I am 45 years old at the time of this writing.

I have autism of the kind formerly known as

Asperger's syndrome, and am in many ways the opposite of a psychopath, because I
have always felt and cared about people too intensely and too deeply, despite having
trouble reading them. But my social isolation and the endless litany of rejections and
misunderstandings I have incurred over the course of my lifetime have given me a
cynical and nihilistic worldview. Today I posted the following essay on the website Quora
in response to someone's question, “How do I become a sociopath, or learn to think like
one?”:

THE SOCIOPATH'S MANTRA

​By Daniel Szyper
3/25/2018

MY RESPONSE TO A QUESTION ON QUORA: “HOW DO I BECOME A SOCIOPATH, OR

LEARN TO THINK LIKE ONE?”

If the reason you want to be like a sociopath is just because you don't want to be taken
advantage of by people, or because you've been tortured by feelings of guilt and shame planted
in you by parents, people, and society, try adopting one of the following phrases as your mantra:

“LIKE I FUCKING CARE”

or

“LIKE I GIVE A FUCK”

Repeat either or both of these mantras all day long, either out loud, under your breath, or
silently in your head, until they start to loop permanently in your inner mental soundtrack.

I came up with these mantras less than a week ago, and already I feel much less need for
others' praise, acceptance or validation. After spending the last 40 of my 45 years in this world
suffering unbearable guilt and shame inflicted upon me as a result of my autism, I could take it
no more, and I hit upon this negative affirmation strategy.

At first when I started repeating ​“LIKE I FUCKING CARE”,​ I knew I was lying to myself,
because I've always cared too much about what other people think of me. But I figured, why not
just keep repeating this lie for a while and see what happens? After all, didn't a psychopath by
the name of Adolf Hitler once say that if you repeat a lie enough times, it becomes the truth?
Well, after several days of repeating this mantra (mostly silently in my head or under my breath),
I am really starting to find I am caring less about what other people think of me, or whether they
validate me or not. I am starting to believe my own lie, to the point that it is changing my
thinking, and what was at first a lie is now becoming my reality.

My goal is to achieve a cultivated indifference towards people who might reject, hurt, abandon,
manipulate, or take advantage of me. My goal is also freedom from a lifetime of accumulated
guilt and shame. And to create a state of interpersonal equanimity and a clinical detachment
from my emotions. The less you tell yourself you care about people or what they think of you,
the less they can control you, whether with guilt, with shame, with false promises, or by taking
advantage of your kindness. All of this has been done to me, repeatedly, all my life. So I
decided I wasn't going to take it anymore, and I started repeating this mantra. And it's working
like a charm.

Remember, the less a man cares about, the harder he is to control. A man who chooses to be a
loner, who cares nothing about validation, praise, acceptance, attention, sympathy, belonging,
love, intimacy, affection, friendship, relationships, sex, power, status, material possessions,
social norms, identity politics, Morality, Community, Country, Faith, lofty principles like
“Compassion” or “Justice", or attachments of any kind--such a man is very hard to control. And
the fewer things you care about, the less often you'll be disappointed. Be as indifferent as
possible to as many things as possible, and you will have mastered your mind. Master your
mind and you will have mastered your emotions, rather than being a slave to them. Refer to the
ancient Greek philosophy of Cynicism and its legendary founder Diogenes for inspiration.
Google them, and look them up on Wikipedia and YouTube.

So, repeat the phrase ​“LIKE I FUCKING CARE”​ or ​“LIKE I GIVE A FUCK”​ all day, every day,
at least in your head, and eventually you may find yourself not giving a fuck what other people
think of you. Pare your emotional needs down to those of a reptile, that cares about nothing
beyond its own survival. You may not end up being a sociopath, but you'll be a lot calmer for it.
And give up any attachment to thinking of yourself as a “Good Person”, because as long as you
are attached to that image of yourself, people may take advantage of it. And every time people’s
treatment of you falls short of what you feel you deserve, you will be disappointed.

Stop giving a fuck about injustice too, no matter how many injustices you may have suffered in
your life. Nature is not just. In nature there are predators and prey and parasites, and humans
are just a part of Nature, not above it. Leave fixing the world's problems and making it a “Better
Place” to other people. Focus on your own survival instead. Life is not a game. Life is War. That
was my advice to myself a week ago, and now it is my advice to you.

Not Giving A Fuck​ may be one of the hardest lessons you or I will ever learn. Well I am
learning it now. And it's about time. Why? Because it hurts too much to feel. And even more to
care.