In this email:

1. When rest isn't all-or-nothing
2. 5 latest videos
3. Beyond Autistic Burnout course
4. Recent popular Tweet
5. Additional resource options
6. Next free workshop
7. Feature article: This Isn’t The End Of The Story, Just The Middle

Hi Reader,

Work and rest are two sides of the same coin. Everything in nature goes through cycles of more activity and less activity. I'm no different.

For the last few months, I've worked really hard to get everything ready for the burnout course to start: setting up and customizing the course platform, creating the content of the course (at least the first month's stuff), getting the word out so that people know it exists, and describing it well enough that they can make an informed decision about whether it's what they want or not.

A lot of messages in our productivity culture suggest that I should be able to put myself on the back, do a happy dance, and move onto new work and more work, and etc. etc.

But the body doesn't work like that. And neither does my brain. It needs rest and restoration. To lie fallow after so much generation.

So last week, I took the week almost completely off. No appointments. Hardly any work (after taking care of a few things on Monday). I did check in with emails once a day to make sure that no one in the course was going to fall through the cracks or be lost or feel abandoned.

And this was a big personal growth point for me. Because in the past few years, I've struggled with having any kind of middle ground with work or rest. It's been largely all or nothing.

But the premise of this course (ironic, huh?) is that you can get out of burnout without quitting everything.

I was better at this while getting out of burnout, because I didn't have much of a choice but to have a middle ground. Because I could only do a little work at a time. But in the last few years, since I've been working steadily, I guess I've fallen back into this all-or-nothing thinking.

But this time, I was able to genuinely rest most of the day, and turn on my work brain for just a short period, and turn it back off again. So cool!

Which means that I have new options at my disposal for the future.

And I did get some really good rest and was feeling much better...until about two days ago, when I started a new medicine that has knocked me out and I'm feeling pretty crappy at the moment. But hopefully this will be short-lived.

Which brings me to the article that I shared below. Even though I'm feeling pretty crappy at the moment, I know this is not my new normal. And the intensity of the course setup and launch is also not going to continue forever (it's already passed, and will be settling into only creating new course materials and running the course for the next five months.) This isn't the end of the story.

This is just a middle chapter.

There's a lot more to come.

Wishing you a neurowonderful day,
Heather

P.S. If you want to join in the course, even though we've already started, that's not a problem. Since this is designed to be able to be used asynchronously, that's not a problem. If you still want in, you can sign up and have access to the first module's recordings and join us for the live meetings in the future (if you want to).

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5 Latest Videos

Transcripts are in the video descriptions.
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​Is it vanity to say you’re good at something?​

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​Small talk as allistic scripts​

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​How overwhelm is useful​

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​Here's Why I Get Mad When People Compliment My Smile​

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​This Isn’t The End Of The Story, Just The Middle​

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Beyond Autistic Burnout

A practical system for sustainable recovery, without quitting everything.

When you're Autistic or AuDHD, the executive function demands of dealing with everyday life can take a heavy toll. All the peopling, transitions, inertia, the sensory load, and more, can wear you down, even while you're doing what you love and making the difference you want to in the world.

I developed a system to help Autistic, AuDHD and ND adults break away from the burnout cycle.

It will help you:

• Say no to things without guilt, shame, or anxious thoughts plaguing you.
• Make healthy changes to your sensory environment and relationships that you know you need without worrying constantly about repercussions.
• Have the executive function capacity to function on a daily basis.
• Make real-time adjustments so that you don't have to suffer through bad situations.
• Free up energy to do the things you want.

If this seems like it might be what you've been looking for, all the juicy details are here:

(It's a long read, but worth it.)

Recent Popular Tweet​
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Heather Cook 🦓🖖Autistic Life Coach @hmm_cook Your abilities and your productivity have nothing to do with your worth as a person. #ActuallyAutistic #Autistic #AuDHD 8:15 AM • Sep 23, 2024 3 Retweets 20 Likes

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Next Free Workshop

Practical Tips for Disclosing Your Autism​

At various points in your later identification autism Journey, you’ll want or need to tell someone that you’re Autistic (or think you might be). But how?

There are so many possible reactions, and you’ve heard of (or experienced) negative ones, and want to avoid those. But how?

In this workshop, I’ll offer a few key tips for approaching this so it is more likely to go well, along with some things to consider and several sample scripts to get you started with what to say.

We’ll cover family/personal as well as work situations.

Tuesday, December 3rd
12 PM PT - 3 PM ET - 8 PM BST

This Isn’t The End Of The Story, Just The Middle

When going through a tough time, it's easy to feel like it's the end of everything, but this isn't the end of your story.

​Read this on my website here​

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I was just talking with someone, and they’d had some big crisis in their life, and it felt very much like, “This is the end of the story. Things are never going to get better. This is always going to be like this from now on.”

And I was thinking, as I was listening to them speak, that so often when we have those kinds of big life-upsetting moments, it feels very, very strongly like ‘this is the end of the story’. ‘This is always going to be like this from now on’. ‘This is going to be my new normal’.

And I’m struck by how there are so many times in my life that have been like that, that I can now look back on and say, “Oh yeah, that thing was a big life-altering moment, and I’m still here. My life has gone on.”

And I’m trying to navigate not saying that in a way that sounds dismissive or just cliche, like ‘life will go on’, but more of like, “What if this isn’t the end of the story? What if this is the middle of the story? What if this is a particularly painful chapter, but I can look at the book and see that the book still has a few 100 pages to go? This is actually the middle of the plot line.”

And when I’m reading a book like that, and there’s a really, really hard part in the middle, sometimes I’ll scan through – I’m not actually reading ahead in the story – but I’m just sort of looking to see, “Okay, this character’s name comes up later in the book. They didn’t die off. There’s still more story to go.” And so I know that, even though it’s really, really hard to read right now, there is more.

And I’m wondering if there was a way for us to know that.

A message from the future

This is purely a thought experiment, but what I suggested to them is, “What if you could talk to a version of yourself 20 years from now? What would they want you to know?”

Okay, they can’t tell you what’s happened since then, because there’s rules about time travel and influencing the past, and all that kind of stuff. So you can’t actually know how this turned out – whether it worked out okay or not, whether the other person changed their mind or not, whether something happened to reverse this, or something happened to make it all better a week from now. That version of you in the future can’t tell you those kinds of details.

But they can tell you something like, “You’re still going to go through a lot of personal growth. This experience is going to shape you, and it’s going to be painful, and you will make it through, and you will have joy in your life again, and you will be able to laugh again,” and something. There’s going to be something for you, or for this particular situation.

What is it that 20 years from now, you could tell you in the midst of this crisis, or in the midst of this disappointment, in the midst of this pain, in the midst of this confusion – whatever it is you’re going through, what can they tell you that will help you right now?

So that’s just my thought. I don’t know what the answer is for you. I’ve done this a couple of times myself at different points, and I found it to be surprisingly helpful. Again, it didn’t fix the situation, but it helped me be able to deal with getting through it.

Okay, that’s my thought. I hope you have a neurowonderful day.

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About Heather
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Hi, I’m Heather. I’m Autistic, ADHD, disabled, and building a life I love.

I coach Autistic and other neurodivergent humans on creating their own neurowonderful lives.

Want personalized support in making your life more autism-friendly? See if 1:1 coaching is a good fit for you.
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