John Elder Robison Quotes & Sayings

When today's brain scientists talk Asperger's, there's no mention of damage - just difference. Neurologists have not identified anything that's missing or ruined in the Asperger brain. That's a very important fact. We are not like the unfortunate people who've lost millions of neurons through strokes, drinking, lead poisoning, or accidental injury. Our brains are complete; it's just the interconnections that are different. — John Elder Robison

Girls are the trickiest and most unpredictable creatures a fellow like me will ever talk to. — John Elder Robison

By the time I was twelve, I had progressed from "If he doesn't get better, he may have to be institutionalized" to "He's a weird, screwed-up kid. — John Elder Robison

Because speaking while watching things has always been difficult for me, learning to drive a car and talk at the same time was a tough one, but I mastered it. — John Elder Robison

Appearing as a character in my brother's books taught me something about myself. For most of my life, my history as an abused child with what I saw as a personality defect was shameful and embarrassing. Being a failure and a high school dropout was humiliating, no matter how well I subsequently did. I lied about my age, my education, and my upbringing for years because the truth was just too horrible to reveal. His book, and people's remarkable acceptance of us as we are, changed all that. I was finally free. — John Elder Robison

(The only time making a fist around the fork helps is when you want to stab someone because he's stealing your food. Now I know stabbing people is really rude, so I hold my fork in the grown-up way all the time, and I rely on discreet snarls to protect my dinner from predators.) — John Elder Robison

Saying you "have" something implies that it's temporary and undesirable. Asperger's isn't like that. You've been Aspergian as long as you can remember, and you'll be that way all your life. It's a way of being, not a disease. — John Elder Robison

There are plenty of people in the world whose lives are governed by rote and routine. Such people will never be happy dealing with me, because I don't conform. Luckily, the world is also full of people who care about results, and those people are usually very happy with me, because my Asperger's compels me to be the ultimate expert in whatever field of interest I choose. And with substantial knowledge, I can obtain good results. — John Elder Robison

Find Your Strengths and Interests — John Elder Robison

It does not matter what sixty-six percent of people do in any particular situation. All that matters is what you do. — John Elder Robison

Here's a good rule of thumb: Your own rituals are okay as long as they don't interfere with your responsibilities in daily life, or make you the subject of teasing or ridicule. Rituals become a problem whenever they prevent you from doing the stuff you're supposed to do, or when they get you in trouble. — John Elder Robison

I named him Poodle, beginning a long tradition of functional pet naming. — John Elder Robison

My conversational difficulties highlight a problem Aspergians face every day. A person with an obvious disability - for example, someone in a wheelchair - is treated compassionately because his handicap is obvious. No one turns to a guy in a wheelchair and says, "Quick! Let's run across the street!" And when he can't run across the street, no one says, "What's his problem?" They offer to help him across the street. With me, though, there is no external sign that I am conversationally handicapped. So folks hear some conversational misstep and say, "What an arrogant jerk!" I look forward to the day when my handicap will afford me the same respect accorded to a guy in a wheelchair. And if the respect comes with a preferred parking space, I won't turn it down. — John Elder Robison

I tried to show him things, but he didn't seem to study what I showed him. Usually, he just put whatever I handed him in his mouth. He would try to eat anything. I fed him Tabasco sauce and he yelled. Having a little brother helped me learn to relate to other people. Being a little brother, Snort learned to watch what he put in his mouth. — John Elder Robison

I can't look at a stranger's face and think, She's smiling just like Amy. When Amy smiles like that she's happy, so this person is probably happy, too. Instead, I watch and evaluate, with a slightly anxious feeling. It's as if I have to build a behavior database for every single person I meet in life. When I encounter someone for the first time, the slate is blank and I don't know what to expect. — John Elder Robison

Bill Gates is said to be Aspergian. Musician Glenn Gould is said to have been Aspergian, along with scientist Albert Einstein, actor Dan Aykroyd, writer Isaac Asimov, and movie director Alfred Hitchcock. As adults, none of those people would be described as disabled, but they were certainly eccentric and different. — John Elder Robison

Learning how to get along with other people is vital for our own success and happiness. — John Elder Robison

As a logical thinker, I cannot help thinking, based on the evidence, that many people who exhibit dramatic reactions to bad news involving strangers are hypocrites. — John Elder Robison

I don't want to be a genius or a freak or something on display. I wish for empathy and compassion from those around me, and I appreciate sincerity, clarity, and logicality in other people. I believe most people - autistic or not - share this wish. And now, with my newfound insight, I'm on the way to achieving that goal. I hope you'll keep those thoughts in mind the next time you meet someone who looks or acts a little strange. — John Elder Robison

It must be my logical consideration of a decision many see as purely intuitive or emotional that throws other people for a loop. — John Elder Robison

When we pulled in, the customs officer looked in the back. The back of the wagon was filled with cases stenciled PINK FLOYD
LONDON.
'Got Pink Floyd in the back of the car, do you?' he asked.
'Righto, mate. We shrunk 'em and stuck 'em in fookin' boxes, we did,' said Nigel.
Amazingly, the customs officer laughed and waved us through. — John Elder Robison

In the past, when people criticized me for asking unexpected questions, I felt ashamed. Now I realize that normal people are acting in a superficial and often false manner. So rather than let them make me feel bad, I express my annoyance. It's my way of trying to strike a blow for logic and rationality. — John Elder Robison

I am sure antidepressants, drugs, and liquor have their place. But so far, that place is in others, not me. — John Elder Robison

When we discover and build upon our gifts it spurs positive feelings in us and those around us, and those feelings go a long way toward dissipating the burden of failure that many young Aspergians carry as kids. — John Elder Robison

It has always bothered me that many people, doctors included, tend to view anything that deviates from the typical as being abnormal or broken. — John Elder Robison

They enrolled me in a group for troubled kids. We would meet each week in an old farmhouse owned by the university and talk about our problems getting along ... They didn't teach me to get along, but I did learn that there were plenty of other kids who couldn't get along any better than me. That in itself was encouraging. I realized that I was not the bottom of the barrel. Or if I was, the bottom was roomy because there were a lot of us down there. — John Elder Robison

Asperger's is not a disease. It's a way of being. There is no cure, nor is there a need for one. There is, however, a need for knowledge and adaptation on the part of Aspergian kids and their families and friends. — John Elder Robison

I knew I was some kind of misfit, but it was becoming apparent that some of the grown-ups who smiled sweetly and told me how terrible and fucked-up I was were complete fuckups themselves. — John Elder Robison

The hard part was living the contrast between being rich and being broke. It was like being smart, and waking up one day to find yourself dumb as a rock, but able to remember your former brains. — John Elder Robison

This is a f***ing mess," I said tactfully. — John Elder Robison

So is there a cure?' I asked.
'It's not a disease,' he explained. 'It doesn't need curing. It's just how you are — John Elder Robison

That was the definition of management - getting others to do your work for you. And we were the others. — John Elder Robison

Being lonely as a kid might well have been necessary for me," I told audiences in my talks. "If I'd had the friends I dreamt of, I'd never have spent the time to become the machine aficionado I am today. Now that I'm grown I can put that in perspective. The world is full of friendly people with no technical skills. The few of us who see into machines like others see into humans are singularly uncommon, and we're valued for that. If we use a technology like TMS to help a lonely teen today, will we be taking that exceptional ability away from him tomorrow? Should we trade friends in seventh grade for designing a working spaceship at age twenty-five? — John Elder Robison

Simply making myself aware of others has remarkably improved my social life. People accept me much faster now that I ignore them less. — John Elder Robison

As I've gotten older, I have taught myself to act "normal." I can do it well enough to fool the average person for a whole evening, maybe longer. But it all falls apart if I hear something that elicits a strong emotional reaction from me that is different from what people expect. In an instant, in their eyes, I turn into the sociopathic killer I was believed to be forty years ago. — John Elder Robison

Sociopath" and "psycho" were two of the most common field diagnoses for my look and expression. I heard it all the time: "I've read about people like you. They have no expression because they have no feeling. Some of the worst murderers in history were sociopaths. — John Elder Robison

A crying grown-up with no visible damage, who knew what that meant? — John Elder Robison

Believe that some kids who are in the middle to more high-functioning range of the autism continuum, like me, do not receive the proper stimulation and end up turning inward to such an extent that they can't function in society, even though they may be incredibly brilliant in some narrowly defined field, like abstract mathematics. — John Elder Robison

I was nice on the inside, but new acquaintances sometimes never stayed around long enough to notice, — John Elder Robison

In high school, I could recognize extremes of emotion. I knew enough to run if a guy came yelling and screaming at me with a baseball bat. But a girl with a subtle expression on her face ... was she smiling at me? Laughing? Quizzical and curious? I had no idea. That led to a lot of awkward interactions and years of loneliness. — John Elder Robison

Subtle brain differences often cause people like me to respond differently - strangely even - to common life situations. Most of us have a hard time with social situations; some of us feel downright crippled. We get frustrated because we're so good at some things, while being completely inept at others. There's just no balance. It's a very difficult way to live, because our strengths seem to contrast so sharply with our weaknesses. "You read so well, and you're so smart! I can't believe you can't do what I told you. You must be faking!" I heard that a lot as a kid. — John Elder Robison

When I act politely, I build a reserve of goodwill in others. That reserve allows those people to cut me some slack when I do something annoying. — John Elder Robison

There's this thing called the competence-deviance hypothesis," she explained. "It says that the more competent an individual is in his field - the more respected he is in the community - the more his eccentric behavior will be tolerated by others. "But the opposite is true for young people, because they have not done anything to earn respect in a community. So when they do weird things they are treated like dangerous animals and hustled into cages. It seems unfair when older, respectable members of the community do stuff that's even stranger and people just shake their heads and smile at their eccentricity." I — John Elder Robison

Unlike some older brothers, I never set him on fire, or cut off an arm or leg, or drowned him in the tub. — John Elder Robison

Last summer, when he thought I wasn't looking, I observed Cubby telling one of the neighborhood six-year-olds that there were dragons living in the storm drains, under our street.
'We feed them meat ... and then they don't get hungry and blow fire and roast us.'
Little James listened closely, with a very serious expression on his face. Then he ran home to get some hot dogs from his mother. — John Elder Robison

When Martha first met me, I was anxious and jumpy. I was always tapping my foot, rocking, or exhibiting some other behavioral aberration. Of course, now we know that's just normal Aspergian behavior, but back then other people thought it was weird, so of course I did, too. One day, for some reason, she decided to try petting my arm, and I immediately stopped rocking and fidgeting. The result was so dramatic, she never stopped. It didn't take long for me to realize the calming effect, too. I like being petted and scratched. "Can you pet me?" I say when I sit next to her. — John Elder Robison

Always keep this point in mind: the word "delay" means what it says: late. Delayed isn't never, no matter how much it may feel like that at age fifteen or even twenty-five. — John Elder Robison

We began reading books together. He loved Dr. Seuss. I read those books so often I could turn the pages and say the words from memory. I became bored with repetition, and I began to make subtle alterations. The story turned into:
One fish
Two fish
Black fish
Blue fish
I eat you fish
And:
See them all
See them run
The man in back
He has a gun — John Elder Robison

We do not naturally care about people we don't know ... If we tried to feel sorry for every death, our little hearts would explode ... I don't have any physical reaction to the news. And there's no reason I should. I don't know them and the news has no effect on my life. — John Elder Robison

I used to fear barking dogs. I would cringe and say to myself, 'Nice doggie please don't bite me I'll just go away,' but by that night I could look at them and think, I am your worst nightmare. Come closer and I will impale you upon my stick. The more I firmly visualized it, the more the dogs believed it. Now the tables had turned. Now the dogs feared me. — John Elder Robison

As a functional Aspergian adult, one thing troubles me deeply about those kids who end up behind the second door. Many descriptions of autism and Asperger's describe people like me as "not wanting contact with others" or "preferring to play alone." I can't speak for other kids, but I'd like to be very clear about my own feelings: I did not ever want to be alone. And all those child psychologists who said "John prefers to play by himself" were dead wrong. I played by myself because I was a failure at playing with others. I was alone as a result of my own limitations, and being alone was one of the bitterest disappointments of my young life. — John Elder Robison

And now I know it is perfectly natural for me not to look at someone when I talk. Those of us with Asperger's are just not comfortable doing it. In fact, I don'treally understand why it's considered normal to stare at someone's eyeballs. — John Elder Robison

When I speak in casual conversation, I try to start a mental clock in my head. I actually learned this from Marty Nemko, a San Francisco career coach. He told me, "For the first thirty seconds after you start talking, imagine a green light in your head. After thirty seconds the light turns yellow. At sixty seconds, it's red." That's a good piece of advice for most any conversational situation. It takes some mental energy to monitor myself, but it works. — John Elder Robison

Building up a weakness just makes you less disabled. Building a strength can take you to the top of the world. — John Elder Robison

And my experience in the music scene had shown me that there were places for places in the world where misfits were welcome. — John Elder Robison