My stages of learning to be a socially normal person

No, that's not at all how any of this works. People who don't have ASD aren't on the autism spectrum because the spectrum isn't an intensity meter where one end is neurotypical and the other end is non-verbally autistic with 24/7 support requirements.

It's called a spectrum disorder because every autistic person experiences different divergences/impairments to varying degrees of severity. Some people can have intense sensory issues but socially pass as neurotypical, others can have minimal sensory issues but really severe social issues.

The DSM used to exclude people who were clearly autistic but didn't align with any of the rigid definitions that were captured in the DSM as distinct diagnosis, that's why it was eventually recognized as a spectrum disorder.

I don't feel the need to build rapport or have close relations with all people. Either we genuinely click or we don't and it's fine for me anyway.

I trust myself enough and I don't crave the approval of others, I don't crave affection.

That being said, for work, in professional circles, with some aquitances, etc. I need to build good rapport and build trust fast, to the point that we build a good relation but not to the point we are friends. And it seems quite easy: be a good listener, echo their opinions, voice their unspoken concerns, summarize their opinions, be appreciative, repeat some key words from what they are saying, be appreciative, don't be judgemental, be genuinely friendly, tell jokes, look them in the eyes, smile, mind your body language and a few others.

When coming in a new workplace, there are people who still didn't integrate well or get along with other people well, even if they work ed there for a few years. There are people that need years to build a relationship with others. But for me, in a few months more people see me like I worked there since ages. I just signal to people that their ideas are mine, too, that we are very much alike.

People are set up to trust other people because that is the easiest way and takes the least effort. If you help them trust you and like you, they will.

And that is part of the problem, because the underlying reason why people connect when you do the mentioned things is that these are usually signs that you are in fact an empathic person, that can put themselves in their shoes and thus care to some degree about how things will pan out for them, meaning they may think they can open up to you, etc. This is in a stark contrast with the phrasing of "playing their game" that frames this type of behavior as a superfluous, silly endavour, when in fact it might be the polar opposite:

In a society of social apes (humans) one of the biggest danger to your and your kins life, bodily autonomy, freedom has historically always been other humans. Meaning that judging the intentions of others is not some silly game, but a survival mechanism of existential importance. And not only that, many people derive a lot of ehat makes their lifes worth living from these feelings of mutual understanding and empathy.

So to most empathic people the idea that a seemingly empathic person could feel nothing at all underneath and potentially sell them down the river is something tingling a gutural fear. Many media depiction of evil serial killers will play on that exact fear (among others).

Master conmen, manipulators, cult leaders (so generally horrible people) are all good at understanding the internal processes (thoughts and feelings) of their victims. This understanding is also essential for true empathy, the way it is applied is very different. If a hacker finds a weak point in a system they can exploit it for their own gain, or they can deal with it in a way benifiting all. The skill of understanding the internals is one thing, the skill of understanding what these internals mean and what are the right actions to derive from that knowledge is something else entirely.

That being said, I think the personal journey the author is on is certainly one that may benefit both them and the people around them. I can just imagine how hard parsing all the complexity of human behavior must be if you can't feel it yourself. This is already hard for people who can, as countless cultural artifacts from all of humanities history proof.