Heather Cook

How to Use Body Signals to Make Better Decisions

If decision making is hard for you, here’s a technique to use body sensations as another source of information for decision making.

On Trying To Be Normal And Understood

Trying to be normal as a way to be understood is a self-defeating. People who learn about you, will only learn about this pretend version of you.

How To Ask Someone To Do Something For You

It can be intimidating to ask someone to do something for you, yet we all have to do this. I’m going to discuss an approach I’ve pieced together on how.

Blue solid foreground with text "Why NTs Do That: Small Talk" and to the side a picture of a pale skinned woman in a green sweater smiling at the camera.

Why Neurotypicals Do That: Small Talk

Autistics and neurotypicals tend to have very different views on small talk. What’s going on from both sides?

Close up on a white fire alarm, with a blurred out image of a room.

Are You Really “Overreacting”?

People react to different amounts of sensory input, but even when it’s only a little, it’s not made up.

Red and yellow fireworks set against a black sky over a crowd of people in silhouette.

My Independence Day

The Fourth of July celebrates the signing of the Declaration of Independence, not of actually gaining independence. That took several more years and they had to fight for it. Hard.

Closeup of the arms and hands of two people shaking hands. Both are wearing business shirts over dark brown skin.

Why Job Interviews Are So Difficult

There are good reasons why job interviews are such strange experiences. Here are a few.

The 5 Most Overlooked (and Common) Autistic Stressors

Here are five things that are so common in our modern lifestyle, that we often don’t have a chance to experience life without them, so we don’t see how much they affect us.

The backs of two people walking by some stairs in an urban park.

Thoughts on Theory of Mind

Theory of Mind is often pointed out as an autistic deficit, but is it really that? Is something else going on? And is it just autistics that find this challenging?