Midnight Sun, Returning to Earth Customs and Applying Compassion to Directness and Honesty

What a fascinating two weeks it has been for me and for a lot there is for me to write about this week, after taking some time to get used to customs on Planet Earth again after feeling like I had come back from Grand Tour of the Solar System trekking through Iceland's Laugavegur region. Coming back home, I attended a retreat and Dhamma talk by respected Tibetan teacher Chamtrul Ringboche on Inner Peace and Compassion.

Beautiful colours in Iceland's Laugavegur region

Those who have heard me speak or who are well versed in Asperger literature will likely be familiar with the extra-terrestrial theme in imagining you have landed on another planet and you don't know the customs or social conventions of its inhabitants, rather like how Mr Spock has difficulty understanding human courtship. This is how it may feel like to be a person with Asperger's Syndrome. but as a person with Asperger's Syndrome, I felt I experienced this coming back home after being away more so than having been in an environment outside my comfort zone! Not only was the landscape so other-worldly, but I also experienced a week without darkness with the Midnight Sun!

Geysers and lava flows

The smoking geysers in the sulphur hills could give a clue to what Enceladus may be like. What is the most surprising feature to many visitors to Iceland though is its desert landscapes, something one wouldn't expect to find in a land close to the Arctic Circle. The deserts, which are caused by soil erosion resulting from glaciers melting courtesy of volcanic activity, including from Ejafjallajokull, which famous halted all air traffic for a while in 2010, reminded me very much of the surface of Mars. Trekking into an area of forestry towards the end of the route though felt like coming back home to Earth!

Taking on Iceland's Laugavegur trekking route was my second serious bit of practice in my bid to summit Africa's highest peak in October. Though not a high-altitude trek, it was both a demanding and thrilling experience in its own right, especially covering 24km on the first day crossing snow, ice fields, lava fields and volcano ash not to mention fast-flowing rivers! As well as trekking across different surfaces, what made the trek particularly exciting for me was the huge contrast in colours present in the landscapes created by a combination of glacial and geothermal activity and different micro-climates from bright sun, strong winds to heavy rain. coping with such change is a challenge to anyone, especially for people with Asperger's Syndrome, but what was a much bigger step outside my comfort zone was sleeping under a sky where the sun didn't set! Fortunately, there was plenty of rain during the evenings, the sound of which on the tent roof somehow aided my sleeping patterns.

Other-worldly desert landscape

After completing the Laugavegur trek, a total of 60km in four days, I felt like I had done a grand tour of the Solar System, seeing similarities in the landscape to images captured by space probes visiting distant worlds, with craters and lava flows being similar to Io, one of Jupiter's four largest moons with many active volcanoes, the glaciers similar to the ice surface on another of Jupiter's moons Europa while the flood plains reminded me of the images of the surface of Titan, Saturn's largest moon, captured by the Huygens probe dropped by Cassini onto the surface of Titan in 2005. On its mission to Saturn, Cassini also spotted geysers erupting on Enceladus, another of Saturn's moons.

Kulusuk, Greenland

Though Laugavegur obviously doesn't match Kilimanjaro altitude-wise, what was good practice on this trek for Kilimanjaro was crossing different surfaces, including volcano ash, of which part of the Lemosho Glades route covers, including walking on an angle with the feet often sinking into the ash. While in Iceland, I was also fortunate enough to visit Greenland, where I saw yet another contrast, this time in lifestyle. we have a tendency to become very used to home comforts often relating to what we may expect from our living standards, that we may forget that there are places where such standards may be very different, and often much harder. This was very visible in Kulusuk, the village in Greenland I visited, where nothing other than moss can grow and where employment opportunities are very limited. Like the Sherpas and Tibetans, many native Greenlanders don't expect to live very long lives, so despite such harsh conditions, they become accustomed to living in the moment, including making as best use of the present that they can and by being happy in the moment.

Respected Tibetan teacher Lama Chamtrul Ringboche gave some helpful guidance on happiness during his public talk in Bellingham, Northumberland. Describing happiness as the essence of humanity, Chamtrul also said that a good foundation for happiness was compassion. I have spoken of how compassion can enable understanding Asperger's Syndrome, but when listening to Chamtrul's talk, it also occured to me that compassion can enable people diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome to understand each other. What is still sometimes confusing with Asperger's Syndrome to me is an aspect that is often considered a strength is the directness and honesty. Because people with Asperger's Syndrome have a tendency to tell it like it is, it can sometimes falsely come across as bitter and twisted or even cold hearted, especially in one channel communication such as E-mail or when posting on social media. This is where applying compassion to both communicating and listening can help overcome such confusion, to help save someone's feelings as well as to understand that no harm is intended through directness and honesty. Stay tuned to Adventures with Autism Works for more on this theme and others related to it.

Donations can still be made towards my Kilimanjaro challenge in aid of the Daisy Chain project, supporting families affected by autism. To find out more, you can visit my sponsorship page at http://www.justgiving.com/Chris-MitchellGNR/ 
    

Mindfulness of Trekking in the Mist

Welcome back to Adventures with Autism Works after a fascinating visit to Cumbria with my colleague Dan Cottrell, who originates from this part of the world. From my last entry, you will know that I was due to set out for the Lake District for my first serious bit of practice in my bid to summit Africa's highest peak Kilimanjaro in aid of the Daisy Chain project by taking on England's highest peak, Scafell Pike (978m). I can happily report that the trek up Scafell Pike was both successful and above all, enjoyable.

As well as the often spectacular scenery, what has made mountain treks that I have had the fortune to experience so enjoyable has been the company I have done them in. Dan and his brother Ben, who joined us on the trek, were great company and clearly enjoyed the experience as much as I did, despite it being misty at the summit. What was interesting was the different individual challenges that the trek was for the three of us, and what we found about walking outside our comfort zone of walking on flat pavements and floors or going up staircases.

Lake Wastwater emerges beneath the mist

Ben, struggling with motor co-ordination being dyspraxic, initially found it difficult to get used to different walking techniques needed to go up some steep rocks. Remembering mindfulness of walking practice,  I suggested to Ben that it might help him to focus attention on each step rather than the distance to or height towards the summit, just by being with each step as you make it. When taught mindfulness of walking, the three aspects of the technique involve focusing on the lifting, moving and putting of each step during the exercise. When trekking though, because the terrain is often so uneven or slippery, in addition to putting an extra aspect to focus on is placing, bringing an awareness of where you are placing your feet with each step, including being wary of the gradient and surface of each placing, including stepping on slippery surfaces and also being aware of balance and gait. Awareness of when to adjust walking speed also helps.

At Scafell Pike summit with Dan and Ben

What we had anticipated from the weather forecast was that the conditions would be highly variable, which turned out to be the case. At the starting point, Wasdale Camp car park, the weather was quite warm, but as we gradually ascended, it started to become cloudier and windier while the temperature dropped. This is where the sensory aspect of trekking become noticeable, in how our senses cope with changing temperatures, including how our skin responds to colder temperatures.

Where mindfulness of walking helped particularly was on the way back from the summit. Trekking downhill is often harder on the joints, but it is often easier to slip over by stepping onto loose gravel when coming down! All three of us had different levels of tiredness when we completed the trek, but when I attempt Kilimanjaro in October, I will be doing this and more each day for ten days!

Including offline donations, my fundraising for Daisy Chain has now exceeded the £1,000 mark! A huge thank you to all who have very generously donated so far. To help further increase the total, I am looking at holding raffles locally, if I can hopefully obtain some generous prize donations. In the meantime, donations can be made online on my sponsorship page at http://www.justgiving.com/Chris-MitchellGNR/

Special thanks to the Cottrell family for their hospitality during my time in Cumbria, including to the frieddly family dog Tara

Prelude to Kilimanjaro I - Scafell

Welcome back to adventures with Autism Works! After an interview on Radio Tees and a Quiz Night, preparations for for my attempt to summit Kilimanjaro are getting more serious, as well as physical! This Bank Holiday Weekend, I have my first bit of practice in the build up, which is a trek up England's highest peak, Scafell Pike in the Lake District (978m). Though, altitude and climate-wise, it may seem a long way from Africa's highest peak, but it is a challenge in its own right.

In common with other treks I have completed, Scafell has an interchangeable climate of its own. Coping with and adjusting to interchangeable weather, as well as being good preparation for the bigger challenge to come later in the year, also helps me in relation to coping with stress and anxiety. Like many other people diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, I do still sometimes find change difficult to manage. It was through trekking in interchangeable conditions that I began to realise that it was more helpful to be with and open up to change rather than resist it.

Scafell Pike (978m)

As well as the physical aspect of preparation, the trek up Scafell is also good sensory preparation, not just in getting a feel of the outdoors, but also getting used to outdoor clothing, which during most 'normal days' I tend not to wear. To help get the best experience out of a trek or climb, it helps to have clothing and footwear that one is comfortable in. This is where trekking can also help those who experience sensory difficulties in relation to autism by being with and opening up to them. 

Accompanying me on the trek up Scafell Pike will be Dan Cottrell, one of Autism Works Software Test Analysts, who is originally from nearby St Bees in Cumbria. On a clear day, it is possible to see England, Scotland, Wales, the Isle of Man and Northern Ireland from the summit of Scafell Pike. However, forecasts suggest that it will be cloudy when we intend to go. To donate to my Kilimanjaro trek in aid of Daisy Chain, my sponsorship page is accessible at http://www.justgiving.com/Chris-MitchellGNR/

To find out how Dan and I fare going up Scafell Pike, stay tuned to Adventures with Autism Works!

Coming Alive, Being Uplifted and Interdependent Networks of Values

Whereas last week's adventure took me to Scandinavia, this week has brought me back a little closer to home, to Middlesbrough where I have been speaking at the MAIN Project's World Autism Day Conference, talking about key issues regarding the Working Together for Change agenda and the Autism Strategy. The highlight of the day though was some superb performances from Middlesbrough's Beverley School Choir and Scott James, whom you may remember also spoke at the Autistic Voices Conference in Manchester in December.

With the highly-talented Scott James

It is incredible how people with Asperger's Syndrome seem to 'come alive' in certain situations. A week ago, talking on Saturday Morning Live, Will Hadcroft, best known as the author of The Feeling's Unmutual and the Ann Droyd series, described how, as a person with Asperger's Syndrome that though he still feels uncomfortable in social situations, when giving a talk on Asperger's Syndrome to an audience, he 'comes alive'. Similarly, giving talks on Asperger's Syndrome has brought me to life, and I also feel that it has enabled people to see who I actually am. Another speaker with Asperger's Syndrome described being on the autistic spectrum as like being in a film, but whereas others seem to have a script to read from, you don't, making it difficult to know what to say sometimes. Scott James, who gave some performances that uplifted the audience, including myself, came alive in a similar way through singing, which he found to an effective way for him to express himself. From his performances with Middlesbrough's Beverley School Choir, it was easy to see why Scott's self-esteem changed dramatically, despite having been written off by so many, when he discovered his hidden talent after a series of singing lessons. As well as performing his hit Through My Eyes, he also performed some tracks from his new album due to be released later this year.


Going back to last week's visit to Denmark, I also observed some values within Danish society that can be learned from effectively in the UK, including enabling the recently passed Social Value Act to deliver. Danish society is shaped around a network of values built on relations of interdependence, a theme that I have talked much about here in a spiritual context. In an economic context though, one of the purposes of the Social Value Act, is to put people before profit, considering the impact that a procurement will have on the local community. This where an awareness of interconnected values helps, as the procurement that offers the best social value may not be the lowest-cost, but rather the one best-placed to be of benefit to the local community, including the local autism community. After all, autism and Asperger's Syndrome affect those not on the autistic spectrum too.

Similarly, one of the main reasons why I chose Daisy Chain as my charity to do the 2012 Bupa Great North Run for was largely because I was impressed with how they had got local businesses on board. I have organised two events in April to continue to raise funds for the charity, including a quiz night and a gig, which will take place on 19th and 25th April respectively. The quiz night will be hosted by Ian Geldard, who has given many seminars on autism from the sibling's perspective, growing up with a brother with autism. The gig features Sheikh Ya Mojo. Fronted by the talented Andy Atkinson, Sheikh Ya Mojo play rock and blues classics from the Rolling Stones, the Doors, Ray Charles, Dr Feelgood and many more. For more information on these events, click on the posters below. To find out more about my challenge, please visit my sponsorship page at http://www.justgiving.com/Chris-MitchellGNR/






















In the meantime, I am looking forward to getting some practical software testing experience in the coming weeks. But to hear how these events go as well as my training and preparation, stayed tuned to Adventures with Autism Works. Happy Easter!

Special thanks to the MAIN Project for inviting me to speak at their World Autism Day Conference and well done to Middlesbrough's Beverley School Choir for raising funds to buy supplies for Romanian schoolchildren, which Scott James will take when he visits Romania next month. I wish Scott every success with his visit.

Scandinavia, Crossing the Road, Mindfulness and Pragmatism

Welcome back to Adventures with Autism Works. This month the adventure has taken me to Scandinavia, where I have been delivering some seminars on Asperger's Syndrome and Mindfulness, including talking about how the effects of mindfulness practice enabled me to settle in when starting at Autism Works as well as also offering some simple mindfulness practice exercises, including mindful eating.

When describing what it is like to be a person with Asperger's Syndrome, one of my favourite analogies I like to use is that of a Vietnamese motorcycle rider in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, where you are not familiar with the local road rules or the road crossing conventions of the pedestrians, who are used to walking into the traffic when crossing the road. This month, during a visit to Copenhagen, Denmark, I saw the opposite, where pedestrians only cross roads at road crossings when the green light comes on, whereas sometimes in the UK when the red man is still on but there is no traffic and we cross the road.

Colourful houses at Nyhavn, Copenhagen

Chances are that Danish pedestrians may well be waiting all day long to cross the road in Hanoi or Saigon! However, the effects of mindfulness practice helps us to cope with coming out of our comfort zone and adapt to our surroundings, wherever we happen to be. A change of location also enables us to notice our habits more clearly. At the conference, as well as talking about how the effects of mindfulness practice enabled me to settle in when staring my role at Autism Works, in the practical workshop I gave later, I talked about how two aspects I like most about mindfulness are its simplicity and flexibility.

Simplicity and flexibility enable mindfulness practice to be accessible at just about any time of day, and enables one seeking mindfulness practice to fit practice around their schedule, however busy or chaotic, rather than shaping your schedule around it. Autisme Center Danmark, who organised the conference, very kindly game me some extra time which I could use to introduce simple mindfulness practices, as well as how to practice mindfulness within routine or habitual parts of our day, including brushing our teeth and eating. One of the practices I offered was mindful eating. If anyone reading this blog has done the eight-week mindfulness-based stress reduction course, they will be familiar with the raisin exercise, where you eat a raising very slowly. When I was first introduced to this exercise, something that I found was that when we eat, we don't often experience what we eat in full, perhaps because we are more concerned with satisfying our appetite. by taking the time to eat slowly and the allow digestion of when we eat, one gains an appreciation of its taste, texture and after-taste. As mindfulness practice can be built into and around busy schedules, in this way it is pragmatic. Similarly, a concept that originated in Denmark, Specialisterne, on which Autism Works is partially modelled, shows that Asperger's Syndrome can be applied pragmatically by applying its strengths and qualities to one's surroundings in a productive way that has benefits for the wider community. 

Statue of Tycho Brahe, Ven Island, Sweden

Another aspect of mindfulness one of the other speakers talked about was, using an image of a rough sea, was how there are many things that the eye alone doesn't see, but our other senses can pick up that we are often oblivious to. During my visit to Scandinavia, I found time to visit the Island of Ven, in the Oresund Sound between Denmark and Sweden, from where the astronomer Tycho Brahe observed the comet of 1577. Without the aid of a telescope, Tycho was able to determine by using a measurement not apparent when both our eyes are open, parallax, that the comet was further away from Earth than the Moon. Unlike the Moon, the comet of 1577 had no observable parallax, a displacement of an object's apparent distance when seen through two lines. Similarly, when we hold up a finger and observe it with our right eye closed and then closing the right eye and opening the left, its position appears to move, because each eye sees a different picture. Observation is how many people with Asperger's syndrome learn non-verbal social skills, observing how others do it.

On the subject of comets, some of us have been lucky enough to see Comet Panstarrs in our skies last week, though cloudy weather has made spotting it difficult with the naked eye. Panstarrs may not return for another 100,000 years, but if you missed it, don't worry, as there is another tailed visitor due to pass by in November, Comet ISON, which could possibly be brighter. Hopefully skies will be clear for the visit of ISON. 

Elsewhere, I am still training for my attempt to summit Kilimanjaro in October to raise much-needed funds for Daisy Chain To find out more visit my sponsorship page at http://www.justgiving.com/Chris-MitchellGNR/ To see how this unfolds, including planned events and adventures during the next two months, stay tuned to Adventures with Autism Works.

Special thanks to Autism Centre Danmark for inviting me to speak in Denmark, for their wonderful hospitality and for giving me a truly memorable experience.

Near-Earth Asteroid and 'Outside the Box' Campaigning

As I write today's blog entry, there is some exciting news from the skies! Earth is due to experience a close shave with an Asteroid, 2012 DA14, which will pass within 17,000 miles of Earth's atmosphere. It all happens a few hours after shock-waves caused by a meteor shower in central Russia have seen at least 500 people injured after glass was blown out of windows. But don't panic, 2012 DA14 is highly unlikely to strike Earth and the two events are a cosmic coincidence, not inter-related. However, if you are lucky enough, depending upon where on the planet you live and if you have clear skies, you may catch a glimpse of it with binoculars.

Coming back down to Earth, I am continuing to explore Contract Finder to look for public sector contracts at Autism Works as well as working on some fundraising events for my Daisy Chain challenge to summit Kilimanjaro and have also been back to the cinema to see No, a film charting the National Plebiscite in Chile in 1988, asking whether General Augusto Pinochet should stay in power. The main character, Rene Saavedra (played by Gael Garcia Bernal), works on a campaign to encourage his fellow Chileans to vote 'no' to another eight years of Pinochet.

Outside the box thinking

In my previous entry, I discussed the ability to filter information and the sort of thinking needed to be able to do this effectively. This week though, I am going to focus on a type of thinking, that as a person with Asperger's Syndrome, I still occasionally have trouble with, but much for which is needed in campaigning and of which there was much of in No - outside the box thinking to encourage outside interest. One of the campaign images that the 'No' team eventually came out with after extensive such thinking, which was the rainbow images, with the colours of the rainbow encompassing a wide political spectrum. As well as flexibility of mind, such thinking on the part of the No campaign team must also have taken a lot of courage, after living in fear for years under a dictatorship where police brutality and disappearances were a regular occurrence.

Where my Daisy Chain challenge is more than just a physical/fitness-related challenge is with the 'outside the box' thinking with the campaigning. The mindfulness practice has helped with this, but I do still occasionally find difficulty in flexible thinking, especially in relation to repetitive phrases and sometimes obsessional thought, usually relating to a fixation or interest. To help with my fundraising campaign, I have organised a quiz night and a charity gig night where local band Sheikh Ya Mojo have a agreed to play a set that includes classics from artists as diverse as Led Zeppelin, the Doors, The Rolling Stones and Ray Charles. These events will take place in April. Stay tuned to Adventures with Autism Works or my Facebook page at http://on.fb.me/NA1RTz  to find out how these and other developments unfold. To find more about my challenge, you can visit my sponsorship page at http://bit.ly/L2eWtp

Hopefully, I can also bring some outside the box thinking to the marketing aspect of Autism Works. Elsewhere, to view Asteroid 2012 DA14, the best chance to spot it from the UK with binoculars or a telescope is around 8.00pm, where it will pass by the constellations of Leo and Taurus, for more detail, see the following link http://bit.ly/ZeyJvK. Happy Asteroid Hunting!

Filtering Information, Unexpected Surprises and Django

Welcome back to Adventures with Autism Works. It may easily be assumed from the lack of activity on this blog lately either that business at Autism Works has been slow or that nothing much interesting has been happening. but over the last two weeks, I encountered different, and in one case, an unexpected situation to apply skills and techniques that I have learned from my MA (Hons) in Information Management and mindfulness practice.

Filtering Information

This week I have been assigned on a task of identifying appropriate contracts that Autism Works could possibly apply for searching online via Business Link's Contract Finder site. This task reminds me very much of when searching for relevant journal articles when researching for assignments and my thesis for my MA, and later when a Research Assistant at Northumbria University, using e-journal databases. A major difference that I noticed during my time at Northumbria, both as a student and as a Research Assistant compared to when began my undergraduate studies at Teesside University in 1996 is that the challenge is more about filtering rather than finding information, as e-journal databases can hold so much more information than a large physical space. Being able to filter such information has enabled me to separate the relevant contracts from the irrelevant, as well as pick out in the more obscure where there are elements of software testing required that Autism Works could perform, including possibly testing some more web-based software.

One of the main reasons though for the lack of entries on this blog so far this calendar year has been because my Asperger training has been very busy this month, and 2013 has already thrown up some unexpected surprises, not least when giving a lecture at the University of the Third Age (U3A) and who should turn up but my former Head of House from school! As you may remember I was reacquainted with some of my former school teachers and peers at the Monkwearmouth School Grand Reunion last October. What my former Head of House, who witnessed at first hand some of the difficult times I went through during adolescence, later said she was impressed with about my talk was that, despite such difficult times I went through back then, I didn't lay any blame to anyone from my past, including former teachers and peers.

One of the first aspects that mindfulness practice enabled me to do was to be able to see people from my past, including former teachers and peers as they are now, and that they didn't know as much I didn't that I had undiagnosed Asperger's Syndrome, a condition that was barely heard of back then. Something else I was slightly surprised mindfulness enabled me to do during one of my training sessions with ESPA's Training and Awareness Group (TAG) was walk in a straight line while looking at the floor through binoculars! The purpose of this exercise is to give one an idea of what motor skills difficulties as well as awkward gait that a person with Asperger's Syndrome can present with might actually feel like. Applying a mindfulness of walking technique though, I was able to focus on other sensations that we often tend to pay little attention to in daily life, including the contact of the feet with the ground when walking or standing, and I was surprised I could still walk straight, whereas another participant thought it was like walking under the influence of alcohol!

Elsewhere in 2013, I have been to the Tyneside Cinema to see Django Unchained, starring Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Leonardo Di Caprio and Samuel L. Jackson, and directed by Quentin Tarantino. For me, as well as entertainment, this film could also be a moment of cinematic history in that it is not only a revival of the Western genre, but also exploring the largely untapped aspects of the American west not often seen in western movies (e.g. cattle drives, gold rushes wagon trains etc.), including in the case of Django Unchained, slavery pre-American Civil War, with Tarantino's black comedy style violence adding an extra dimension. An acquired taste, Tarantino's style can entertain as easily as it can appal (especially to those with 'high moral standards'), but for me, Tarantino's first two films, Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction provided an anecdote to the more formulaic 1980s action hero movies. Likewise, the relatively unique experience of seeing a film at Tyneside Cinema, for me, provides an more authentic anecdote to the excess commercialisation of the big chain cinemas.

Stay tuned to Adventures with Autism Works to see how developments unfold throughout 2013.

I am still doing much physical training for the second part of my challenge, to summit Kilimanjaro in October, to raise much-needed funds for Daisy Chain. Visit my sponsorship page at http://www.justgiving.com/Chris-MitchellGNR/ to find out more.