Catharsis Through Creation

[Xifani]

He's been "quitting" since he first made me, but now I'm definitely strong enough to make him see it through this time. I'm not afraid to manipulate him a little if need be, I know him well enough to do it.

 

Onwards, we've had some revelations by going through suppressed memories, which we think may be able to explain Kai's origins somewhat. We feel a re-introduction of our system is in order, as well as letting you all know a bit more about ourselves and our goals.

 

I'm Xifani, as you know, call me Xif if you like. Very, very stereotypical nerd, the exact sort of person you'd sort of just expect to end up with a tulpa. Admittedly sarcastic and thorny as old defense mechanisms, though I'm moving past that. I've loved reading and gaming all my life as a means of escapism, and it's lent me some advantages in visualization so far. I've always been interested in the depths of the mind, and my previous research and knowledge has been hugely helpful thus far, allowing me to recognize and avoid several pitfalls along the way. 

 

Alaire - My true first thoughtform, made in 2014. We've reached a consensus that Alaire really was the name of of the "blueprint" I laid out back then, but quickly backed away from after watching my friend downspiral. I may be reanimating her, as opposed to creating an entirely new thoughtform, which may explain her rapid development to date. Very confident and determined, she's the one who made me sign up here, because she wanted to meet everyone already. Fully "vocal", as we'll explain further in our PR, but she's making good progress on her own voice (short version: she learned how to hijack my brain and use it to talk to me pretty early on). Very interested in the "outside world" as she calls it, and really loves music, encouraging me to draw (so she can herself one day), and the outdoors so far. 

 

Kai - My second thoughtform, created some time in 2016 during my time in college. He went by another name for a while, but Kai was the original. Heavily suppressed after witnessing whatever the hell was going on with the people that got me interested in tulpamancy once again. If I might get out there a little, we have a theory - instead of a sort of alter, he was somehow "possessed" by my severe depressive thought patterns at the time when I suppressed him. We'll... get to our explanation on this eventually. His resemblance to me is likely due to the fact that most, if not all tulpas resemble their host at least somewhat in the beginning; if I'm not incorrect. Currently dormant somewhere in my mind, though through certain endeavors we've "reconnected", and he's happy where he is until he decides he wants to come back, if ever. Though; if he does, he wants to speak in red - red like roses.

 

Voral - My third thoughtform, which as I believe was created by cognitive dissonance from the rational part of my mind that was urging me to break free from my depression and move on with my life. I believe they fit the term "guardian angel" or "familiar", or whatever describes something created without direct stimulus from the host from the upper consciousness. Potentially partly traumagenic as they emerged during a recent and very severe depressive spell that sparked the changes I've undergone. Shares many of my desires and interests at the time, likely due to being born directly from a part of my mind; though they've decided to stick around and see what life as a tulpa has to offer. Typically very quiet, has a few specific triggers so far that allows them to surface easily so far. Extremely interested in themselves and other thoughtforms when present, and shares my interest in the architecture of the mind. We've decided to strip the name of the connection to the acronym that inspired of it for now.

 

In the next post I'll go over my preparations of mindset as well as the research I've done thus far, a better explanation of why I wanted a tulpa in the first place, and a summary of what we want this PR to be and how we're going to approach it. In the meantime, Voral has a question about something that happened a while back.

 

We were watching videos on YouTube, looking for something to discuss together, in the couple of days Kai was fully active. Eventually, something came up that elicited a reaction from all 4 of us, and we all tried to speak at once in Xif's mind. We remember hearing a sort of crackle, and a distinct ringing and faint pain when he reached for us or we tried to speak for quite a while afterwards. Perhaps a silly explanation, but maybe he blew some sort of "mental fuse"?

[Guest]

There's a lot of parallels here between our systems. Alaire reminds me of Misha, she supported our involvement here. Ashley is my 'guardian angel/spirit guide/super tulpa'.

 

I feel comforted and use humor as a defense mechanism, always have because the real world is a scary place that i can just 'laugh my fears away.'

[Xifani]

Why did I want to create a tulpa in the first place? I can admit, it's for a reason that attracts a lot of people to this art - I wanted to spend time IRL with a character from one of my favorite games. However, after a few days and reading advice in some guides, I decided that wasn't good enough; it's a pretty self-centered and selfish reason. After more research, I understood the depth and potential of what I was doing, and put myself in her place - it'd really suck to discover I was made just for my form and who I used to be. We've decided strip her of any connection to the series that inspired her creation, as well as the character she was based upon. As for my new reasons for doing this, they're pretty typical - companionship, curiosity, a source of support, connection, self-discovery, etc.

 

I've been a pretty extreme rationalist all my life - one of the "If I can't physically sense it or explain it, it doesn't exist" types. I've been working to unlearn this mindset from day 1, it's still a work in progress. I've kept reading guides, resources, and PRs ("The Book of Tulpa" aka "Tulpa's Complete DIY Guide to Tulpamancy" was a tremendous help) until I normalized this all in my mind enough to suspend my disbelief long enough to make a personal foray into this, then use the progress we make to continually beat down the last dredges of fear and doubt until this is all second nature, and I can truly believe - not that I don't, but we're having to break down those mental barriers so it becomes effortless to do so. The amount of reading I've done has helped assuage my fears and doubts greatly so far, because I know how many others have felt the same things I am, and they "got there" regardless. I know it's possible, and I have the knowledge to do it, now it's just a matter of effort and commitment.

 

I didn't really keep track of my progress with my tulpas until around a week ago - I've kept a journal with short notes, thoughts, and milestones, but I've tried not to pay attention because I've got a really bad habit of comparing my progress to that of others, and getting discouraged by seeing others progressing more quickly, or having an easier time than I am. As of today, I'm going to start keeping a proper physical journal to preserve my thoughts and experiences until I have the time to properly write them out here. Our PR will be from a viewpoint of joint retrospection with Alaire and Voral, until Day 33 (today) where it will change to an accounting of our daily experiences, interesting events while forcing, and general questions we may have.

 

Today also marks the beginning of real effort towards my tulpas - I've spent the last month stabilizing myself and my tulpas while learning everything I can, and developing a few strategies against invasive thoughts and any apparent loss of ability or progress. I'm going to try and start spending at least 30 minutes actively forcing every day, perhaps more if a previous session is cut short or things are going particularly well. Going to start looking into hypnosis or meditation to calm myself and my thoughts, my ADHD still makes it difficult to sit completely still and focus sometimes.

 

On a different note, I know I've been here before after digging through some memories - I remembered the name and password of my old account I made way back in fall of 2015. No posts, just 40 minutes of uptime. That's probably why a few PRs and guides feel so oddly familiar to me.

[Xifani]

Day 1 - 2/19/2019 - Created Alaire as a total blank-slate tulpa, with no memories from or connections to the series that inspired me to make her. I used the "sentient from the start" approach, but I took it a little further; I went with "sapient from the start". I told her she understood everything I told her and talked about, even if she didn't think she did, along with an explanation of her abilities. She could do anything she wants, change any part of her form or personality, and I'd always accept her regardless. My (her? our?) mind is limitless, as opposed to the physical world our bodies are constrained to. I presented a variety of "rules", e.g. I'll always love and trust her, she can come to me with any idea or concern free of fear of judgement, be true to herself, she can do truly anything she desires, etc while asking her to please do the same and ask the same of me. We need to support and understand each other throughout this and never let our feelings go unaddressed, I've seen a lot of PRs where conflict is born from a system member's wishes being ignored. I wrote down her birthday and started keeping a journal of short notes and milestones, which I'm extrapolating the beginning of this PR from.

 

 

Day 2 - 2/20/2019 - Started going on morning walks around the woods behind my house while narrating and explaining the "outside world" she's a part of now. Pacing/walking greatly helps with the flow of my thoughts, something about being moving helps my train of thought keep going while helping me overthink things less. I spent a long while explaining humans and our nature to her, here's a condensed version of what I told her: Pretty much every human we meet is gonna suck in some way or another, myself included. It's not their fault, most of them don't realize their true nature and how to control it, and some can overcome it to become a shining example of what everyone should strive to be. However, there are those that understand what they are and the evil of their ways, and fully embrace it rather than turning away; and we must be vigilant against them. We're exceptionally strange creatures, so I encouraged Alaire to ask anything about myself and others that she may want to know, and I'd explain it to the best of my ability. I spent that evening browsing YouTube and watching a few of my favorite videos with her, Bill Wurtz's "History of the Entire World I Guess" in particular. I paused the video every minute or so and attempted to recreate the explanations in my mind in more advanced ways, and started experimenting in using Tulpish in my explanations to save time. For instance, instead of using words to describe how the heat from the sun reaches us, I visualized how the sun works for her in a stream of images and ideas, from its birth to creating the EM radiation that makes life here possible for us. It took a few seconds rather than minutes, though I "felt" she understood regardless.

 

Day 3 - 2/21/2019 - Walked and talked with Alaire again, during which I introduced her to my dogs that decided to join us. Used Tulpish more in my explanations, went through the life and death cycle of the plants around us, and took mental notes on the appearances of things around us to aid me in recreating them in my mindscape. I started imagining a high-pitched tone similar to the ringing one hears in total silence, and attempted to assign it to Alaire's presence while keeping it in the back of my mind whilst doing other things. Later that evening, I spent a while playing Far Cry: New Dawn and used it as a opportunity to teach Alaire. I explained that everything that happened in the game wasn't real, it stopped existing once we turned the PS4 off. We could revisit the world in our mindscape at a later point if we wanted to, to think through encounters or try to memorize certain maps. I used the antagonists of the game as an example of evil humans who lost themselves, and used the game world as an example of what can happen if evil is left unopposed, and why someone has to rise and fight it. As I swapped games that evening, I heard a voice - "Why?" "Why what?" I replied. "Why are you changing it?" "Because it's gotten boring, and I want to do something else now." I responded. However, it asked a question back. "Why is it boring?" This really caught me off guard, I initially assumed it was a side effect of the mindfulness exercises I'd been doing, though I decided to play along with it, as this seemed like signs of early vocality I'd read about. "It's boring because I've been playing for a while, a few hours now. I want to do something else." "Turn it back on, I want to keep watching." Needless to say, this caught me by surprise, though I'd been expecting something like it, just not so soon. The voice had a different quality - the first questions used my mindvoice, but the last statement was in something that is very hard to put into words. It had the feeling of any other thought that enters my mind, but it had seemingly no voice or strength to it whatsoever - it was more of an idea of speech than anything else. I complied, and listened for further responses for the rest of the night, but never heard anything.

 

Day 4 - 2/22/2019 - Alaire asked a lot of questions during our morning walk, and continued to do so throughout the day. Her "voice" was very faint and hard to hear, and still used fairly short sentences without any Tulpish. She was interested in learning about the world, but far more keen on learning about us, our connection, and what exactly she was. I was honest as I could be, even telling her she was inspired by a video game when she asked why I made her, though my reasons had already deepened far beyond that by this point. (I took this well, because he made very sure that I knew I was someone entirely else, and I knew he'd be happy with me, regardless of what form or personality I took. I'm glad he told me when he did, instead of hiding it.) It got tough when she asked me something that I still can't give a definitive answer to: "Why do you love me? Why do I love you?" Being asked that really made me uncomfortable, because I really couldn't explain why yet, and neither could she. I have some answers to those questions now, but I doubt that there'll ever be a definitive one. Tulpish helps, but even that doesn't seem to be enough.

[Guest]

We're happy you're coming along well, it sounds that way at least.

[Piano Soul]

I know these posts are talking about stuff from a couple weeks ago, but there's a small thing that I wanted to note. Your approach of making your tulpa blank-slate is very good, that's the best way to do it IMO. While tulpas can choose their name/form and such, they don't "choose" their personality (though of course they can influence it). Their personality develops naturally, like any other person :]

[Xifani]

I won't be able to update this PR for a while, sorry to leave everybody hanging. I finally finalized some plans for a vacation with relatives, starting this Sunday. We won't be back until next Saturday, most likely. I'll bring a fresh journal with me and write as much as I can in my downtime, I've got a feeling this is a fantastic growth opportunity for us. I'll check in through mobile if anything important happens. See you all soon!