Would Autistic spectrum disorder make a better buddhist?

These signs make me think it might do, in some cases at least…

https://psychology-tools.com/autism-spectrum-quotient/

Especially if retreat into a forest is the ideal, and not having to deal with humans.

In my work I come across ASD sometimes and they come across as more honest and less affected by the world.

with metta

Mat

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This is some thing similar to a foreigner think that a monk is as same as a beggar.
There is right view and wrong view but they all are views.
There is something called household equanimity but it is not the same as equanimity in Jhana.
We should be able to differentiate the subtle differences.

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People with genuine physical or psychological issues should not be stigmatised. They should be supported as needed, and indeed they have strengths joe blogs might not have. I’m saying ASD maybe a strength, rather than an weakness, in Buddhism.

Some people with anti-social personality disorder (for example) are not a good fit for or have more practice to do than others without it.

I’m just (somewhat generalizing but…) saying as it is.

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Well, autism has a hu-u-u-u-uge spectrum of condition. People with moderate forms of autism can certainly be better Buddhists than the normies, even though I am not sure about whether they will have any significant advantage on the monastic path. If the autism is more severe, just like anything else, it creates more problems than it solves, which is why we follow the Middle path. So yeah, there totally can be something true to your question, why not :slight_smile:

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I do not have much knowledge about ASD. However I know a parent who got two ASD children. They are so friendly and lovable. But they have to go to a special school.
I am not sure whether they can comprehend a deep teaching like Buddhism.
However I have to respect your opinion. I believe this is your specialisation.
I wish to know more about your experience.

The link you given in OP is not responding to get my score?
:slight_smile:
Another point is I believe we all are somewhat suffer from ASD.

This is the story of a guy with high level Asperger, that I liked particularly.

Account This is an instance of what happens to me so often, that It could be everyday.

When I was young and taking a degree in computer science as a programmer, I had about thirty people involved in the same specialty than me.
As we were almost through the last part of the training, I was rated second in my section. The guy who was rated first had had already four years of previous experience.

So here I was, doing my job, as good as I could; but not melting much with the other students. I have never been this kind of person. Not that I am ugly, or having some social disability (I have always had a good relationship with women - and some fair, but aloof friendship with men).
It is just that I am the opposite of the “facebook guy”.

So I was not getting involved with the “social jig” around; particularly when there was some problem to solve; and I kept doing my stuff on the side.
I never understood how a group could move towards a certain person, bootlick that person, because he or she had the solution; and then move away slily from him or her, once they got it; and most of the time disparage that person covertly.
It felt to me like they didn’t even notice how pitiful this was.
So this social game was not for me; and the group, without hating me, did not like me much.
A sort of shrouded jealousy was covering our relationship. I did not belong to the “social jig”; but I got the job done pretty easily; always at the last minute, but with much concentration in the task.

So one day, at the end of the training, some conundrum came along, and no one could solve it. I did not notice it right away, until the “social jig” got so hectic.
That was enough for me to concentrate quickly on the matter, and in a couple of minutes, I figured out the solution and gave it to everyone, without asking people to polish my apple.

They did not understand. And those social muttons got back at me harshly.

The following day, the dean of the university himself, rushed through the door asking: “who said that?”.
So everyone turned towards me and disparagingly said (thirty fingers pointed at me): “HIM!”.

The dean looked at them slightingly in return and said to them: “he is right”. And he looked at me like if I was god on earth and left.

They hated me after that.

That’s the story of my life.

I suppose that a bit of asocial behavior helps to seclude from the social jig, and the rather muttony attitude attached.
It surely looks like it helps concentrate fully on the matter at stake, and see things from a different angle - often the good one.

Seems to me like the Facebook guy is a bit high spectrum Asperger. That’s what they say anyway. The way he despised publicly the “morons” who subscibe to his social application, as he put it once, looks a bit like the reaction of the guy of the story.
This been said, he made twice as much subscriptions after that. Maybe was he right.
Here is Peter Thiel view on the “missing the imitation, socialization gene” (aka muttony disposition).
And a FT article.

In other words, high IQ and a pinch of Asperger, might be where the truth is.

I can agree with this particular sentiment. But, being a good Buddhist is just a matter of following the dhamma. If someone with a disease follows the dhamma, then they’re a good Buddhist. It’s not as if the disease is, strictly, speaking, the cause of dhamma practice.

On the test you linked I came out as borderline significantly Autistic or high functioning autistic.

My experience is no. Not better or worse but different.

Or rather one should ask “a better Buddhist for doing what?”.
I admire the facility the sutras depict the Buddha having with people but I don’t think I have his “people skills”. I prefer smaller groups or one-on-one.

I have had a difficult time in longer term lay retreat/semi-monastic settings. I’d make a better hermit or scholar.

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