INDEPENDENCE VS. AUTONOMY
INDEPENDENCE – AN IMPOSSIBLE GOAL
Independence is the ability to live your life without being helped or influenced by other people.
Pursuing independence is a goal agreed upon universally by our society. Parents set it as a goal for their children. Teachers set it as a goal for their students. Employers set it as a goal for their employees. Friends and family set it as a goal for each other.
But it’s an impossible goal for anyone to achieve!
Nobody is truly independent in our society. We just don’t like to admit it.
We have to buy our food, drink, clothes, and all kinds of other items of necessity from shops. We have to get our housing either built or provided to rent by other people. We have to buy our water, heating, and electricity from utility companies. We have to get our education in school, delivered by teachers. We have to get our healthcare from professionals, largely dependent on insurance companies.
And so on and so forth. We are all somehow dependent on other people.
So when people talk about being independent in our society they really mean a toned-down version:
The ability to work and manage one’s own dependency on other people on your own with the money you earn.
And society sets this as the goal for every human being who gets born into it the moment they are born. Maybe even before that. Regardless of our individual circumstances, independence is always upheld as the highest goal. Even if reaching it will forever be impossible.
WHY SETTING INDEPENDENCE AS THE HIGHEST GOAL IS A PROBLEM
Don’t get me wrong – striving for independence isn’t inherently harmful. But it can be when pushing for independence when it is impossible to achieve or harmful to pursue.
All human beings are individuals. That means we all have an individual set of skills, abilities, needs, and difficulties. And that individuality influences the level of independence possible to healthily achieve for each of us in all the different areas of life.
Working and living independently are just not achievable goals for many of us. I am autistic, disabled, physically and mentally ill. I simply cannot achieve the same level of independence in the same areas of life as a person who is abled and healthy.
Striving for independence while it is factually unachievable leads to a multitude of negative consequences. Pressure, stress, exhaustion, anxiety, illness, frustration, low self-esteem, depression, even suicide. That. Must. Stop.
Forced pushing for unachievable independence locks people in this negative state indefinitely while they could break free and go a more positive path. Don’t continue to push for independence when it’s harmful to do so. Instead focus on a much more achievable and healthier goal: autonomy!
AUTONOMY – A BETTER GOAL
Autonomy is the ability to make your own informed un-coerced decisions.
Autonomy can often be achieved in cases where independence can’t. It is also a much healthier goal because it takes into account all our individual skills, abilities, needs, and difficulties.
Whenever confronted with a case of a struggle for independence, ask yourself:
Does independence really need to be achieved for this? Is it even possible? Is it worth it to keep trying? Is it harmful to keep pushing? Is there a better, easier, healthier way to achieve whatever I am trying to achieve?
Choosing autonomy over independence is often a question of preventing harm and preserving energy. Those are things we should strive for. For ourselves and for others.
You can read about why and how I personally swapped unachievable independence for achievable autonomy HERE.
This is such an important post, thank you for writing it! I’ve written about my own journey of having independence imposed upon me here: http://www.anaccessiblelife.com/rejected-needs-and-societal-structures. I also write about how to move forward in other posts. It seems like we’re on similar journeys. I really liked your distinction between autonomy and independence, I hadn’t thought about that before, but it’s an important one. Especially as enforcing independence can sometimes mean a lack of autonomy. I will definitely read more of your posts. Wishing you well!
Thank you for reading and taking the time to respond! I read your post as well and liked it very much – you are right it seems we are on similar journeys! Glad to see others are finding their path, too :)
Very excellent article describing exactly what I have been see as my son has grown up. I have a son who in his mid-twenties and has autism spectrum disorder.
I think what you wrote about pushing the independence goal resulting in the person being in a constant negative state striving and failing to meet the impossible is completely true.
And it is completely true that no one is ever independent. We are all interdependent and that is completely different from dependence. Interdependence is being connected in a way that is positive for all. The people in my son’s life including me who provide supports as necessary also receive supports back from my son in different ways. Everyone contributes in their own way…so all of us together have lives that are so much better than living independent of each other. Our lives are so much better all of us going through life together.
I like the way you talk about autonomy because that is achievable and so positive in the context of personally chosen supports and environments that work for the person with autism–not pushed on them. Then that person can make the most un-coerced decisions. They can have a life on their terms in a way that works for them preventing harm and preserving energy as you say which are so important as much as possible.
That’s what my son and all his people work on together–building an interdependent community at home, at work, within a schedule that works for him, in a way that he can control as much as possible. This helps him to have a life that he views as doable, successful in the way he considers successful and worthwhile and to be able to take care of himself in the way that he needs.
Thank you for writing this! Like you, I am also very tired of the words like independence that make for feelings of hopelessness when all of us live a life of interdependence that helps each of us achieve autonomy and life a more calm life with better health and more happiness.
Thank you for your kind words. And thank you for accepting your son the way he is and supporting him in achieving autonomy and happiness!