The word “identity” has two different meanings:
1. The fact of being who or what a person or thing is.
2. A close similarity or affinity.
I would like to focus on the first meaning.
My identity is based on who I am as a person.
It’s based on the things I do and don’t like.
My identity is based on the clothes I wear.
My identity is based on the way I choose to talk.
My identity is based on my thoughts and opinions.
My identity isn’t based on my Autism or Anxiety.
Some people say they’re identity is their Autism.
And if they’re happy with that, that’s great.
But I was just recently diagnosed with Autism.
And while I have had it my entire life.
I didn’t know anything about it.
I did, however, know that I had anxiety issues.
I’ve had anxiety for a long time, and it’s bad.
I can recognize when an attack is gonna happen.
This isn’t always the case, but a lot of the time, it is.
I know what helps me when I have an anxiety attack.
I have an understanding of what I can and can't handle.
My Autism, on the other hand, is still a mystery to me.
I know that it affects the way I think and learn.
I know it’s the reason for why I am sensitive to temperature.
I know it’s why so had such a hard time in school.
But I refuse to say that my Autism and anxiety identify me as a person.
I have known my personality way long never than both my Autism and anxiety combined.
This isn’t true for everyone, but it is for me.
This is the way I choose to approach my Autism and anxiety.
I’m Autistic, and I’m not ashamed of it.
I have anxiety, and I’m working ******* it.
But I’m not Autism, and I’m not Anxiety.
I’m me.
And I will always stand by this train of thought.
I know that there are times when my interests become my coping skills.
But when I’m not anxious, then they are just my interests.
When I’m having an anxiety attack, then they are the skills I need in order to function.
Right now, this isn’t a coping skill.
My writing this, isn’t a form of therapy.
This is an interest of mine.
I love to write, and was thinking about this, so I decided to speak my mind.
I’m happy to say I’m happy right now.
I don’t feel a bit of stress, and if I do, then one of my interests will be used to help me through it.
Until then, I’m just doing what makes me happy.
And I’m happy that I know myself well to recognize this.
You don’t have to agree with me on anything I just said.
I just ask that you respect that these are my opinions.
I’m an individual who just happens to have Autism and anxiety.
Alright, that’s all I got, I’ve just been in a writing mood over the last few days.

matt
did you get my reply? i hope you did, i had written approx. 5, and all of them deleted... i hope i allowed myself a justifiable response with this one:

how about solipsism? solipsism is an elevated term for autism, isn't it? me? personally? i love cats, but they have a tendency to become inexhaustive economists of curiosity... i wasn't implying autism as an insult, i was implying a more crude word, synonymous with solipsism, and there is no shame in that to begin with. i like cats, because i own two, and i'm most content, when i can allow myself the time, to allow them the same time, to be left alone. cat, solo... dog + man + tail waggling + throw a ball... i better post this reply before i allow this reply, to become deleted... with all the prior 5 that have been, and me, having to post the alternative, "revision".

i.e. i rather imagine autism to be in need of having an elevated status of being designated by the term: solipsism... how can i make myself elaborate? point being, i don't want to... i too am confined to a strict vocab. fixation for the purpose of expressing language, that mitigates, bypassing, shrapnel wording of: one category fits all, conjunction words, which, i find, I, to be akin to, when categorised as: AND to begin to confine oneself to, the subsequent rigor of nouns.

i hope this doesn't end, or begin as, an apology... by autistic i was imply solipsist, i wasn't implying the retrograde slur of ******... if there's any god, it's in the disinhibited self of the autist, readily plucked, by... no basis for either a selfish, or a selfless act... i'm over-wording this, but... point being... i needed to settle myself in a posit, above the current cultural norm of the troll... which has nothing to do with autism, or as i like to call it: solipsism, diminished to a slur of: automaton...

i hope you can make lite reading of this... i concede, i attempted to make more than necessary, and conciliatory scribbles... if in any way i redeemed myself, i hope you'll concede to entertaining, accepting my apology.

Jules  22h
My only issue was that your poem seemed to make Autism synonymous with stupid or any other derogatory term. However, seeing as that wasn’t how you meant it, I apologize. I’m a bit defensive as my brother has autism

Mateuš Conrad  22h
that's perfectly understandable, given the circumstances, i am hardly surprised... i'm still here if you want to continue past the initial shock-tactic of testing the waters with me, obviously we can change the subject and not stand, metaphorically: with knives pressed against each others' throats... there i was, thinking i'd reply diving into the subject matter for no, necessary clarification / added depth... but it's the least i can appreciate from your cordial response, as to, at least, appreciate a change in the subject matter, so that, both of us, can return to feeding off a sentiment of: being left, less, uncomfortable; which implies that i have to instigate the question to change the subject matter... hmm... speed-dating-esque trivia... movies, paintings, music... literature... ah... kind of blue, miles davis, my english teacher told me, that if anyone in the classroom didn't own this album by the age they were 30... there was something wrong with them... in my then paranoia, i bought the album, and now own it on vinyl... somehow... i find that there's something more wrong with me, owning it, than not owning it.

Jules  22h
Favorite movie- Mamma Mia, favorite painting- amazing piece by a local artist, music- currently obsessed with the Beatles, favorite book- We all fall down. I’m thoroughly impressed about how reasonable you are being given the circumstances, and after reading a few more of your poems, I can tell you are a good person

Mateuš Conrad  21h
oh come on... mamma mia?! and not something akin to west side story?! who's the local artist? i only access to a London base, and, that requires a networking schedule i'm not going to equip myself with; and i'm hardly surprised by how understanding you are of me, and i do wish to pay more compliments to you, but... i feel that that would overstate me taking liberty in me not incurring an over-simplified stance of my own liberty towards you... remember, i'm one person in writing against a blank, and another person to conjure forth a reply... against a canvas, that is a readied flesh of my own flesh, bone of my own bone, i can see the antagonist in the compounded state of, the sacrosanct state of lingo... i can be a ******* against a blank canvas, but, obviously, when i am to begin with a clarity of an addressee, i cannot consider staging a variation of something, inhospitable, as a Kandinsky-variation to suit myself... Jules, you can never become something akin i treat a blank sparring estate i perform in writing without, something you are already established with, concerns equivalent to my own predisposition being unchanllenged / or, rather, undistrubed. the beatles... i'm trying to find something of a vinyl collector's "beginner's luck"... i'm too into prog. rock music... EP album experiences, akin to: king crimson's debut: in the court of the crimson king... serves me right, for not getting into Mahler... or Eric Dolphy jazz... so i turned the blind eye, and moved toward pagan music... wardruna... hedningarna... in extremo... garmarna... faun... heilung... esp. the last... i have never wished to visit the Faroe Islands more, than, after listening to their music.

Jules  21h
Mammia Mia is my favorite almost solely because of the memories attached to it. You certainly are a unique person

Mateuš Conrad  21h
i agree, i'm a sucker for super trouper and money money money, i'm waiting for a Tina Turner musical, to be honest... don't worry, i've looked into some of your comment sections... i cannot alleviate the blatantly bogus comments that are worth nothing more than an immediacy to make antagonism... i can't, i wish i could, but.... it's either this variant of an outlet, or a punching bag... i'm as unique as you find me to be... but when i just see "demands to conform" to an otherwise unnatural behavior... i don't like behaving in a counter-cordial fashion... you understand me? if there's no need to be bogus, why begin to bother being so? i hope we can remain lodged into partial nuances... and continue this discussion, beside tomorrow, i.e. whenever you feel like to preserve it, which, i hope... you will strip away more of your anonymity... but even if that is to not be the case: i thank you for the compliments... but from having inspected the immediate comments... you are a most tender artifact worth double the inspection's curiosity with a shy eye... and until i take myself to rest, and slumber, i can only leave your with these words... i wish the world was more welcoming than i allow you to believe it to be. if you can ever forgive me, i can only hope you can, by bidding me a goodnight, and welcoming me back into the discussion, within the confines of a tomorrow.

Jules  20h
Goodnight, my hopefully future friend. Poetry is definitely one of the best outlets. I definitely understand that aspect of you

Mateuš Conrad  20h
i hope to entertain you here, once more, and all the future that can be shared between the both of us. let me see you tomorrow, and scrap a beginning of a conversation with you, once more toward a focus of a beginning... and see how many minutes this allows us to entertain an amnesia of: beginning with today... how about that? i'll take to sleep, and hope, to grin... i actually re-read what i wrote: and figured... if i was being all-too despotic in securing pedantry... but then... if you took to complimenting me, i have to compliment you: tender soul... scouting the merger of sight and the hybrid coast... tender petal... why not? who is to obstruct me telling you this? lever... beside the said and into what's thought... tender petal... what a Scouser would call pet, i'd call petal... or... heavily implied: stagnant Bismarck stipend... if it be too much to ask... write me more than under the scrutiny of below the already given minus, of the 10 sentences. come at me as a punching bag... just as an experiment... i want to be the new vanguard... experiment with being uninhibited.

Jules  19h
Even the way you talk is extremely poetic. I appreciate how you took the time to try to talk everything out to prevent us from having any bad blood between, and I see know that you didn’t mean any harm from what you said. Thank you for being so kind about it all. I sincerely hope we can pick up this conversation again tomorrow as I feel we are on the road to a promising friendship. I’d be happy to write more per text, but for the sake of experimentation, I’m intrigued to see if you could try to talk in a little less of a formal dialect

Mateuš Conrad  1h
trying to bypass a formal dialect will be hard, as we're too fresh into our patchwork of setting boundaries, rigid as that might sound, and the current climate, to me, you're a slab of marble, not a statue. this sort of friendship, you're talking about, requires us to keep a modest concern for language, which, awfully, is riddled with diatribe excerpts... how we will transcend this, is, well, concerned with both of us to decide... i'm starting to entertain the fact that you have an autistic brother, since i'm learning to be panicy-picky with my language... i too had an ultra-autistic "friend" back in high-school... and i would constantly retrieve a blank-state response from him, i.e. i was looking at less a person, and more: a labyrinth. how i'll transition into a more informal use of language, i'm unsure how that will take place, Jules, we can't exactly share experiences, we can only avast ourselves, on what will pursue its own noumenon characteristics of stated language. at present, we only share a commonality of language, i'm bewildered by stating something informal... i wish i could, but i'm only allowed an "aggrieved" presence to your wish for: informality, slang, holding-hands type of escapism. i think that, with regards to your wishes, we'll have to settle for a sediments' worth of unravelling, like me, you're too trying to escape the puddle's worth of being immediately "concerned" with the comment section... we'll need to find commonality... from yesterday, i can tell you: i had the beatles faze when i was leaving the years attributed to my teens... then i found it really hard to find new music, outside the realm of bands akin to tool, the neo-progressive rock bands... but i see your point, my language is the sort of formal, that stages a lack of intimacy, but this is an ontological-high-jump, given your reply, and emphasis on friendship... you will have to curate me, moving forward, since i will be unable to moderate how, me, interacting with you, will be adequate to have finally said, something informal, by your standards of scrutiny. time, i will first have to see some of your idioms to change my dialect; i'll begin, i'll tell you where this was written from, Romford, Essex, England.

Jules  1h
If we are to move forward as friends, I have to express my feeling on the autism topic. First off, Autism is a spectrum that ranges from high functioning to low functioning. 30% of people with autism are in fact of average or higher intelligence. Some of the most famous scientists including Albert Einstein were in fact autistic. It is not synonymous with simple or stupid in any way, shape, or form. I dislike that you said your friend seemed to be less of a person because he had autism. However, I understand that you’re misconceptions weren’t meant in a malicious way

Mateuš Conrad  51s
so how can i move forward to establish a less informal dialect? i wasn't focusing on the details of the stated condition, i know that i'm handling something as fragile as an egg in terms of what words i employ, and that i might seem astoudning, in having not contra opinions on the matter beneath the impersonal "facade"... but you were asking about how to make our interaction more uninhibited, if we're going to lecture each other about infringing on delicate matters... i wasn't implying the person in question was less of a person, i was implying he was more of a person, by resembling a labyrinth, i didn't take any personhood from him, i simply reattached it to a metaphor, of elevated complexity, of a labyrinth: i was lost in attaining a mutual comprehension of a shared experience with him... what's so bad about that? i only mentioned something in passing, since your's, was the original "concern"... you asked me how we could continue in a less informal manner... this reply will not answer your original "concerns"... what if i were to say: i'm schizophrenic? what then? you'd lecture me on... all of your knowledge on the matter? if we're all going to interrogate each other... thus... then you have a misconception of schizophrenics... akin to john nash... personally, i don't understand how you'd think i'd be primarily focused on something said: intended to be relegated to: in passing... guess what... i'll send this and...

      BLOCK

               i'm basically rummaging
through porcelain...
  i was ****** off one writing
platform for no reason...
   being ****** off from another
is not on my wish list,
from a very, simple,
lack of reciprocated
       feed of understanding;

   oh i know when i see minor *******,
some liking it to micro-aggression...
i chose a fox as my totem,
learning from a 2015 "debacle":
it looks innocent at first,
    but then spirals out of control;
the more i sieve through
this construct known as humanity,
the more i chose to remain
hidden.
   - and for all the worth
of the tabloid press...
   this is where i'll reign, myself
included.