The Body as an Anchor

Autistic burnout is no fun. Sometimes, no matter what you do, it's going to happen. The world is demanding. At some point it all catches up to us, whether Autistic or not. So we reach for our tools and get to work. By this time, however, we're left reacting to the problem. We have to dig ourselves out of the hole that we created by ignoring our own needs.

Many of our tools are more effective as a preventative, just as some problems are better prevented than reacted to. That has been my challenge lately. As an Autistic person who is only unmasking now, at age 43, I'm realizing that I added some difficulty to my adventure. While I had good reason to avoid being labeled 'less than' as a child, and even into my time with the military and beyond, that's not my life anymore. Failing to accept and own my identity as an Autistic person in this life, meant failing to communicate my true self to the people who I love, and the people who love and support me. It also meant failing to recognize and utilize the tools that I have at my disposal.

Exercise is one of those tools.

A consistent workout isn't just a dose of happy chemicals for your brain, though it is that. More importantly, it’s a win. It’s a small, daily promise you keep to yourself. When I was a kid, I started out terrible at baseball, as many of you probably did. But I practiced. Every small milestone, like hitting the ball a little further or making a clean catch, was not just about the game. It was a deposit in my self-esteem account. It taught me that I had agency. That I could get better at hard things.

As with everything, adapt it to YOU. You don't have to be Arnold to exercise, you just have to do a little more than you're accustomed to for it to make a difference. We can adjust and we can live in that "comfortably uncomfortable" place where we do hard things we've never done before. It's not about forcing yourself, it's about growing yourself.

That's the real benefit of a physical practice. It’s not about the mirror or the scale, though there's nothing wrong with being proud of your body. The true power is in how you feel. It's the strength and self-respect you earn that bleeds into every other corner of your life.

It starts small. A few minutes a day. You do it as consistently as you can, for as long as you can.

That's how you build an anchor, to which other routines, goals, and interests attach and expand. You may anchor to music, art, cooking, rhythmic swaying, humming in a dark room, harmonica playing, organizing, or any number of other practices, or combinations. The true strength of these anchors comes when you align with your special interests and become more of yourself with each time you reach for them. With each new anchor, the space between anchors gets smaller. Eventually, you have enough anchors to move from one to the next freely. Each transition becomes easier with practice. This is how I see my special interests, and how I intentionally work them into my day as often as possible.

If you know exactly what I'm talking about, share your physical routine or another anchor that helps you feel better every day. Write it in the comments.

If this doesn't make sense, just do something today that requires a little more movement than your average day. Don't go from 0 to 60 on day one, just add a little each day. You'll see that the small increases will produce results in only a few weeks. Get past any initial soreness. That's just the body adapting to getting stronger and soreness is always worst in the first couple weeks IF you keep going. If not, you have to push through it every time you start anew.

Keep going! Your life is worth working on!

Enjoy the day!