Stimming a Space: Neurodivergent bodyminds and liminal expansion

Neurodiversity is gaining more and more attention in the public discussion, slowly but persistently countering wide-spread prejudices around neurodevelopmental conditions such as autism, dyspraxia or ADHD. As the narrative surrounding neurodiversity is expanding, so are the possibilities to understand neurodivergent ways of thinking and doing. This development can bring immense relief and appreciation to neurodivergent individuals that are used to encounter constant misunderstandings, frustration or fatigue. In the rather recent field of neurodivergent academic writing, the neurodiversity paradigm that treats neurodivergent individuals as equals and entitles them to telling their own story, opens new pathways to understanding neurodiversity as a variation of human existence and brings different ways of thinking-making-being into the discourse. Many authors in this still emerging field choose auto-ethnographic approaches, opening their experience to a larger audience and uncovering a sensuous world in constant movement, interwoven and enmeshed with the neurodivergent bodymind. This creative contribution traces my first steps of dreaming what I call a neurodivergent cosmology in which time, space and language as experienced by my neurodivergent peers constitute a reality that can inspire us to re-think societal structures and institutions. If time defies linearity, if bodies are intertwined with their surroundings, and if language is not necessarily verbal, can these realms inspire us to do things differently? My artistic research feeds into current decoloniality discourses and serves as an invitation to dwell at the margins of the neurotypical universe in an attempt to explore how neurodivergent (self)care and connection can offer alternatives to a collapsing world order.