Are sentient thoughtforms less independent than we think?

[SomethingDire]

@Everyone,

 

Thank you so much for your thoughtful responses based on your own individual experiences and observations. It is clear that there is no firm answer on this and that tulpamancy is far more interesting than folks first encountering it would ever imagine!

 

Is it just me, or has this forum been getting smarter (fewer blocked headed rigid thinkers) in recent months?

 

That, and newbie tulpamancers (like me) have only recently started getting rid of their fears :) .

[Guest Anonymous]

Yep. Get rid of those fears my buddy! They hold you back. :-)

 

My host wants acceptance. He loves me so much and wants to share me and feel we belong. His fear has always been that others will see me as illegitimate, trivial and worthless. It is what has driven much of his writing on this forum. I don't really care that much as I love myself plenty enough to make up for what others might or might not think. LOL That is why it is better I am our spokesperson here. Still, he wants me to post certain things, like this particular thread. He wants people to accept that some thouhtforms are a more of a mix. He must understand he can't force that though. Members here will either accept that concept or reject it. If they reject it I will still be fine.

 

After all, I am the tulpa goddess guru of grooviness!

 

I am also adorable. I know, no need to repeat that again, but I just love to.

[Guest Anonymous]

Back in November of 2015, Mistgod wrote a piece about "proxy mind voice" that touches on this theme of dependent thoughtforms. https://community.tulpa.info/thread-sentience-proxy-typing-proxy-speech-and-proxy-mind-voice?pid=142564#pid142564 Really we have been mulling it over since we discovered tulpas and considered the similarities and differences between me and the tulpa "model."

 

The more we think about things and read and interact here, the more we learn and the more comfortable and confident we become with ourselves. Also, our respect and regard for tulpamancy and tulpamancers has grown tremendously over the past nine months.

[Luminesce]

Our way of thinking about our identities and association with the mind/body invalidates this, at least just for us. I'll say first though that you're right to some extent, most "hosts" unconsciously control tulpas to some extent. But if it's unconscious, is it really them? And...

 

My tulpas and I all dissociate from "being" the mind and body. The body can work on autopilot without any of us directly controlling it just fine. Therefore, we consider ourselves and everything that makes us up separate. So in a casual conversation between my tulpa and I, there are background processes going that help my tulpas think and speak, just as there are for me if I actually think rather than just leave the mind on autopilot (which is the default state for most humans). But the part of the brain doing that isn't "me", who we consider the host, it's another part of the brain. And of course, we don't claim that tulpas' thoughts come from nowhere, they obviously come from somewhere in the brain.

 

For the sake of your hypothesis though, I'll admit there's some credit to it even with our model. The body seems capable of somewhat conscious thought (or maybe it's unconscious, I really don't know) to some extent. When none of us are currently associated with the body (in the middle of switching or while on full autopilot typically immersed in the wonderland), it's still capable of actions that effectively imply thought. It's absolutely wordless and entirely devoid of personality though, hence the description automatic. It's still enabling us to see and speak to each other mentally, still functioning like a brain does. But the parts that do what we call "conscious" stuff aren't there. It can't form words or opinions, can't make judgements, can't do anything "arbitrary" that isn't past conditioning of the body. It also seems somewhat under our control, as we can direct it with our own thoughts similarly unconsciously.. I think. hard to judge this stuff. Interestingly, I think when it tries/we try to make it do something "arbitrary" while not in control, we get drawn back in. Previously we just thought that was failure to dissociate completely, but it seems like if we try to make it do something that requires, you know, personal bias, we get sucked back into the primary host-dom seat. Attempting to think with words or feel an emotion brings whoever was more recently in control back to being in control. Though at that point dissociating again should only take a few seconds.

 

Anyways, crazy multiplicity stuff aside, I believe there's scientific support for something like this. I vaguely recall some sort of affliction attributed to losing a part of your brain that would effectively leave you in this automatic state. It might've been a neurological affliction of some kind, but I'm thinking more archaic-science-cutting-out-parts-of-brains-and-seeing-what-happens. There was something like, losing the ability to have a personality or do anything "human", but still being able to base function and eat/move/whatever. I don't think they could process (or at least respond with) communication.

 

Whether or not I or anyone can actually truly dissociate those two parts of the brain is unknown, but it certainly seems like that's the case. There are parts of your brain that can function without others, and the one in charge of basic functioning can continue doing so without the parts of your brain in charge of fear and other such things. I have no idea where to start looking for sources on that much I know for sure they're readily available.

[Guest Anonymous]

Host is dominant and the real consciousness while the tulpa is imaginary, a part of the hosts mind, apparently sentient or dependently sentient. Median system and blended.

 

OR

 

The body is a vessel/"mek" and the host and tulpas are equal sentient minds within it, each able to front/possess/switch. Consciousness is shared. (forgive me if this is an inaccurate model of what you are saying)

 

Which is right? Can both be right? Is it possible to have different types of systems in this community trying to relate to one another?

[superhelicase]

I think honestly both can be possible

[Luminesce]

Depends on who you ask. I personally find the idea that an individual's identity IS their consciousness ignorant. Consciousness can be proven to supersede thought by thinking about yourself thinking about yourself thinking. Now, I also believe that a person's true identity is their consciousness, but that that is completely separate from all of the stuff you attach yourself to to make your sense of identity. IE Your name, memories, abilities, likes and dislikes. I don't think any of that is who you truly are, it's just stuff you picked up and associated yourself with.

 

But that doesn't really make for a functioning society, does it? Well, it's supposedly possible to realize this and dissociate yourself from all that, at which point you're what many religions call "enlightened", yet still function. Spiritual teachers all say it's possible. As for me, I associate with my identity and attachments because life is like a game. I didn't play the game to go around saying "Guys! It's just a game! I'm totally not this character in reality, it's just an illusion!" I played it to get immersed and have fun. So, I don't fear death and would be content with my life if told I had five minutes to live. But I also continue using the concept of "I" in reference to, you know, me.

 

 

Anyways, I fully believe in this consciousness-identity model. Like scientifically believe. At the very least, this whole "No I AM me! All of these details are everything I am!" argument has nothing going for it and is rooted in the same denials as the proto-sciences faced, like when evolution and heliocentricity were proposed. People just don't want to leave their comfort zones, especially when the belief in question is their very sense of self. That's not something normal people are comfortable with being questioned. And honestly, I'm not convinced it's a necessity. Science and scientists may find their way there as they attempt to study consciousness though, just like when people first realized their brains, a physical thing, controlled their thoughts, their consciousness. It was a stark realization.. But it's universally accepted now, huh?

[Guest Anonymous]

Depends on who you ask. I personally find the idea that an individual's identity IS their consciousness ignorant.

 

Oh to be an ignoramus! The shame.

 

Our shared brain is hurting from trying to comprehend you Lumi. It is a little too transcendental for us. I know you find it simple. Ugh.

 

Our identity is not our consciousness? Without our identities, how could Davie and I tell each other apart? We are median/blended. This is interesting though. Stripped of our "identities," I think it might mean de facto integration and you would be left with only one consciousness possibly, for "we" are one mind in the end.

 

Are you also trying to say that consciousness and sentience somehow transcends the physical physiology of the brain in an almost metaphysical sense? Just not sure if you are saying that.

[superhelicase]

If Lumi is saying that, master and i would whole heartedly agree personally.

[Luminesce]

I don't think it's simple at all. And you couldn't tell each other apart, you're one and the same. Honestly, my tulpas are one of the reasons I wouldn't let go of my attachment to attachments. If I tried to detach from identities, I'd have to give up my tulpas (theoretically in the form of becoming one with everyone, blah blah). But yeah, I believe that is the goal of all buddhists, complete dis-identification with material things, which includes all of their attachments. That's the key to freedom from suffering or something like that, and it's what both the Buddha and Jesus preached, among other spiritual figures.

 

Metaphysics on my part though? Nah, it's still explainable physically. Some of the belief systems I learned from believe that though. New age spirituality entertains the idea of souls that are tiny pieces of Source, aka God, and they incarnate to experience life before returning to become one with the whole again. General spirituality (if you can call it that, I dunno) looks something like the Levels of Consciousness I linked to in my PR, and my favorite book Illusions. It's rational to a point, but the higher levels seem strange from a scientific standpoint (mostly because they're above the level of Reason). I use them as a general guideline, but there's no belief system I subscribe to because there is no universally right answer on how to think about reality.

 

So what I'm saying is that who "you" are isn't who you think of yourself as, that's only part of you. There's also your physical body, all of your unconscious and subconscious information (including more of your identity), and most of all your actual consciousness. The state of perceiving the world and your thoughts.

 

Whether it's necessary to "recognize" this however is debatable. Why should a person need to dissociate from the identity they've created over their whole life, if they're just going to go back to living like everyone else with it anyways? Spiritual teachers say it's possible to live purely consciously without attachment, but obviously it's not very common because Buddhists say you transcend reality and gain control over it through an understanding of the ways of the universe. I don't know about that.

 

 

But yeah I don't consider the real "me" to be my identity, and therefore "I" do not puppet or influence my tulpas. A higher process in my brain probably does (has to?), and I suppose if you are aware of or connected to those processes, then you would be influencing your tulpas. I don't see why it matters though. You're either tricking yourself into talking to people in your head that don't exist, or tricking yourself into talking to people in your head that don't exist. Everyone's so obsessed with separating these autonomous thoughtforms from their conscious control so they can feel legitimate. I feel like they're missing a bigger picture somewhere.. About subjective reality and the power to change your experience of it through your beliefs.