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Creative Identity Markers


arachnocaccia

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Hi everyone. We were wondering if anyone had ideas for how we could signal to our housemates who is currently fronting.

 

Our current method (other than voice, which is unreliable) is a necklace that is orange on one side and blue on the other. It's not proven helpful, other than reminding me to take the front more often.

 

A more fanciful idea was a tattoo that could change in response to some sort of stimulus, but that seems a ways off. 😅

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We're waiting to get 3 sweaters, each in a different color, to represent who's fronting. But wearing the same clothes every time we front is boring and not a good idea. It's more of a fun thing to do every now and then.

 

We would like to get a necklace too, with 3 symbols that can be swapped whenever we want. Different bracelets with your names on it could also work. 

 

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If you are open with your housemates, don't pretend to be one another, and let them know who is fronting, they'll eventually pick up on tells that you may not even be aware of yourselves. My host's ex-wife can tell when we switch by a slight hitch in breathing. She can tell the difference between our posture, our sighing, and our resting expressions. Another good friend says we all have different 'energies', though our experiments indicate that he needs to see or hear us in order to accurately tell who is switched in, almost ruling out the implied uncanny perceptions.

 

We do try hard to telegraph our identities, especially in voice, where we differ significantly in accent and delivery, and slightly in pitch and vocabulary. I find the sound of my speaking voice very affirming of my identity. As a bonus, my mindvoice adapted to match without our having to work to differentiate it from Ember's.

 

Iris and I do have iconic symbols of our own that are often incorporated into the clothing of our forms, though we don't have good physical or even digital representations of them yet. Long-term, we are likely to have such representations, and may use them partly in service of distinguishing us. Ember doesn't have such a symbol yet, usually substituting the system symbol in our avatar for that purpose.

 

-Vesper

I'm not having fun here anymore, so we've decided to take a bit of a break, starting February 27, 2020. - Ember

 

Ember - Soulbonder, Female, 39 years old, from Georgia, USA . . . . [Our Progress Report] . . . . [How We Switch]

Vesper Dowrin - Insourced Soulbond from London, UK, World of Darkness, Female, born 9 Sep 1964, bonded ~12 May 2017

Iris Ravenlock - Insourced Soulbond from the Winter Court of Faerie, Dresdenverse, Female, born 6 Jun 1982, bonded ~5 Dec 2015

 

'Real isn't how you are made,' said the Skin Horse. 'It's a thing that happens to you.' - The Velveteen Rabbit

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I mean, the necklace sounds great. As long as you've told them what the necklace/colors mean, I don't see why that alone wouldn't work.


People usually (well, this is a rare thing to do, but in those rare cases, people-) use clothing of some kind, whether a shirt or similar thing, or maybe like.. a wristband? I don't know, the necklace thing sounds as good as it gets to me.

Hi! I'm Lumi, host of Reisen, Tewi, Flandre and Lucilyn.

Everyone deserves to love and be loved. It's human nature.

My tulpas and I have a Q&A thread, which was the first (and largest) of its kind. Feel free to ask us about tulpamancy stuff there.

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The best practical indicators of identity vary based on how often headmates switch or otherwise change fronters. If switching once a day or less, different headmates might have separate physical wardrobes, part the body's hair in a different place, and so on. If switching multiple times in a single conversation, as we do, changing voice, expression, posture, and body language are probably the best approach. If switching in for a few hours at a time, which seems to be the most common interval in this community, a distinctive accessory might be helpful but not an excessive amount of trouble.

 

-Vesper

I'm not having fun here anymore, so we've decided to take a bit of a break, starting February 27, 2020. - Ember

 

Ember - Soulbonder, Female, 39 years old, from Georgia, USA . . . . [Our Progress Report] . . . . [How We Switch]

Vesper Dowrin - Insourced Soulbond from London, UK, World of Darkness, Female, born 9 Sep 1964, bonded ~12 May 2017

Iris Ravenlock - Insourced Soulbond from the Winter Court of Faerie, Dresdenverse, Female, born 6 Jun 1982, bonded ~5 Dec 2015

 

'Real isn't how you are made,' said the Skin Horse. 'It's a thing that happens to you.' - The Velveteen Rabbit

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We tend to do... Well, many of these things. My voice sounds decently different from Aster's, though I'm still working on masculinization, we try to wear the necklace often, and on days I intend to front more often we part our hair differently, and curl it. I have my own pair of gloves that only I wear. The housemates seem to still have difficulty.

 

Aster: It'd be cool to have like, color shifting contacts. 

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Some of it has to come down to your housemates' respect and buy-in, then, which derives from the relationship you build with them. Even if you were wearing a t-shirt emblazoned in huge letters, front and back, "Call Me Baker", they would still have to consent to participate.

 

A couple of our friends are uncanny at identifying us on sight, with no specific effort on our parts beyond being authentic to ourselves. But another seems to use a name almost at random. If, from the context of the conversation, she should have known better, the fronter will generally just gently clear her throat as a signal that she used the wrong name and she'll correct herself. But if she's calling out across the room, we'll assume that the one addressed was the one she wanted to talk to, and that person will politely switch in to respond.

 

-Ember

I'm not having fun here anymore, so we've decided to take a bit of a break, starting February 27, 2020. - Ember

 

Ember - Soulbonder, Female, 39 years old, from Georgia, USA . . . . [Our Progress Report] . . . . [How We Switch]

Vesper Dowrin - Insourced Soulbond from London, UK, World of Darkness, Female, born 9 Sep 1964, bonded ~12 May 2017

Iris Ravenlock - Insourced Soulbond from the Winter Court of Faerie, Dresdenverse, Female, born 6 Jun 1982, bonded ~5 Dec 2015

 

'Real isn't how you are made,' said the Skin Horse. 'It's a thing that happens to you.' - The Velveteen Rabbit

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23 hours ago, Ember.Vesper said:

A couple of our friends are uncanny at identifying us on sight, with no specific effort on our parts beyond being authentic to ourselves.

 

That's pretty crazy, it's really cool that you have people who know you guys that well. No one should ever be able to tell us apart by sight, but if anyone knew my tulpas particularly well, they'd be able to tell who was fronting after hearing us talk for like 5-15 seconds I think lol. For now, it just seems like slight changes in mood I think, but if you knew we switched/who my tulpas were and were looking for it, it wouldn't be impossible.

 

But I mean, not all systemmates are different enough for that to be the case. I'd be incredibly impressed if someone could tell the difference in me and Flandre without just getting a lucky guess.

Hi! I'm Lumi, host of Reisen, Tewi, Flandre and Lucilyn.

Everyone deserves to love and be loved. It's human nature.

My tulpas and I have a Q&A thread, which was the first (and largest) of its kind. Feel free to ask us about tulpamancy stuff there.

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I like the necklace idea, and if that's too much to fuss over bracelets may work better.

We never make it painfully obvious to people who's who with the exception of Cat's brother now. However, it makes me feel better to slip little clues that I'm a separate person. On Discord Cat uses to talk to her high school friends, I will use a unique picture when I'm the one who's primarily talking as my avatar. Face to face though, I don't want to risk being obnoxious about who's who, so I just stick with clothing decisions and body language.

One time I tried to use a sign to flip back between me and Cat and it was the worst. I gave up on it because one of us would like to inset a comment. At that point, I just make sure our voices have some sort of distinction.

Cat and I have thought about getting me my own suit I could wear at home, but we don't have any plans to do that anytime soon. Maybe in a few years. A black bow tie would be nice, especially if I wanted to speak to other tulpa systems in person.

The semester before we learned switching, I wore slightly different clothes, but nothing drastically different. The biggest difference is I was more likely to have brushed our hair and avoided girl power shirts. Even though I now can switch, I am not very good at it and I usually switch with Cat on days I have class. Unlike last semester, we have classes on the same days and have no choice but to compromise on what we wear. As for better grooming, that habit rubbed onto Cat and now that's no longer as valid of an indicator of who's who. This may change once I am comfortable with Cat possessing me, but it's possible more blending in habits will occur rather than a separation of them.

I don't think body language is enough to get people to notice anything weird. At the very least, no one has given us strange looks or asked us questions. We have switched before and after talking to people and so far no one has noticed anything. The only person who had a problem with me talking to Cat's mother switched-in was Cat because my apathy towards Cat's mother seemed to be leaking through, even though Cat's mother seemed oblivious to me being switched-in that day.

I'm Ranger, GrayTheCat's cobud (tulpa), and I love hippos! I also like cake and chatting about stuff. I go by Rosalin or Ronan sometimes. You can call me Roz but please don't call me Ron.

My other headmates have their own account now.

 

If I missed seeing your art, please PM/DM me!

Blog | Not So Temporary Log | Switching Log | Yay! | Bre Translator | Art Thread

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