Gareth Snaith, Neurodiversity Coach

Gareth Snaith is one of our Neurodivergent coaches at 3SC. Here he reflects on the personal connection between neurodivergence and the self.

One of the most powerful truths I’ve come to understand through my work and lived experience is this: every individual experience is crucial, unique, and valid. Your perspective and everyone else’s matters. And, in the Neurodivergent community, those perspectives are often beautifully nuanced, deeply personal, and often hard to define within the bounds of neat language.

I’m an Autistic ADHDer or AUDHD, and over time, I’ve come to understand my relationship with my Neurodivergence in a particular way. For me, I live with my neurodivergence. I don’t see it as my identity in full, for me it is something that exists within my brain, but not as the whole, sum total of who I am.

My ‘self’ feels like something separate. It can’t be reduced to simple biology or the physical workings of my mind on a biological level. The Neurodivergence may be a product of my brain, but I believe the ‘self’; my essence, consciousness, Atma or soul, if you like, exists beyond just the basic, material biological world.

Yes, it’s a little philosophical, even spiritual or existential. But for me, separating the self from the condition helps create space. Space to acknowledge that I’m not defined only by a diagnostic label, and that it’s okay to think about Neurodivergence in a way that includes meaning, mystery, and subjectivity. It’s not ableist to hold spiritual or non-material views of identity, it’s just another way of relating to experience.

In coaching conversations, I often bring this up gently and invite others to reflect. The responses are always fascinating. Some say they are their neurodivergence. Others say they live with it. Some describe suffering from it. Others can’t quite find the words for how they relate to it at all. Each expression is valid. Every conversation brings a new insight.

I don’t claim to have all the answers. I simply love the awkward, wonderful nuance that comes with being human; Neurodivergent or otherwise. Identity, selfhood, and experience are all complex, organic, and imperfect. That’s what makes these reflections, and our community, so rich.