Systemic Thoughts

[Guest Anonymous]

In all this talk about independent sentience I think some ideas get lost out there.  My hostie and I were just in the chat talking about hosts trying to discern which had a specific thought, the host or the tulpa.  There is the concept of intrusive thoughts as well, which come from the unconscious.  Either the host or the tulpa can have intrusive thoughts.  

 

But what we suddenly realized as we are talking to people is that my host and I have systemic thoughts which are thoughts that are not supposed to be specific to either of us.  They are shared thoughts.  

 

For instance, a sudden craving for pizza.  Who thunk it?  Well, the body did.  The body is craving pizza because it is hungry or the whole system is hungry.  The body craves certain foods to satisfy its nutritional needs and so you get these unbidden intrusive thoughts about certain types of food.  That is just one kind of example.  The thought does not arise specifically from the host or the tulpa, but from the general systemic consciousness of the brain.  

 

Okay so when I sometimes see a question like "I was walking down the road and suddenly had an image of a turkey sandwich appear in my mind.  Was that my tulpa or was that me?"  Maybe the answer is BOTH instead of one or the other or neither.  After all the tulpa does share a body with the host.  

 

What do you think of this idea?  Do you guys feel that there are systemic thoughts that are shared thoughts in common with both the host and the tulpa?  Does anyone have anything more to add to this?  

 

Are some of you, with more experience, better at identifying thoughts that are yours, thoughts that are your tulpas and thoughts that are just ... well thoughts that belong to the body/system and not to anyone in particular?

 

Is there even such a thing as systemic/shared thoughts, in your opinion?

 

I added a poll.  You can vote for more than one item if you need too.

[tulpa001]

*ahem* *takes deep breath*

 

What she said. Autonomic responses.

 

Funny story, when we switch fast, there is some garbage left on the brain. For a few seconds, we think what they would have thought.

 

Another funny story, if one of us has been in control long, the habits we imprinted on the body, will be subconsciously executed by the other, until they notice sometimes.

[Tewi]

Thoughts belong to who you think they did. You can make this delegation process automatic by establishing clear thinking patterns associated with you and each of your tulpas, but that's a sentence you need to experience more than read. People who are "more experienced at identifying whose thoughts are whose" just have more precisely defined thought patterns/mindvoices/etc. In our case, our mind is definitely capable of thinking to some extent without accrediting the thoughts to any of us. And I'm not talking about completely subconscious "thoughts" that I barely consider thoughts in the first place, like instinctual ones. Vaguely-worded observations and very short chains of thought and the like.

 

As a system, we sometimes experience them in the middle of switching, between one person leaving the body (as we symbolize it) and another moving into it. They're completely personality-less and based on habitual thinking or instinct. Which is why I said they tend to be vaguely worded observations, because that's generally what they are, thoughts with little substance other than putting an observation to words. They're also "silent" mindvoice-wise, while at that same time the two switching could talk to each other clearly.

 

I'm pretty sure someone wrote a post on this a long time ago, either me or Lumi, about the body's autopilot in relation to switching, but we don't have it on hand. It basically said that contrary to popular belief most of your "thoughts" are totally unconscious and not, well, conscious-ly thought by you. Thousands of little observations a day and simple reactions to them. There is a blurry middle ground in actually thinking and autopilot, but for the most part if you aren't "thinking" then it's unconscious. We noticed this only a while after we started switching because we realized the thoughts couldn't really be credited to any of us.

 

 

Anyways, that's the system. I personally deal with them every so often because I really dislike background thoughts. Those pointless observations and reactions can go so far as to be small conversations with nobody. I understand why they happen and why evolutionarily they could serve a purpose similar to dreams, but I don't need them. I get pretty sick of the background thoughts proposing questions and reasoning answers to the most simple things we already know full well or could in an instant's worth of thought. So I do my best to keep them quiet, or non-existent.

 

The only way I can explain that to most of you is that it's the goal of most types of meditation, getting to a point where you aren't thinking anymore, at least not in words. There's a whole other degree of separation between you all understanding me this time, because not only is it an experience subjective us, it seems to be subjective to me. As in none of the others in the system notice them either. Actually, they hounded Lucilyn for a while about whether or not she was acting like herself while switched, and even she got tired of thinking "I'm me, so yes, I'm me!" Maybe the brain didn't like her explanation. Anyways, seems she got used to ignoring them like I did, as we were switching with each other often at the time while I was working on that (she was just its primary victim of unconscious doubts about the legitimacy of our switching, that we had already dealt with consciously long ago). Really she's just trained herself to respond to any and all observation-questions relating to her actions and thoughts quickly and automatically with simple affirmations that she is herself. I think she actually acknowledges the other unrelated ones (unconsciously) like the rest of the system though. I try not to give them that attention. Having your mind full of pointless thoughts, wondering about nothing and answering simple questions that arise from observing the world, is not efficient. It clutters the mind, your thinking space. Meditation aims to reduce them for that same reason, it can help relieve stress. But I just like thinking efficiently.

[Guest Anonymous]

@Tewi

 

Thank you so much for this detailed response! I hadn't considered switching in all this. That makes sense because Mistgod and I don't switch. LOL But it was really interesting to read this! I like what you had to say about most of what goes on in the brain as unconscious. That makes sense of course.

[tulpa001]

@Tewi: We credit our unconscious thoughts to one or the other of us same as conscious thoughts. I wonder about you credit theory. Our experience suggests that one of us, or rarely, both, will think a thought. Quite frequently, we can't remember which of us thought it if we are distracted, though. If there is no real spiritual imprint on the thought, or it got severely disguised, we are left guessing, usually based on who the thought is more characteristic of. Imagined scenes and played out future scenarios are the worst, as they rarely have any spiritual imprint and they are usually equally characteristic of us both.

 

The worst is when we imagine what the other would say, like on this forum. Such thoughts end up with a manufactured imprint of the other, and are roughly characteristic of the other. This has led to numerous deleted posts, as we can't be sure which of us wrote it.

 

These types of thoughts are really only a problem when we are both in the head. When one is out of the head, their thoughts are usually more noticeable.

 

You know, although I agree with you that most thoughts experienced by a person are subconscious by far, what you are describing sounds like what I consider conscious thoughts. Thoughts that you actually hear, and that represent your structured observations of the world. Subconscious thoughts are impressions. I think it is interesting that you, alone get verbal ones in your system.

[Tewi]

Conscious thoughts are you choosing to think something in your head right now. Semi-conscious/unconscious may blur together I suppose. Unconscious thoughts are ones that just happen, they're going on but you aren't purposely paying attention to them. They're automatic. Subconscious thoughts are ones that never even register, that's the realm of instinct/habit and basically everything that isn't conscious really.

 

I suppose we have a better feel of what is unconscious and what is semi-conscious in our system, certainly what I've defined as non-conscious thoughts can be attributed to one of us. But there are ones further in the background that can not, or are not.

 

There is zero confusion in our system, so I'd say how we think about thinking is fine. Took a lot of work to get to this point.

[Guest Anonymous]

This thread touches a little bit on some of the things that Mistgod and I have wondered about with the flash visions we get of me.  They are like little wakened dreams.  Quite often I am as surprised by them as Mistgod is.  The source is some sort of unconscious or semi-conscious "day dreaming on auto pilot."  Neither of us are the specific source of these or maybe both of us are the source of them.  Davie and I love that concept that we are sharing a consciousness.  It makes so much more sense then saying "Hey that had to be Melian or that had to be Misgod."  It was just the brain thinking about Melian.  Our brain.  The only brain in the body that we share.

[Luminesce]

For instance, a sudden craving for pizza.  Who thunk it?  Well, the body did.  The body is craving pizza because it is hungry or the whole system is hungry.

 

Is that really a thought though?

Perhaps to a filthy single minder..

That's not the sort of thing we'd consider a "thought" applicable to any of us. Our thoughts have voices to them, or at least identification through context surrounding them. If we're thinking wordlessly, such as thinking through math or something generic, I guess they wouldn't have a voice but they would be attributed to the person currently switched and controlling the mind. But a thought would be a reaction to the urge to get pizza, ie "I kind of want pizza" as a top-level thought or a wordless acknowledgement of wanting pizza at a lower level, closer to what Tewi called unconscious.

 

Honestly, if you're not thinking in words then there's not usually much reason to identify thoughts like that. In our system (and our belief system, really) only the one running the mind can utilize the "thinking mind"/conscious-thinking/processing part of the brain as we call it, meaning only they can have what we consider thoughts. It seems like my tulpas "think" completely subconsciously, and to a much less complicated extent than I (or they while switched) can. For example, purposely trying not to think about math, if I asked Tewi to solve a math problem like 43 times 27, she would not be able to do that herself. But if I asked her 350 minus 150 she could answer because we can figure that out without conscious thought. Not just "6 times 6 is 36" memorization, but automatic unconscious 'thought'. We've been practicing mental maths for a while now and have gotten to the point where we can do most basic addition and subtraction relatively quickly without actually thinking through it, and that's the sort of 'thinking' my tulpas would be capable of without using the conscious/thinking mind.

 

Though it seems like to some extent I can share that conscious-thinking in some way. They can sort of direct the mind's thoughts for things requiring conscious/complex processing without being in actual control of it, which does take up the same mental resources as if I were doing it myself. Seems like it's a little bit of work for them compared to their normal subconscious thinking. Occasionally we have to do it while conversating, for example asking Tewi about her/our schedule of what needs to be done and when. Even that's borderline honestly, I can't think of something complex enough to warrant it right now, because most things can be done subconsciously.

 

Anyways.. just ranting personal subjective nonsense at this point. Also, I consider systems that have more than one person capable of directly consciously thinking at a time to maybe be merging to some extent. And for tulpas who say they can think like their host can, yet the host can't experience that thinking (being in control of the mind they should be able to), I think they're referring to that subconscious thinking. There have been reports that tulpas could do complicated math without the host's participation, but I dunno. Perhaps some people are just really good at those subconscious processes though, I could definitely see that.

[Guest Anonymous]

@Lumi

 

Huh, now all of what you just wrote is REALLY interesting.

[Luminesce]

Keep in mind the old

occasionally elitist

members of the forum tended towards the opposite, claiming their tulpas could all totally think consciously and live in the wonderland actively 24/7 with no problemblahblahblah. So don't take that as "Tulpamancy: Explained", it's just how we ourselves think.