 Merry Christmas! Ho ho ho ho ho! Welcome back to the Ask Birders Grove Christmas special. The special news is I've got baubles in my beard and I know they're making noise so I'm going to take them out now. I hurt them more than I expected. Be some moisturizer. Mmm, there's that one on there. Let's leave him there. Just re-centering a little bit. There we go. So, I'm always at a bit of a kerfuffle when it comes to doing subscriber specials for milestones and doing anything related to holidays or any significant event. So when it came to Christmas, you know what I just thought? I thought I'm not gonna go too full out on the whole thingy. And I'm just gonna chat to you guys about the year. The year that we have had and the year that is to come. And also to bring light to something that I believe is very important. And that is not everybody has a fun time at Christmas. I know they don't. For a lot of people, Christmas can be a really horrible time of year. There's a lot of goddamn suicide attempts at Christmas and a lot of those people succeed. There's a lot of loneliness and mourning and if you've lost anyone throughout the year when it comes to Christmas and they use you around at Christmas, it's not great. But before we talk about those very important things, I just want to say thank you. And this is an actual genuine sincere thank you. Not a sarcastic to me thank you that you're also used to. There has been times in my life, I mean to be honest, the majority of the time in my life where I did not enjoy living at all. I never really felt like I had a purpose other than just living and living in constant depression and anxiety. And coming onto YouTube, it sort of started as something where I could just get my thoughts and emotions out there and hopefully receive some positive uplifting comments about it. But nowadays it has actually become something that I'm very passionate about. And it's done a lot more to shape who I am than I have really let you guys on. There's been so many times where my YouTube success as I6, I think nearly 2000 subscribers for me that feels like a lot. I know that there are some bigger channels out there and you know that they sort of dwarf my channel in comparison. But just thinking about just how many people have actively wanted to press a subscribe button so they could listen to more of me. It's just amazing. It really is. It really, really is. It's not always been easy, easy. It's sometimes it can be stressful because I've put a lot of pressure on myself to put out videos alongside the other stuff that I've been doing. And but in general, I've received so much positivity from making this channel and so much positivity from you guys. You have helped me open doors for my career paths. You've made, you've helped me, you know, pave the, I'm going to use a path analogy again, pave the path towards trying to solve this terrible way that our society treats autistics and treats autism as a thing. And I couldn't do it without you. I literally couldn't do it without you. There are some really exciting things that are coming up over the course of, you know, the next few months. I've had a lot of interest from different companies who want to to me to go along and or me to try their products. And it's, you know, I've been asked to go on to this radio show by this lady called Anna Kennedy. And I honestly, I didn't really know who Anna Kennedy was at the time, but I sort of got an email and said, oh, do you want to come up and shoot a radio show in Covent Garden in London? So I was like, ooh, Covent Garden in London. That sounds proper. So I chatted to my lovely mother and she told me that Anna Kennedy is quite a big thing in terms of the world of autism. She set up some special needs schools. She's been a successful author. She's done a lot. I mean, she's an OBE. And to think that I am getting contacted by people like that blows my mind. It really, it really does blow my mind. It's amazing what we can do as a community coming together. Although it is me speaking on camera and it is me putting out the videos without the support of everybody on there and not even just the numbers that the stats and the views and the subscribe accounts, but the comments. Just getting those comments, although, you know, sometimes it can be negative, getting those positive comments that mean a lot and have a lot of wording and power and emotion in them really makes me want to make more videos. And it really, it makes me feel like I'm doing good. And I do feel like I'm doing good and I want to make good. So it makes me very, very happy, very happy. I don't know why I'm going off somber and stuff. I'm trying not to tear up. Okay, okay. Let's bring back some humor into deflect them tears. No tears, not today. Not today, Anna. Sunday afternoon. It's not Sunday, it's Monday. And it's not the afternoon. It's the evening. As some of you may know, I have been going through a difficult time post uni and during uni. There's some things in my personal life that I don't, you know, want to talk about. Although I would love to, I feel like some things need to be personal. But there have been a lot of difficult things that I've had to deal with over the course of, you know, the past three or four months. Not just mental health wise, you know, usually it would be just mental health and declining and stuff. But actually, things have been happening. And it's kind of hit me very hard and took a lot of energy and breath out of me. So it's, it's been difficult. But I'm hoping that coming the next, next new year, I'll be able to be more consistent and actually give you an upload schedule so that you know when my videos come out. So you don't think, Oh no, where's his videos? And oh no, there's too many videos in the short space of time. I can't watch over those. I'm going to have to put them in my saved file. Well, I'll try and try and ease that pain with my actions. Again, not being sarcastic. Everything that comes out of my mouth to me sounds like I'm being sarcastic. Why, why is that? I don't know. Who knows? Let me know in the comments so I can change it. So that's all the, the teary emotional thank you part of the video out of the way. Again, you guys are amazing. From my heart, you've helped me so much personally, emotionally, work related wise, spiritually. You really have. So I don't know how, how else I can say it, but thank you. You. Thank you for being a part of my channel. The reason why I'm including this part of the video is that I know that all of the, you know, festivities and good, good feelings and good moves and getting presents is all great. And for a look for, you know, for a good proportion of people, yeah, it is. Sure, it can be a little bit stressful, but it's worth the effort and people have a good time. Not everybody has the, not everybody has a family. Not everybody has lots of friends. Specifically when talking about autistic people, we are one of the most socially isolated, depressed, anxious, suicidal group on the planet. That's disregarding all the other stuff about alienation and bullying. And for many people on the autistic spectrum, Christmas is not great. It's not fun and full of Santa Clauses and Rudolphs and Christmas lights, decorations and beard baubles. And sometimes Christmas can be, can even be bad and horrible. And there is someone in my life that, when I'm, you know, that sort of sparked off the idea of talking about this and it's, it's really opened my eyes to what Christmas can be like for people. If you don't have good relationships with your family or you don't have your family and all of your Christmas, Christmas is when you were younger, were not great and they were full of difficult scenarios and they were just another one of those things where maybe your parents got really drunk and did something questionable. Christmas can, can be bad because sometimes people expect too much of other people. Some families have a lot of money or some, some families get by and they can buy lots of presents and they can give them to their children and they can be happy and they can put them on Facebook and they can show everybody just how much they care for their children for buying presents and all that blah blah blah blah. And yeah, giving gifts is, is great and it's, it's wonderful and it's nice and it's thoughtful but it's not all about buying the most expensive, great, amazing, fun gift. Sometimes it's just about having enough money to get you, get your family together or having, making enough of an effort to get your family together and have fun and connect with each other and talk to each other. We, we always put a lot of pressure on ourselves to make our Christmas the best but by trying to make it the best and buying all these things and plastering everything everywhere, sometimes you can, it can detract from the real meaning behind holidays, which is giving people an excuse to get off work and have fun and talk to each other. Obviously my views can be very different to other people's, some people obviously just like the presents and they don't want to spend any time with their family, could be like that but I think that that is the reason for Christmas. I think that Christmas does not have to be just confined to your family, Christmas is for giving and showing other human beings affection. It doesn't mean just your family or your friends or your spouse or your girlfriend or boyfriend or your niece, it's about doing kind things for people, whether it be for the homeless, you don't have to do anything extravagant, maybe make a shoebox, put some stuff in it, put some Christmas stuff in it if you want, put some food in there, put some washing up supplies. Those kind of things can be amazing for people who don't have the ability to make expenses for them for that stuff. That could be one of the examples of giving. Another could be seeing someone or talking to someone who is loosely connected to the family, who doesn't specifically have a lot of people, a lot of kind people in their life. Someone who doesn't have anyone to go and be festive with and be happy and loving and kind with. Let them be a part of your festivities, let them feel the Christmas giving spirit. It all sounds very sappy and you know at heart I'm not particularly comfortable with displaying emotion like this and sometimes well especially nowadays I feel like it makes me weak to bring up stuff like this but you know in my heart I do honestly believe that we all need to include other people in our lives even just for a holiday. If you know anybody who suffers with depression or is suffering with a loss or is particularly lonesome and vulnerable at a certain time of year especially Christmas consider trying to do a little thing just to bring a little bit of smile and a little bit of want for them into their life. I feel like just those little acts those little important meaningful acts can do a lot for people and if you're out there watching this and you feel like any of that has resonated with you all I want to say to you is Merry Christmas. I am so glad that you're watching this video and I want you around. My heart goes out to you and I want you to honestly say from the bottom of my heart that the best thing that you can do is to start giving to other people. Sometimes the only way to get out of a hole is to make other people feel good. It's not like a quick little hit of dopamine it doesn't lift you up and make you spike up but it gives you something to be proud of and it gives you happiness to know that you have affected someone's life in a positive way. Just go out there. Don't feel like you're surrounded by all these expectations of making Christmas amazing or great. If it's not great don't beat yourself up about it because there are a lot of people out there who feel exactly the same as you despite all these Christmas adverts despite all these songs and advertisements on Spotify that drive me out the bloody wall despite all that you don't need to do anything. Things that are positive and nice but when you're not feeling it and you don't feel a part of anything aren't great. You don't need to feel pressured to make it great. Just do something that you enjoy. Help others as much as you can. If you can't then it's okay. Try reach out to people even if it's just saying Merry Christmas. Just reach out to those people who you feel the most compassion for like if you really want if you want to. You can always reach out to me and I always feel a bit tentative about this because I feel like I'm promoting myself but I'm not. If you want to message me and chat about something over Christmas I probably won't be uploading that much from now to new years and from this when this video comes out but yeah just send me a message and I will reply to you and I wish you a Merry Christmas in person. A personalized Tommy message that's true. Okay okay emotional stuff pushing pushing away. Getting into Zen mode because there is a very important announcement to make right now for you guys. I have in this bag a present from Santa. No no a present from the gods. Let me show you what's in my bag. What has the gods sent me this Christmas? What do we have here? I'll tell you who we have here. Everybody meet Felicia. Felicia is a microscopic tardigrad. A specimen able to survive for I think off the top of my head around eight years in the vacuum of space or in extreme environmental conditions and she is magnificent. Just look at her that's why she's called Felicia. Felicia will be joining me on the channel for the foreseeable future just because I love her so much. Hi Felicia. She's great. I love her so much. Got her from Amsterdam on my holidays. If you want to see some more of my holiday fun go check out my Instagram. You know where it is. It's at the top of my page. Click on it. Click on that button if you if you want to of course. Felicia I don't know how to put you Felicia so I'm just gonna put you up here. There you go Felicia. She's covered by me. Okay Felicia. Okay let's put you somewhere Felicia. Felicia can go in my head. This will make a great thumbnail for the video. Felicia now she's still out the frame. Felicia you can go here. I'm sorry Felicia. It's always weird doing these summary videos. I always I don't want to cut it down too much but I also want to leave in a lot of it which is the same thing but I don't want to make it too long because then nobody's gonna click on it and Felicia will be happy about that. Won't you Felicia? That's enough for you. As I said thank you guys so much for being a part of my channel. If you do want me to do something special for my 2000 subscriber milestone and there is something specific make sure to go over to my Facebook page where I'll be putting a poll very very far ahead of time very unlike Thomas on what video you would like me to do and you can just give me suggestions and I will pick the best one the one that people have found most popular and also the one that isn't too extravagant and impossible for me to do at this moment and and we'll do one of those. As always check out those social medias down there. I've got the 40-odd podcast which I will be doing a new year special. I know it's been a long time since I uploaded a new podcast episode but I've been so busy. So please be patient and please be impatient for the next episode of the 40-odd podcast. That was terrible. It's terrible. I'm leaving in the stuff so you can see how much pain goes into me talking to a camera. It's quite tragic. Thank you so much people. I wish you a new Merry Christmas. I hope you're doing good. As I said, message me if you need anything. I mean not anything but message me a letter. Message me if you want to talk. I'll be here for you in these festive times as much as I can. You guys are awesome. I just want to say from everybody at Asperger's Growth which is just me. Merry Christmas. Feliz Navidad. Feliz Navidad.