.

The past 5-6 years have enlightened me to gain some mild form of social awareness and self-awareness and brought me to the realisation that I previously had zero awareness of anything and basically lived in a bubble.

These are 2 good examples:

In highschool, friends would comment that I had never been in a "fight" (like bitchy, teenage girls suddenly decide they hate each other today) "because you can't fight with someone when you actually have to tell them that you are fighting". I thought this was a compliment. If a friend is being ridiculous over some silly little thing, then I as the mature and logical one will help them talk it over, so they can realise how irrational they are being and learn from this experience. This usually ended with "oh just forget it". To which I reply "you're welcome, and don't worry I won't think another thing of it".

Whenever I didn't understand what someone meant, I assumed they must have a very low IQ and be too dumb to properly articulate themselves, so I would smile and nod sympathetically, that must be terrible, I feel very sorry for them.

I now understand that I misinterpreted every social encounter for the first 30 years of my life.

Bursting my happy little bubble where I was always right and knew exactly what was going on, has been a fascinating discovery and given me so many answers. But it's also brought me into reality and now I never know what's going on or what's expected of me.

Is this part of some process? Thoughts? Opinions?

No, ignorance is never good. Now, you can start to grow and improve your coping skills. It is a tough voyage and you will need courage and strength. Sometimes, I wish I could go back to being ignorant and blind about myself. Hating the world was so much easier.

Look into mindfulness. It has helped me.

They say "ignorance is bliss."

The danger in that thinking is that the Bliss is liable to be destroyed by knowledge which penetrates your shell no matter what. Inevitably, your blissful oblivion will be destroyed.

It's better to know where you stand on things, and to improve on your status-quo,

rather than create a false status-quo based upon ignorance.

No. Knowing what I know now, I know that ignorance is not always bliss.

Thank you all for understanding. I do realise my ignorance made me intolerable to NTs and probably anyone less autistic than me. I don't really want to go back in my bubble, I'm just becoming aware that I have so much to learn. Every thing I thought I knew was wrong, I'm starting over learning kindergarten social skills and meanwhile every social encounter is confusing as hell. All of your advice is appreciated and I take it all on board.

I don't find that my "ignorance" of social mores made me "intolerant" to NT's.

I find that it left me open as a target of their teasing/bullying/attempts at getting slick with me.

When I was ignorant of my Autism I thought I had charactor flaws and was a weak person.

If those people were being mean to you then I say being ignorant was good because it keeps your feelings from being hurt. Sometimes ignorance also keeps you from being anxious and having anxiety in social situations because you are so oblivious to how things could be interpreted or how butt hurt people get over silly things. I sometimes miss my days where I was oblivious because I didn't have social anxiety and I wasn't afraid to talk to anyone and I could talk about anything and ask any questions and if someone was critical I just thought it was only them with the problem. It was like I had better social skills then too because I talked a lot and was very social as a child because I always wanted to talk to people and know their name and be friends. My ignorance is what made me do that. I was also unaware of meanness kids would do to me and unaware of the abuse my ex was doing so that was good because they couldn't hurt me. I also wonder if my ignorance is what probably saved me from the relationship because of my ignorance, his abuse was backfiring so he discarded me.

Also I have been oblivious to the meanness here I would get from other members, some made it more obvious than others, so it would appear I didn't care how others treated me and it also meant some got away with it while others who made it obvious didn't so it looked like I gave out special treatment.

Part of the problem is that both you and your high school friends were ignorant. They were ignorant of the workings of your mind, and you could not comprehend theirs. If they had been more perceptive and observant of you, they might have noticed that you "don't take hints" and described explicitly or said literally what their issues were instead of hinting around.

From my point of view, it's like you (and many of us) grew up speaking Latin while the majority of other people speak English. The truth is, they don't understand Latin and we don't speak English, so we're both ignorant, its just that the English speakers greatly outnumber those fluent in Latin.

Of course, being surrounded by English speakers we will need to learn the language to the best of our ability. Just don't forget that at least some of those English speaking majority may also be interested in learning some Latin, too.

I was oblivious to the fact that I was different until I was 13 years old. Then I became painfully aware of how different and socially awkward I was. I had no clue what was wrong or why things were this way. Thirteen was also the age at which I started to feel quite depressed. It seemed other people were able to enjoy the social aspect of their lives quite a bit, and I felt completely left out of that. I had no idea why or how to deal with it. I didn't learn I was ASD until I was 38 years old. It explained quite a lot, but it also took away my hope that I would ever overcome this.

According to Big Brother within the book "1984," Ignorance is Strength.

Are you really better off in Big Brother's society?

I always knew there was something wrong with me because of the way people reacted to me. I never could do anything right. I was always making social mistakes. I couldn't fit in. I had behavioral problems. I couldn't identify with regular people; couldn't make friends. Was always left out. I didn't know how to study or keep track of assignments. I was late for everything. I would get all A's on tests, but fail the classes because I didn't do any hw.

People thought I was rude, weird, immature, lazy, irresponsible. I never could get my life together, or be responsible. I never could understand what was wrong with me.

I would say to my therapist, "Why am I so different?", and the response would be to just tell me I was imagining that I was different. I knew I wasn't imagining things, because of how people reacted to me my entire life. But the therapist never witnessed any of it.

Then I did some research and realized why I have these problems and was able to identify many of the things I was doing wrong. I asked people I knew about the things they noticed, and I couldn't believe how many things I did that were so obviously wrong to other people.

So no, for me, ignorance was misery. How can one help oneself without being able to identify the problems? Now at least I have a chance.

You're pretty smart. You're learning Mandarin.

And I found out what your screen name means (I believe!)

It's the name of a Chinese instrumental musical piece.