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Tag: DEEP

  • Neuro-Holographic Thoughts

    Neuro-Holographic Thoughts

    I believe that the DEEP (Double Empathy Extreme Problem) is at the heart of all the systemic ableist issues we have in our education, social and healthcare systems. The lack of an embodied presence and connection between people being together as humans is causing harm. It is leaving marginalised people further on the edges and at an even further disadvantage socially, financially, politically, and in every other dimension possible.

    (Original blog written August 2024, edited March 2025)

    DEEP Disconnect

    The disconnect, lack of understanding and gaping hole where a sense of belonging should be is creating huge mental health problems, especially for our neurodivergent young people who are the focus of my Autistic Realms work. Many young people are now left with no accessible education; they are slipping through the cracks of a broken education and mental health system and getting stuck between systems that value neuronormativity and ignore or misunderstand neurodivergent needs.

    We don’t want people to be ‘falling through the net’, feeling like they are ‘treading water in unchartered seas’, feeling adrift’ and ‘weathered like sea glass’ (Shepherd et al., 2024). As Gray-Hammond (2024) has highlighted, this impact stretches far beyond the young person; it can break family and professional relationships in multidimensional ways, and it is painful. Helen Mirra (conceptual artist) responded to my last post about DEEP with her insightful thoughts:

    “I almost sense a space of opportunity being described — that while being in double empathy tangles unaware can be disorienting, that an awareness of the double empathy problem could rather have a potential for orientation — with a consciousness that Double Empathy needs to be recognised and acknowledged — maybe something like DEAP — Double Empathy Awareness Potential? Practice?”

    Queer Liminal Spaces

    As David Gray-Hammond said in their latest blog Reclaiming Neurofuturism: The Liminal as a Space of Queer Potential (2024);

    “Queer space is the liberation of human kind.”

    I love trying to harvest something positive, to try and find potential in the in-between of things, the shattered systems, and our fragmented relationships. I feel eternally optimistic that things can change for the better; we can work towards radical inclusivity and embrace neuroqueer theory to find a space to breathe, re-connect, deconstruct and reimagine new possibilities. If we are embodied, tuned in, and have wide-open sensory gates, we can acknowledge the empathy gap and create a new plateau, a new space to rise above the disconnect. “Queer space is a space of somatic and cognitive discovery, made possible by the space between. It is through that discovery that we make connection with others possible” (Gray-Hammond, 2024).

    Monocultures

    I have had a few amazing and inspiring meetings this week, one with Jorn Bettin (AutCollab) and another with Dawn Prince-Hughes (CASY), both alongside Ryan Boren (Stimpunks). We all feel the DEEP gap of disconnect due to the domination of neuronormativity. Jorn has captured this within his writing about monocultures. Dawn is exploring similar avenues with the groundbreaking work being carried out by the Cultural Autism Studies Programme at Yale (CASY). Dawn has described this as people being;

    Unable to see shades of lived nuance and constitutionally lacking organs of exquisite sensitivity, the truncated, neurotypical gaze rakes over the bodies of (neuro-holographic) life — whether designated autistic, animal, any other undesirable caste, or nature itself — they assess them only in terms of cost, threats, or utility. They can’t or won’t see them.

    Modern, connectively truncated influence has driven an obsession with homogeneity and increasingly raised a maniacal rejection of inward and outward difference to a hellish art form. The lives (and deaths) of sentient, (neuro-holograhpic) beings is foundational to daily life and underscores the danger of using gifts evolutionarily tooled for a better, more compassionate future are pressed into service for the structure we were put here to change.
    (Dawn Prince Hughes, 2023)
    *neuro-holographic = my edits.

    Ecology of Care and Transforming Spaces

    Jorn Bettin (2024) wrote about Life in the compost heap of industrialised monoculture. He echoes my experience of burnout caused by systemic unmet needs. Jorn agrees that neurodivergent and other marginalised groups are often left out, alienated, and at the bottom of the compost heap. However, we can help people thrive; we can change our personal and institutional landscapes. Jorn, through their work with AutCollab, suggests that we need to embrace an ecology of care.

    The emergence of ecologies of care is the emergence of a beautiful diversity of human scale cultural species and organisms in the cultural compost heap of the industrialised mono-cult. (Jorn Bettin, 2024)

    Dawn suggests;

    We can start a new, inclusive movement by leading the way back to the primal awareness, the connective wisdom, we were born with, because we are first and foremost, in all ways that matter, neuroexpansive minds. (Dawn Prince Hughes, 2023)

    Through our discussions this week, we realised our vision and aims for Neuroqueer Learning Spaces (Boren and Edgar, 2024), reach far beyond education and the small communities we are already involved with. There is an energy-driving created serendipity that is dancing between our shared spaces and bringing like-minded people together. We all have our own stories and history, and for many neurodivergent people, we all have layers of trauma that live within our bodies, spreading back over generations and impacting our sensory way of being in the present and impacting our ways of moving forward. As David highlighted by drawing upon Nick Walker’s (2021) work;

    The master’s house represents a dominant paradigm. In the context of neuroqueer theory, this would be the pathology paradigm. A paradigm within which deviation from normative embodiment is seen as disordered. The liminal represents a space outside of the paradigm. It is a pinnacle of queer space in that its potential is one of unbounded queening; in the liminal, the very meaning of being human may be called into question. (Gray-Hammond, 2024)

    Helen Mirra (2023) expands on this idea of human potential in her concept of holotropism, which I have explored in my previous blogs. She writes;

    “To be holotropic is to have wide open sensory gates. To participate in/as the immense world without becoming overwhelmed, we holotropes have two central methods: in, by hyperfocusing our attention on one sensory or cognitive path, and as, through synthesising our experience into coherence. A sense of wholeness occurs through both of these processes — less consciously in hyperfocus, more consciously in coherence”. (Helen Mirra, 2023)

    David Gray-Hammond is bringing the conversation further forward and exploring my original idea of the potential of Neuroqueering in the In-between. He shares that;

    The queer liminal space allows for connection and expansion because there is no axis to follow. There is no map to trace. The pathology paradigm seeks to arborify rhizomes, reducing them to roots and radicles. In liminal space, lack of structure allows for the organic development and joining up of rhizomes. It is in the liminal where minority silos come together. To the master’s house, it is an existential threat. To the oppressed minority, it is a place where what we were taught to be impossible becomes not only possible but probable. With infinite liminal space and infinite time, queer improbability becomes queer realisation. That which we are told can not happen is subverted into existence. (Gray-Hammond, 2024)


    Neuro-Holographic

    When people connect at a deeper level, going beyond any social, cultural, racial or gender differences, meaning can be found where words are not needed; we can be with each other as human souls. To have ‘wide open sensory gates’ is to be innately hyper-sensitive and hyper-empathetic. However, I do think everyone can work towards this regardless of differences in neurology. We can all become more embodied through somatic practices and having a willingness to open your sensory gates, to de-armour, un-mask and by being prepared to be vulnerable when it is safe to do so. Being embodied enables deeper more meaningful connections to form, it creates resonance and vibrations, vibrations are pregnant with energy, and energy is transformative, it has neuroqueering potential.

    The word neuro-holographic has emerged from within the neurodivergent community, “a buried treasure of our culture that used many hands to lift up into the light”. As Dawn suggested, ‘We belong to the term, rather than the term belonging to us’.



    So, what does neuro-holographic mean?



    Dawn helped draw some light on what neuro-holographic means in the CASY Facebook Group (March 2025) and wrote, “So many autistic people are aware of, and affected by, the reality that there is no division between them and their environment — whether it is the person next to them, the dog running in the park, the plant in the windowsill, or the star at the edge of the universe.” Dawn shared a quote from Brian M Sabourin, which helps to explain the link between neuro-holographic thoughts and Autistic Physics a bit further:

    “According to quantum physics a particle vibrating due to your sound when you speak can affect a molecule inside a star at the edge of the Universe instantly. This phenomenon is known as quantum entanglement. The greatest illusion of this Universe is the illusion of separation.” (Brian M Sabourin, Jan 2025)



    When Dawn, Ryan and I discussed the term neuro-holographic, there was an instant shared resonance and affinity with the word, we were all on the same plane, the same plateau. We all experienced and felt validation from a shared understanding of quantum entanglement through our experiences of being Autistic and a different sensory system, feeling tuned into a wider energy with the environment around us. We shared a rhythm and way of being as neurokin, and the double empathy problem that persists in so many other spaces was somewhat dissolved – an experience echoed by many within the thriving CASY community group and within our online events, too. There is a sense of togetherness, belonging, and a shared intention to work against harmful neuronormative practices and instead to work together towards transformative neuroqueer possibilities.

    To embrace being neuro-holographic is to embrace opening up spaces within our souls so we can work together and transform society and support each other.

    Bodies Without Organs and The Plane of Immanence

    In their work, One Thousand Plateaus (1987), Deleuze and Guattari discuss the idea of a body without organs. The body without organs is not a hollow body; rather, I see and feel that it is the plane where dwelling and possibility are, a kind of “liquid matrix” (Theoretical Puppets, 2021); it is primordial, a place where you aren’t restricted by your organs (literally your body in real terms, i.e. freedom of movement) or the organs (machines) of society. Deleuze and Guattari suggest that networks and connections are made possible through the body without organs as it liberates you from Capitalism and the knots of neuronormativity. It allows people to be free from control, free to follow our desire lines, free to be affected (experience affects).

    To use the analogy in the webinar delivered by Theory & Philosophy (2020), to be a body without organs could be interpreted as us being similar to an unfertilised field. If no seeds are planted, if there’s no relational pull or movement, then the field will likely remain a field; it will never transform, it will never produce an outcome beyond itself, and there will be no crops. This could be positive or negative for a field, but when we talk about people, we don’t want people to remain static, unchanged or stuck or to stagnate, and we don’t want other people and systems to be deciding our use and destiny without our consent or input.

    We need people to have agency, autonomy, and control over their own lives, enabling them to keep on transforming and being responsive, organically moving with the seasons and inviting natural processes. We need an attunement with nature so we can all morph in time and space organically, embodied, and as whole beings.

    Returning to our primordial ways of being and being intune with the natural rhythms of the world around us allows people’s sensory gates to expand, it enables created serendipity to form further connections, adding luminescent nodes to the autistic rhizome. When connections develop in shared holographic space/time, it also creates deeper (perhaps, holographic?) connections of shared meaning, the potential for safe unmasking and bodily liberty; it enables neuroqueering potential and ideas to form more creatively.

    In our meeting, Dawn, Ryan and all perceived and felt the word neuro-holographic at a deep inner level, in our core, it was a ‘felt’ understanding more than a cognitive or intellectual resonance. I am considering if using Deleuze and Guartari’s idea of being “bodies without organs” could help people understand the experience of being neuro-holographic. Neuro-holographic is a felt perception, an open ‘One-All’ that is perhaps more likely to be experienced when people are not tied down by neuronormativity and they have unravelled themselves and lived wholly in the in-between spaces.


    To become a body without organs you need to have safe spaces and time to explore, you need to want to actively seek and find alternative ways, new paths, new plateaus and horizons and to change yourself and the wider systems, planes and spaces around you. There is definitely an element of privilege in finding safe spaces and communities to be able to do this and also to have the time to explore. If I hadn’t resigned from my teaching career, I would very likely have not had capacity to even dip my toe into reading about all this, I would have likely been left feeling very stuck. Exploring takes time, and it also takes time to neuroqueer your bodymind, My neuroqueering journey has been rhizomatic, chaotic but I have also found coherence as I connect with others on the plane of immanence as human souls all trying to find meaning in places where perhaps words and concepts are not even needed or relevant and cease to make sense.

    The Plane of Immanence, as discussed by Deleuze and Guattari (1994), discusses philosophical concepts as “fragmentary wholes that are not aligned with one another”. They continue to explain;

    They are not pieces of a jigsaw puzzle but rather the outcome of throws of the dice. They resonate nonetheless, and the ways introduces a powerful Whole aining open, is not fragmented; an unlimited One all….it is a plateau, it is a plane of immanence of concepts’ (they also stress that the plane of immanence is not a concept). (Deleuze and Guattari, 1994, p35)

    On the plane of immanence, there are rhizomatic networks or connections, becomings and energy. In their book One Thousand Plateaus (1980), Deleuze and Guattari explain that on the plane of immanence;

    “There are only relations of movement and rest, speed and slowness between unformed elements, or at least between elements that are relatively unformed, molecules, and particles of all kinds. There are only haecceities, affects, subjectless individuations that constitute collective assemblages. … We call this plane, which knows only longitudes and latitudes, speeds and haecceities, the plane of consistency or composition (as opposed to a plan(e) of organization or development).”

    I have intentionally used a hyphen between the words neuro and holographic to represent the in-between of neurology and holographic ways of being and experiencing the world, a pause for tuning in, an embodiment, a space of Ma. I have resisted using the word “neuro-holographism as that could imply another new theory or concept. Neuro-holographic is not a concept; rather, I feel like it IS the plane of immanence on which neuroqueer theory breathes and lives; it is the ‘wave that rolls and unrolls’ other concepts (Deleuze & Guattari, What is Philosophy, 1994, p36). To resonate with the term neuro-holographic is to resonate as souls, with your core self, perhaps with your spirit.

    To be part of society is to be part of a community and to live meaningfully. It means connecting as human souls and having a sense of belonging and a sense of togetherness with others. For many neurodivergent and marginalised people, this lack of connection and shared meaning is where disconnect and further stigmatisation often hits and breaks people. For a radically inclusive neuroqueer future, we need radical acceptance and to embrace liminal spaces, the plateaus, the sometimes painful caves, pleats, and caverns where we may become stuck in our lives. As David suggests,

    The liminal space, then, is not a place of stagnation, but one of growth and evolution. It is the site of plasticity in the world’s communities. All communities exist within liminal spaces, much as planets exist in empty space. A community was once a nothing that became a something, liminality provided the potential to become.

    Being Neuroholographic and Embracing Liminal Space to Neuroqueer

    To be neuro-holograpic, to resonate with holotropism and embrace neuroqueer theory means that the weight of neuronormativity may be felt so painfully that it feels like it is piercing through the bodymind. This light can flow, it can move between the smallest of spaces and opening and shines through liminal spaces to offer some hope in previously dark void spaces. It allows light to enter Ma, a space where we can pause and breathe and act upon neuroqueer thoughts that can transform our bodyminds. It can enable new nodes on the rhizome to form from within our communities as we connect with others and transport us to new planes, new spaces to become and keep on becoming. Once DEEP is dissolved or there is a bridge or line of flight to rise above and support understanding of the differences between people, it allows for responsiveness without imposing on each other to change into something we aren’t (we don’t go from a barren field to a crop field ). We can transform within ourselves and create our own destinies by creating new paths. The impact of our inner transformation can lead to even more connections and so further expand the rhizome towards other bodies without organs to keep evolving, transforming and becoming.

    Once we grasp and intentionally embrace the plateaus of liminal spaces, the smooth spaces, then the DEEP gap can dissolve and melt away, rising above the liminal disconnect. We can take a breath, be responsive to our environment and our relationships, and (in theory) ‘become bodies without organs’ to transform further. We can become neuroqueer in a phenomenological sense. Instead of the machines of capitalist society filling the spaces, if we embrace neuroqueer theory through the perspective of Deleuze and Guattari’s body without organs idea, then we can actively choose to subvert and queer the direction we travel in and neuroqueer ourselves and the spaces and relations around us, neuro-holographically.

    Holographic Bodyminds

    Dawn, Ryan and I tried to define the word and experience of being neuro-holographic, but we couldn’t; we just shared excited nods and stimmy responses of mutual agreement and joy at our connection. Perhaps the beauty lies in the way that the word neuro-holographic can only be felt or experienced in a luminescent, undefinable iridescent way, which creates a holographic energy of light and vibration that expands and ripples beyond our singular bodyminds to connect with other bodyminds, it creates multiplicity from the friction between us as humans. Connecting with others enables an expansion of our community rhizomes in exciting ways full of radical inclusive neuroqueer possibilities.

    Dawn Prince Hughes works with Dr. Roger Jou, who founded CASY (Community Autism Socials at Yale) in 2014. This has now transformed into CASY (CULTURAL AUTISM STUDIES AT YALE). CASY offers a new way forward for Autism studies; they are a community that is truly pushing beyond the boundaries of normative hegemony but also stretches the potential of Neuroqueer Theory. CASY is based on a completely egalitarian and neuro-holographic model that stretches worldwide and involves many languages and cultures! If you’d like to find out more, please check out the links below:

    Meet up: https://www.meetup.com/ProjectCASY/

    Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/DrRogerJou

    Email: SPARKforAutism@yale.edu

    References

    Bettin, J. (2024) Ecologies of care. Autistic Collaboration. https://autcollab.org/knowledge-repository/ecologies-of-care/

    Bettin, J. (2024a, January 17). Life in the compost heap of the industrialised mono-cult. NeuroClastic. https://neuroclastic.com/life-in-the-compost-heap-of-the-industrialised-mono-cult/

    Boren, R. & Edgar, H. (2024b, March 23). Neuroqueering Learning Spaces: an Exploration. Stimpunks Foundation. https://stimpunks.org/2024/03/23/neuroqueering-learning-spaces-an-exploration/

    Deleuze, G., & Guattari, F. (1994). What is Philosophy? Verso.

    Deleuze, G. & Guattari, F. (1987). A Thousand Plateaus: Capitalism and Schizophrenia. U of Minnesota Press.

    Edgar, H. (2024b, June 15). The Double Empathy Problem is DEEP — MoreRealms — Medium. Medium. https://medium.com/@helenrealms/the-double-empathy-problem-is-deep-2364b3412c39

    Edgar, H. (2024a, May 28). Neuroqueering from the Inbetween — MoreRealms — Medium. Medium. https://medium.com/@helenrealms/neuroqueering-from-the-inbetween-4ec0c12fd0e5

    Edgar, H. (2023b, November 20). Being With — MoreRealms — medium. Medium. https://medium.com/@helenrealms/being-with-1751dba19743

    Edgar, H. (2023b, July 1). Caverns, Pleats and Folds — MoreRealms — Medium. Medium. https://medium.com/@helenrealms/caverns-pleats-and-folds-912cc93cb950

    Gray-Hammond, D. (2024, June 19). Emergent divergence. Emergent Divergence. https://emergentdivergence.com/?s=parent+burnout+

    Gray-Hammond, D. (2024c, June 22). Reclaiming Neurofuturism: The Liminal as a space of Queer potential. Emergent Divergence. https://emergentdivergence.com/2024/06/22/reclaiming-neurofuturism-the-liminal-as-a-space-of-queer-potential/

    Mirra, H. H. (2024b, April 27). Holotropism: a multi-dimensional, spacious, edgeless terrain. Medium. https://hmirra.medium.com/holotropism-1cdf99c00b74

    Prince Hughes, D. (2023b, February 22). The unique responsibility of neuroexpansive minds for cultural inclusion. Autism Spectrum News. https://autismspectrumnews.org/the-unique-responsibility-of-neuroexpansive-minds-for-cultural-inclusion/

    Shepherd, J., Sutton, B., Smith, S., & Szlenkier, M. (2024e). ‘Sea‐glass survivors’: Autistic testimonies about education experiences. British Journal of Special Education. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8578.12506

    Stimpunks Foundation. (2024b, August 3). Neuro-Holographic – Stimpunks Foundation. https://stimpunks.org/glossary/neuro-holographic/?fbclid=IwY2xjawIl7FBleHRuA2FlbQIxMAABHbs6Oss-N3KZn-3ufdKjiXHl0qBWYAt8WttUb3_S29nrKumlBUK8pliH7g_aem_7G1NR1rcAvKDhoiLE15E-Q

    Theoretical Puppets. (2021, March 28). Gilles Deleuze on Gilbert Simondon, Synesthesia, and The Body Without Organs [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k2yyW3ml6nM

    Theory & Philosophy. (2020b, August 4). What is the Body Without Organs? | Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari | Keyword[Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irrNcRPGr8Q

    Walker, N. (2021). Neuroqueer heresies: Notes on the Neurodiversity Paradigm, Autistic Empowerment, and Postnormal Possibilities. Autonomous Press

  • Neuroqueering in the Liminal Spaces

    Neuroqueering in the Liminal Spaces

    Neuroqueering in Liminal Spaces

    “By silencing our bodyminds, they (neurotypical society) have halted the growth of a chaotic self. We are no longer able to move fluidly through our experience, instead frozen like ice on an arctic tundra” (Gray-Hammond, 2023)

    David Gray-Hammond (Emergent Divergence) and I are responding to each other’s blogs to help expand the Autistic Rhizome. We are adding nodules to the webs of discussions happening in the Dark Forests (Boren, 2024) of the online communities and creating an open-source bank of writing to carve a path for community discussion about neuroqueering.

    David is continuing his ‘Reclaiming Neurofuturism’ series and has responded to my post The Double Empathy Problem is DEEP. He explored the litigious nature of disabled embodiment and questioned the intentional creation of minority silos via the double empathy divide (Milton, 2012). In support of my own thinking, David also suggests that we need to embrace the healing power of liminal spaces.

    I am writing extensively about the in-between, liminal spaces and Ma as a potential chapter for Nick Walker’s new Neuroqueer Anthology (struggling to write it coherently so that it may make sense to others, but it is slowly forming!). Liminality has been a long term passion of mine, tunnelling back over 30 years. As an autistic person, I feel I have lived my entire life in the liminal. I have always been in-between or on the edges of social groups, always struggling with an internal battle due to the effects masking has on my sensory system. Being monotropic has meant the in-between is felt intensely; it has led to cycles of burnout and impacts my mental, physical and sensory health.

    I am still living in the liminal, on the edges, often in spaces filled with anxiety and uncertainty. However, I have gone through a huge and difficult process of unlearning and relearning over the past few years since I realised I was autistic, rejecting the deficit ways of thinking about neurodivergence and dismantling my own ableist thought patterns. Patterns that have been reinforced over decades by the weight of neuronormativity. I am grateful for the autistic communities I am part of for supporting me and providing cushioning to help me navigate my way through this messy process whilst trying to prevent myself heading into a deeper burnout cycle. However, I still feel like I am living on the edges, even within the most caring and supportive neurodivergent communities.

    The years of masking, the impact of living in a neuronormative ableist-driven society and going through cycles of burnout has, in many ways resulted in my bodymind being ‘silenced’, getting stuck. David echoed this feeling as he explained;

    “By silencing our bodyminds, they (neurotypical society) have halted the growth of a Chaotic Self . We are no longer able to move fluidly through our experience, instead frozen like ice on an arctic tundra.”

    Tundras are cold and harsh environments, but biodiversity adapts to the landscape and the short growing seasons, plants and animals transform their ways of being to survive. Tundras offer some hope that life can exist even in the cruellest of environments.

    However, we don’t want people feeling frozen, stuck on an arctic tundra, trapped in endless freeze/thaw/burnout cycles. People deserve more than a life in survival mode where they are constantly on high alert for danger and in looping patterns of sensory regulation-seeking behaviour, living in Meerkat Mode (Adkin, 2023). In Walker’s inspiring presentation, ‘Expanding the Creative Potentials of Human Neurodiversity’ at ITAKOM (It Takes All Kinds of Minds Conference, March 2023), she explored how we need to work together so we can flourish so that the;

    ‘creative synergy, the chemistry that is between and among different minds’ can emerge…so the magic happens’.

    We need our beautifully different bodyminds to work together; we need to develop a common language and be open to different ways of thinking, more accepting and inclusive. Radical inclusivity is a concept Ryan Boren (Stimpunks) and I have been exploring as part of our Neuroqueer Learning Spaces Project. There is no single path to radical inclusivity; it begins with being embodied, of being open to connecting with yourself and others, it is cultivated by ongoing neuroqueering efforts to meet needs, it is a confrontation with normativity. Radical inclusivity is more than accommodating needs; it is about fostering cognitive and somatic liberty to enable the potential of neuroqueering to open up new, as yet unknown possibilities.

    Radical Inclusive spaces would benefit everyone. They are embodied spaces of deep connection and safety where people can tune in and be responsive to the needs of others. They offer a deeper connection, and they close the DEEP double empathy gap that I feel is at the root of so much hurt, pain, disconnect and disorientation. For radical inclusion, we need to work together. We need connections, a shared deep understanding, an embodied presence, a sense of meaning, and a sense of belonging. We need community, love and kindness to expand the rhizome.

    Deleuze and Guattari’s One Thousand Plateaus (1980) explores the concepts of the rhizome and also the importance of plateaus being transforming spaces that resist the linear hierarchy of neuronormativity and embrace the potential of the multiplicity of rhizomatic connections. The possibility to use these concepts to explore neuroqueer theory shines through One Thousand Plateaus, it is like a sunbeam bringing hope in Ma, inbetween the doorways of the liminal spaces that so many of us may feel we are living in.

    Rhizomes are open-ended; they have no middle, they have no start and there is no end. (Much like this series of blogs between David and I, I am again beginning in the Middle Entrance, again. You are joining conversations that have been evolving over the past two years in David’s Emergence Divergence Discord server, a node of the autistic rhizome, Open invite to join us there!).

    In summary:

    Rhizomes are interconnected networks of shared ideas and experiences filled with potential. Much like neuroqueer theory, rhizomes have multiple entry points, they are non-heirarchical. Anyone can neuroqueer, and anyone can enter a rhizome at any point, at any time, if the desire and intent are inside them to want to transform and explore neuroqueering.

    Smooth Spaces challenge the idea of traditional hierarchy. They are continuous spaces where the theories of Monotropism (Murray et al., 2005) and Flow Theory (Heasman et al., 2024) can flourish and open up creative neuroqueer potential, an emerging way of being. I experience smooth spaces as the spaces in the gaps of the rhizome; they are the liminal spaces.

    Plateaus are spaces of stability; they offer balance and equilibrium, equity, potential for awe and wonder and further expansion and transformation.

    Liminal Spaces provide smooth, open plateaus, spaces to connect, transform, and neuroqueer from the safety of our rhizomatic communities.

    This new series of blogs will provide a plateau for discussion, a space where the intensity you may feel of being stuck at or between a node point of the rhizome can gain some stability and grounding. We are seeking to expand our bodyminds as we write and connect with others, exploring the dynamics and discord of the DEEP Double Empathy Extreme Problem. As Walker (2019, pg 283) suggested in her thesis;

    “we need to “look beyond social cues to the deeper dynamics of interacting bodies, exceptional tactile and kinesthetic sensitivity, and affinity for what I’ve termed the aesthetics of emergence”

    We are opening discussions to explore the endless possibilities of an awe-inspiring neuroqueer future, to help bridge the DEEP empathy gap so many people are experiencing and to work towards a radically inclusive society.

    “To recognise our responsibility to each other lies in our power to create better futures for each other. Connection is the striking surface of a hammer on the walls of the masters house.” (Gray-Hammond, 2024)

    **These blogs will also form part of the discussions and feed into the Neuroqueer Learning Spaces Project I am developing with Ryan Boren (Stimpunks)**

    References

    Adkin, T., & Gray-Hammond, D. (2023). Meerkatting — Emergent Divergence. Emergent Divergence. https://emergentdivergence.com/tag/meerkatting/

    Boren, R. (2024, June 9). Campfires in dark Forests: Community brings safety to the serendipity. Stimpunks Foundation. https://stimpunks.org/2024/05/16/campfires-in-dark-forests-community-brings-safety-to-the-serendipity/

    Edgar, H. (2024, June 15) The Double Empathy Problem is DEEP — MoreRealms — Medium. Medium. https://medium.com/@helenrealms/the-double-empathy-problem-is-deep-2364b3412c39

    Edgar, H. (2023, June 27). Middle entrance — MoreRealms — Medium. Medium. https://medium.com/@helenrealms/middle-entrance-973dc06920b0

    Gray-Hammond, D. (2023). Reclaiming Neurofuturism: Rhizomatic Communities and the Chaotic Self. Emergent Divergence. https://emergentdivergence.com/2023/04/30/reclaiming-neurofuturism-rhizomatic-communities-and-the-chaotic-self/

    Gray-Hammond, D. (2023). Autistic rhizome — emergent divergence. Emergent Divergence. https://emergentdivergence.com/category/autism/autistic-community/autistic-rhizome/

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