Through the magic of the internet I've been watching people who are neurodivergent or "neurodivergent" (meaning they think they are but don't have a diagnosis) and some of it has been interesting. One thing they talk about is masking vs. being authentic. I'm currently on an airplane and the little girl behind me has kicked the seat pretty relentlessly for 9 hours and grasped the back of my seat and pulled my hair in the process several times. I know she is a kid, I believe that plane travel is difficult for everyone and especially children, and I have empathy for the mother deciding that letting the kid make me uncomfortable (surely she knows) is a reasonable price to be seated next to someone who is not currently screaming. But this is how a lot of the "authentic self" talk feels to me: like permission to do what feels natural at the expense of making other people uncomfortable. And part of my response to that is irritation on two levels -- first, that I don't like having my seat kicked and second, that I regularly choose to sit with my own discomfort so as not to make others uncomfortable, and isn't that the price of being among others? There's a certain lack of empathy in this that I don't like. That you can need to self soothe in ways that are obvious I guess I understand but once it's disruptive to others... Maybe you don't get to do those things, if you literally can't do them without your comfort meaning someone else's discomfort.
I don't mean discomfort like that when I'm in a museum and there's someone in a corner sort of quietly rocking back and forth or "stimming" as the kids these days say, cause I understand art can be overwhelming and I think everyone should be able to explore that edge where the beauty of it is too much.
But like, moaning loudly in a restaurant to the point that I can't hear my dining companion is discomfort that I consider unacceptable. Restaurants are not a necessity. 7
Of course with airplanes it's important to remember that the reason we're all uncomfortable is a choice by corporate airlines to make people less comfortable by making seats closer together, thinner, etc. and I curse this compromise of our space in the same breath that I celebrate that we now have flights affordable enough that children can even be on the plane. I was once a parent conveying a child across an ocean and a continent and it ain't cheap, I know.
But I also wish that the way we acknowledge our own inconvenience could be expanded to consider the inconvenience of others. Like if the mother could at least point out to the child that she's pulling my hair and that's not nice? Could we all compromise our authenticity and even our own comfort a little, in the interest of continuing to occupy the same spaces?
Part 2, coming later (maybe): nobody is impressed by how quickly you got the suitcase out of the overhead bin and stood in line, anxiety-masking weirdo. You don't need to worry THAT much about other people.