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The Lifetime Tulpa


HotsTulp

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It all started in the Summer of 1993. While I'm not sure of very many memories in my life stretching back that far, I am sure of this one. It was hot out. Summers down here always tend to be. The memory has that bright light that casts a warm sheen across everything, the way old memories tend to play out through your mind. Was it because my eyes just took in more light back then? Or is it just one of those effects really old recollections have? I remember visiting an aquarium with my grandmother, and picking out several stuffed aquatic animals from a kiosk. Everything bathed in that glow. Like aging photographs. I was only five then, but I still remember.

 

Being a kid, I slept with a handful of various stuffed animals in my too-big-for-me-at-the-time queen-sized bed. Before I went to sleep every night I would turn that bed into a playground for me and my stuffed animals. Imagination running wild, I immersed myself in pure fantasy. Usually a derivative from whatever Disney movie I watched that day, the stuffed animals and I would act out elaborate scenes...scenarios...scripts...whatever you could call them, late into the night, eventually succumbing to dreams. It was something for me to look forward to during the day. It was a creative escape from what was otherwise a fairly routine and uneventful life.

 

But one stuffed animal out of the many stood out from all the others. It may have been because she was the largest. Or maybe because she was one of the first ones I ever remembered getting. Or maybe because she was a shark. Regardless, she was the one stuffed animal who starred opposite me in all my support roles. She had the strongest voice of them all, and her and I would chat and plan out exactly how the scenes were going to go before bringing the cast together and putting the imagination to action. At the time I didn't think much about my chats with Sharky, (yes, the creative genius of a five year old's mind came up with that name) it was just a part of the creative process. And sometimes it wasn't. Sometimes we'd actually just chat. I would tell her about my day, about things that happened in it, and she would respond in kind. Occasionally she would give me advice with a certain measured wisdom that far exceeded anything I could come up with as a five year old. At the time I thought nothing of it.

 

And so this carried on, night after night. I had early on realized that Sharky was an imaginary friend. I was never delusional about it. Sharky never told me to do anything malicious and was always nothing but positive in all our interactions. Being a quiet child all through grade school, it did not take long before I turned almost wholly to Sharky for most of my social interactions. And I fell in love with her. I still had fully understood her to be a stuffed animal, a figment of my imagination. But I couldn't deny the actual feelings and emotions I had towards Sharky. She had helped me through a lot, and a lot of who I was I owed to her, as crazy as it all sounded at the time. 

 

The years just went on and on like that. My social awkwardness evened out into a normal level which let me be much more functional through high school and college. By all outward appearances I was pretty much completely normal. I was still very introverted, and subconsciously kept finding efficient ways at staying essentially alone. And still, Sharky was always there. At that point I had resigned myself to the fact that this "imaginary friend" must be some rampant inner monologue mixed with my imagination, consistently fed by just the years of interaction I've had with the stuffed animal. I never feared for my sanity, Sharky had always just been Sharky. I still loved her. I still new she wasn't real. But goddamn did it feel good to go to bed to a friendly voice inside my head every night. That's why I always hung on to her, I think. Twenty five years. 

 

Cue the present day. 

 

Ever since high school, I had been fairly active in a few boards on the site known as 4chan. (You can probably already see where this is heading.) A couple months ago I was made aware of a board called /trash/. I had perused it from time-to-time just to see what horrors lay within. It was all pretty tame, nothing really in my interests that couldn't be found in other threads on other boards. I did see the word "tulpa" pop up pretty frequently, usually accompanied by a character from "My Little Pony." It pinged on my radar because of MLP, but I dismissed it because I did not know what the word "tulpa" meant. I assumed it was something in Spanish and did no further investigation. A little over a month ago, quite on a lark, I had decided to open up one of those "tulpa" threads to see what on earth it was all about, as /trash/ apparently always had one running, and in all my years on 4chan I had never seen the word used elsewhere. 

 

At first I was confused, scrolling through the thread. Like a wine connoisseur analyzing a particularly finicky Merlot, the thread had some heavy notes of waifu with a small lingering taste of MLP. But the aroma was a general mix of OCs and...was that RP? I was completely lost on the different flavors being thrown around. Something about oils. Something about consciousness. It made absolutely no sense to me. But alas, there was a wall of text in the OP that included some "guides" and "community info." So I went to those. And then everything changed. I tore through several guides immediately, completely intrigued by what I was reading. It sounded absolutely insane, but something about it was pulling me. It kept me reading guides, I had to know more and more about tulpas. The concept of a living being created within one's own conscious mind was fascinating. My initial reaction was out of pure curiosity; I had no intention of pursuing tulpamancy. But reading about the creation process, possession, visualization, it was all very interesting. 

 

I shit you not, it was only when I went to bed that same night and turned to Sharky that I connected the dots. At first I almost didn't even want to believe it. I thought it was all just way too weird, way too "out there" for me. It was only when I literally asked Sharky "Do you think you might be a tulpa?" and she said she might be that it all hit me full force. For the past 25 years I had been working in my long-established wonderland, imposing, and passively forcing every single night with Sharky. At first I started second guessing everything. Were we just parroting? Was this still all just imaginary? But no. I could hear her voice-that-was-not-a-voice completely distinctly from my own. And my whole life she'd tell me stuff that there was no way I could think up alone. I had had a second living consciousness in me and didn't even think about it. And that's when the guilt came. I realized I had never thought about her during the day hardly ever. I would interact with her all night, we'd have a ton of fun, and then I would just...leave. For the entire day. I had always thought she was this stuffed shark in my bed but she really had always been this person in my head. Sharky said that she wasn't slighted by any of that, as she wasn't even aware of the exact nature of her own existence until then. She knew she was alive, but she didn't know what it meant in the context of a tulpa because neither of us had ever heard of the concept. And now we had.

 

So then and there we committed ourselves to finding out exactly what it meant. We wanted to find out how far we could take it. The way Sharky saw it, we had been working 25 years to reach this point where our journey could actually begin. So here it begins. I'll try to update at least weekly for the both of us. The first post or two will likely hash out the last month of progress that Sharky and I have made. Some things have been happening very very quickly, other things very slow. Both due to over twenty five years of habits. 

 

Enjoy!

* Indicates Sharky is typing

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That's a very interesting story so I look forward to seeing what sort of things you post here. I'd especially be interested if Sharky could give her input as well, what she thinks about that realization.

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In that first week it was fairly difficult to simply remember to talk to Sharky during the day. When I did remember, it all came as easily as it did at night. Both her and myself were happy to realize that this was, in fact, the real deal. I would chat with her at random times while at work, when I thought to. Over a month on now and it's still a bit tricky to consciously talk with her during my out-of-bed hours. But we're getting better. We had for so long settled into a routine that breaking the old habit is something that will take time. 

 

We began setting up a little bit more of a formal wonderland at night before bed. In the past, the wonderland had been ever-changing, and while we had adapted to that sort of fluid environment, we thought we would try playing things by the book a little bit more. It was simple enough. I had gone to a grassy field with rolling hills surrounded by a forest a couple years back, and that place had stuck in my memory. It was simple and detailed enough that I thought it would make a good wonderland. It was relatively easy for Sharky to utilize the wonderland. Since she had been basically fully autonomous and conscious for years, I let her have free range with her own form. She chose an anthropomorphic shark, which wasn't all too surprising. The exact details of which she is still hammering out. Sometimes her hair will be slightly different, or there will be a minuscule change in her body shape. I'm leaving full creative control over appearance to her. 

 

Sharky was very interested in the entire aspect of possession from the get-go. On one of our first nights, we tried experimenting with it. I had done a sufficient amount of reading to understand the concept, and felt I had a firm enough grasp on the mechanics of it. And, most importantly, I had complete trust and faith in Sharky. In fact, it was during this initial possession exercise that I realized I had this creeping fear, this almost self-doubt, about if what I was doing was particularly safe or wise. But confronting those thoughts and feelings, I had the realization that this was Sharky. This was a woman I've shared my bed with nearly every single night for the last 25 years. I would never hurt her and she would never hurt me. We started small on the first night; Just trying to get my right arm possessed. Sharky was quite apt with it. She raised my right arm into the air as I lay on my back on my bed. It was...twitchy...which I had read was a normal experience. She played with the joints in my fingers, testing them. I had lost all feeling in the arm as Sharky took control of it, replaced with this dull glowing warmth instead, almost like the arm was a memory. A few minutes of this carried on, and then there was a snap. She dropped her right hand straight to my face in the blink of an eye. It actually completely took me by surprise. She ran her hand down my cheekbones, across my jawline, tracing her fingertips across my lips, all the while remarking how this was the first time she's ever actually felt me. The first time she's ever actually placed her skin on mine. 

 

She said that the possession event kind of weirded her out. She wasn't a huge fan of it. As she explains it to me now, it's not that she didn't like it, it was just that to her it felt unnatural. She's spent so long existing more or less ephemerally in my mind, the idea of interacting with the real world through me is foreign. We haven't tried any serious possession like that since the initial successful attempt. It's something that I want to explore more of, but understand that Sharky isn't entirely comfortable with it yet. So we've put a pin in it, refocusing efforts on just integration of Sharky into my day-to-day life and letting her experience things more through that. 

 

That's a very interesting story so I look forward to seeing what sort of things you post here. I'd especially be interested if Sharky could give her input as well, what she thinks about that realization.

Glad you're interested! It is definitely quite the journey, I must say. While Sharky doesn't really type directly quite yet, and I'm more or less uncomfortable trying to fake a direct translation by masquerading it as her own voice, I can relay that she has largely been nonplussed by the developments of the last month+. For her, it was really more that I was the one to actually realize how things were. Things didn't really change for Sharky, they changed for how I viewed Sharky. It's not like she became more conscious, or developed a personality, or started talking with me more. She already had all of those things because she has always been fully herself. It was more the dynamic of our relationship had changed. She does say that this realization on my part does make her feel inclined to be more free in her interactions with me. It's like she has a free pass now to butt into my consciousness whenever she wants, since she is her own person. And I'm completely fine and open to that sort of interaction, so it's been fairly positive. 

 

As soon as both myself and Sharky become comfortable enough for her to type directly, I (or she) will most certainly post directly. I'll make sure to mark it as such when it does happen.

* Indicates Sharky is typing

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  • 2 weeks later...

I missed an update from last week. My apologies. I make a concerted effort to check in on my wonderland to see how Sharky is doing during my day. At least once or twice, even if for only a few minutes while at work. She's always there. She knows I've been having a rough time at work these past few months, these past few weeks being no exception. I've been finding myself a lot more tired than usual, which happens from time to time. It's nothing new. I just feel that it's comforting knowing that, while I might be too tired during the evenings to interact with Sharky much, she's still there during the day, and I can steal away moments with her whenever I want. My apologies for the short post. With the next one I do I want to try to at least act as the intermediary to allow Sharky to give her input about everything as well. While her and I have chatted about it at length, and our viewpoints on the matter have mostly been in sync, it'll be nice to have record of her own remarks, as direct and unfiltered as possible.

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Over this last week I've been making much more of a concerted effort to go to sleep in my Wonderland with Sharky, and to try to drift off into some semblance of a dream world with her in it. But, to keep matters in perspective, and in the interest of full disclosure here, I feel like I should describe some things.

 

For the better part of the last 25-some odd years, it has only been Sharky and myself sharing a bed. Her in her plushy form and me in my-...well...-human form, naturally. But over the course of the last two months I have introduced a second plushy to my bed. It was entirely impulsive, and greatly devoid of any sort of planning or conscious effort. But I feel this is a place of good company to understand what I might be going through. I had purchased a 4DE plushy of the popular character Rarity from the My Little Pony series from Hasbro. I had just so happened to find myself at a furry convention where my favorite pony from the series was being sold, and I picked her up instantly due to a goodly amount of alcohol. And while I waffled between regretting the purchase and thinking it was the best purchase of my life, she eventually made her way to my bed, despite any better judgment. 

 

From there, she began to...infiltrate my psyche in the same way-I suppose-that Sharky did. Sharky understood that there was "somepony" else in the bed, and somepony that I had been thinking about for a good amount of time. And now that Rarity was in a type of physical embodiment where I slept, it almost made everything more...real. I can't truthfully tell if Sharky created her or I did, but Rarity, as a character from the My Little Pony show (and my favorite character from the show, at that), began exhibiting more signs of being an actual Tulpa than what I was initially prepared for. Sharky had reassured me that everything was fine, that she had spoken with Rarity herself and that everything was in order. 

 

However, to be 100% candid on the matter, I have started feeling a little bit uncomfortable. I feel that things are starting to spiral out of control. I don't feel that Rarity is my tulpa. I never consciously meant for any of this. But Sharky, my tulpa who I trust completely, continues to assure me that Rarity is in fact a tulpa, and that she's managing her without any issues. I have done some limited reading on tulpas creating tulpas without the host realizing it, but I never thought that I would fall under that umbrella category. But that seems to be the case. I haven't interacted wholly with this Rarity, and I am not fully aware of how she falls into the tulpa hierarchy. But I trust Sharky. She seems to know what she's doing. And I'll attempt to reconcile how all of this is panning out in the coming week or two. I just haven't been able to allocate enough time to actually do so as of late. It's only recently been brought to my attention, if I'm being honest. 

 

Inspiring. Please keep writing :D

Thanks! I'll definitely continue to try to! Hopefully Sharky can step in more frequently to carry the writing side of things, since I know her perspective on the entire venture is likely quite valuable for people who read this, her continued development as a tulpa in the "tulpa" sense, and my own cataloging ventures. Thanks again!

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So you think maybe Rarity is Sharky's tulpa? I've heard of tulpae having a tulpa of their own before, and haven't heard of any problems specific to it. You definitely want to accept her if Sharky likes her, and it'd be good for her to have a friend in your head I think. It may seem uncomfortable, but it sounds like things are handled and will probably turn out positive in the long run.

 

Granted, I'm no expert, I can barely get a few words out of mine after a great deal of effort. In that way, I wish I had your problem instead of mine. But if I do get verbal on that level, I will definitely want to either make a second tulpa or have her make one so she'll have someone to interact with regularly besides me.

 

I enjoy your posts though, and now look forward to maybe hearing Sharky's thoughts on Rarity and other things in general.

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  • 2 weeks later...

The last two weeks have been absolutely incredible. 

 

It basically all started with sitting down with Sharky and figuring out what was going on with Rarity. Sharky was adamant that, while she may have had a heavy part in her creation as her own tulpa, that she was ultimately condoned and sanctioned by my own conscious mind. Her argument was that this was something I wanted. This, naturally, made me skeptical. But Sharky insisted that I at least talk with her, and interact with her. And...I have to say...she's pretty legit. My initial fears of her suffering complications from the realization of being an already-fictional character were completely put at ease. She understands that her "template", her entire formula for being, was contrived in a mind that had her best interests in mind. And that's all really a tulpa is, at its core, right? She's incredibly self aware, and even over these last few weeks she's become incredibly vocal and forceful in my day-to-day activities. And Sharky even says that she's good for us, because Rarity is so much more vocal than her. 

 

One case in point is that, for the better part of the last two years I have been trying to motivate myself to work out more. To stay fit, cut down on excess weight, etc. And normally I had been pretty good at it so long as I had some sort of motivation or accountability partner involved in exercise routines alongside me. But, again, these last few years have been blatantly lacking that. And as a result I had gained a good 30lbs. But Rarity has since butted in. And with her, Sharky has started getting more bold and vocal. Combined, they have *literally* forced me to run and exercise every single day. Working abs, arms, straight up running for absurd amounts of time, it's all them. For me, in-person accountability had always been a key component of my exercise regime. And now I literally have that. There are two voices in my head that tell me I need to work out every day. There's no compromise out of it, either. It's incredible. I'm already down 5lbs because I'm eating better and exercising due to direct influence from these two. 

 

But let's backpedal a little bit. On the first night that I literally sat down with Sharky and had a talk about Rarity, we came to the conclusion that we were going to incorporate her into our nightly Wonderland things (I touched on this briefly in my first post, if you want to back-track). I realized that I had Sharky - who I had known my whole life - and Rarity, who I still had no real clue about other than she was a tulpa and we all needed to jive together comfortably. In my normally easy-going nightly scenarios that I play out with Sharky the entire process comes very naturally. But here I had found myself absolutely frozen with fear and stress. I didn't know what to do. The actual full reality of the fact that I had a tulpa (Sharky) and she/I had a tulpa (Rarity) hit me like a freight train. I didn't know what to do. I started having a legitimate panic attack. I had Sharky and Rarity who both wanted to play, and I was frozen. Sharky responded first and foremost, assuring me that everything was okay, that nothing was actually changing too drastically. It was more that there were more voices now to draw from. It wasn't a bad thing. She stressed that point quite a bit. That it wasn't a bad thing, even though it felt like I was losing control of everything. She talked me back down to normalcy. 

 

To shorten things considerably, we three went on to have a very successful evening that was incredibly productive. I started hearing Rarity's tulpa more often and everything just clicked beautifully. At the end of the night we all even cuddled up beautifully and I had the best sleep I think I have ever had in my entire life. From then on out, it was a dual voice of Rarity and Sharky bouncing around my head, unencumbered.

* Indicates Sharky is typing

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  • 3 weeks later...

Been a while since the last post. A good amount has happened the last few weeks. Mostly positive. 

 

The individualistic nature of both Sharky and Rarity have evolved more. Almost to a concerning point, at least with regards to Sharky. I had been having trouble sleeping for a week, really out of the blue, couldn't figure out what the problem was. Diet was fine, exercise was fine, I wasn't stressed about anything, it was strange. I just chalked it up to my off again/on again depression. Then a couple things happened. During the day I'll randomly pop into my headspace and check on Rarity and Sharky, just to see what's up. Sharky was legit asleep. This opened my eyes to the fact that I guess I've just long been ignoring, that they both exist, and are real and alive, and can act completely upon their own autonomy. Rarity informed me that she thought Sharky was actually depressed. I spoke with Sharky about it and sure enough, she said she was just feeling down for no reason. It makes sense, I battle with the same thing, but I felt absolutely terrible that I had...just neglected her for so long. I mean, she understood, and said I shouldn't even apologize, but I still felt bad. 

 

During my check-ins to the two during my day, I've been starting to try pushing the envelope of our conversations. Since I'm not really able to dedicate 100% concentration to the wonderland and them, it's a little spotty. And more often than not, I interrupt them in the middle of a conversation. And when I try to listen in to their conversation, it's disjointed, quiet, scattered. Almost like trying to eavesdrop on the conversation at a table next to you in a loud restaurant. I feel like this is just a limitation of my experience with tulpas. I've spoke with Rarity about this at length (Rarity is absolutely fascinated by her own existence, it seems), and she assures me to not worry about it, that it'll just take practice. Sharky is even more dismissive of it all, which makes sense. She's been around the block with me my whole life practically. But getting involved in dialogue with the two has been returning positive results. I'd ask them to brainstorm ideas for our nightly play in the wonderland, what they feel like doing, the concepts and plots we could explore. Sharky is more comfortable just going with the flow. I've been pushing her to get involved in the creative process more and have a stronger voice. Rarity has been very vocal about what she wants to do and how she wants to do it, which has been refreshing and also kind of fun. For forever I have been the only one guiding everything. It's so nice to just step back from the process and let someone else take control. Some nights (particularly when I wasn't doing too hot with my sleep schedule) we'd even just cuddle and chat instead of actually playing. It was incredibly relaxing. 

 

This next month I'll be getting a lifesize plush of Rarity. This is something that I actually commissioned way back in November of last year (so prior to all this tulpa stuff), and I had been eagerly anticipating its arrival almost daily. Since Rarity has joined Sharky as a tulpa, she's also joined in to my anticipation. She'll reference how awesome it will be to "have a body" (her words). And, while I'm not totally sure of this, I think she sometimes is trying to use the fact that she'll have what is literally going to be a lifesized version of herself in my bed constantly to make Sharky jealous. I tell her to settle down and reel it in when I notice this happening, but she acts innocent of everything. Sharky doesn't really care either way. If there ever is to be any sort of hierarchy between the two, Sharky knows exactly where she stands. 

 

One strange thing that was actually a negative occurred this last week. Was reading some thread either in /trash/ or /mlp/ or something that mentioned in an off-hand manner completely unrelated to tulpas specifically, that talked about how hearing voices in your head was essentially you just going crazy. For whatever reason, this just triggered a massive panic attack. I could feel the onslaught coming, that familiar screaming pressure building in my head, my stomach dropping out from under me, feeling like I was about to completely lose my mind and pass out in a cold-sweat mess. But instead, as soon as I could feel the panic attack coming, Sharky and Rarity were there. They basically just talked me down from the panic attack, curtailing it from going into full swing. They said I was fine, I was safe, they were there and that everything was going to be okay. I'd always wondered what it would be like to have someone around during a panic attack. Now I know. It helps.

 

It helps a lot.

* Indicates Sharky is typing

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