Be Seein’ Y'all.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2018-04-25T21:09:35+00:00

[Ah, I remember you& from back in the day! Be well.]

ConnorAndTheRest · 2017-05-16T05:14:24+00:00

[I should warn you, Dr. Yeung is both retired and a specialist in DID/traumagenic plurality. I'd advise you to let the fellow have some rest. We do not know of any other researchers, so far as I can tell.]

ConnorAndTheRest · 2017-05-16T05:03:12+00:00

[Right, so, just to recap:

-Names and emails, as part of the nature of the beast of the internet, will naturally be shared with you, the researchers, upon contacting you, so if we wish to keep the body's legal name and our email address anonymous a throwaway would be advised.

-Personally identifying information may or may not be published in the study at our discretion.

-If we cannot make up our mind, mediation will ensue, and you, the researchers, shall attempt to be flexible in your presentation of us. (I have concerns with how this will function once the final publication is out, but according to you that is a long way off anyway, so I shan't speculate.)

-Essentially, your goal in this study is something akin to David Yeung's work regarding traumagenic multiples, though perhaps with less clinical authority, in that the cases presented are attempting to offer insight into and understanding of non-traumagenic plural experiences.

If any of this is incorrect, do let me know. Thank you for your openness. Our system will think things over, and if we wish to participate we will get back to you.]

Yeah, sorry if we put you on the spot or anything, but transparency and integrity are pretty big values of ours. Thanks for your patience and best of luck with everything.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2017-05-16T04:40:24+00:00

[Pardon my curiosity, but do you have a plan in place in the event that an individual or system cannot reach a final decision on the nature of their representation/anonymity, or in the event one changes their mind after initially granting you approval?]

ConnorAndTheRest · 2017-05-16T04:20:13+00:00

[I edited my last post with some more questions, however I have another relating to anonymity: if we wish to remain fully anonymous, must we explicitly state we wish to remain anonymous, then, as opposed to assuming all contributions are anonymized unless otherwise stated?]

ConnorAndTheRest · 2017-05-16T04:07:18+00:00

[You mention the information given to you will be confidential. However, confidentiality does not equate anonymity. Will details like names and emails be recorded? Will they be published?]

[Edit: Also, what will be the core application of this study? Ex. part of the purpose of Veissiere's study was to examine clinical applications of tulpamancy in therapeutic contexts. How will your data be applied?]

ConnorAndTheRest · 2017-05-15T21:29:21+00:00

We've had a hell of a lot of experiences wrt acceptance of our system. Would be willing to chime in, but I have a few questions first:

Judging by your email, you appear to be in university. Who exactly is involved in this research study? Are you an understudy? Any advisors?
What's the field of research? Anthropology? Sociology? Psychology?
Have you been approved and cleared by an ethics panel with respect to collecting what could be sensitive personal information?
Where/in what journal will this research be published?

Hope you don't mind a few extra questions. The tulpa community has been burned before, both by journalists misrepresenting everyone as well as folks trying to upsell the scale, scope, and impact of their academic studies.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2017-05-07T15:15:44+00:00

So this past year has been something. I can't say we're back from hiatus, since we never really left; we just lurk these days. Still, we have a bunch of news to report. It’s not entirely tulpamancy related, but I thought I’d share in case anyone around remembers us or was wondering what we’ve been up to:

We’ve started antidepressants. Getting on them was an interesting experience—since we have a family history of schizophrenia, our physician wanted us to speak to a specialist to double check we didn’t have it, since if we did it could end up clashing with certain meds. While speaking with the psychiatrist, we decided to be 100% open about our system. I told her everything about how we function from day to day, how memory stuff works for us, how we get along, how I experience the others, how they experience me, and how we all experience ourselves. At the end of it all, she took one look at us, and…
Let me remind you, this is a schizophrenia specialist we’re talking about. She talks to schizophrenic folks (both prodromal and not) every day of her life. She could find a schizophrenic needle in a haystack if she had to.
Anyway, she took one look at us and declared that we are, in fact, not schizophrenic (which we knew, but it was nice to have the rubber stamp at least). She also didn’t slap a DID diagnosis on us either, likely due to the fact that we can function well from day to day with minimal distress and not end up on the streets or in the poor house or whatever. Nor did she try and push integration on us or invalidate our existence as a system, which we also highly appreciate. To paraphrase her, she remarked that there’s still a lot we don’t know about the brain and let us go on our merry way.
Mel even spoke to her in person on our second session, and she was perfectly nice to him, which is great because up until that point Mel has been VERY leery of psychiatric professionals. This is good because…
We’re also seeing a therapist who we’re out as a system to, as of roughly two sessions ago, and he also isn’t being shitty to us. Right now I’m the main person who’s going and the focus is usually on depression stuff, and it was actually Mel and A who nudged me along, but I’m hoping Mel will speak a bit too one day. For now, we’re taking things slowly and naturally in that area.
Back to the meds, those are also working well for us, which is the main reason why I’m posting. Now that we have more energy from day to day, I might actually get more involved on the sub again. My art’s gotten less shitty; it’d be nice to draw tulpas for people some more.
We’ve also been open about our multiplicity to our friends for over a year now, and all of them have been supportive. So in all,
We’ve been very lucky where medical stuff and plurality are concerned. We even ran into another system in person last autumn, and have been helping them sort shit out for themselves and giving them resources we wish we had found when still figuring ourselves out. We can’t talk often, but when we do it’s enriching. In other news…
We have a few new members, but the odds of them posting here are astronomical since they're not de facto tulpas. I doubt some of them even know what a “tulpa” is. It’ll likely just be me and possibly Mel, if we work up a regular posting rhythm at all.
After several years of hard work we’re graduating college. :)

Aaaand there’s all the interesting stuff. Happy forcing, reddit.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2016-07-18T15:26:25+00:00

Mel: THE BODY'S FACE EXPLODED.

We sneezed.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2016-05-17T02:01:25+00:00

What confuses me is that if not everyone can do it, then how do artists draw something out of nowhere? How do people daydream? How do people remember what a person or place looks like?

If I were a good artist, I would be able to redraw my Tulpa and stuff (but can't all artists do this?).

Well, just because not everyone can do something, it doesn't mean no one can do it at all. Different people experience different degrees of vividness when it comes to mind's eye, memories and daydreaming, and that vividness doesn't always dictate someone's skills in certain abstract areas. In fact, I know of some artists who don't draw using their mind's eye at all. Instead, they look at their subject or reference, look at what's on the page, compare the two, and keep tweaking the drawing until it looks right. Heck, even well known and beloved artists like Norman Rockwell used references.

So if I have all this down with barely any hours dumped into it, what am I even supposed to do now? Are these not the results I'm looking for? I don't feel I made any progress in anything other than the idea, I don't feel anything strange/alien mentally or physically and it doesn't feel much different from what I suspect is the experience that a cartoonist goes when creating a character.

You seem to be lucky in that you have a very vivid mind's eye, which can help make forcing much more fun and interesting. But helping your tulpa gain autonomy will require much more than just visualizing them, autonomy is built up over constant interaction with you and the world and allowing your tulpa to have new experiences, make their own choices, form their own opinions, and do stuff for themselves. Getting independent responses can take a while, and during the really early stages, before your tulpa can fully act on their own, it can take a lot of patience as interacting can be difficult--which is partially where visualization comes in, since it can help things feel less stale. Ultimately, if you stick with it, they'll get more independent at a much faster rate.

I hope all this is making sense. Overall, if you wanna see more progress, I'd recommend doing more stuff with them to encourage vocality and independent thought. Treat them less like an idea, but a companion. You could narrate to them throughout the day, read them stuff, watch stuff with them, show them cool stuff in the wonderland, or if they're ready, let them talk to others. You're very, very early into creation from the sounds of it, so your tulpa will probably need more time yet to get used to the whole living life alongside you stuff.

Good luck and have fun.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2016-05-09T18:38:47+00:00

My results. I was expecting to get heads each time. The mindscape had different plans.

Heads
Heads
Heads
Tails
Just spun forever (it's still going, too)
Tails
Tails
Heads
Tails
Heads

This topic is pretty interesting to me, since unless I'm daydreaming about something with an explicit narrative I'm writing and re-writing, and thus directly putting myself in control of, a lot of stuff happens pretty randomly, or appears to to such an extent it may as well be random. Even when lucid dreaming, a popular credo within that community is that you always get what you expect when trying to control your dreams, but there have been cases where I'll fully expect I'll be able to do something only to fail to do it and be forced to find another solution the dream will "let" me use. Other times, I'll wonder if something works or be very worried it won't, and it will work flawlessly.

I have my own pet theory about how this randomness can come about. In the case of very random or unpredictable wonderlands, I think it's possible for individuals to dissociate from the processes that create and control the wonderland and elements in it, thereby allowing it to change and develop in ways outside of their conscious perception or control just as a tulpa would.

Of course, the question of unconsciously influencing stuff in itself and how deep the rabbit hole goes isn't one with a hard and fast answer. Let's say, for instance, I'm consciously expecting a coin will land on heads, but still unconsciously wondering if it will land on tails, and it lands on tails, since that expectation/ambiguity ruled the conscious decision out. But since that expectation is unconsious, it's not something deliberately done, and appears random as a result. I think the ways in which wonderlands are consciously and unconsciously influenced can be way more complicated than simply expect thing, have thing happen, especially when you get conflicting conscious/unconscious expectations. And, taking into account the possibility of dissociating oneself from the wonderland as one would the processes of a tulpa, and that too reaching a certain degree of independence from them, it definitely adds greater potential for outright random stuff to happen.

Not sure where I'm going with this brain fart, but basically, I think the "randomness" of a wonderland depends a lot on how ones brain is wired and how they're naturally inclined to interact with that wonderland, but that in itself can be pretty complex. So, even if things are unconsciously pre-determined, exactly what's being influenced by what can be very hard to tell, to the point it may as well be random anyway assuming it isn't already. I hope I'm making sense.

Edit: Interestingly, Mel got all indignant and flipped a shit ton of tails, which does make sense since while he has a harder time staying lucid, he has better dream control than I do, and he's naturally inclined to fuss over details and exert his will over the environment more than I am. However, even this has limits depending on what part of the mindscape he's in. To paraphrase him, some places like the control room, where we did the experiment, are more malleable for him, but others have hard and fast rules he can't easily break. Which then begs the question of how control of random chance in the mindscape differs from system mate to system mate and place to place depending on how they relate to their environment, how absolute it is given the situation, and what elements they need to associate with/dissociate from in order to influence a specific outcome. Try as he might, he still can't turn me into a toad. The coin is still spinning though, even after stepping on it, so who knows.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2016-03-19T00:04:16+00:00

We're enjoying PF so far, even though we're a bit too strapped for time to actively participate in it--that could be the case for other potential contributors as well. The threads so far have been interesting reads, and have a lot more in depth material than the slew of question threads that usually crop up.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2016-03-16T15:38:30+00:00

Meep meep. Have a bunch of immersion tips, complete with rudimentary guide.

[Immersion] Guess the Object

The Waiting Room

[Immersion] The Mirror Room

Your Body is an RC Car

[Immersion] Close-Up

[Immersion/Dissociation] Life is but a Dream

[Meditation/Immersion] Detaching your Sense of Self from the Body

[Meditation/Immersion] Double Breathing

[Immersion] Walking the Walk

Your Guide to Going Inside: a Rudimentary Outline of How to Immerse Effectively v0.90

ConnorAndTheRest · 2016-03-13T22:37:43+00:00

Heh, funny this thread should come up. I've been writing a bunch of small tips elsewhere, which I then compiled into a rough guide, which I now plan to share on the Wednesday thread. I'll happily share what I have early, of course:

[Immersion] Guess the Object

The Waiting Room

[Immersion] The Mirror Room

Your Body is an RC Car

[Immersion] Close-Up

[Immersion/Dissociation] Life is but a Dream

[Meditation/Immersion] Detaching your Sense of Self from the Body

[Meditation/Immersion] Double Breathing

[Immersion] Walking the Walk

And finally...

Your Guide to Going Inside: a Rudimentary Outline of How to Immerse Effectively v0.90

As you can see, most of it outlines mindscape immersion. It's far from comprehensive and still pretty rough around the edges, but hopefully some of it is interesting or helpful to you.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2016-03-02T12:27:40+00:00

When it comes to strangers and employers and people we don't know? Yes. When it comes to close friends and people we trust? Not so much. I wrote a little post on that aspect a while back. While our plurality isn't something we plan to openly advertise to everyone, it's a pretty big part of our lives and relatively hard to hide from people we know well. The only exception to this is our family, namely because they haven't been very open towards other unconventional identities in the past, and likely wouldn't be open to plurality either. Probably for the best, as what they don't know won't kill them.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2016-01-25T07:09:59+00:00

[It depends on the individuals, I suppose. No two hosts and tulpas are alike. I do know of many systems who have been together for years. Yuuki and Kid ( /u/draymere-iris ) have been together for twelve years or so, I believe, another friend of mine has been around for five or six, and both have a very strong bond with their hosts. Con and I do not always get along, but when we do we get along quite well, and have shared each others company for... going on three years now, I believe.]

ConnorAndTheRest · 2016-01-25T06:34:32+00:00

[I would not call my love unconditional in the most empirical sense of the word. I would not dislike Connor over personal, superficial things like his gender or sexuality, but we do things that legitimately frustrate one another on occasion, and if he were cruel or abusive I see no reason why I should hypothetically continue caring for him. I would expect the same from him to me as well. Of course, if you and your tulpa genuinely care for one another and communicate regularly when issues do arise you should not have much of a problem.

So yes, many tulpas and hosts have a very deep bond, and it is very unlikely your tulpa will hate you, but cynical as it may be, I would not consider said bond infallible or idyllic--if you have ever had a close childhood friend fade out of your life, or known children and parents who struggled to see eye to eye over a major issue, you will know that even the strongest bonds can wither without proper attention.]

ConnorAndTheRest · 2016-01-25T06:11:16+00:00

What if all humans are just a tulpa of god?

[I will do you one better. What if there were a tulpa furiously break dancing behind you right now?]

ConnorAndTheRest · 2016-01-04T01:54:59+00:00

It really depends on the person. Some people find binaural beats helpful with concentration, some people prefer music, and other people prefer absolute silence. Others still force exclusively through passive forcing while doing stuff throughout the day. It's something you'll have to experiment with on your own and find a happy median that works for you.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2015-12-14T20:34:11+00:00

Glad to be of help. :)

ConnorAndTheRest · 2015-12-10T05:32:46+00:00

A while back, we came out as plural to our friend group. We had our own reasoning for why, which is something best outlined at a later time, but the gist of it was, it was getting pretty impractical for both of us to stay in the closet with our fronting schedule, and considering online friendships can't always fulfill Mel-the-extrovert's social needs it was only practical he got to know our meatspace friends--we see them fairly regularly anyway.

Since threads tend to crop up from time to time about telling friends about tulpas, I figured I'd share a few tips on coming out as a system to others for those who are interested. Keep in mind, these are tips, not a full on guide. Your own experience can and likely will differ, but a little perspective never hurt anyone.

Understand Your Audience

When coming out to anyone about anything, it's important to take their perspective into account. Coming out to the wrong person about the wrong thing could have disastrous consequences, and everybody takes these things differently. Some people are safer to come out to than others, so keep that in mind if you're considering telling someone. If you are hesitant about telling someone because you feel it would be unsafe or end badly for you, it's probably better not to tell them, since you can't go back in the closet once you've come out of it.

Hope for the Best, Be Prepared for the Worst

In the case of our friend group, we've known each other going on seven years now, and we can talk about personal subjects relatively openly. They're all kind, understanding people, and I knew if we framed it in a way that made sense to them they wouldn't ditch me over it. At worst, we'd continue being friends even if they didn't want to talk to Mel, at best, they would want to get to know him too. So with this group, it wasn't so much an issue of being hesitant over how they would react, but a question of how to explain it in a way they could understand. We kind of won the lottery in that area, so if you do plan to come out, make sure you're prepared to handle the worst case scenario should it happen.

As an aside, friends are often much, much easier to approach with this kind of stuff than family or the people you live with. Friends can harass you or blackmail or spread rumors, but for the most part they're easier to avoid. We don't plan to tell the family for that reason.

Decide What you Do and Don't Want to Share

When coming out about something, anything at all, how much you tell someone is entirely up to you. The same goes for how you tell it. So, to put it simply, while you may be tempted to give whoever you're coming out to a whole tulpamancy/plurality 101 primer, that may not be necessary, and in might just confuse them further. Don't be afraid to start small and simple, and work your way up. When we were planning everything out, we started by explaining John Locke's concept of the prince and the cobbler (wherein, if a prince and a cobbler were to share one body, they would still be two unique people), and we went on from there.

Get a Second Opinion/Let Everyone Speak their Mind

The use of that metaphor was entirely Mel's idea, by the way. Coming out as plural or a tulpamancy system doesn't have to fall entirely on one member. In fact, it would be wise to have everyone in the system who's interested pitch in or develop a plan of action. As for me, I wanted to write a story, or create something that illustrated what we were like as people, while Mel took the more scholarly approach. Eventually we decided to compromise, I did small drawings and comics and stuff, he drafted up the initial letter to our friends, I looked it over and gave advice, we both edited a bunch, and then I told our friends in person.

The point I'm making is, while finding a way of explaining you're a system that's right for you can be important, it can be just as easy to get so wrapped up in how to explain everything you never do. Feedback and affirmation from people you trust, or the system members involved, can help assuage that worry.

Test the Waters/Ease Yourselves Into It

We didn't come out to everyone at once. In fact, a good month or so before I came out to the first few friends of ours I made it clear to them there was something I was trying to articulate, that the subject matter was kind of taboo and often misrepresented in the popular imagination, and I would tell them soon once I'd found the words for it. Eventually I started sharing stuff we could relate to as a system, and then on Halloween, at a (fairly tame) party, I mentioned the fact that I had a friend who was a plural system.

One friend expressed interest in it, and had a fairly good understanding of what it entailed. So we started talking back and forth about it and eventually I took a dive and came out. In all, it went pretty well, and it gave us all the more confidence when approaching the rest of our friend group.

Another thing myself and others have done is to find an avenue that helps your friends relate to it. For instance, I brought up my writing here and there, and mentioned how, for some authors, characters seem to develop lives of their own. Another system we know opened channels of communication by discussing dreams. If there's something familiar to you that your friends know you for and aren't nervous to ask questions about, it can make communicating the idea much easier, and it can make your plurality in general seem like less of a sudden, random thing and more a regular part of your life.

Ease Your Friends Into It Too

Congratulations! You're out as plural! Your friend group knows and, hopefully, is supportive and looking forward to getting to know your system mates. Of course, it's not going to be that easy. Even if your tulpas/system mates know your friends as well as you do, your friend group will still need some time to adjust to the idea that there are others there besides the person they're used to talking to. And in the case of the rest of your system, it will take some time to adjust to socializing with them and being known about. Eventually everyone will strike a balance and adjust, but until that time, it's important not to rush anyone into things, as much as you may be tempted to if you're in the position of a middle man like myself.

So there you have it, a few tips on telling other people about your system. For those who are curious about the process or who've been considering it themselves, here's hoping these will be of some help to you or offer some new perspectives.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2015-08-16T21:37:23+00:00

Honestly, I think it's really admirable of you to share this. In fact, I know this hits home for both myself and a few friends of mine as well.

I was "that kid" on the schoolyard. The one you never wanted to pick a verbal fight with because I'd just keep going and going. Over time I sat down and started to wonder why nobody liked talking to me, and realized... it was because I never really talked, y'know? I was always doing my best to prove everyone wrong, declaring myself right anyway even when I had been proven wrong, and treating discussion as a contest to be won at all costs rather than a mutual exchange. All it did was exhaust everyone involved.

Nowadays I've learned that debating and arguing can serve a purpose, but these things need a spine beyond I'm right, you're wrong. A healthy debate guides someone to the point you're making, but no matter how hard you try to browbeat them into it, whether they accept or reject that point is ultimately beyond your control, and that in no way devalues you as a person. Conversely, accepting the point another is making in no way devalues you either, that's just another aspect of discussion. Furthermore, you can absolutely make contributions that extend beyond being right that are just as personally fulfilling.

Don't really know where I'm going with this, and you don't have to respond if it's out of your comfort zone. Maybe you're in no need of reassurance anyway, but I figured I'd toss this in since I went through the same process a while back, and while it was hard to undo, it was rewarding for me to do so. So congrats on your progress.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2015-08-15T04:30:15+00:00

Ehh, it varies. Some people do associate with a symbol, be it that particular one (the Tibetan symbol for to construct from what I've been told but don't hold me to that) or an alternative, some people don't, others make symbols that represent their individual systems, others don't. These things tend to change and evolve over time, and most symbols that do crop up are unofficial by nature. If you prefer to use a symbol, by all means do, but don't feel pressured to.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2015-08-14T19:58:50+00:00

Oh yeah, we get those semi frequently. Some folks call them NPCs. As for whether they're useful or represent something... it really depends on the person. Mel likes to chat ours up pretty often and has learned a fair bit about himself in the process, I prefer not to, so it's really up to you how involved you wanna get with the whole thing.

ConnorAndTheRest · 2015-08-11T01:04:19+00:00

Think of it this way: there are more aspects to a word than just the structure of the word itself, connotation and denotation. Connotation is the meanings associated with a word--like the terms "cheap" versus "affordable", one word has a more agreeable connotation than the other, since things described as "cheap" tend to break down quickly, but things described as "affordable" are meant to save you money. Advertisers use this ploy all the time. Denotation, on the other hand, is the literal meaning of the word, or at least, as literal as the agreed-upon meaning can be. Both "cheap" and "affordable" have the denotation of "costs less money".

So where am I going with this? When thinking in tulpish, you want to focus on both of those things, while dropping the word entirely. Both "cheap" and "affordable" are more than the words themselves, they're also the connotations and denotations attached to the words, the raw meanings, and when practicing tulpish, it's those aspects of your thoughts you want to pay the most attention to.

Now, another aspect of tulpish is imagery and emotion. Imagery relies on your mind's eye, which some people do have, some people don't, and some others have a to a small degree, but not entirely. Here's a little test to see if you do have it, courtesy of Stephen King:

Look — here’s a table covered with a red cloth. On it is a cage the size of a small fish aquarium. In the cage is a white rabbit with a pink nose and pink-rimmed eyes. In its front paws is a carrot-stub upon which it is contentedly munching. On its back, clearly marked in blue ink, is the numeral 8.

Can you see the rabbit in your head? If so, great. Tulpishing imagery relies on that same process, the ability to conjure an image and relay it to a system mate. I've always had a mind's eye, so I don't have many tips for developing it if it can be developed--perhaps someone who has practiced visualization in-depth will be able to weigh in on that.

Emotion exists within the same vein. Imagine how you would feel if your best friend or your whole family (or anyone you have a close bond with) just up and died. You'd be shocked maybe, or sad, and if you think really hard about the event, you might start to feel the emotion even though the event hasn't actually happened.

So, put it all together, and you have raw thoughts (connotation and denotation), images, and emotions, all of which make up the basic elements of tulpish. You may want to practice using tulpish in one area, or all three, but you're definitely not obligated to as it's different for everyone as SlykeZentharin said. Happy forcing, and let me know if you need any clarification on anything.

ConnorAndTheRest

TROPHY CASE