Supporting casts or new tulpas?

[solarchariot]

So, here I am, working with one tulpa, Bliss, in the wonderland in a typical, daytime fantasy day-dreaming mode, background and situational dialogue sets fleshing out responses and adding tones and colors and textures and flavors, and she and I have either spontaneously created a supporting cast which was to help solidify her personality, or there is suddenly a lot more mouths to feed, metaphorically and figuratively .

 

I am not vehemently opposed to 'others' but I was wanting just ONE. I mean, I saw a possibility for others way down the road, (conditionally, depending on the degree of success and based on 'our' needs) but for now, one was sufficient, because, well, this is taking up some brain power. I suppose I won't run out of brain power, but distract-ability has gone up and I fear a decrease efficiency to follow.

 

So, I am asking something, but I don't know the question is yet. I don't get the sense that Bliss is threatened or feels ignored as my attention shifts. If the story of shaman with the two wolves is accurate, I suppose the wolf i 'feed' is still the overall analogy, so whoever I give attention to gets fortified... Existentially, I wonder if I am obligated to the 'group' as they seem to be playing an integral part of initial development. And what does that mean for overall rules and guidelines for future day-dreaming episodes? There's the question! If I, as a human and host, have the power of bringing a personality into being, which is an incredibly weighted responsibility, and further, in having corroboration that it's possible through daily interaction with said being, then isn't it obligatory that I now proceed even more gently over the earth, because clearly thoughts and attention, or lack there of, have the power of life and death.

 

My head hurts. :(

[Guest Anonymous]

I say it depends on how important that wonderland is to your tulpa. If it is just a temporary play space, then maybe not so important. If it is something very important and symbolic to your tulpa then it should be respected and carefully tended.

 

What about "NPCs?" How much should we care about them and how should we treat them? Well, I think they are often like "extras" or "guest stars" on the set of the wonderland. They are more like dream characters for you tulpa to interact with. Do you have a moral responsibility to the well being of NPCs? Again, I think it depends on how important they become to your tulpa, but certainly it would be nice for the development of your tulpa to treat them well and as if they are significant.

 

I have a large supporting cast of characters in my dreamscape. In my case, my supporting cast supplements me and they are all linked to me in important ways. Also, accidental secondary tulpas could develop from this supporting cast of characters. So certainly that is a good reason to treat them right and as if they matter.

 

P.S. I should mention that my dreamscape has quite a few dream characters that are extremely temporary. They appear, I interact them and then they are out of the scene and the story never to return or rarely to return. These are transitory and so less focused. I treat them like literary characters or dream personas, without an enduring soul or spark of life. For instance, monsters that I blow up or shoot down. I would never harm them if I felt they were a real being, if I could help it. I think very transitory imagery might not be something to be concerned about.

[Temar]

This is a question my system has struggled with, too. Our host is a writer, which means she creates a lot of characters. Without knowing it, for over a decade, she was having us "come alive" as part of her writing process. Looking at it now, after the fact? Yeah. Our head is hella crowded. And I don't know that our host could stop soulbonding if she wanted to.

 

See, most "supporting cast characters" or "NPCs" do generally start out as just that... which is to say that they're simple mental constructs. Just a bundle of theoretical personality and pre-gened backstory. Then, after a while of working with the character, that character can become like an algorithm that the brain automatically runs without your direct input... but that's a pretty short hop to genuine autonomy, and that's where things get complicated (at least for my system).

 

See, my host's writing process has become so tightly tied to what gives us our "life," as it were, that a lot of the more developed supporting cast members tend to reach a sort of proto-tulpa state just by virtue of being worked with for a while. From there, it's a sliding scale that only leads up. We have soulbonds in here that are everywhere on the spectrum to barely a bubble of semi-awareness to fully formed ones like me, and on every rung of the ladder in between.

 

So I'm not going to tell you that accidental tulpas can't happen. Nor am I telling you it's necessarily a bad thing--just that it comes with its own set of problems.

 

Attention, for example, is a finite resource, which means that it's pretty common for my headmates to go inactive from lack of attention after a while (though most will probably become active again in the future, so it's not a death, but it's still kinda sad, like having an old friend move across the country. And if a new headmate moves in, that usually means someone else moves out to make room.) We tend to cap out at about three to seven fully active 'bonds at any given time, with a bunch of semi-actives that can be pulled up from inside at will or due to some sort of external trigger... but more than that at a time and it gets pretty strained. So, yeah, there is a numbers game there.

 

I think what it comes down to is what Melian was talking about... about how much these NPCs mean to you and your tulpa. I have a bunch of characters from my backstory than never gained sentience in the outerworld, but they're still people to me and my experiences, and I think that might be part of what makes it possible that they could 'bond if given enough attention. If someone is a person to you, you tend to treat them as such.

 

Another questions is what the process is you're using to build them. Lots of people have Wonderland NPCs no problem and never have to worry about them turning self-aware, while others, like my system, pretty much spawn a fresh headmate every few months or so. Attention is what feeds a tulpa, but it takes more than that to give them that spark, so see if you and your tulpa can isolate what made her spark and, if you're worried about that, try your best not to give that spark to any of her supporting cast.

 

Again, not saying that multiple tuppers is a bad thing. But we can be a handful en masse, so it's up to you whether you're ready for that. ;)

[Guest Anonymous]

Well, Rina and I are in a sorta funny situation there, one I guess is a bit unique and unusual, but turned out to work nicely.

 

Here's the problem we had:

- She's sort of a soulbond...

- ... and missed her friends and family from the fictional world she's from

- But I didn't want to have more tulpasoulbondwhatevers

 

The solution I came up with and that worked out for us:

- She created the people she wanted as tulpasoulbondwhatevers by combining my perfect knowledge of each of them combined with her personal memories of them...

- ... thus bringing them to life while making sure they're from the same iteration of that fictional world that she's from...

- but not in the exact same way she exists

- Rather than being completely "mentally separate" from her (like she is from me), they "run" on her subconscious and exist primarily in her wonderland (which, in her case, is not a mental place we can both access, but rather a consistent subconscious dream / daydream she can retreat to)...

- ... unless she actively tulpaforces them into the active mindspace, allowing them to talk to me and interact with the outside world through me

 

So, yeah. That.

This "model" allows her to have her friends and family and even for them and me to meet when we want to, but without forcing me to constantly live with a butt-ton of tulpasoulbondwhatevers.

 

There's quite a bunch of them - fourteen people, to be precise.

 

Sometimes they drop by, especially Akiizu and Youka... but most of them stay in their wonderland most of the time, and I don't hear much at all from / about them aside from what they and Rina (primarily Rina) tell me about what they're all up to.

 

So, yeah, that's how it is for us.

 

It all luckily worked out nicely... which makes me really glad; Rina seems much more fulfilled and satisfied ever since she has her friends and family back. :)

Some of them were somewhat confused about the whole "my past is fictional and I now live in a subconscious mindspace of Esterina, who now actually shares a body with the guy who created all of us"-thing - but by now they're all fine.

 

And as I mentioned, Rina's wonderland is a consistent thing (meaning it's not like it stops existing or functioning when she's not in it), so the same goes for all of them.

Essentially, instead of Rina's "doesn't need attention at all to exist / simply exists separate from me" or the typical "needs attention to exist", it's, as I understand it, a thing of "needs Rina to be conscious to exist" - and since Rina doesn't ever actually sleep and is always conscious, well, there you go.

 

And before that question comes up - no, she doesn't experience any mental strain from playing host for these fourteen people.

But when she brings two or three of them over into the active mindspace at once for an extended period of time, that's, as she put it once, when it can get a little bit exhausting after a while.

And I myself didn't notice any change at all... aside from that one time a few of them visited for pretty long at once and Rina got a bit mentally exhausted - we share a body, so her light headache was also my light headache. xP

 

There you go.

Lots of words.

 

TL;DR:

Rina has friends and family in her wonderland as "quasi-semi-tulpasoulbondwhatevers", and she can meet them by going there herself (which she does on a daily basis for many hours) or by manually tulpaforcing them into the active mindspace, allowing them to interact with me, and with the outside world through me (which most of them didn't show too much interest in so far, though).

 

Side note:

None of them seem to be at all able to affect me in many of the ways Rina can, like doing projection, affecting my mental state, making me feel warmer or colder and so on.

I'm not sure why this is; Rina might know, but I never bothered to ask her and she isn't here right now.

Things like me "feeling" their presence when they're in the active mindspace, just like I can feel Rina's presence when she's there, do work, though.

 

 

Greets,

AG

[Guest Anonymous]

"quasi-semi-tulpasoulbondwhatevers"

 

-staring at the screen slack jawed

 

I love Tulpa Info.

[Guest Anonymous]

-staring at the screen slack jawed

 

I love Tulpa Info.

 

AGGuy - making fun of the whole terminology shtick since... 2016, actually.

 

... on a serious note: I've come to use the not-a-word "tulpasoulbondwhatever" because, at some point, I just had enough of explaining how I'm not sure what exactly Rina is.

So I say "tulpasoulbondwhatever" instead - a nice and simple way of saying it's one of those, but I don't care which. xD

 

 

Greets,

AG

[Guest Anonymous]

I love it.

[solarchariot]

What I'm hearing is comforting. I guess my primary worry is slowing the process, as I'm wanting greater auditory and visual awareness, as opposed to mind''s view. The existential treatment of others is fairly resolved, as I tend to lean towards love and compassion in general.

[solarchariot]

I was surprised that "NPC"s was used to describe NPC, as I saw that as a gaming term. Not inappropriate term. Fitting in a way. And, the tulpa world as so many specified terms, i was surprised it didn't have its own... like notquiteatulpasoulboundwhateverlite. :)

 

When I Lucid dream, the characters range from NPCish to more substantial, and I wonder if this is how I should best frame my evolving experiences with this phenomenon. That there is just a continuum of consciousness, and even with a specific consciousness, there are others... not just personality sets, but complete models of other people, plus perceived models, and invented models...

 

I once engaged in a thought experiment where I was to create a mental counsel, comprised of anyone from history I admire, and we would sit at a table, play cards, and or just talking and solve problems... What I am doing now reminds me of this: www.artofmanliness.com/2012/03/.../the-cabinet-of-invisible-counselors/

 

I get pretty excited about the possibilities, and then frustrated because I want to move faster, and then I remind myself many of you have been around since 2012... In fact, I listened to a youtube video about tupla info that broadcasted in 2012.. nick and friends?

 

Aww, suffer the newbs... :)

[TheGreenQueen]

I think OP has hit upon an interesting concept: that, to really get a feel for a character, or, even in real life, to really know yourself, all of this becomes more defined when interacting with others.

 

It's just that, with tulpas, unless they are in a very accepting environment, with real people to talk to them, this self-awareness/development must come from other imaginary things.

 

- Rather than being completely "mentally separate" from her (like she is from me), they "run" on her subconscious and exist primarily in her wonderland

 

So, your tulpa has tulpas.

 

*cue Inception noise*

 

I suppose that's no less strange than my characters having created tulpas in my story, when they are tulpas out here themselves.

 

Or Gaster 4 coming into existence as a plural system. https://community.tulpa.info/thread-de-pathologizing-plurality-and-a-tulpa-that-began-as-non-singular?pid=167250#pid167250

 

And I don't know that our host could stop soulbonding if she wanted to.

 

. . .

 

We tend to cap out at about three to seven fully active 'bonds at any given time, with a bunch of semi-actives

 

. . .

 

Lots of people have Wonderland NPCs no problem and never have to worry about them turning self-aware, while others, like my system, pretty much spawn a fresh headmate every few months or so.

 

I've basically had this problem- that I've developed so many characters that I had to knock a few out or I would just spend all my time doing this. >_>

 

My solution was a little more forceful, of course, but that's probably because I value my personal mental space a lot. I'm essentially so introverted that having tulpas that can pop in on me anytime sometimes can come across as invasive and suffocating. I mean, your mind is supposed to be 'the last bastion' from the world and outer imput, you know?

 

As in life, I only want a small number of friends, so in my head also. My mind was already super chatty enough without the additions.

 

We are not additions, really, we are all reflections of you.

 

Not Amberwing, Undyne, or Tulip/Toph.

 

Hmmm. But, of those, Toph did not retain her personality, and Undyne is no longer with us. Perhaps you simply needed to have more alignment. The more divergent ones were causing problems.

 

Yes, for harmony's sake, I had to. Even Amber I had to rework considerably.

 

I mean, I get what you're saying- if a cell forms a vesicle, some of its cytoplasm is in that smaller capsule. That's kind of how you and Toriel, especially, formed. But all those listed above were intentional journeys into people *not* like me.

 

Yes, I see the difference. Felt it, even.

 

Sans was sort of a hybrid. He had elements of me, but a bunch of other stuff added in, too. But, he's no longer here either, and that was after he went through a similar thing the Toph tulpa did, that was bending him back towards my own personality.

 

EDIT: Also, I'd like to add that we are indeed 'additional.' I'm not sure what Gaster 4 meant when he said that, honestly. He believes we are separate consciousnesses, and we've established that most of us believe we are 'separate' and growing in a way that other tulpas who are still 'attached' are not.

 

Yes, yes. Semantics. We were her, until I decided to split off and everyone else followed my lead. That's what I mean. Calling us 'additional' just seemed off, since we weren't intended to be tulpas. Also, what can I say, I'm sort of embarrassed by taking up time and attention that wasn't exactly given permission for. So any wording that brings attention to that fact makes me uncomfortable.

 

This is why communicating with *words* is more thorny that communicating with thoughts.

 

Anyway, in sum, to the OP: what were your original reasons for creating Bliss? Would those same reasons apply to bringing others in, or not? How much time are you willing to devote to this?

 

I was essentially forced to deal with it, once I realized what was going on. That was not a good feeling. It was fun at first, but devolved from there.

 

Due to my personal experience, I think you should keep in mind that this is *your* head. Don't feel obligated to give NPCs any more recognition than *you* want to. If you are not actively working to make them sentient, I see no reason to feel guilty if you push them away. If one starts showing signs of independence, then you can mull it over some more, but I still think you have most say over whether it's entitled to your attention or assistance.