If you don't like having obsessions, why not?

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i spend most days at home absorbed in my obsessions. WP is one at present.
i spent today in the studio - big yellow 9 foot long painting. that for me is just fantastic.
yes..i am grounded by my son.
i cannot live without my obsessions.
this morning started with WP and then also some reading and looking at frank stella's work. and also matisse and also a quick squizz at a bronzino painting.
the painting all day and a break for lunch, emails and WP. then back to painting until 3 when my son got home. so then i hang on the computer to be near him. got him arvo tea but just sit on the computer. He did tell me that his new male teacher taught them "Blue Moon" today - so we got that up on youtube for him.
More wp and a few dashes down to the studio to look at the big yellow painting.
more work on it tomorrow.

i have absolutely no interest in the real world, except fo the news and tv and music on youtube.
oh and i drove down to the framers to sort out some framing then straight back home to hermitsville again.

now wp again.......

tomorrow - the big yellow painting, a few emails and WP and the whole shabang over again.

I think that's what is seen to be the point, with obsessions - that you might not have time for them at all but you either try to control your enviroment to cater to how you want to do things or adjust everything as much as is within your power, to fit around your restricted behaviours and obsessions / special interests or even just the need to live in your own world.

Exactly.
Obsessions often force the issue and become compulsions.
This is the reason why I will come home after working all day, ignore the mountains of dirty dishes and piles of soiled laundry, and proceed to tromp outside into the garden at night with a flashlight to obsessively work with plants for about five hours. Then I come back in some time after midnight... wild-eyed, freezing, and exhausted. I collapse into sleep, then get up a few hours later to go to work again. Not the healthiest way to live.

I said previously about how I am grateful the "real world" balances out what I spend my time doing. For sure, I would most likely drift off into plant-music-fantasy-land if given the opportunity. While that would be eternally wonderful, it is not practical. Having responsibilities of a house, a job, and a son do help me to learn and maintain behaviors that help me to stay functional, so that I can spend time indulging my special interests without too much negative consequence.

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well yes...but that is mightlily practical of you. what if you went back to collecge (as is you r want and dream) and then spent all day playing wiht you rbeloved plants and getting paid for it? Such a scenario would enable you tru happiness adn practicality.

i am afraid i am sorely lacking the latter.
the past five years it did not matter as the art scene was sufficiently buoyed by the economy to enable me to live in a small and coccooned dream world of my own.
of late, it has been bad financially due to the recession. i make enough to pay bills and that is that.

i still believe the aim is happiness and special intterests.

Yes, of course. That is what I want to do. Go back to college, get a degree in plant science, and get a job doing what I love. Of course. For me, there are some rather large life issues that need to be ironed out before I could attempt something like that. I made a lot of mistakes in the past ten years that have put me deep in a figurative "pit". I am trying to build myself a ladder.

That sucks. I understand what you mean. My son's mother is a self-promoting artist, and is grappling with this same issue. Seems not many people want art when they themselves are out of a job.

Yes it is. I had enough people telling me things like this when I was growing up: "You'll never make it playing music. No one gets a job doing that. Music is something you do for fun. You need a real job. You're not a rock star. etc....."
I think that for autistic people, following special interests is the only way to gain any sustainable measure of stability and happiness in life. I realize this ten years too late. But at least I did not go a further ten without realizing it.

Depends on the obsession, really. Certain ones, like piano playing and exercise, while they would be described by most as full-on compulsions, are thoroughly enjoyable and comforting, and help me stay (my version of) sane. Others, however, are downright obtrusive, and regularly get in the way of 'normal' socializing and even personal productivity at home or at work.

For the most part, I enjoy my obsessions. I love collecting and get more pleasure out of many things than most people do. On the other hand, I can become obsessed with a fictional character to the point where I wish he/she were real, and then really feel a pang and pain with the knowledge that he/she will never ever be real. Same thing with music---a melodic line or verse will touch my soul just right and cause such intense sadness that the only way to get it out of my system is to listen to it over and over again. Then I can finally become desensitized to the song, which is good on the one hand, but a bit sad on the other because I can never enjoy the song the same way again.

Thanks to my latest obsession, I've never been more driven in my life to grow up, get a job, and become a full-fledged adult. What's so bad about that? I've had obsessions since I was a toddler and they've always made me happy. Whenever I look back on my years, I always have those really good memories, even through the toughest times.

This has happened to me way too many times. Luckily there are just as many songs I've been fixated on from the time I was a child that I can still listen to on loop and not tire of. (Like, for instance, 'Eve of Destruction', which I'm listening to at the moment for the fifth time in a row, and is going into its 35th year of my obsession!)

As long as you can function in the real world, there is absolutely nothing wrong with having an obsession! And if you are REALLY lucky, you can find a way to put your obsession to good use! I mean if it involves making an income from it, then all the better!

This is an interesting conversation.

I think an obsession, by definition, is something that you keep thinking about even though you don't want to think about it . A compulsion is something you feel like you need to do, even though you don't want to.

I notice people use the word "obsession" when they really just mean "very strong special interest." If your special interest is " birds", for instance, you might spend a huge amount of time drawing pictures of birds, reading about them, watching documentaries about them, listing different kinds, and whatnot. But if it makes you happy, and enriches your life, then that's great. If you are miserable because you can't get those wretched birds out of your mind, no matter how you try, then it's an obsession.

From what I can tell, AS special interests can take on an obsessive nature at times, because they can be so strong that they interfere with the rest of life.


For the most part, mine aren't like that. However, I'd be more well-rested if it weren't for my special interests, because I can lie awake for hours happily thinking about my favorite Alan Rickman movies or knitting Aran sweaters, even if I'm really sleepy. But I personally think it's better to lie awake thinking of your special interest than doing what most people apparently do, which is lie awake worrying about their to-do list. May as well go to sleep happy.

I've never cared for the term "special interest" actually. I'm not sure if there are others here that feel the same way, but that's just my personal opinion.