Degree of certainty on communication

Post Reply New Topic

Whenever I communicate with people I have difficulty understanding the scope or extent of what they say. In a way it reminds me of walking on snow that has frozen a bit. In so far that I am never sure if my weight or assumptions are correctly placed. I crave certainty and to a degree determinism when it comes to conversations. So when I hear the statement, for example, "Look at the menu and tell me what's good." I do exactly that, though upon further investigation they really wanted me to order the food. So my action was misplaced due to the assumption on the other party's part on what was going to be decoded from the statement.
My question is if anyone else has similar examples to this? I typically am able to present a facade of I know what I am doing, but I just remove myself from the context so I am not expected to make any decisions, and as a result I don't learn. Do you typically have methods to cope with the unexpected interpretation of what people say?

Yep, the same happens to me. When I don't understand what I'm being told and i can't figure it out after a few seconds I just ask for clarifications. Guessing it on your own might be exhausting if you have to do it continuously. Plus now you'll know for certain what they meant, which might be helpful if a similar situation arises in the future. It's like collecting data.

This is an extremely typical aspie phenomenon -- almost a conclusively diagnostic one. It can be exacerbated in certain cultural contexts where the custom is to never be direct in saying anything. (It's hard to imagine a more rude custom from an aspie perspective.)

I don't have any recommendations other than to say the better you know the people you're with, the easier it is (because experience will tell you what they probably mean in any given case).

I would also suggest making a point of seeking friends who believe in clear, direct communication.

Luckily for me, when I was in my early twenties, there were a lot of popular magazine articles on how to be assertive without being aggressive. I took this info to heart, not just as a guide to my own behavior, but also to help me decide who was likely to be a good friend of mine. I knew that I was bad at picking up on subtle hints. Therefore, I concluded that I needed my friends who would be assertive with me and to communicate clearly rather than to expect me to pick up on subtle hints.

Yes. Happens to me a lot. I remember, as a young adult, constantly complaining, "why don't people just say what they mean? Wouldn't this be easier for everyone?"

I never got a good answer.

I think many NTs refer to this as a lack of common sense.

I feel that I have real good common sense but the problem I display is with logic dilemmas. So let me give a short story to explain the difference.

Let me tell you a fictitious story about a boy named Johnny and his dad Max. Johnny loved his dad and Max loved his Aspie son. Johnny was in third grade and his dad took him along to the parent-teacher conference at his school. When Max entered the classroom, his teacher pulled Max aside and informed him that she would like to speak with Max alone. So Max knelt down and said to Johnny “Look into my eyes, I want you to stay here, its really important. I will come back and get you when I am done.” Max then left the room and followed the teacher down the hallway. The fire alarm suddenly tripped off. Johnny didn’t know what to do. His dad loved him and told him to wait there. It was an order because he made a point of looking him straight in the eyes. But then the hallway began to fill with smoke. Johnny thought my dad will come for me, but he starts to consider other possibilities, thousands of options. But none of them contained an option for leaving the room. Meanwhile Max evacuated the building along with hundreds of other students, teachers and parents. Max furiously look through the crowd trying to find his small son believing that he left the building. Now Johnny has a major dilemma. He now saw flames of fire and knew he will die but his dad told him to stay put and his dad loves him and would never hurt him. The entire school is now engulfed in flames and there is no way for Max to return to the classroom and rescue his son. Johnny tries as hard as he could to figure a way out of this dilemma. The wheels in his mind are whirling around faster and faster until they become a blur. Johnny finally selects a solution that came the closest to solving the dilemma. Before he dies, he springs into action.

Fire trucks show up on the scene and it is a world of chaos as firemen go to work extinguishing the blaze. Max is in the middle of this chaos frantically searching for his son. Hours later the body of a dead boy is pulled from the rubble of the burnt out structure clutching something. Some kids passing by make fun of Johnny saying he sure was “one dumb kid”. He had “no common sense”. When they finally pulled the object he was clutching as he died, they discovered it was the remains of a fire extinguisher.

The main point is that it is really important to teach an Aspie child the “exceptions to the rule”. And there always are exceptions to the rule. Conflicts of this type create a major impasse in the logic stream.