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What are we?


Akecalo

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Strange as it might seem, as a system, we don't really know what we are. We have found a kinship with the tulpa community, due to the similarities between the current concept of the tulpa and our own system. We are not always convinced that the similarities result in identity however. Is that the type of system that we really are? The truth is, we don't know for sure. Here is a story:

 

A long time ago, I was two. The memories that I have of being that age are few. I do, however have memories of being that age. I remember my father. I remember my sister as a baby. I remember part of the conversation that I had with my mother as she tried to explain why my father would never come home again and the question that I asked in my confusion as I struggled to understand. I also remember some of the progression of men who came into the house in the wake of that. Like I said, not much. The brain on which I run is slightly strange, which may explain why I have any memories at all of that age.

 

Around that time, Sophie appeared. To me she was real, but also not external like the other people around me. to everybody else she was an imaginary friend. I knew what she looked like, but could not see her. I would open doors for her, or demand that a place be set at the table, but I knew that I carried her with me. I could talk to her and she could talk to me, but I knew that she was in some way a part of me. Sophie persisted, she did not fade as some imaginary friends do. However, a couple of years after she arrived, during a period of which I have more and clearer memories, I realised that I should stop talking about her.

 

A few times, comments had been made in which vague disapproval of imaginary friends had been expressed. I was starting to become slightly more uneasy about talking about Sophie. during this time, I was made aware of one of Sophie's memories. We had been in the front garden, my mother was talking to a neighbour. The neighbour saw the body and identified it as me, addressing me by name. Sophie, who was at the front replied "no, I'm Sophie". The response was something along the lines of "you might want to be careful who you say that to, you don't want them to get the wrong impression". The timbre of the reply was "that was a bit weird". We both felt embarrassment about that interaction. It was around then that I stopped talking about Sophie.

 

Sophie persisted however. I still spoke to her, she spoke to me. I wanted with all my heart to see her, to see her in the world as the girl that I knew her to be. I tried to practice seeing her, to make my image of her as clear as possible, to really be able to feel her touch, to really hear her voice outside of my mind. I spent a lot of time and effort on this, over a period of years and to my surprise I made some progress. I was able to feel her touch against my skin. Sometimes I really could hear her, although we never lost the "mindvoice" communication. Sometimes, fleetingly, I even felt like I saw her.

 

At some point, Sophie decided that she wanted to grow. Our image of her began to change slightly, every so often. From the blonde little girl that she had been, she grew to match my age as we both grew older, a little bit at a time. The teenage years brought a step change in her appearance. Sophie decided that she woiuld rather have long black hair, and startling blue eyes that would glow during times of strong or deep emotion. this form became her stable form, the one that she most identified with, although she still occasionally presents other images of herself, as a form of self expression. I had not spoken about Sophie to others in years now, our modes of address were simply to direct thoughts to each other with no need for a name, just a non-verbal or even pseudo visual method of address. Around this time I considered mentioning Sophie to someone I knew. She indicated that if I did, she would like to be referred to by a name that she had chosen, rather than the name that I had chosen for her all those years ago. I had chosen the name Sophie frm a book that had been read to me around the time that she first appeared. She didn't have much investment in that name, it was just they way that I had chosen to refer to her when talking to others, which I had not done for many years. The name that she chose fit her better as she now was. She chose Maya.

 

Also during the tween or early teen years, my social anxiety reached a crescendo, both Maya and I began to feel a need for additional support in times of stress. We talked about what that support would look like. Mara appeared. In fact Maya had in part chosen her name to fit with Mara's name, because it amused her, in addition to the fact that it fit her current nature better than the name that I had given her.

 

I followed the same process with Mara, practicing where I could to make the communication with her clearer, to get a clearer image of what she looked like, and to be able to hear and see her as much as was possible. With both of them, i had followed a process that I had arrived at by trial and error over years, that had seemingly improved these things. the process was not unlike that described in forcing guides.

 

Our progress was damaged by a time of extreme stress, that resulted in distruption to the ease of communication that we had established. Since that time, we have been working to regain the progress in communication and interaction that we had made before. We were all always present during that time, but it became much more difficult for us to communicate and interact. Each became less aware of what the others were doing. At a number of stressful times during our life, there has been some level of dissociation, memories that don't join up properly, lack of control who is at the front and difficulty in communicating with systemmates.

 

More recently, as we recovered, we found some references to the tulpa community. We saw some similarities between the practices of the community and the progress we had made in interacting with each other and decided to participate. We have made friends and had interesting interactions. More recently still, we have seen posts by the wider multiplicity community, and seen interesting parallels between some of the stories that others have told and our own story.

 

Given the circumstances of our early life, we are not completely sure what type of system we are. Whether it matters to us or not is dependent on our moods. Sometimes we think that it does.

Akecalo - Host

 

Maya - Tulpa

 

Mara - Tulpa

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It sounds to me that you are naturally plural. The process you describe is very much how tulpas used to be made (my opinion based on my family experiences). The loss of memory and time is not. That sounds like you problems have added disorder to your plurality.

 

Ultimately I think we all ask “what am I?” I think you are going to need to work that out for yourself. If you are still experiencing memory loss you need to consider professional help to address your problems.

Please consider supporting Tulpa.info.


 

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Thanks for responding.

 

It sounds to me that you are naturally plural. The process you describe is very much how tulpas used to be made (my opinion based on my family experiences). The loss of memory and time is not. That sounds like you problems have added disorder to your plurality.

 

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. There does seem to be a splash of disorder mixed into our experience at times. For the most part things seem to work fairly well, but sometimes, a few issues do seem to appear. I have wondered whether the plurality that we exhibit was more influenced by natural tendancy or by the work that we put into being able to function together. I suppose that we might not be able to determine that now.

 

Ultimately I think we all ask “what am I?” I think you are going to need to work that out for yourself. If you are still experiencing memory loss you need to consider professional help to address your problems.

 

You are right I guess, we will have to draw our conclusions ourselves, eventually. I have recently begun discussing the memory issues with a couple of professionals and the seeming plurality with one of them. They have yet to inform us of their conclusions, so we will have to see how that goes. It will be interesting to hear what they conclude. Thanks for the advice, I appreciate it.

Akecalo - Host

 

Maya - Tulpa

 

Mara - Tulpa

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We certainly do like to the label things, don't we. The question is the questions of ages... Is this all we are?

 

I asked in another thread if anyone has ever read the book 'invizikids" but your story sound remarkably similar to the author. I recommend it, and when you read it, I want a book report here! I wonder if you find your label... Here's a link which summarizes:

 

http://magonia.haaan.com/2009/invizikids/

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What are we Indeed?

 

Your situation at first sounds pretty similar to mine. At a very early age I discovered an imaginary friend that I could talk to. In our case she prefered to speak to me through our mouth. And that's where our story ended in my early life.

 

 

We talked in front of stepdad# who knows, I know the dudes name but it hardly matters. He decided the best way to get that stuff to stop was batting my head around between his hands. Over and over again. I was like...3? 4? I don't really remember it happening I do remember telling the other portion of my family why he gave me those bruises though. In the bath. This person who was questioning me got this horrified look on their face and told me how bad it was to be talking to yourself like that. There was a lot more really but details arnt really important.

 

One side of my family tried to beat it out of me, while the other side was telling me how awful it was and that people "go crazy" that way. Needless to say I've developed a bit of a complex in regards to my own sanity. The biggest thing was that I considered myself "us", and I guess no one really knew how to handle that.

 

So she went the way of the dinosaur for a very very long time. To be honest I think she completely went away and now I have another one.(2 but you get the point) At first Trixie the first one that appeared, 6-7 years ago, told me that she had been around for years and years. So while its possible she is the same.... whatever from my childhood it's not exactly likely.

 

Anyway, during a rather dark part of my life I pretended to hang out with a character from a tv show daily at work for a couple weeks. At the end of the second week, I suddenly had a very loud voice in my head asking me where I wanted to go today. Had no idea such a thing as tulpa existed. I just figured that what I had been warned about "going crazy" as a kid finally happened and now my life was ruined. It should be noted all these past memories were very buried as i didnt want to think about them, that discovery came much later. The second(and third) showed up shortly after, not sure exactly why those ones showed up though. Just all of a sudden I wasn't talking to Trixie anymore because she was "over there" so who is this? That happened twice fairly quickly thereafter. They have since merged(recently) as apparently my mind is unstable enough that having 3 is a problem.

 

Not trying to tell you my life story, just letting you know you arnt exactly alone. My tulpa seem to be a little closer to "me" than some other people's tulpa. As in they could just be extensions of my personality had I gone a different way. They still have almost all other qualities that tulpa do, and treating them like tulpa has really been helping us work some of this crap out.

 

Long story short. We aren't sure either. Trixie openly admits she would lie to me about anything really to preserve a clear mental state. I've had so many problems just coming to terms with what I've gone through and where we want to go from here. Trixie takes our sanity (mainly just mine, they seem fine) extremely seriously. It's kind of embarrassing honestly how much trouble I've had dealing with this whole experience but that's the whole reason I'm back after all this time. To get this crap out there so not only can I go back and read it, but other people can too. It's not always just rainbows and sunshine.

 

Our prior agreement to just live out life as one single unit lasted about, 2 Years and then they were back asking to be let in again because they weren't going away, and wanted to be part of our life again.

 

What I discovered about this is during those 2 years my emotions were almost unreachable. The only strong emotions i had felt during that time were anger and depression(if you can even call that an emotion)

When they first came back for the first couple weeks it's like I was finally allowed to feel happiness again, I can feel much more clearly the emotional spectrum I remember being able to before we took our break.

 

The important thing to remember is that it doesn't really matter exactly what you are. You are you. And funnily enough you are the only you. Even though that sounds kind of off in this community. No one's minds are going to line up side by side and look the same. We all have our own things to deal with, our own problems. As long as you are happy, your system mates are happy, and you are able to lead the life you want to, why bother with the label?(like I have for years, so it's not like I'm one to talk)

 

One thing I did find that is pseudo comforting. None of this is going on outside of my head, it's ALL me in there. Perhaps a slightly different me, but it's still me. It's not some outside influence there to do you harm or lead you down a wrong path. It's just you, trying to figure out what works for you, and what doesn't.

 

I've talked to my wife at length about this. And her opinion is that it is not tulpa. It's my coping mechanism that was tripped when I was little and tripped again when I was an adult just trying to figure out and deal with this insanity we call existence. I havnt talked to any professional about any of this, mostly at first because I didn't want to be labeled as crazy, but now it's more that I don't think anyone can really help me with it anymore. I'm stable, happy, healthy I'm able to hold my job, provide for my family. And having someone of authority tell me "no you arnt because (whatever reason)would do more harm than good.

 

If it is, or isn't tulpa treating them like tulpa is only seeming to help, so that's where we are with this.

 

We wish you luck in figuring it out for yourself. Or deciding that it doesn't need figured out.

There are few things more confusing in this life, than trying to figure yourself out.

 

>The tulpa that I created this account for no longer wants it. So not having an account myself, ill take it.<

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What are we Indeed?

 

Your situation at first sounds pretty similar to mine. At a very early age I discovered an imaginary friend that I could talk to. In our case she prefered to speak to me through our mouth. And that's where our story ended in my early life.

 

We talked in front of stepdad# who knows, I know the dudes name but it hardly matters. He decided the best way to get that stuff to stop was batting my head around between his hands. Over and over again. I was like...3? 4? I don't really remember it happening I do remember telling the other portion of my family why he gave me those bruises though. In the bath. This person who was questioning me got this horrified look on their face and told me how bad it was to be talking to yourself like that. There was a lot more really but details arnt really important.

 

One side of my family tried to beat it out of me, while the other side was telling me how awful it was and that people "go crazy" that way. Needless to say I've developed a bit of a complex in regards to my own sanity. The biggest thing was that I considered myself "us", and I guess no one really knew how to handle that.

 

Sounds like you had a rough time, I'm sorry to hear that. I hope that things have improved for you.

 

The important thing to remember is that it doesn't really matter exactly what you are. You are you. And funnily enough you are the only you. Even though that sounds kind of off in this community. No one's minds are going to line up side by side and look the same. We all have our own things to deal with, our own problems. As long as you are happy, your system mates are happy, and you are able to lead the life you want to, why bother with the label?(like I have for years, so it's not like I'm one to talk)

 

One thing I did find that is pseudo comforting. None of this is going on outside of my head, it's ALL me in there. Perhaps a slightly different me, but it's still me. It's not some outside influence there to do you harm or lead you down a wrong path. It's just you, trying to figure out what works for you, and what doesn't.

 

Good advice. We learned a long time ago that we can work together to have a happy system. There have been some difficult times, but we are able to work together and get through it, for the most part. Hopefully.

 

I've talked to my wife at length about this. And her opinion is that it is not tulpa. It's my coping mechanism that was tripped when I was little and tripped again when I was an adult just trying to figure out and deal with this insanity we call existence. I havnt talked to any professional about any of this, mostly at first because I didn't want to be labeled as crazy, but now it's more that I don't think anyone can really help me with it anymore. I'm stable, happy, healthy I'm able to hold my job, provide for my family. And having someone of authority tell me "no you arnt because (whatever reason)would do more harm than good.

 

If it is, or isn't tulpa treating them like tulpa is only seeming to help, so that's where we are with this.

 

We wish you luck in figuring it out for yourself. Or deciding that it doesn't need figured out.

 

Same here. Treating the systemmates as if they were tulpas (even though I didn't know what a tulpa was, but they seem to be something close) seems to have helped us with communication and the ability to work together. It also has brought us closer. Whatever we are, the tulpamancy-like practices have helped us function as a system. We are able to co-exist comfortably for the most part, I guess we can be glad about that.

 

Thank you for the wishes, we appreciate that. I hope that things continue to get better for you as well.

Akecalo - Host

 

Maya - Tulpa

 

Mara - Tulpa

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Things as always with life are a bit up and a bit down, but having a handle on yourself is invaluable.

 

Now it's more life making things difficult rather than our own internal struggle doing so. Which makes things easier to take. When the biggest argument is what game we are going to play today, or who is going to front while we are by ourselves at work. It really can't be all that bad right?

 

Granted, everything isn't peachy, but how often do you get that in life anyway? You take the good when you can, deal with the bad when you can't, and keep on trucking.

 

Thank you for your well wishes as well. May all of our worst moments lie in the past and all of our best moments in the future.

 

And that goes for everyone.

There are few things more confusing in this life, than trying to figure yourself out.

 

>The tulpa that I created this account for no longer wants it. So not having an account myself, ill take it.<

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Sorry solarchariot, I thought that I had responded to you, I think it may have been amalgamated with an inadvertently duplicated post which a moderator kindly deleted for me to repair the results of my incompetence, for which I am grateful.

 

We certainly do like to the label things, don't we. The question is the questions of ages... Is this all we are?

 

I think that sometimes it is believed that if we can label something, we understand it. Thankfully the world is a bit more interesting than that.

 

I asked in another thread if anyone has ever read the book 'invizikids" but your story sound remarkably similar to the author. I recommend it, and when you read it, I want a book report here! I wonder if you find your label... Here's a link which summarizes:

 

http://magonia.haaan.com/2009/invizikids/

 

I have not read this one. I looked for a copy in a few places, but nobody had it in stock. I would like to read it. Interesting that the author has noted some common similarities in accounts of childhood imaginary friends. I wounder whether the magonia url hints at the direction in which his conclusion leans. I'll have to keep an eye out for a copy.

Akecalo - Host

 

Maya - Tulpa

 

Mara - Tulpa

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