Over 100 people attended "Demystifying Autism"

A fantastic experience

William Stillman promised in the beginning of the conference that everyone present would leave the conference with a fundamentally new perspective. He kept his promise and fundamentally touched our understanding of ourselves, Neurotypicals and Autistic persons. We learned to see the world from the perspective of people who live within the Autistic world. We discovered the Autism in each of ourselves.  We especially learned that a lot of our assumptions are dead wrong. William Stillman gave us tools to reflect on our actions and interactions. He proved over and over that Autistic people are inherently gentle and excuisitely sensitive. Hopefully William allows us to repeat his seven golden rules

Stillmans 7 Golden Rules

1. Presume intellect
2. People have good reasons for doing what they are doing.
3. People do the very best they can do
4. I need to feel safe and in control
5. I can't stand anything unpredictable
6. There is safety in sameness
7. When I know what to expect of the environment I may better adopt to it.

William Stillman let us experience directly what it can mean to have to live up to expectations that are not understood because they have not been explained. He showed vivedly that experiences the world of some autistic people for less than two minutes feels like a nightmare. He left no taboo standing and described what we see often see as behaviours as attempts to communicate or as communication.

William showed us that we should recognise compulsions as passion and that when we do so the persons with Autism can really shine. He is a witness to that.

Willam showed us that the team that is there to help the Autistic person often needs to be directed and guided much more than the autistic person him or herself. he gave us strong tools to work with so we can get to the answers we need to help ourselves and the Autistic persons around us. And yes his golden rules apply for everyone Autistic, Neurotypical or anything else.

Most specially and personally he shared his deep painful personal history that left me with tears in the eyes. And when I told him that, he had tears too. Yes Autistic people are inherently gentle and excuisitely sensitive.

Thank you William Stillman and a big thank you all who organised the conference.

We will stay in touch