Lesson 4.1: Tagging Your Deficits: Getting to Know Your Own Brain

Practical guidance for identifying the autistic—and NON-autistic—quirks in your brain that form the singularity of YOU!

Let’s take a break from the heavy stuff. Let’s have some fun. And there’s nothing more fun than exploring who you are and learning about what makes you unique.

In Lesson 4, I encouraged you to tag your deficits—to start learning about the sorts of thinking, perceiving, feeling, and doing that your brain might struggle with. In this follow-up article, we’ll guide you through a concrete list of potential mental quirks that you should hunt for within yourself.

We’ll review which of these mental deficits are probably caused by autism—and which are independent of your autism and therefore not a symptom of your dark gift.

This exercise offers a number of benefits, pilgrim. First, it will help you get to know your own mind. That’s always valuable! A chance to develop your self-awareness!

Second, it should help you cultivate a greater appreciation for the extraordinary diversity of all human souls. There’s so many different qualities of mind that vary from person to person that no two brains are much alike. That’s a Major Takeaway: as you investigate and revel in your own individual neural quirks, consider the crucial fact that everybody else has their own distinctive constellation of flaws, too. Most of which you’ll be completely unaware of, just as they won’t know about all the idiosyncrasies jogging around your noggin.

In short, pondering your own mental diversity should help you appreciate that everybody is “neurodiverse” and nobody is “neurotypical.”

Here are Three Concrete Objectives to aim for as you review the list of potential mental deficits below:

#1: Your most important goal, pilgrim, is to TAG YOUR DEFICITS! Go through the list and reflect on whether any of the mental activities described might be weird or wonky in you. Please keep in mind: this list of potential deficits is nowhere near complete. I’ll keep adding to it as the months go by, but it covers enough to get you going. After you review the deficits below, perhaps you’ll realize there’s something else odd or peculiar in your thoughts, feelings, or actions that wasn’t listed here. Great! Write that down, too. (And if you don’t mind, please mention it to me—I’m always looking to expand the list!) At the end, you want a concrete list of things that don’t work so great in your brain.

#2: Once you’ve tagged as many of your deficits as you can, start sorting your list according to which quirks are likely caused by autism (as described below) and which are likely independent of your autism. This will help you start distinguishing your dark gift—your autistic mind—from other random neural quirks that might be crucial to your identity and experience of reality but which are not part of your dark gift.

In a future article we’ll explore which of your deficits are modifiable and which are permanent. And we’ll also discuss how we can use these insights into your deficits to learn faster, connect deeper, and experience more passion in our daily life.

But now is all about answering: Which mental activities do I struggle with?

MENTAL DYNAMICS *NOT* DIRECTLY GENERATED BY AUTISM (These may occur with your dark gift, but they are not your dark gift.)

VISUAL WHAT MODULE Dynamics: What is this thing I see?

• Color deficits: can you easily distinguish red, green, blue, yellow?

• Border deficits: do you sometimes have difficulty detecting the edges of things or naming the shapes of things, like ovals and trapezoids?

• Surface deficits: do you sometimes have difficulty telling which object on the table in front of you is closest to you? Do different objects sometimes seem to blend or bleed together?

• Texture deficits: do you have more (or less) trouble identifying shiny things? Glowing things? Do you have trouble identifying complicated textured surfaces, like gravel or foliage?

• Coarse grain, fine grain deficits: when looking at a photograph or painting, do you have more (or less) difficulty recognizing what’s going on in regions with lots of intricate detail (like someone’s eye) or regions with large-scale, sweeping detail (like a sky)? When you look at the Mona Lisa, do you experience her smile as strangely enigmatic—or are you confused as to what all the fuss is about?

Below, these are additional Visual What module dynamics that require interactions with other modules in other parts of your brain, and thus the underlying deficit might lie within the connectivity between modules.

• Generating a NAME for a visual object: do you usually know what a thing is for, but sometimes have trouble coming up with its name?

• Generating a USE for a visual object: do you usually know the name for a thing, but sometimes have trouble remembering or figuring out what it might be used for?

• Generating a FEELING about a visual object: do you have little trouble recognizing the name and use of stuff, but usually don’t feel any particular emotions towards stuff, like hammers or hats? Or, alternately, do you find that you often have very powerful emotions towards objects, obsessing over balloons or batons and perhaps even feeling romantic feelings towards inanimate objects?

VISUAL WHERE MODULE Dynamics: Where is this thing I see?

• Hemisphere deficits: do you have trouble recognizing or locating objects on your left compared to your right, or the opposite? Do you have an easier time interacting with objects that start out on your left than your right (or the opposite)?

• Localization deficits: do you have sometimes have trouble identifying exactly where an object is in front of you, or trouble expressing to someone where something is in the space in front of you? This is when you’re actually looking at an object, rather than remembering where you put an object.

• Judging Distance deficits: do you have trouble guessing how many steps you need to take to reach a door in front of you, or trouble expressing to others how long a room is? Do you have trouble hitting golf balls?

• Movement deficits: do you have trouble tracking or catching moving objects? Are you terrible at games like volleyball and dodgeball, or swatting flies? (This can also be a How module deficit, see below.)

• Big and Small deficits: do you have trouble comparing the size of similar objects, like recognizing which Amazon delivery box is larger?

• Left and Right deficits: do you have trouble remembering which way is left and which is right, or distinguishing east from west?

HOW MODULE Dynamics: How do I hit my target?

• Targeting deficits: What you are trying to distinguish here is the distinction between judging the distance to a target, which is a Visual Where Module dynamic, and hitting the target, which is a How Module dynamic. If you feel like you can see a target just fine and have a strong sense of “how far away” it is—and yet, find yourself unable to hit the target by reaching or throwing, then the quirky dynamic is in your How module.

• Reaching deficits: When you reach for a target—like picking up a pencil—do you usually nail it without effort, or are you sometimes a little clumsy when grabbing things?

• Throwing deficits: When you are aiming an object at another object—throwing a basketball in a hoop or just throwing a wad of paper into the wastebasket—do you seem to miss more than most folks?

• Drawing deficits: Are you a “bad artist”? When you draw a portrait of someone’s face or a diagram of your back yard, do you usually end up with confusing squiggles or folks reacting with incomprehension?

• Vocalizing deficits: Do you have trouble pronouncing words correctly? Do you stutter, slur, mumble, mutter?

• Pointing deficits: Do you have trouble following where other people are pointing? (If you fail to notice people pointing in the first place, that’s likely an autism-related deficit; see below.)

NAVIGATION MODULE Dynamics: Where am I and how do I navigate to my destination?

• Landmark deficits: When you travel around a city, are you very bad (or very good) at remembering the location of landmarks, such as the Eiffel Tower or Forbidden Palace?

• Labyrinth deficits: When you travel around a city, are you very good (or very bad) at “feeling” where you are and intuiting the direction you need to go to get to your destination—like whether you should turn left or go straight? Do you find chess to be quite difficult or (naturally easy)?

WHEN MODULE Dynamics: What comes next in the list?

• Creating Lists deficits: Do you have trouble writing down lists, like grocery lists or recipe steps or phone numbers? Would you be a bad waiter or waitress because you’d always be getting people’s orders wrong?

• Remembering Lists deficits: Maybe you can write down a list just fine, but do you have trouble remembering a list without resorting to looking at what you wrote? Are you always forgetting the items you wanted to get at the store, or the steps you were supposed to take to grill chicken or reprogram your car?

• Counting deficits: Do you have trouble counting by 5’s or counting even numbers or counting a lot of similar objects, like the number of eggs in a basket?

• Motor sequence deficits: Do you have trouble learning dances, like the tango or the Hustle? Do you have trouble learning sequences of manual activity, like changing the tire on a bicycle or shucking oysters?

• Following instructions deficits: Do you have trouble at work when your boss asks you to perform a complex sequence of tasks, or at school when an assignment involves many steps? If someone gives you directions involving a series of turns (such as “go straight for 3 blocks, then turn right, then go straight for 5 blocks”), will you get confused and forget it if you don’t write it down?

• Language deficits: Human language, both spoken and written, relies on a tight-knit stack of Where modules. You might have a deficit in any of these language Where modules, each which produces a different mental effect. Do you have trouble distinguishing spoken phonemes, such as the sounds “ba” and “be”? Do you have sometimes have trouble distinguishing spoken words, such as “bad” and '“bed”? Do you sometimes have trouble distinguishing the meaning of spoken sentences, such as “Go to bed now” and “Go get bad now”, especially when the grammar is unusual?

• Reading deficits: Are you dyslexic? Do you have difficulty distinguishing b’s and d’s on the page, or have trouble when reading a word that has multiple meanings, like “jam” (which can mean jelly or to shove)?

• Rhythm deficits: Can you tap your foot to the beat? Clap along with the audience? Or do you find yourself often falling out of sync with the groove?

• Melody deficits: Do you have difficulty recognizing a song from its melody? Do you have trouble recognizing whether a melody is fast or slow?

Auditory What Module Dynamics: What is this thing I hear?

• Timbre: Are you especially bad (or especially good!) at recognizing the sources of the sounds you hear? Can you distinguish a violin from a cello, a sparrow’s voice from a pigeon’s voice, the sound of leather stretching and the sound of pleather stretching?

• Pitch: Do you have difficulty judging whether a piano is off-key? Do you have difficulty singing on pitch—or do you possess perfect pitch?

Auditory Where Module Dynamics: Where is this thing I hear?

• Localization: do you have sometimes have trouble identifying exactly where an object is in space when you can hear it but not see it? Such as a helicopter in the sky, a child laughing somewhere behind you, a motorcycle coming towards you from the side?

• Judging Distance: do you have trouble guessing how far away someone is from the sound of their voice?

• Movement: do you have trouble tracking or grabbing moving objects that are giving off a sound, such as playing Marco Polo in the swimming pool or picking up a toy train chugging along with your eyes closed?

MENTAL DYNAMICS THAT ARE *PROBABLY* GENERATED BY YOUR AUTISM (These are likely part of your dark gift and should be considered autistic symptoms in most cases.)

These are forms of thinking that depend upon the effective operation of the Why Module. A broken Why module is the defining biological disruption that causes autism, so any personal quirks you unearth in the dynamics listed below are probably because of your dark gift.¹

• Humor deficits: There’s two different ways you might experience difficulties with humor: creating humor and processing humor. Do you have trouble telling jokes? Do other folks think your humor is weird, annoying, or not funny at all? Or do you avoid comedy completely—do you think that stand-up comedians are usually boring and stupid, and don’t understand why other people think they’re so funny? Do you often find yourselves in situations where other people are laughing at something but you don’t really see what’s so funny?

• Fear quirks: Do you like scary movies more intensely than other people? Or do you avoid scary movies all together? Do you have a special preference for the Addams Family or the Netflix series Wednesday? Are you comfortable with skulls, skeletons, bloody wounds, slasher flicks—or do you feel an intense aversion toward these things?

• Special Interests: You can’t be autistic without at least one very special interest! A subject or activity that you find yourself magnetically drawn to, that gives you timeless pleasure when you immerse yourself fully in its beguiling waves. It could be something mechanical: carpentry, fashion design, Legos. It could be something cognitive: crossword puzzles, mutual fund pricing, cargo logistics. It could be something perceptual: making ramen broth, mixing new perfumes, identifying the best cut of rib-eye. It could be something motor: ballet choreography, alpine skiing, free-soloing. If you are obsessed with an interest, if you feel you are most “yourself” when indulging in your interest, this is a core dark gift dynamic. A direct consequence of your broken Why module: instead of announcing, “This person is SO VERY INTERESTING!” your brain is telling you “this ballet choreography is SO VERY INTERESTING!”

• Repetition and Monologuing: Do you find yourself repeating certain phrases over and over again? Or events and activities: do you find yourself talking in circles about something dramatic that just happened, like if someone cuts you off in highway traffic, do you find yourself going on and on about it, examining it from every possible angle? Do others tell you that you tend to monologue or talk in circles? Do you have trouble letting other people talk once you get going?

• Disconnect between your inner feelings and outer expression: Do you sometimes feel happy and calm, yet people react as if you’re angry or upset? Do you sometimes feel angry and upset, yet people react as if you’re calm and uninterested? Do others call you aloof, robotic, detached, difficult to read? Do people sometimes react to you like you’re a chaotic, out-of-control wreck, even though you’re trying to connect with them in the most simple and direct way possible?

• Moral outrage and certitude: Do you find yourself frequently feeling strong moral feelings—feelings of justice and righteousness—that you have trouble letting go, even though other people don’t seem to share your moral sentiments? (This latter part is key: non-autistic folks certainly feel strong moral emotions, but their emotions generally tend to be shared by their community; autistic folks more often feel moral outrage that is not widely shared by a community and may be considered idiosyncratic.) If you find yourself often needing to explain to people why something is outrageous and you see that they’re having trouble following you or caring, this may be a sign of this autistic dynamic.

• Small talk and casual conversation deficits: Do you have difficulty in social situations where there is open-ended purpose, such as a cocktail party? Do you have trouble making small talk about ordinary, trivial matters? Do you find it much easier in social situations where there’s a clear collective purpose, such as teaching a class or building a porch, compared to open-ended situations, like a Memorial Day barbecue or talking to the stranger next to you while waiting in line to buy tickets to a Broadway show?

This list is just to get you going in the investigation of your mind. Real-world deficits can be complex and subtle. Here’s an example: I know a person who has good control of their handwriting when writing with their right hand—but trouble expressing meaning with their right hand. Thus, they can copy a word easily with their right hand, but if you ask them to compose a thank you note, they have trouble finding the right words. But their left hand is the exact opposite: they can easily compose an original note with their left hand—but they have tremendous difficulty controlling the movements of their left hand so whatever they try to write ends up looking like incomprehensible scribbles.

It takes time and patience to sort through all the delicate details of your mind’s operation, but it’s a rewarding process. With time, you might even be able to identify the prime engines of your personality—the core mental dynamics of your individual brain that shape your singular experience of the universe.

In future articles we’ll go deeper into the quirks of your autistic brain. . .

Previous LESSON: Lesson 4: Getting Control of Your Autism: Tagging Your Deficits

Next LESSON: Lesson 5: The Ladder of Purpose

Read FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS about Dr. Ogas and the Dark Gift

1. It is possible that there are two or more independent but parallel sources of neural disruption in your brain that both serve to impair the same mental dynamics in different ways. I can’t speak about how common or rare this might be, but it’s certainly physiologically possible.