How to Make People Feel Heard and Seen

Amazing article , I like this paragraph in particular
http://www.decipher-morgan.com/2014/10/what-its-like.html

"Morgan took a deep breath, pondered this question some, and then said, haltingly, "People think I don't listen, but I do. Teacher always says, 'Pay attention, sweet boy!' but I am paying attention. It's hard. I pay attention to everything, all at the same time. I can't pay attention to just one thing... I can't always use my words."

This is how  I feel much of the time. There is so much coming at me. I can't DO half the things I want to do because I can't focus on the right things long enough. But I get a lot out of what I do focus on. At the grocery store last night I saw a woman had a notebook with a list on the conveyor belt, on beautiful rainbow paper and the most beautiful handwriting. I commented on how beautiful the paper and handwriting were to her. I noticed she said "For Speech Tx room" and knew that must mean speech therapy, so asked her if she was a speech therapist. She said she was. We got into a conversation on autism, in 5 minutes with a random stranger because I noticed her handwriting. As she left she said "Thank you so much for complimenting my handwriting" in a really genuine emotion tone of voice. So maybe, sometimes having too much attention to detail can make people feel heard and seen. That's not a bad thing.

Another night at the same store, a woman was having a seizure of some sort out front in the parking lot. People gathered around to see if they could help. I forget the details now, but it ended in me having a conversation with one of the employees there about autism, and learning about a possible place where I might be able to volunteer with people with disabilities because her son has autism and goes there. Being aware of what's going on around you... sometimes it pays.