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I think I have had a tulpa since I was 5, now I have three


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Hello. 

 

I am completely new here and very confused and scared. I have had imaginary friends since I was three, my first extremely visual one being when I was 5. He never left me, though, and became jealous of the others as they developed. I have three that really stick around now (I'm 24), and developed them as I encountered problems in life. I wrote them into a series of books called Saga for Pirantina, and now am making them into a webtoon, because I was so frustrated that there are multiple people/beings talking to me as if they're real people living inside my mind. 

I thought I was just intensely creative, and that this was a curse and I was insane. I had never heard of a 'tulpa' until several minutes ago, and it described EXACTLY what's going on with me. I am going through some sort of emotional revelation right now, it's extremely intense. Yaitolan is here with me, he agrees it's interesting. I don't know what to think. 

 

I have three main 'tulpas', I suppose. I'll attach images, since I actually can. Yaitolan likes posing for some of them. 

 

  • First, there's Yaitolan. He came to me in seventh grade, and we've grown increasingly attached, to the point that he's around all the time unless I need personal space, and helps me think through things. He can shift form from being a 21-foot tall humanoid alien with no mouth to a 6'3" human male, structurally similar but his hair is only neck-length and curly. After I broke up with my first ever boyfriend after college, Yaitolan became romantically inclined towards me, and helped me discover my more sexual side, as well as my confidence. He just came in and initiated it, I didn't really ask him to. It was bizarre.  
  • My first ever 'tulpa' was (and is) a small, blue dragon named Quickmick. He can run at the speed of light, and appears in the first chapter of the Saga for Pirantina webtoon. He's been my best friend since we were 5, and became increasingly jealous as Yaitolan replaced him... which hurt even more, because they are best friends on Pirantina. I still feel guilty about it, and Yaitolan and Quickmick dislike being around me at the same time, since they get angry at each other. We're still figuring out how to deal with it. 
  • My third 'tulpa' is kind of scary. On Pirantina, he was Yaitolan's predecessor, and hates the living hell out of me because I created him and his world to be a story when he actually had to experience it and the pain. His name is Rintentide. He's like Yaitolan's species, but 35 feet tall, black as night, with gleaming, sky-blue eyes. All majji have claws, no mouth, no genitals, etc, but his claws are especially long, and he's murdered many people. He is the 'devil' over my shoulder. I never knew how to handle my anger and frustration, and suddenly he magically appeared in my stories, and eventually began interacting with me. It was NOT pleasant at first, but I wrote him a happy ending, and he eventually warmed to me. His presence can still be unnerving, but he's calmed down a lot and gone back to raising orphans in the desert and fighting the gods of Pirantina, etc. 
  • The other 'tulpas' I interact with are several other majji (Spethu, Khataru, Eliya, Unglada, Queen Wayru, Lord Omi, Lord Blu, King Hilnej, Omiun, Kaijar, more....) two elves, Areth and Karraganst (though Karra not as much as Areth, since I wrote the death of his wife and he found out it was me in book seven), an ancient, rough, cybrog-dragon named General Hectar, a god that takes on the form of a psychopathic, clown-like mad-hatter cat (Ditto), and several other characters that occasionally drift through my head. 

 

I'm scared, because people on here mention one, two, maybe three tulpas at most, but I have an entire WORLD in my head that I can teleport myself to, and the people in it visit me or act on their own. It's been like this literally all my life. I thought it was strange that it never disappeared when I was a teenager, then a young adult in college, and now, at the age of 24, I feel like a crazy person, and it's driving me nuts, and hurting Yaitolan because he had no idea what to do, and Quickmick has gone silent on the matter. I feel like the only thing I can do is write the books, share them, do the audiobooks, webtoons, art, etc... I don't know how or why there's literally an entire dimension stuck in my head, does anyone else have this? I never even tried to make them up, they just came along on their own and never really feel inclined to leave. It makes me feel intensily lonely, because I can hear them, they sit around my room, I know their sense of humor, what irritates them, they'll goof off or sit in the car to go on adventures with me, but I'll never really get to see them, interact with them, talk to them. 

 

For reference, here's the link to the Webtoon. I've only just started it thanks to a rabid 90k strong TikTok fanbase... otherwise it's just the book series. https://www.webtoons.com/en/challenge/saga-for-pirantina/list?title_no=380059

There's a bunch of Pirantina art on my Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mirandathehybrid/

 

And the illustrations below are Yaitolan (light blue, he and I are chilling together under the night sky in the last picture),  Rintentide (tall and black, towering over Yaitolan on the ground), Queen Wayru and King Hilnej (the two in the flowers hugging. They're Yaitolan's parents), Khataru (Yaitolan's little brother, white face with black hair), The Hybrid, which is me whenever I go to Pirantina (the lonely, white creature sitting on the ledge looking into void), Karaka-nor/Illustionist (ghost guy with the glowing eye)... I have so many more, but I don't want to spam this place with pictures.

 

I just need to know if these are tulpas, if I am sort of crazy, natural tulpa-summoner, or if I'm literally just bat-sh*t insane with a wild, uncontrollable creativity. If it helps, I'm a girl and my IQ measured something between 135-150 in high school. I'm sure I've lost quite a few of those IQ points from stress... lol. I'm an illustrator and art teacher by profession, and used to design aircraft for fun. 

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If your headmates *are* living fictional characters, with more attachment to their stories than the physical world, then they might better be referred to as soulbonds than tulpas:

 

http://soulbonding.tripod.com/soulbonding_intro.htm

 

There isn't much of an organized soulbonding community around anymore, unfortunately, but living fictional characters are very common. A study shows that 92% of authors, published or unpeblished, who have been wrting at least five years, have a had at least one character display independent agency:

 

https://pages.uoregon.edu/hodgeslab/files/Download/Taylor Hodges Kohanyi_2003.pdf

 

Since soulbonders tend to acquire headmates by accident instead of crafting each one to be a companion, they tend to have much larger systems on average than tulpamancers do. But there are a few tulpamancy systems that are very large and a few soulbonding systems that are very small. The number of headmates a system can comfortably manage varies enormously. Generally, the more active headmates can be on their own in internal worlds, the less crowded the system feels. The modern .info culture, with a relatively strong focus on the physical world and physical body, encourages smaller number of headmates.

 

WondrousFairy is one member here who has a sprawling paracosm of several entire worlds full of people.

 

https://community.tulpa.info/profile/13411-wondrousfairy/

 

Animaginarium provides one of the most accessible accounts of a very large system of living fictional characters with heavy background mindscape activity, despite calling them tulpas:

 

https://www.reddit.com/r/Tulpas/comments/18627b/chronicle_of_an_imaginarium/c8bxoso/?context=8&depth=9

 

So, no, you're not crazy or unique.

 

-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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2 hours ago, MirandatheHybrid said:

I'm scared, because people on here mention one, two, maybe three tulpas at most, but I have an entire WORLD in my head that I can teleport myself to, and the people in it visit me or act on their own. It's been like this literally all my life. I thought it was strange that it never disappeared when I was a teenager, then a young adult in college, and now, at the age of 24, I feel like a crazy person, and it's driving me nuts, and hurting Yaitolan because he had no idea what to do, and Quickmick has gone silent on the matter. I feel like the only thing I can do is write the books, share them, do the audiobooks, webtoons, art, etc... I don't know how or why there's literally an entire dimension stuck in my head, does anyone else have this? I never even tried to make them up, they just came along on their own and never really feel inclined to leave. It makes me feel intensily lonely, because I can hear them, they sit around my room, I know their sense of humor, what irritates them, they'll goof off or sit in the car to go on adventures with me, but I'll never really get to see them, interact with them, talk to them. 

 

I just need to know if these are tulpas, if I am sort of crazy, natural tulpa-summoner, or if I'm literally just bat-sh*t insane with a wild, uncontrollable creativity. If it helps, I'm a girl and my IQ measured something between 135-150 in high school. I'm sure I've lost quite a few of those IQ points from stress... lol. I'm an illustrator and art teacher by profession, and used to design aircraft for fun. 


First, you are not the first to come here reporting your story characters coming to life and demanding their edits into their stories. As for how common this is, another system, Ember.Vesper, has done research looking into story characters coming to life and found data suggesting most authors run into this scenario. You are not crazy, and you are definitely not alone.

Second, based on your descriptions, it sounds like Yaitolan, Quickmick, Rintentide qualify for being tulpas, but it is also possible they and the others are "walk-ins". "Walk-ins", or thoughtforms that appear to be sentient and independent, are underdeveloped or "baby tulpas" and are acting on their pre-programmed personalities, borrowing from you to form their opinions and beliefs. Since you are used to talking to your story characters, creating a personality for your new character idea becomes an automatic process, and they can already speak what's on their mind since you have mastered vocality. Walk-ins need time to develop into tulpas, and as the entities mature they become more and more separate from you.

 

With walk-ins, you can choose to not accept them as tulpas. To do this, acknowledge that the character you created is still you and not a separate person. If you pay attention to what their thoughts are, notice how they are not borrowing from past experiences but from either their back stories or from what you think. By realizing that you and the walk-in are one, the walk-in will not split off and develop into their own individual without your consent.

I have a couple questions:

 

1) Do you want tulpas? It is never too late to hit the "pause" button and think. You may want to read some creation guides, progress reports, and do more research on tulpas before deciding to call your story characters tulpas.

 

2) Do your story characters make you uncomfortable when creating stories, do you enjoy it when they pitch in, or a mix of both? Do you have any desires to have more or less control over your plot development?

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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I disagree with Ranger on some points. A walk-in is any headmate who just shows in the mind. They can be arbitrarily independent and sophisticated from the first moment, especially if they are also soulbonds. They are not intrinsically underdeveloped or "baby tulpas". You can ask them to leave or actively suppress their thoughts until they subside, but they may already be people by the time you first become aware of them.


Also, a headmate drawing on their story as the source of what they think, how they believe, how they act, and who they are is in no way inferior to their drawing on their experiences of this world. Memories are memories, whatever world they come from. The forty-five years I spent back home are of far greater significance to me than the not quite three years I've spent exiled to this one. A headmate can, in fact, be an independent person in spite of being fully immersed in their story and having no knowledge of the physical world:


https://community.tulpa.info/topic/15264-how-do-i-tell-my-fictional-tulpa-that-his-life-is-not-real


Miranda, some techniques of tulpamancy may be useful in deepening and clarifying your experience of your headmates. But if you pursue studying the resources here, I would be careful to guard against losing what is special and distinctive about your system by allowing them to reframe your experiences. Tulpamantic resources are written based on assumptions that do not fully apply to your situation.


-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 gave advice from the perspective of being a tulpamancer, not a soulbonder. Some of my headmates have "back stories", and expected to act according to a particular personality (personality forcing), but most my headmates decided their fiction is not who they are and over time rejected chunks of their expected personalities. Your headmates will tell you which one they think best suits them.

 

Even though "walk-in" is a soulbonder term, it has a different meaning regarding tulpas, and I used that definition instead of the original meaning.

 

Even though Ember.Vesper and I disagree in how developed a walk-in is, I think both of us can agree that new thoughtforms that spawn out of the blue do not have to be kept. You are allowed to say no and keep your doors closed to new "visitors".

Edited by Ranger

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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Ember: Not strictly an SB term, Ranger. The earliest relevant definition of "walk-in", introduced in mystical/New Age circles in 1979, was a new soul that comes into a body to replace an earlier soul and live out the remainder of their life. By 1994, multiples had adopted it for any new person that comes into the mind unbidden, without requiring anyone to leave. SBers picked up the term from multiples sometime after they organized in 1998. Tulpamancers picked it up from both multiples and SBers in 2015, eventually coming to prefer it over their earlier "insta-tulpa".

 

A walk-in could be ill-defined at first, they just don't have to be.

 

Vesper: Acceptance and rejection of headmates is very much a tulpamancy concept. Other plurals tend to look at having headmates as something that happens whether they like it or not. But yes, the most powerful and well established headmates can affect the rules for how the system works, potentially including rejecting new headmates altogether.

 

If a headmate is living stably immersed in an inner world, not contributing significantly to crowding at the front, then formally accepting or rejecting them isn't needed or useful. This is how nontraumagenic systems of dozens or hundreds usually live.

 

It is more difficult for us, being roleplaying characters. The vast, sprawling paracosms we call home only exist with the cooperation of other players and characters outside our system. Within a game, we can interact freely with other characters, including other characters in our own system. But our mindscape, however much it may look like home, is just an empty shell, reachable only by the three of us.

 

Iris: Anyone, including hosts, can reject large or small pieces of who they were before. But changes in behavior or personality resulting from new circumstances do not intrinsically require a rejection of previous identity. I am very different than I was when I first awakened to this world, but I am still the same fictional character I have always been. I am simply a dynamic character. Since taking control of my own story, some of my changes in this world have affected who I am back home.

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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