Autism Awareness and Acceptance

During Autism Awareness and Acceptance Month, we often return to ideas that many of us already know. This is one of them.

The distinction between awareness and acceptance is not new. Most people reading this have heard it before. I know I have said it many times myself. And yet, I find it is something worth coming back to, again and again.

For me, this reflection has been shaped not just by professional experience, but by listening. Listening to autistic individuals who describe what it feels like to be seen, but not understood. To be included, but not truly accepted.

Awareness helps us notice. Acceptance asks something more of us.

It asks us to move beyond recognizing difference and toward respecting it. It asks us to shift from “How do we change this person?” to “How do we understand and support this person as they are?”

We will not get it right all the time.  Nevertheless, we can work to stay open to learning, to adjusting, and to deepening our capacity to truly accept others.

So perhaps this month is not about hearing something new. Perhaps it is about returning to something important, and asking ourselves how we are living it in our daily interactions.

Below are two videos that speak to this message.  The first is a video from my dear friend, Dr. Emile Gouws.  ICDL's President and self-advocate.  Emile's message about connection is incredibly important.  Then, the next video includes three clips from attendees at our recent International DIR Conference.  All three clips are so meaningful, but the message from the autistic self-advocate about how DIR can help, is particularly powerful.  Please check them out.