Cognitive Liberty: An Intrapersonal Voyage of Consciousness Evolution

By Chris P. Younce.

Mankind is at a crossroads. Our social systems are breaking down because we’ve lost touch with our ecological position in the natural world. We’ve become utterly distracted by the fast-paced demands of daily life to the point where we’ve lost track of who we are. We’ve forgotten how to work as a team and nurture the partnerships that helped us be who we are today. Our neglected partnerships and abusive attitude toward our homeland reflect a mass symptom of ignorance that begs me to question the sanity of modern culture. Our inability to apply our attention to our intention has placed our species into vulnerable territory. Nature beckons us to wake up and remember who’s in charge.

The research explored throughout this book is based on the personal evolutionary process of creativity: our way of relating to the world. The reason this exploration is so personal is that it deals with the universal qualities of consciousness, as experienced uniquely by each individual on a subjective level. Thus, the theme of this project is to identify the objective aspect of evolving human consciousness by means of cognitive liberation. This quest is meant to address the peculiar problems of the unconscious and subconscious that shape ordinary experiences. This book considers consciousness as the locus of evolutionary change.

What does it mean to be free from insecurity, to not get caught up in the trap of our minds and carried away from what truly matters in life? Cognitive Liberty offers our bodies and minds a resolution to our being and embrace life as a journey on its own terms. It’s a friendly reminder that we’re part of a learning process in constant stages of development and indeterminism. The more we’re able to have fun with the process, the greater the freedom we experience in return.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Aug 3, 2022
• ISBN: 9781662455445

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Cognitive Liberty

An Intrapersonal Voyage of Consciousness Evolution

Chris P. Younce.

Copyright © 2022 Chris P. Younce

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING

Conneaut Lake, PA

First originally published by Page Publishing 2022

ISBN 978-1-6624-5543-8 (pbk)

ISBN 978-1-6624-5545-2 (hc)

ISBN 978-1-6624-5544-5 (digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

In honor of Goddard

And what it was meant to do

With what life we had left to lose

Preface

An Intrapersonal Reckoning

Over the course of my career, I have noticed an unsettling degree of ignorance within the field of human services and developmental disabilities services (DDS). Part of which is rooted in a dated paradigm within the field of mental health (MH) services, and psychiatry in general. By extension, this ignorance permeates the Western mind and has infected our worldview as a collective society. The consequences of which have been, and will continue to be, catastrophic to our social and ecological context. We’re in a speeding car driving through foggy roads. In order to reclaim ownership of our vehicle and of the road, we need to know when to slow down and somehow redirect. Needless to say, we have a load of catching up to do in order to make our systems work.

I started this project in 2012, by the end of my undergrad program at Goddard, which was when I noticed a strange correlation between autism spectrum disorder and modern culture. As a collective mind, we’re locked into a habitual state of compulsivity that overrides our ability to apply our consciousness in daily life. I first noticed this in myself, then I quickly realized I was not alone. In fact, many others have alluded to the same thing, whether browsing Facebook or in the shower or washing the dishes—all too often the mind will zone out and disconnect from the here and now.

It’s easy and natural for the mind to wander, thinking of this and that, and drift off into a tangent that may or may not benefit our interpersonal relationships. The more we do this, however, the less we pause to reflect what’s happening in the intrapersonal: a term I use sparingly that underlies the narrative of this book, which refers to our unique way we internalize the world. Personal evolution and healing often begins when we apply ourselves to the world and consciously intervene on habits that are inherently averse to us. This is a process known as integration, and it takes a lot of time and work to get there. But it’s refreshing to know that we are all in this journey together.

Each of us are embodied universes, and if we’re not in touch with our center, that part of us that holds our universe intact, things start to fall apart. It’s like this for each of us as conscious bodies and as a collective organism. We have a responsibility, as human beings, to put our consciousness to use and not just check out. The main problem I see with autism and culture, in the ways they parallel each other, is that consciousness becomes trapped in the head as a source of being. Whenever this happens, we become carried away and lose our balance. We overemphasize our intellectual side and neglect our emotional side or vice versa. Both working in harmony are needed to create social and ecological systems that are sustainable. It’s clear that we’re living in a period where our systems are not working, and as a result, we’ve become lost, angry, and confused. The more astray from our center we become, the more estranged we become to who we are.

As relevant the research covered in this book is to DDS or MH, or human services in general, I was surprised to see how nearly 100 percent of my colleagues had never even heard of such terms as neuroplasticity or holotropic. These are evolutionary concepts I cover in the book as they highlight tremendous value in understanding how we can create a more comprehensive guideline to supporting people with autism or others who suffer from significant trauma. More importantly, I think concepts like these should be well understood by the culture at large, in how they apply to our ecological position in the world today. Nothing could be more relevant to our evolution as a species.

Chris P. Younce

Waterbury, VT

Introduction

Evolution as Cognitive Liberation

Reality is not limited to the perception we have traditionally used.

—Paul Stamets

Although our most innovative ideas and technologies were once heralded as the pinnacle of human evolution, we find ourselves today in a destructive trajectory rooted in an isolated, heartless drive to amass ever more power and wealth. I believe this runs counter to our intrapersonal and interpersonal nature. As a society, we have oppressed the foundation of our natural intelligence and creative capacities to live sustainably. Deep down we can feel that something isn’t right. Our legacy as evolving beings of consciousness beckons us to awaken to our true potential and indisputably realize our role in the evolutionary story of the planet. I will argue that what we’re experiencing at the level of planetary crisis (socially and environmentally) is nothing short of a crisis of perception—one that requires an understanding of the psychological and ecological factors that inform our consciousness.

I will claim that an evolution of consciousness is necessary. A cognitive liberation not unlike the evolution of consciousness that transformed us from primates into Homo sapiens. No longer can we afford to borrow and pillage our way to a ruthless spree of egocentric ignorance and narrow-minded disregard for the limitation of Earth’s resources. As cofounder of Peak Prosperity, Chris Martenson puts it, You cannot have infinite growth on a finite planet. The exponential curve of human populations and modern economies are generating demands for a tsunami of chaos in the coming decades ahead. With our resources waning and our global debt running amuck, the adversity will only grow more frightening and warrant our attention like nothing ever before witnessed in human history. There must be a better, more resourceful way of doing things, and it starts with us. Like it or not, we are the problem.

I will posit the idea that this isolation from the natural world is an illusion, that we are neither alone nor disconnected from Nature. It’s not difficult to hear Mother Earth crying for a wakefulness that recognizes humanity as part of a systematic, symbiotic, interwoven network—a synergized and cognitive web of life. The difficulty is discovering a way within us to intervene on conditioned habits of perception and admitting to the fact that what may have worked in the past certainly doesn’t work anymore. One may say that reorganizing and restructuring our inherited misperceptions is one of the greatest adaptive challenges we face if we are going to survive and create a future world worth inheriting for our children and grandchildren. Nevertheless, we must find a way to change our minds.

By liberating and transcending consciousness beyond the ego and the compulsiveness of the mind, we can furthermore contemplate the reality that the earth is a single organism. And by nature, we are constituents of this organism. Henceforth we can make sense of the fact that, as Carl Sagan once put it, an organism at war with itself is doomed. In order to heed Sagan’s words, we need to first recognize how we’ve strayed from our inner Nature to live in harmony with the earth’s rhythms. But as Lao Tzu pointed out in the wisdom of his 2,500-year-old Tao Te Ching, The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step. And as in any first step, critically identifying the problem brings us that much closer to addressing it effectively, in alignment with who we truly are in the natural dance of evolution. This book aims to enhance that awareness and provide necessary guidelines to build resilience for what’s to come. And hopefully prevent such incompatibility from manifesting irreparably out of control. Knowing that we’ve lost our way means we can begin anew to find it again. Now is the time to reset and embrace our limitations as we open our minds and discover what is happening to us.

Cognitive liberty is a concept I use to describe two basic principles. One is in terms of freedom of the mind, and the other is freedom from the mind. Though these definitions seem to contradict each other, both are evidently necessary for transcendence and creative freedom, because you can’t have one without the other. Freedom of the mind—to use it as one chooses or to think what they will—empowers one to wield the mind consciously. Therefore, without this empowerment, freedom from the mind becomes meaningless. The latter definition is a concept and experience just as essential as the former, if not more so. I plan to review the benefits of both throughout this book in that cognitive liberty is a process meant to foster creativity, compassion, and reciprocity.

Cognitive liberty embraces the notion that life and reality itself could possibly be an elaborate simulation. That we could be living in a simulated environment, attuned to our inner world of cocreative consciousness, from our hearts to our minds. If life is an elaborate simulation, then for what purpose would this be other than to learn something (or a series of things) for ourselves. In considering this model of reality, cognitive liberty is an individualized learning process through reconnecting with spirit. Of optimizing the conversation between the head and the heart as a means of cultivating inner coherence, our relationship with the eternal present. "The Great Stream of the moving now," as Alan Watts would say. This is where the center of creation begins and ends simultaneously.

At the heart of consciousness is the nameless void, the ineffable moment, the eye of the storm. Therefore to try and call it something would miss the point entirely. This is where the latter definition of cognitive liberty comes into play. For what it represents as an experience itself and the concept of itself are two separate things. Knowing the difference is a critical starting point for practicing a reunion with spirit by reconnecting with the breath to metabolize our deeply personal, and often traumatic, insecurities. Cognitive liberty is transformative in this regard, by calibrating one’s center, to remember and to learn how to simply play. The mind is an art project, and consciousness is an art itself. This book views consciousness as not only a universal and unexplainable phenomenon but it is ultimately the locus of evolutionary change.

Through research in psychology and neurology, quantum physics and epigenetics, mycology and ecology, as well as shamanism and tryptamine psychedelics—coupled with Taoist principles—I will demonstrate how the creative process exemplifies our evolution as individuals and as a species. Cognitive liberty is an examination of the brain and its insatiable desire for dominance over ourselves and our environments and how this bamboozles us into an endless trap of insecurity. In order to learn how to work with our advanced modular nature—that is, to prognosticate a future of everlasting bliss and gratification—we need to step outside of our programs of perception dominated by this polarized organ. Cognitive liberty is intended to transcend the limitations of our brain and its socially constructed, subconscious perceptions so that we may begin anew the creative work of evolving our consciousness and healing the spirit of Mother Earth.

To help illustrate this along the way, I will refer to figure 1 below, an equilateral triangle, divided into three compartments constructing three more equilateral triangles within it. These three compartments represent the duality of existential resonance.

Figure 1. The trinity of transcendence

These triangles are to serve as references for understanding how different states of consciousness interact with the self and the natural world. One triangle is that of knowing, which includes processes of the mind such as thinking, reasoning, and language. Another is that of doing, which entails processes of the body as our direct relationship to the environment and our developmental process of mastership. And the other is that of being, which envelopes processes of the soul such as the visionary and mystical states of artistic creativity through feeling, instinct, and intuition. These three triangles are uniquely positioned as a way of geometrically understanding the three facets of the self. The center, left unchecked and unhindered by resonance, captures what Taoist masters refer to as Tao: the way. This core of the trinity, the inverted triangle represented as the nucleus of the diagram, could be understood as the immortal emptiness or the raw space between one state of consciousness to another. I view this space as the essence that holds the universe together. Without this inverted core of emptiness, all three states of knowing, doing, and being would cease to exist in proportion to each other.

During part I of this project, I will explore the soft science and social impact of psychology and mental health. Primarily, I will broaden my attention to one of the most alienated and enigmatic of developmental disabilities: autism. Using this as an overview, I will explain how and why I see both autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and modern culture as operating systems in and of themselves. They are functions within the same box of familiarity, sensitivity, personality, and compulsivity. These characteristics are synthesized in the subconscious as programming or conditioning, which governs ordinary experience and filters perception into a mode of egocentricity. In essence, all of which have one thing in common: insecurity.

In reflecting on who we are as a species and as individuals, we must navigate through the smoke and mirrors of our subconscious. In doing so, we can observe the rigidity and compulsiveness that threaten to swallow our spirits whole, while rendering our consciousness less conscious in the process. To halt such destructive thought-behavior patterns, it’s important to identify how we relate to mental disorders and developmental disabilities, which are conducive to subconscious compulsiveness. In this regard, I provide examples of my own experience as a person with a learning disability.

Throughout this section, I explore how the brain is a hyperactive associative network that becomes programmed over time. In other words, the brain is a social organ, and the mind develops through interpersonal relationships. I sum up this section by exploring how it is possible to evolve the brain through neuroplasticity. Neuroplasticity, by our commanding free will, is the power to rewire our brains by changing our minds. This is a fairly recent idea in science, which counters the old doctrine that our brains were fixed after childhood development and that only decay happened beyond that. Rewiring the brain is made possible because of the elasticity our neural networks consist of, which makes our neurosynaptic organization sensitive and malleable to the environment. In other words, based on principles of neuroplasticity, our perception of the environment has the power to reinforce our thoughts into reality.

In part II, I will briefly explore the cutting-edge model of quantum physics, and in doing so, I will expand on how this revolutionary field of research is remodeling the study of life as we know it. Indeed, our new understanding of biology embraces reality as it pertains to our subjective experience. With the help of Bruce Lipton’s monumental research, I will share how our biology is influenced by (and adapts to) environmental signals, not by genes or DNA blueprints. In fact, evolution is not the result of genetic determinism at all. Lipton’s work explains how cellular behavior and evolution is actually driven by the environment, via the cellular integral membrane proteins that sense and perceive the environment. At the cellular level, biological expression require signals in order to select the genes for appropriate behavioral responses.

This section attempts to identify a biology within consciousness because, as revealed by quantum mechanics, consciousness is the ground of all being. From this, Lipton describes, Perception controls behavior, perception activates the expression of the genes and, when or if necessary, perception ‘rewrites’ genes. I conclude this section by using the terms belief and perception interchangeably because, based on evidence in neurobiology, the brain/mind/body complex cannot distinguish what is inside or outside of the body. In other words, there is no difference between what we actually perceive and what we believe we perceive. So an awareness of the situatedness of our perspectives and perceptions, and the fact that we can change them, is pivotal in our capacity to interpret an appropriate behavioral response conducive to evolutionary survival and advancement.

In part III, I review our evolutionary need for a deeper understanding of ecology. With the help of Simon Powell and Paul Stamets, I evaluate how genetic determinism is a dated and erroneous paradigm in its attempt to come up with an integral theory of evolution. By rethinking what Nature is through questioning why Nature is, we can more clearly discern that Nature is intelligent. This very idea penetrates at the heart of what scientific materialism relentlessly ignores. Scientific propaganda assimilates Nature and evolution as a dumb, mindless process with meaningless accidents of chance variation. Science deliberately pulls their interpretations on DNA and evolution out of context while trying to explain how evolution occurs. This section presents a new perspective contributing to a cultural and scientific paradigm shift that recognizes natural intelligence in evolution.

There is an abundance of evidence of natural intelligence throughout the biosphere, expressed as symbiosis and other cooperative movements in evolutionary processes. This idea is a new way of seeing the traditionally acclaimed survival of the fittest in natural selection. It’s a matter of redefining what we mean by fittest, which applies to Nature as a sensible organism with numerous examples of self-organizing, bio-logic. Thus, reinforcing how evolution is a learning process. One that I would qualify furthermore as a creative process. The fungi and their prolific role in cultivating ecosystems are widely attributed to this paradigm. Fungi operate as a kind of evolutionary reinforcement for its host, providing a natural immunological benefit for the environment and its constituent occupants. Intelligence within intelligence is the story of symbiosis and mycelium (network-based organisms), as we dive deeper into the rabbit hole of why Nature is the way it is. Seeing Nature in a new way relies on our flexibility to change our minds. A mission committed to solving the problems and addressing the predicaments of our perceptual distortion and learning how to live sustainably.

In part IV, I will review how cognitive liberty is our birthright and our responsibility. We owe it to our homeland to give back and use what consciousness we have left to reconcile our relationship with our life partners. I will expand on this concept by exploring the stoned-ape hypothesis as a way of speculating how the genesis of our species is more likely a you are what you eat story. Of course, the notion of our unique and perplexed neurogenesis remains a mystery all the same. This speculation explores the role of psychedelics, particularly psilocybin-containing mushrooms, in the evolution of human consciousness. All too often, however, this idea proposed by Terence and Dennis McKenna gets dismissed far too easily by the academicians of Western reductionism. In spite of this narrow-minded attitude, I want to encourage those who read on to suspend their personal disbelief and be open to the idea that we do not have all the answers.

Additionally, as we navigate our way through the mystery of our being, I will explore the creative process as a way of cultivating a center within us to evolve our consciousness and learn how to simply enjoy life as a process on its own terms. Fungal networks provide compelling examples of trusting the process in the form of our instincts and being true to our nature as decentralized, indeterministic organisms. Through this, we can regain our focus and restructure our footing to remember our role in Nature. As we become more conscious of our relational awareness, we become more proprioceptive. Thus, we begin to heal our deepest wounds of the personality and the collective psyche. We can come to terms with how we are lost and damaged souls in a viscous circle of self-sabotage and self-destruction.

By reviewing how the ego can be dissolved and transcended, how consciousness and creativity can be catalyzed and liberated, through experiences of wonder and awe, we can capture the neurochemical potential to reprogram newly efficient subconscious processes. In alluding to the freedom of the mind, we don’t need to look further than the wisdom of sacred plants and fungi as mastered by primordial shamanism. These psychedelic compounds are perceptual technologies, spiritual medicines designed to interrupt the psyche from egocentric patterns of spotlight consciousness, the default mode network, and our habitual compulsivity. In light of the fact that our bodies are composed of molecules, we can harness the power of breath to attain altered states of consciousness as well.

Just to be clear, I do not suggest everybody use psilocybin, especially without taking the time and intent to prepare and respect the sacred integrity of its transformative power. If we are going to be adults about this topic, we need to imbue a nature of respect and maturity while dealing with the experience. The psilocybe Teacher is not a party drug. Her wisdom and positive impact should be taken seriously and not marginalized by the party atmosphere. I only propose that people who do use psilocybin continue to with humble respect, adequate preparation, and appropriate guidance. And that the surge of research in this area continues to be funded. Whether macrodosing or microdosing, psilocybin is clearly an ally in our story of consciousness evolution and neurogenesis.

The value of these experiences is in its nature of illuminating unconscious habits and subconscious programs. Revealing what we are unaware of or that everything we’ve known to believe could be completely wrong. These experiences can empower individuals to think for themselves and detoxify the psyche. This testimony represents the quintessence of cognitive liberty in its neighboring definition: freedom from the mind (as a program of the past). This is where the creative process comes into play for what it means to the intrapersonal and how it is essential to human evolution. This will provide an evolutionary context to our consciousness as a formula for spiritual growth and individual development. It is here where our ecological proprioceptors awaken.

Humanitarian metamorphosis begins with weaving our dreams of the heart to cultivate the collective mind. Cognitive liberty is an art project of engineering the inner world the way we want to be. Given our dire circumstance, we owe it to our legacy to explore, expand, and liberate the human mind. Giving us access to our creative potential. Ultimately, our fate lies with our relationship to Nature. My proclamation is that our birthright is to understand that we are Nature, and this cannot be well understood without cognitive freedom. The sanctuary of peace and harmony rests with our inner Nature to be real with ourselves and to use our imaginations wisely. That means finding a way for the soul to be perceptible and to be more and more conscious. Fundamentally, according to Alex Grey, this is the mission of art. The nature of who we are and what we do reveals our consciousness evolution as artists. We are a superorganism, and we all must work together to create a sustainable future. This revelation gives way to understanding how the Zen art of Wu Wei is the technique we need to learn to truly become free spirits in the serenity of inner paradise and prosperity. Using our hearts as much as we use our brains. Only then will we experience a free society and learn what it means to truly be human.

Part I

The Social Continuum: Autism in Culture and Ego within Subconscious

Chapter 1

Relating to Autism

There is a certain loss of insight in the tendency of psychoanalysis to isolate the individual from culture. Once we recognize the limitations of talk from the couch, or rather, once we recognize that talk from the couch is still an activity in culture, it becomes plain that there is nothing for the psychoanalyst to analyze except these cultural projections—the world of slums and telegrams and newspapers—and thus psychoanalysis fulfills itself only when it becomes historical and cultural analysis.

—Norman O. Brown

Autism is probably one of the broadest spectrum disabilities known to man. To this day, researchers have yet to fully grasp what autism spectrum disorder is. However, despite its prevailing enigma, there is a hidden characteristic about ASD that highlights the role of any neurotypical as a product of culture. As complex, unique, and individualized this disorder may be, the secrets of the autistic brain can be mapped out and explored in simple terms. By reviewing the conditions and characteristics of autistic brain function, we can speculate what’s behind the curtain of its behavioral tendencies. The purpose of this chapter is to help remove that curtain. And see what is truly behind the gummed up works of the subconscious brain of autism. If we can demystify the autistic mind, then perhaps we can come to redefine the scripts that we know to be disability and disorder.

The Autism Spectrum

Let’s start off by reviewing the latest version of diagnostic criteria of ASD. The American Psychiatric Association’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual, Fifth Edition (DSM-5) states:

A. Persistent deficits in social communication and social interaction across multiple contexts, as manifested by the following, currently or by history:

Deficits in social-emotional reciprocity, ranging, for example, from abnormal social approach and failure of normal back-and-forth conversation; to reduced sharing of interests, emotions, or affect; to failure to initiate or respond to social interactions.

Deficits in nonverbal communicative behaviors used for social interaction, ranging, for example, from poorly integrated verbal and nonverbal communication; to abnormalities in eye contact and body language or deficits in understanding and use of gestures; to a total lack of facial expressions and nonverbal communication.

Deficits in developing, maintaining, and understand relationships, ranging, for example, from difficulties adjusting behavior to suit various social contexts; to difficulties in sharing imaginative play or in making friends; to absence of interest in peers.

B. Restricted, repetitive patterns of behavior, interests, or activities, as manifested by at least two of the following, currently or by history:

Stereotyped or repetitive motor movements, use of objects, or speech (e.g., simple motor stereotypes, lining up toys or flipping objects, echolalia, idiosyncratic phrases).

Insistence on sameness, inflexible adherence to routines, or ritualized patterns of verbal or nonverbal behavior (e.g., extreme distress at small changes, difficulties with transitions, rigid thinking patterns, greeting rituals, need to take same route or eat same food every day).

Highly restricted, fixated interests that are abnormal in intensity or focus (e.g., strong attachment to or preoccupation with unusual objects, excessively circumscribed or perseverative interests).

Hyper- or hyporeactivity to sensory input or unusual interest in sensory aspects of the environment (e.g., apparent indifference to pain/temperature, adverse response to specific sounds or textures, excessive smelling or touching of objects, visual fascination with lights or movement).

Severity is based on social communication impairments and restricted, repetitive patterns of behavior.

C. Symptoms must be present in the early developmental period (but may not become fully manifest until social demands exceed limited capacities, or may be masked by learned strategies in later life).

D. Symptoms cause clinically significant impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of current functioning.

E. These disturbances are not better explained by intellectual disability (intellectual developmental disorder) or global developmental delay. Intellectual disability and autism spectrum disorder frequently co-occur; to make comorbid diagnoses of autism spectrum disorder and intellectual disability, social communication should be below that expected for general developmental level.

Note: Individuals with a well-established DSM-IV diagnosis of autistic disorder, Asperger’s disorder, or pervasive developmental disorder not otherwise specified should be given the diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder. Individuals who have marked deficits in social communication, but whose symptoms do not otherwise meet criteria for autism spectrum disorder, should be evaluated for social (pragmatic) communication disorder. (American Psychiatric Association, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th ed. [Arlington, VA: American Psychiatric Association, 2013])

In Rethinking the DSM, Larry E. Beutler and Mary L. Malik refer to the autism spectrum as a continuum. Since it is such a broad spectrum of traits, it is common for people on the spectrum to have more than one DSM diagnosis.

Critics of the categorical approach propose the adoption of dimensional models where maladies or disorders can be conceptualized as falling somewhere along a continuum ranging from normal to pathological. Co-morbidity has been proven to be a continuing problem for the DSM system, as researchers suggest that most people meet the criteria for more than one DSM diagnosis…(6).

After reviewing the above criteria from the DSM-5, it’s evident that our understanding of autism has certainly been modified since its original diagnostic discovery in the 1940s. In fact, prior to this diagnostic discovery, observations of patients with symptoms of autism led psychiatric practitioners to diagnosing individuals with schizophrenia. It is no doubt that we have come a long way since then.

Until recent DSM editions, the spectrum included disorders like: Asperger’s syndrome (a distortion of social awareness, sensitivity overload to stimuli, rigid thinking, and an isolated internal monologue) and savant syndrome (unusual or extraordinary systems of thought and memory, and some have a strong or sensitive intuition for numbers, patterns, and symbols, like Dustin Hoffman’s character in the motion picture Rain Man). Both are generally considered to be high functioning.

Other characteristics of autism include traits of obsessive-compulsive disorder (impulsive, pattern-repetitive, and anxious behaviors). Due to the nature of sensory feedback, or lack thereof, people with severe autism often have challenges with proprioception¹ and dyspraxia,² which could explain why some folks naturally have high tone or low tone motor control deficits. These deficits will often impede the ability of an individual with ASD to communicate in traditional ways, and they need extra support with their communication. Symptoms of ASD can also exhibit a wider range of disabilities to include attention deficit disorder (ADD), because autistic people have remote, inner monologues that would affect their attention span in social situations. This idea came from Steven Johnson’s hypotheses in his book Mind Wide Open based on the tests he conducted on regaining attention and his own neurofeedbacks.³

So What Is Autism?

The autism spectrum is a vast category of deficits and levels of executive functioning skills, ranging from person to person, which makes it very difficult to define. And though I would never claim that one definition says it all, I would like to share what I’ve discovered about ASD in general. My underlying definition of autism is the sensory urge for predictability. More eloquently, it is a state of mind to be, or stay, in a comfort zone. This urge stems from a place of perpetually unsettling anxiety and discomfort. Which includes (but is not limited to) a hyperarousal response to exterior stimuli or a hypoarousal response to inner stimuli. From an operative standpoint, these are hardwired social habits to think, do, and feel what is familiar in the form of refined neuro-synaptic pathways. These habits are generally viewed as irrational responses to fear. Though I have come to understand that when working with cases of those who have autism, no matter how severe their symptoms may be, virtually they’re always coming from a place of