Shownotes
This episode details what neurodivergence is, and why it’s relevant to improv. I include a couple of examples in there. Check out the transcript tab on this page to see the text version of this episode.
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Transcripts
Hello, and welcome to the Flat Improv Podcast, Neurodivision Podcast.
::I don't really even know what this is gonna be called yet.
::Maybe we'll find it organically during this series.
::This is the second time I'm recording this.
::Maybe some of you can relate to, I don't know, losing the whole file.
::I had it, I think my computer restarted on its own, and it was gone the next morning.
::And so we're doing it again.
::Here we are doing another recording of possibly about the same things.
::Good thing I have a very detailed spreadsheet.
::There we go.
::I have a spreadsheet of my notes.
::I actually have a few dozen topics already lined up for episodes, so this might go on for a while.
::Anyways, we're talking about neurodivergence and how that applies to improv, or looking at improv through the lens of neurodivergence, or the other way around, or something like that.
::I think you know what I'm going to be talking about.
::It goes without saying that improv involves the brain, and we do everything with our brains.
::That's how we see the world.
::That's how the world operates.
::And anyone who is neurodivergent knows that the world is really not set up for us.
::And that includes improv in a lot of ways.
::It involves all kind of learning.
::Neurodivergence is how the brain processes information.
::It's inherently how we think, how we're wired, how we learn things.
::So we're going to look at these things in this podcast.
::You know what?
::Does this count as a podcast?
::I guess maybe it does.
::It's me just standing at my desk talking into a microphone staring at the wall and a list of notes.
::Anyways, learning improv.
::That's something I've done a lot of.
::And learning improv involves learning in classes using exercises and getting notes.
::And a lot of those exercises and notes are sort of in a lot of ways built for neurotypical brains.
::And that makes sense.
::I mean, the exercises and the learning that we have is really how we've learned ourselves.
::Like if I'm approaching teaching something, it's probably going to be influenced in a lot of ways from how I learned it myself.
::However, I found myself when I started running, leading exercises and so on, that I oftentimes was just kind of leading exercises that really didn't work that well for me.
::And I asked myself, why?
::Why am I doing this?
::And why am I teaching these things in this way that didn't really work that well for me to begin with?
::Why am I not thinking about teaching things in a way that functions a little bit better for the way I think?
::In addition to the more traditional ways that are taught in other places, because all of them are useful to all people.
::And that's, I guess, when I started thinking about these two things married together.
::And I also started to notice, like, why does this explanation for something work better than that explanation for something?
::And we run across that all the time.
::I mean, think about learning the game of the scene, which probably most of you have at some point in your improv past.
::And you've noticed that a lot of teachers explain how to find the game in different ways.
::And I mean, that's a great example of just how everybody's brain functions differently.
::Everybody thinks differently.
::I, for example, took me a long time to get to a point where a second beat was even explained in a way that worked for me.
::And really thinking about second beats is a great example of neurodivergence and improv because second beats involve details, right?
::And an autistic brain, for example, processes details in a completely different order than a neurotypical brain.
::A neurotypical brain obviously looks at, not obviously, it just does apparently according to literature.
::It looks at things from a top down, a high level perspective first, the big picture first before going to details.
::And an autistic brain looks at details first before going to the big picture.
::So of course, if you look at analyzing a scene to do something analogous or a time dash of some sort and sort of do the same type of scene again, that matters a lot.
::So that's just one example.
::Let's just talk about what is neurodivergence for a second.
::Some of you might maybe haven't come across that.
::It is a more recent definition.
::This refers to a person whose brain processes information in a way that's atypical to the majority of the population.
::It's not necessarily, I mean, there's a whole lot of different perspectives on whether or not it's a disability.
::It is when you're in an environment that doesn't work for you.
::But let's just think about it's just a way that we're processing information differently.
::One example is the autistic neurotype.
::This includes specific abilities to focus, to recognize patterns, to remember factual information quite well, quite efficiently.
::And of course, that's going to have an impact on improv.
::In a lot of ways, a positive impact.
::Think about recognizing patterns.
::That's a very useful thing in improv.
::Neurotypes, they involve both strengths and challenges, depending on the environment and the task at hand.
::So some tasks are going to be more challenging.
::Some environments might be more challenging.
::Some environments might be great.
::Tasks might be well-suited.
::It just depends on what you're doing, what's around you.
::A single neurotype, I mean, again, think about the autistic neurotype, it's often on a spectrum, and it also involves a lot of comorbidities in your history.
::So it's never going to be presented exactly the same way.
::Again, all people are different.
::All brains are different.
::And so you're going to be experiencing things.
::I might be the same neurotype as you, but you are going to experience things potentially very different than I experience them.
::And vice versa.
::So that is something to remember.
::And we're not looking for perfection.
::There is no perfection in a class.
::There's no perfection in improv.
::We know we're not looking for perfection.
::But one thing we are looking for, of course, is inclusion and thinking about these things.
::So this series, it's very important for me to say, and I'm probably going to be saying this a lot throughout, it is not intended to diagnose.
::It's not intended to diagnose yourself.
::It's not intended to diagnose anyone you're doing improv with.
::We're just going to be looking at some of the strengths, some of the challenges, and how it relates to improv.
::We are going to be explaining things.
::We are not making excuses here.
::This isn't some great big long series to question a note that I have that I didn't like say.
::No, this is just to explore some of the experiences that we have in improv, and maybe some of it might be useful to you.
::If you're neurodivergent, it might be useful to you if you improv with neurodiverse individuals.
::And you do, by the way.
::We are taking your classes.
::We are doing improv with you.
::But of course, this is just my experience.
::That's it.
::And if anyone else comes on here with me, it's their experiences, and that's it.
::I'm not a professional at this.
::It's just what I experience.
::So please don't use us to diagnose others.
::Don't use it to diagnose yourself.
::Go read some good resources or books or something, or talk to a professional if you have access to one, if you want to figure out yourself.
::But anyways, let's move on from that stuff.
::So I gave one example here of what might be different for us neurodivergent individuals thinking about second beats.
::Another example is the unusual.
::I think that should have been the first one because it is so central to who we are.
::We are by definition divergent, right?
::We are by definition, our brains process things differently.
::We respond differently.
::We think differently.
::The first thing that comes to our mind is often not what's considered, and I'm doing air quotes.
::You just can't see them typical.
::You know, if we are answering honestly, if we're saying what we really would say in real life, and then it's tagged as the unusual thing, we are not surprised.
::But we might just in that moment no longer be considered the voice of reason, or the normal, I'm doing air quotes again, you just can't see them again, the normal person.
::So if you're asking us to do these things, and you're saying that what we're doing is unusual or whatever, that might be something that just came out in the moment, and we understand a lot of the times that it is unusual.
::We'll give our honest in the flow, in the moment response, and then it will be a second, and then we'll be like, that was not considered normal.
::But then it's too late because it's already in the scene.
::So I think that is one thing to just notice, to just notice that somebody who may be giving their honest reaction, it might be honest and normal for them.
::They might realize that it's unusual.
::We can edit for that, but it might not come naturally in the flow right away.
::So who the hell will this series be useful to?
::Well, I'm hoping, as I said previously, that it's useful to improvisers who do improv with or teach neurodivergent people, and that includes all improvisers.
::We are all around you.
::I'm afraid, if you didn't already realize, we're in the community.
::I can see it.
::I've heard it.
::I've talked to lots of people who have identified as neurodivergent, and I can almost guarantee, I can't guarantee, but I would not be surprised one bit if every team and every class had neurodivergent improvisers in them.
::Even of people who have talked to me and mentioned this to me, and I've mentioned this to them, I've been in classes where 50 percent are identified neurodivergent improvisers.
::So we're out there and we're probably in all of your classes and on all of your team.
::So basically, if you do improv or you teach improv, hopefully, this will be useful to you.
::So you understand the people that you are teaching or doing improv with a little bit better.
::This might help you to be a little bit more inclusive or not, or just understand.
::That's not a bad thing, I hope.
::If you yourself are not neurodivergent, I'm hoping that some parts of the series will be useful to you in some way of just understanding what's going on in the brain.
::This is now a special interest to me.
::It took me quite a while to understand some of these things.
::Even though I already knew I was neurodivergent, I didn't really understand what was happening in my brain or how these exercises were formed, how they should feel, how they should work in a brain until I got to a certain point in my improv.
::So this might be particularly useful if you're newer to improv or newer to some elements of some of these parts of improv, or it might just be my experience that is different to yours and it might help you later on.
::Or not at all.
::I don't know.
::Maybe it'll just make you feel not alone.
::I really don't know.
::I would love to hear.
::So please leave a comment.
::Let me know.
::Send me an email and let me know, of course, what you want to hear about.
::You know, one part of neurodivergence is called masking.
::And that's where we just kind of chameleon in to the neurotypical population.
::We're sneaky like that.
::We are good at acting.
::We are good at mimicking voices.
::We are very good at fitting in, especially people who are assigned female at birth.
::Because we have been socialized as women to fit in.
::Did you know I was autistic?
::Or did I just chameleon myself in to your community?
::Well, if not, now you do.
::Bye for now.
