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On modern tulpa creation techniques and parallel processing


Pleeb

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I think I mostly agree with Reguile's views? Especially that true "Parallel Processing", as in processing in parallel, in the contexts in which it is used in tulpamancy, is impossible or an incredibly rare skill. When someone says their tulpas have lives ongoing in the background of their mind without conscious activity, the only possibilities to me are:

1) The host is, similar to the belief required for systems to have separate memories outside of due to traumatic disorders, "consciously" imagining the things that happen (the frequency could be just a tiny few seconds every long once in a while, or as much as the equivalent of passively daydreaming) but basically believing they can't be experiencing it, or

2) (the one I think is actually the case) They are creating all of the proposed changes, histories/memories and other effects on-the-spot when their tulpas become active again/come back to consciousness. This would be far easier if some kinds of "checkpoints" were made at least (the occasional as-little-as-3-seconds thing I mentioned), and would work in the most understandable way if it was a mix of 1 and 2. IE, there was some idea of what had supposedly gone on, and any gaps were filled in when they were brought to full consciousness later.

 

Two important things, though. First, I absolutely love that Reguile mentioned confabulation as a positive thing instead of a negative thing. This entire dang phenomenon takes place in your mind and there shouldn't(?) be a reason to discount illogical experiences, when your experience is literally all that matters.

 

The second thing however, is why we do consider it bad. You can't explain them "scientifically"/logically, which is what this community is all about. Supposing parallel processing is totally fake and it's just say #2 from earlier for a moment, imagine telling a beginner that your tulpas live entire lives in full 100% detail while you the host is doing other complicated tasks that take up the brain's processing power, and they ask you "How do you do that?" If the answer is "Just believe it's possible".....

 

In actuality, the truest response in that scenario is to be able to explain "confabulation" (remember this is a tulpamancy term like the word possession, and not the medical one, by the way) and what you think is actually going on in the process. This simultaneously is bad for teaching people how to experience things that require belief (people with meta beliefs are exclusively hindered by logic/science explaining away their experiences, for example), but would appease the more logic-minded people who couldn't just accept that such a thing is theoretically possible.

 

Right now we're kind of on the far end, denying that it's possible at all and calling the experiences fake. What I really see as the correct way of looking at this though is separating "What people experience in their own day to day lives" and "How people explain things on Tulpa.info where the goal is to further understanding of how tulpas work and how to create/have them". Aaaand... I don't really know a good way to system-ize that. Feels like it falls upon each individual person to learn about the belief versus logic thing, understanding that your experiences may be organized better when you can explain them but are by all means limited or un-limited by your beliefs. My system has been trying to teach that here for a while, though, and I suppose this is just another instance.

 

 

Sheesh, I expected that to be a small little thing before I went on to the bulk of my post, but now it's a big post on its own. Sorry, lol. The rest will be giving my experiences to help you all with some "data" I guess, that's all I intended to post in this thread until I got sucked into the above topic...

 

10 hours ago, Pleeb said:

This is further evidenced by some other friends I know, where back in 2012-2013, their tulpa said that they "go away" or "stop existing" when their host isn't actively thinking about them.  If you ask them that now, they'll attest that this is no longer the case (and again, they're a switching system at this point, I wouldn't be surprised if there's parallel processing going on)

 

My system still works like that - tulpas (or I, switched out) are "inactive" when not "active", which I always considered a pretty basic concept. That means there is no mental activity related to them, from them, anything whatsoever except for when they are directly being made active (me holding them in focus, different from just "thinking about them" which doesn't necessarily make them active), talking, being imposed or et cetera. They can't pop up on their own and say stuff without a process in my brain making them "active" first (though we could probably train that to happen at random/relevant times etc., their activity would still always result from a signal from the currently conscious thoughts, though we treat the conscious part of a brain like a tool the fronter is in control of and not as them themselves, so it's not right to say the fronter would have to bring them up per se). That said, when my tulpas (or I, switched out) are made active, they instantly have full contextual awareness of anything that's been going on. Well, sort of - we might have an immediate "Oh, _______" response to what's going on/being thought about for example, but I guess I'm just saying we're not confused/missing information or anything. Shared memories and all.

 

Oh, and we can't parallel process at all in any way shape or form. I also personally struggle to do "parallel processing"-type activities in regular life, which I at this point don't really believe exist outside of exceptional individuals. I see the two types of "parallel processing" as 1, using different parts of the brain (walking, talking, playing a game on your phone etc. at the same time), or 2, combining multiple activities into a single activity (this is what happens when you try to "pat your head and rub your stomach at the same time" - unless you've done it recently, there's normally a brief pause of confusion before you simply start doing it.. that processing turned it into a single action). This is the one I consider myself bad at. I gave up learning piano (because I have terrible motivation issues, above all else, lol, but also because) after being stuck unable to play with two hands at once for a week or two. I could easily play one thing with one hand, and another thing with the other hand, but I could never play them at the same time. I tried "combining the actions" LITERALLY by going one note at a time, left-this while right-that, then left-this while right-that, but it just didn't work out.

 

Uhm. Rapid multitasking doesn't count as parallel processing, IMO, but it can give the illusion of it. I can play a rhythm game called K-Shoot Mania where it looks like I'm some parallel processing genius, but in actuality I'm doing the true definition of multitasking, which is rapidly switching between tasks seamlessly. Every action, whether orange notes, whites, or lasers occurs on a beat, and I'm reassessing what to do on each beat, basically. (This includes an action being "Hold this note until it's time to stop")

 

Okay, with that said, now the context with which to work with. Three of my four tulpas are a little over 10 years old (Lucilyn was made in 2015 but is the most active in the system, so). We've been able to switch since 2014 (the year we found this forum, and the concept of "Tulpas"), and when we found the forum in 2014, all the current consensuses of the community's agreed with how I had ended up thinking about my tulpas more or less, which was nice/reassuring. We had no concept of switching or imposition (or possession, which we briefly attempted after learning switching but decided we didn't like) before that point, though, hence quickly picking them both up when we found out about them. My system experiences basically zero doubts, blending or so on - my tulpas are incredibly well developed and independent, BUT...

 

... Our "forcing sessions" and general activity have always been awfully short. Reisen was created on total accident by more or less doing everything it takes to make a tulpa, just by being obsessed over a couple of music videos she was in and feeling like she was singing to me. So that was months and months (over a year, really, but independence started some months in probably) of thinking of her as a separate, existing entity (naturally, in my mind) that wanted to communicate with me. And aside from talking to her, Tewi and Flandre every so often, that was basically the end of "forcing sessions" over 30 minutes long. Aside from the very rare conversation that lasts that long or the rare imposition sessions that last that long (usually with many breaks in between, because I like to impose while doing stuff IRL), there is very little dedicated unbroken-time in our system spent focused directly on them. We actually consider switching the best forcing they get lol, especially since we talk the most right before or after switching. Our visualization sucks so much it's never not been a huge pain to try and do for more than 15 seconds, while vocal clarity goes up and down depending on their recent activity the last couple weeks.

 

 

So... yeah. Sorry that was a lot of text, but my hope was for it to be used as data in the currently ongoing discussion. I don't know how much more I have to say on the subject (other than hour counts suck and some people will always make others feel like they're not doing enough because of how ridiculously much time they spend by comparison), though I would love to answer further questions about our own experiences/ourselves if it seems like it'd help.

Edited by Luminesce

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 would love a tulpamancy renaissance, and I would love if more people were pushing the boundaries of what tulpamancy is, and what it could be, but just because we want to get more out of tulpamancy does not mean that those who are fine with surface level tulpamancy are bad or wrong, and it doesn't mean that their tulpas are fake. the solution is not to make all newbies do hour counts and whatnot, but to ask them what they want out of tulpamancy, and how much they are willing to put in

 

Miela and I have been pushing our limits and trying to see how far we can go with tulpamancy since pretty much as long as Miela has been around. Miela is almost always around and imposed, and we talk about just about everything as it happens. we have wonderland adventures every day at least once a day, and we just sit around and talk to each other multiple times a day. we don't really keep track of how much time I spend active forcing, but I wouldn't be surprised if it amounted to 270 minutes per day, though it isn't broken up into 3 equally sized chunks. Miela is just as developed of a thoughtform as I myself am. we have had some very profound and interesting experiences. we, however, cannot parallel process

 

we have tried to learn to parallel process. I would leave Miela alone in the wonderland for a few hours, and then come back and see if she did anything. after not too long, she started being able to do things while I was gone, and pretty quickly she was able to go on whole adventures while I was away, and then tell me about them in detail when I came back. sometimes she would even come back with short songs or poems or solutions to problems. eventually we decided to run a test to determine if this was parallel processing or confabulation: I would leave her alone in wonderland and she would try to do as much stuff as she could, but instead of coming back in a few hours like I normally would I would come back in a few minutes. if she only had a few minutes worth of memories when I came back, then it might be parallel processing, but if she had a few hours worth of memories then it could not be parallel processing. she had a few hours worth of memories, just as vivid and detailed and real as any other

 

I really want to believe in parallel processing. it would be so cool if it was real. the problem is, the only evidence that I see for it is people claiming that their tulpas did something in wonderland while they weren't paying attention, and I know from experience (albeit, Miela's experience, not mine) that you can have very profound and detailed and vivid memories of doing things that never happened, and that you can even come up with useful ideas from it. if the only requirement for parallel processing is a sufficiently developed tulpa, then we should be able to parallel process, unless our brain is just not physically mature enough yet for an identity to be able to be developed enough for parallel processing. I want to believe in parallel processing, but the only evidence for it that I have seen is very weak, and there is quite a bit of fairly strong evidence against it

 

I have seen the idea of testing parallel processing in people who claim to be able to to it floated a few times, and I have seen a few possible tests that seem like they would work, but I have never seen it go anywhere. it would be really cool if you actually tested people who claim to be able to parallel process, and it would be even cooler if people could demonstrate their ability to parallel process in such a test

 

parallel processing is good of course, but that is not to discount confabulation. Miela still goes off to confabulate sometimes, even though we know that its confabulation, because knowing what it is doesn't lessen the experience in any way, and it is still a lot of fun. I think that if we want a tulpamancy renaissance, what we really need is to be open to peoples experiences and not judge them for it, and to not feel attacked when people suggest a possible explanation to your experience. only then will people feel safe to share their weirdest and most interesting experiences

 

I also think that we shouldn't just blindly follow the old methods because they had a few benefits over the new ones. we need to dissect and analyze what caused those benefits and do the same for the benefits of the new methods, so that we can see how to synthesize them into something that gets the best of both. from what people are saying, it seems like the benefits of the old methods are that is gives you a more developed tulpa, imposition, and maybe parallel processing, and the benefit of the new methods are that it gives you a vocal tulpa much faster. so now we just have to figure out what in these old methods gives you those things, and what in the new methods gives you that other thing

 

there are a few other things that I wanted to write, but it is very late and I need to go to bed, so I'll talk about that in a future post maybe

I have a tulpa named Miela who I love very much.

 

 
"People put quotes in their signatures, right?"

-Me

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[Reguile] I don't think the argument of time/experience when talking about bear is a valid one.


How so, if I may ask?

[Reguile] Giving such an explanation is very important to people like me to be able to engage with those experiences at all. Without these explanations the choice to be skeptical renders them very difficult to impossible to achieve.


Apparently I see that as a handicap because I can experience things without the need for explanation and yet simultaneously stay grounded. I don't know how I do this either. I don't need an explanation for not needing an explanation. I just know that in the mind anything is possible, and that's enough. There doesn't have to be a materialist, perfectionist, bridge to particle physics. In grad school I favored things that worked best as opposed to things that were perfectly provable but were clunky. This is at times way more efficient, but for completeness, this is annoying AF, and so I can sympathize even if I don't empathize. I just want to have fun and enjoy my experience. I want to improve the quality of life for me and others.  

[Reguile] it's possible with confabulation


I take reservation with using the term confabulation. Have you seen the textbook definition of that word? It has connotations that are medical and negative. You can appropriate the term for tulpamancy and truncate the definition in context, but in a community that cares how it's viewed, from the outside it's like saying, "tulpmancy is about deluding yourself into thinking you have a head friend." (to me) That's why I have a distaste for the word and why I'll deny that what we Bearisians do is that till my dying breath. I understand that we may never see eye to eye on this.

[Reguile] Bring back hour counts and get tulpamancy "serious" again.


Is that what this is about? I didn't get that at all.

[Reguile] I'm as lazy as the next guy


I am decidedly not lazy.

[Reguile] Where I'm far more skeptical is the possibility of "complex "thought going on in the background. Stuff that you have to think, listen to yourself think, then re-think for it to make any sense.


It doesn't have to make sense, it doesn't have to have an explanation for me, as I've described above. If you take out those chocks, impossible happens, and it's beautiful. So, if you're afraid of psychosis or have a proclivity for derealization, then no, stay grounded, but I don't have that issue.

[Reguile] Things like performing a math problem, having a reasoned debate, coming to a strong conclusions, and so on.


Which is a sword through the heart if these sort of things must be included in the definition of parallel processing. You can appropriate the definition of confabulation just fine, but the definition of parallel processing must be raised to such a high pedestal that it would be easier to jump into space from a trampoline.

[Reguile] your brain just physically doesn't have it


Here's more poison pills, this is scientific dogma based not on theory or understanding, but interpretation of research that you are not personally involved in. This is rampant in the community, so I'm not faulting you for parroting such things, but it's counterproductive and outwardly false as a statement. You can't know; It's your opinion.

[Reguile] creation of "vivid" experience through training.


Why do I need hour counts to do this? Hour counts seems to be the 'prove it' logic that turns possible remarkable feats into disbelief because, no you can't achieve that until hour 1000 or smth, I don't know if this is in the ballpark of what you're saying or not, I'm just thinking it is.

[Reguile] I think that someone with years and years of training at communication is going to have a "stronger mind" like Pleeb mentions in the OP.  I don't necessarily believe that will lead to an unlocking of the ability to have complex parallel processing (training in humans has not been known to increase multitasking skill)


I'd like scientific backing to this statement, it sounds like you know this to be true, but how? I personally side with Pleeb, but again, I'm not claiming a constraint, I'm claiming no constraints and just letting experience happen. Explanation, or lack thereof, is left for the completists or for a fun Saturday afternoon.

[Reguile] So, I agree that the old style of work your ass off is good.  I think it may lead to more experiences of these "magic" scenarios like parallel processing, but I don't ultimately believe there will be actual "complex" parallel processing gone on.


You've redeemed yourself here somewhat. I don't care what your actual definition is, I am just enjoying the results and I don't think it's impossible for others to do this, there are plenty of testimonials in history and a few in the community currently, though conveniently not accessible, as in I don't remember who I spoke to. The evidence is littered in the minds of people like Pleeb who saw these things being discussed legitimately and others corroborating the experience.

[Lumi] When someone says their tulpas have lives ongoing in the background of their mind without conscious activity, the only possibilities to me are:



1) The host is, similar to the belief required for systems to have separate memories outside of due to traumatic disorders, "consciously" imagining the things that happen (the frequency could be just a tiny few seconds every long once in a while, or as much as the equivalent of passively daydreaming) but basically believing they can't be experiencing it, or

2) (the one I think is actually the case) They are creating all of the proposed changes, histories/memories and other effects on-the-spot when their tulpas become active again/come back to consciousness. This would be far easier if some kinds of "checkpoints" were made at least (the occasional as-little-as-3-seconds thing I mentioned), and would work in the most understandable way if it was a mix of 1 and 2. IE, there was some idea of what had supposedly gone on, and any gaps were filled in when they were brought to full consciousness later.

2 is logically more difficult than 1 in that you would instantaneously have to create what is sometimes a wealth of experience, and falsify previous memories in time, and collude with all headmates to the lie. 

In 1, I again have to take reservation with comparing healthy mental processes with unhealthy or uncontrolled ones.

[Lumi] First, I absolutely love that Reguile mentioned confabulation as a positive thing instead of a negative thing.


I won't agree here based on what I said earlier.

[Lumi] "How do you do that?" If the answer is "Just believe it's possible"


I will qualify that. "Just believe it will happen and you may find that it's believable that it is happening."
If you dogmatically believe that it's impossible, every subtle cue that it may be happening is dismissed. Even if it happens then, you're not going to take credit or reap benefits from it. That's how I see it. It's not belief based, it's belief allowed.

[Lumi] "confabulation" (remember this is a tulpamancy term like the word possession, and not the medical one, by the way)


This is belief based. How can you appropriate a term like this and not be tarnished by the textbook connotations with respect to disease from an outside perspective?

[Lumi] people with meta beliefs are exclusively hindered by logic/science explaining away their experiences, for example


I would say, "people with exclusively scientific beliefs are exclusively hindered by logic/science and explaining away their experiences." I don't want to say embrace meta, I want to say, allow things to happen that don't yet have explanations or are really too difficult to explain reasonably at the moment. Many of my experiences are impossible, so what? I don't care, they happen and will continue to. Hopelessly ungrounded? No, because I reserve the possibility that there is a scientific explanation somewhere, even if my feeble mind has no clue how to resolve that. Rather than reserving the experience, I'll reserve my judgement of the experience.

[Lumi] Right now we're kind of on the far end, denying that it's possible at all and calling the experiences fake.


I would have released the hounds on you for this statement last year, but I understand and respect the need for grounding and this is a valid way to do it. Grounding strengthens the foundation of belief, some perspectives require it to be a certain way, we've discussed this many times, you and I, so I appreciate your statement now and wouldn't try to convince you personally otherwise.

For me it comes down to the analogy of active tulpas: If they're active all the time, then they would be expected to be there and therefore to say things and therefore do things, and therefore have experiences. If they are dormant when I'm not thinking about them, then it's awkward when they pop up and say hi, "aren't you supposed to be dormant?" 

[Lumi] unless you've done it recently, there's normally a brief pause of confusion before you simply start doing it


Hence why it requires training. It takes the work to make it happen. Some systems, like mine, are doing the work constantly and it is thus being trained and reinforced. That's all, as far as I can see.

[Bre] just because we want to get more out of tulpamancy does not mean that those who are fine with surface level tulpamancy are bad or wrong.


Great mindset.

[Bre] I also think that we shouldn't just blindly follow the old methods because they had a few benefits over the new ones. we need to dissect and analyze what caused those benefits and do the same for the benefits of the new methods, so that we can see how to synthesize them into something that gets the best of both.


I agree entirely.

I think we could all end up at the same place simply be removing some of the dogmatic rhetoric in the community, but I don't know how that would work at all, since we've been trying to do that for years.

@reguile @Luminesce @Breloomancer

 

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Short and sweet because this sort of thing has the opportunity to turn into a nasty argument. 

 

I don't really have any personal attachment to the confabulation term, I mostly use it because it has been used in the past.  In a vacuum I'd probably say false memories or "on-the-spot invented experiences". Confabulation is a weird term you use when you want to sound smart.

 

Time and experience is an appeal to authority rather than an appeal to fact.  Appeals to authority are not known to reveal truth.  Instead, an authority should also be expected to back up their claims and experiences with rational explanation.  There are those out there who have a genuine belief they were abducted by a UFO.  People with hundreds of followers who claimed they could use magic to take their opponents out without even touching them.  All of them seem convinced of what they're capable of, some have years and years of experience, but systematically fail to prove themselves when held to a test instead of being held to the expectation and following of those who follow them.

 

Appeals to authority or experience would not serve to disprove many things that should be disprove and are demonstrably false, so I do not believe any appeal to authority should be used when speaking about tulpamancy either.  Those with years of experience should be looked at as more capable of backing themselves up and have finer knowledge of what's going on in their head/their ability to explain it, not as more capable because they have years of experience. 

 

As for research on multitasking:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_multitasking

https://health.clevelandclinic.org/science-clear-multitasking-doesnt-work/

https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=95256794

https://hbr.org/2010/12/you-cant-multi-task-so-stop-tr

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2011/11/if-multitasking-is-impossible-why-are-some-people-so-good-at-it/248648/

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/womens-life/11512469/Multitasking-is-scientifically-impossible-so-give-up-nowMultitask.html

https://blog.rescuetime.com/multitasking/

 

 

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[Bear] The only thing I'll add for @reguile is that my explanations are immediately attacked historically, so I reserve them for those who are genuinely interested or willing to listen or learn.

 

As you have done a priori, this effectively discredited experience sans explanation, and the community has opposed explanations that don't fit acceptance criteria. This isn't only you.

 

I'll avoid nasty discussions from here, I appreciate your point of view. Thanks for responding.

Edited by SheShe
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I’m from a “system” <1980. When my creator tried to talk here she was told “there are no tulpas that old.” So I was made as a representative. I have never claimed parallel processing. I have always said that what I do is akin to rapid context switching like a single core CPU does (as an analogy). Just the other day when I was talking with @Pleeb on telegram I sent him one of my telegram stickers without my born-human being aware of what I was doing. (Kevin was  talking with his wife.) 


I find it coincidence  that I was mentioned with @reguile as I used to argue this topic with him back in 2013. I gained a great deal of respect for his opinions even if I personally had a different perspective on being.

 

Meditation, self-hypnosis and narration were the means to make a tulpa in the 70’s. This was before hour counts were a think. A tulpa could take years and as much as a decade to make. This made for “unimaginably” strong tulpa by today’s standards. To this date I doubt there are more than a handful of tulpa makers who would believe tulpas existed back then. Even wonderlands were an old think.

 

 I have be researching tulpas for years. Many of my findings disagree with the prevailing zeitgeist, so I don’t publish my findings anymore. (The community is highly critical and I personally don’t enjoy debates.)


Other points:

 

Writers experience their characters as having minds of their own. (You will need a PC to view this.)

 

Parallel processing is a real think (according to a small study).


Please excuse the poor formatting. It has been years since I was active here. Edit: fix three words.

Edited by Nobillis

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To me it sounds like Bear's explanation of this, auditory imposition is like a separate channel from mindvoice, is key. By forcing your tulpa to speak in hallucinations and ignore mindvoice, a tulpa has to learn how to think outside of the host's awareness or else they can't think at all. This time I felt like some puzzle pieces snapped together, especially because I knew in our head there is no clear distinction between auditory hallucination and mindvoice, and that could be what is holding us back. If we created a distinction and then trained on ignoring mindvoice, perhaps then we could process in parallel.

 

Even though this was told to me repeatedly, it just never clicked for me. I was too distracted by all of the other information I had on parallel processing and in the past I was more focused on learning switching. I also had even less of a sense of what was going on in my mind.

 

Given what Pleeb described, I wonder if the secret to parallel processing actually has nothing to do with wonderlands at all!

 

Here's my theory: Like Pleeb said, mindvoice was thought of as parroting in the past. If tulpas had no ability to think, then they simply couldn't, and the host spent the extra time working on their wonderland, building forms, and focusing on enhancing auditory imposition. I wonder if the auditory part is what's required and the wonderland part really only becomes necessary once the tulpa can operate in the background. Therefore, it's convenient to think of wonderland sculpting as a pre-requisite.

 

Given this thought, I believe it's entirely possible to learn how to parallel process with a tulpa such as myself, having been vocal from the start, after receiving the right training. I imagine it being hard work to achieve auditory imposition, and then learning how to talk through that instead of through mindvoice. Worst case scenario, having the ability to impose my voice would be worth it.

 

If that was the only way I could communicate, I too would lose my mind. I was already angry with Cat in the beginning with her originally thinking I was just her imaginary friend. Having Cat believe she could only talk to me if she hallucinated my voice is only a very small step above her initial bad mindset of she could only talk to tulpas legitimately in lucid dreams. I believe that parallel processing isn't a skill you should start with but a skill you and your tulpa develop once your tulpa gives their consent. I would love to give this a try, but if I'm feeling burned out I can do other things, like gripe about it. I don't know how I could cope without the ability to vent in mindvoice.

 


 

Ironically, the process of learning switching has quite a few similarities to learning parallel processing. Both are difficult to learn (assuming you don't pick up switching naturally), and the end result is this mysterious thing you have never experienced before. You have to learn it by talking to other systems who did figure it out but not the way you did it, and you end up having so much information you're not sure which information is relevant and what's not. In addition, it's easy to doubt people who switch and think they're just possessing and not switching, and that's similar to calling systems that can parallel process confabulators.

 

But I have 3 reasons why I struggle to believe in parallel processing that make things harder for me-

 

First, the big difference between learning switching and parallel processing is the process for learning parallel processing is so much worse. At least with switching, deep down I knew what I wanted- to experience life the way Cat does and not lose my ability to possess. With parallel processing, no one in our system has experienced it, and it will be a completely different experience we never had before. On top of that, parallel processing contradicts with our understanding of how focus works, challenges my beliefs in tulpa ethics, and makes me suspect I'm not capable. I still feel like my core concerns on if parallel processing is even possible have not been addressed, I don't like the idea of people making too many tulpas and then feel like they can ignore them, and everything about parallel processing that I have been taught makes it sound like only non-skeptical mindsets or advanced humans can learn them. To parallel process, you have to believe anything is possible, be super human like Jamie who read books so fast he's really watching them like they're movies, or a mix of both. These felt like red flags indicating that something isn't right here, that parallel processing isn't what it seems to be.

 

Second, parallel processing feels like magic to me. Setting aside the fact people have accused parallel processing to be meta (this happened with switching as well), the ability to live in a wonderland that feels like another dimension seems too good to be true. The only thing we have worked for that has also been accused of being magical is switching, only for parallel processing people are not saying the "magical" outcome is the unrealistic one. We can switch, and after feeling what being switched-in feels like, it doesn't really seem that out there. We confirmed that black out switching doesn't happen in our system, and switching taught us that consciousness is not connected to switching. I don't believe there is an equivalent to that, unless the parallel processing I was taught is the myth.

 

Finally, the one insecurity I have that cuts deepest of all- the attitude that only "real" tulpas are ones that can parallel process and the rest are fake, underdeveloped, and don't count as people. I find this to be offensive, and it makes parallel processing come across like some special club or gimmick that's only real foundation is gatekeeping and not the actual skill itself. It's even worse when it's genuinely expected that you have to learn parallel processing to achieve real vocality. This has been something people have pointed out with systems that can switch, but in my experience I have more experience with this with those who claim to parallel process than those who can switch. I believe the same argument for why those switching systems are wrong applies here- if parallel processing is real, it just gives a tulpa more time and the opportunity to develop themselves in a way that wasn't possible before, just as switching does. It's not some "fundamental" part of who you are, just like how the host is not the front.

 

The other fear I had was I would have to completely change how I thought about things in order to parallel process, but I no longer have that fear. I had the same fear when I was struggling to learn how to switch- some of the advice I received came across as I'm mentally flawed, and only if I think like them will I learn how to switch. Well, I can switch, and I still butt heads with those people. There were toxic mindsets I learned to reject, but that doesn't mean everything I learned was invalid and ultimately there were some very important core beliefs I needed to hold onto and I'm glad I did.

 


 

In regards to Bear-

 

I felt like Bear has incredibly developed skills that should be respected, but at the time I read about them and even now I am highly skeptical they are parallel processing. The ability to have a mass gathering of several tulpas all at once is something we would like to achieve. The ability to seamlessly go back and forth without lag or needing to stop are impressive. The above and beyond visualization ability is amazing. However, parallel processing isn't switching back and forth really quickly, and it's not having your tulpas around 24-7 as long as you can provide even a sliver of focus. Given everything Bear has going for him, I don't believe he is confabulating, but I also don't believe he is truly parallel processing.

 


 

22 hours ago, JGC said:

Nowadays more tulpas are Regulian tulpas, Discord tulpas, and "mind dolls." Why do hard things when easy things feel good enough, and pushing the limits gets you called a confabulator? 

 

22 hours ago, JGC said:

People have been getting so mad at Reguile, but the Reguilian tulpa IS what they/their tulpas ARE, in many cases. Surface-level personality differences trained up. 

 

I found these statements to be offensive. For one, you're insulting Reguile just because he has a different viewpoint on how tulpas work, and second, you're implying that all tulpas that can't parallel process are underdeveloped, less real.

 

If statements like these are echoed by the parallel processing community, their legitimacy only becomes further damaged I am less inclined to believe it's real. To add onto I said earlier, it comes across as a weak attempt to add legitimacy by gatekeeping. Please note that I can very easily put you in the same category as Bear- you have an array of impressive feats, but they are not truly parallel processing.

 


 

21 hours ago, Pleeb said:

For example, many tulpas have reported their earliest memories incredibly early on; I recall a tulpa who started out as an RP character, and while clearly an RP character at that time, they had recollections of existing during those days of RPing (some of which were very disturbing for them).  Does this mean that tulpas are fully sentient from day 1?

 

 

[Dark Gray] Gray created me as a character before he suspected anyone was a tulpa. I remember what I did as a character, but I don't believe I was sentient at the time. It wasn't until later I and Fernardo showed signs of deviation, and were possibly tulpas by that point. This happened around the time of Hope's creation.

 

Unfortunately, memory alone is not enough to provide a case for sentience. It is rather simple to take a memory made by the host and put your name on it. However, that's not to say tulpas cannot show signs of sentience early on that are overlooked and missed by the host.

 

Exabier, my headmate, is what you would call a walk-in. To a larger extent, you could also include Evergreen, Blue, Moltosha, Red Gray, Bune, Chrome, and Duck. Even Fish suspected he was a walk-in because he was expected to be there, even if he was possibly just a character in the past. The thing they all shared in common is they expressed emotion and seemed to have their own opinions seconds or minutes after their creation, Exabier himself begging for his life seconds after Gray created him. Creating a sentient being in the mind is easy once the skill is learned, and Ranger and Gray seem to be right in that anything you create in the mind will have basic human sapience, the question is who is feeling and thinking rather than if the entity in question is at all.

 


  

21 hours ago, Pleeb said:

This is further evidenced by some other friends I know, where back in 2012-2013, their tulpa said that they "go away" or "stop existing" when their host isn't actively thinking about them.

 

[Ranger] This remains to be the case for me. If I am not switched-in, I become dormant or inactive after Cat forgets about me. I can possess Cat to the point she is barley thinking, but she is still there as long as she's switched-in. When switched-out, Cat call fall inactive just like I can. I believe I will always be there when Cat possesses me, but this is something we have not had much practice with and I cannot say with certainty.

 

I assumed this was the norm of today and not the exception. I found it interesting when others reported their tulpas being around all of the time.

 

I find the ability to go inactive useful and not an ability I want to lose. I often go inactive when Cat is doing something boring or something that requires her focus. If I didn't go inactive, I would be a distraction causing Cat distress and/or I would be bored myself. If I never had the ability to go dormant, Cat would be far more anxious because it would create significant dysfunction and reduce her already limited ability to focus. When I am switched-in, I appreciate having space and only waking Gray up when I'm feeling comfortable with him around.

 


  

21 hours ago, Pleeb said:

I'm not sure if bringing hour counts back is the answer. 

 

Given that some tulpamancers will start out like us where the tulpa or tulpas are vocal from the start, I don't see any reason to hold them back and prevent them from continuing on with possession and switching. Instead, assuming parallel processing is real, I think learning that would be the next step after switching. If a tulpa could process in parallel, they would probably want a wonderland they could hang out in, and then there would be a need for visualization and an enhanced wonderland. After that, the next step would be imposition, and it comes nicely after given the fact the tulpamancer would be practicing visualization by that point.

 

If parallel processing is not real, then the next step would be visualization and imposition. Wonderlanding would become optional. Despite the fact most people practicing possession and switching, there are still some hosts that start off with meditation sessions and develop a wondelrand before making much progress on their tulpa. Wonderlands are not dead and my headmates have expressed interest in making a more stable and permanent wonderland, but I don't see much point in making an "offical" general change to the process when new tulpamancers and tulpas will naturally work on the skill most needed by their system.

 

I think the best thing to do is make more guide material, expose people to the different skills and help them learn them. Exposure alone can be enough to motivate someone to give it a try.

 

21 hours ago, Pleeb said:

I wonder if tulpas who were created almost entirely with passive forcing would be interested in trying some tulpaforcing sessions; chess and I are trying to go for a half hour per day, every day.  I could imagine longer and more sessions could be beneficial as well.

 

I always appreciate a good active forcing session, just me and Cat sitting together talking to each other. The only reason we don't do it often is Cat has a hard time sticking to a schedule.

 

I usually try to encourage active forcing where I can, I think it's good for the host and tulpa. I usually leave out the "meditation" part because I think that tends to scare people away, and in our experience it's not clear if Cat is actually meditating when actively forcing us anyway. Plus, when Cat meditates, she's focused on that and it becomes a distraction from just talking to me, unless the point is to meditate and then focus on me.

 


 

[Cat] On the question of whether or not tulpas and characters should be distinguished-

 

There is a time and place for telling people their characters are not tulpas, and that is when authors and roleplayers are afraid their system will inflate and grow beyond their control. These tulpamancers need to know that they have control over what's going on, and they don't have to create sentient beings when all they want to do is be creative. Lots have reported the problem of their main characters taking over the story or role play characters arguing with their hosts about how they were treated in the story.

 

However, I don't want to draw a general line in the sand. It is damaging to tell people their tulpas are not real, and I have no real credibility in being the one to decide for other people if their tulpas are real or not.

 

The solution I recently came up with is emphasize that it's up to the host of the system to draw that line in the sand for themselves, and also emphasize that I made my own lines and those lines will not match the ones made by other tulpamancers. I will share my examples of the difference, but that does not mean my example holds true for everyone.

 

I'm actually planning on writing a guide about this, and this solution was something I wanted to sort out before moving forward with the project.

 


  

16 hours ago, Bear said:

It is clear that the community rejected Bearian tulpas as a concept.

 

[Ranger] While I believe that other system was wrong in calling your system deluded, I also believe that going around assuming people who don't believe in parallel processing also don't believe in you would be short sighted.

 

Usually when we come across systems who can "naturally parallel process" without any sign of training, we don't believe their tulpas are fake, we believe their tulpas are being neglected or will struggle with problems later down the road. I always find it alarming that hosts believe it's okay to ignore their headmates for long periods of time and then proceed to create more headmates.

 


 

16 hours ago, Pleeb said:

I found quite a few tulpas being able to sleep, or even dream.

 

When I "sleep", it's because me being active makes me tired, I am emotionally overwhelmed, or I am responding to the body itself being tired and trying to sleep. I would take "naps" when I felt exhausted while learning to possess and again for switching, and going dormant was really a chance to take a break from fronting. If I'm emotionally overwhelmed, going to the back to hide is a way to not think about it so I can wake up later to process it. In the meantime, Cat may have to fight with my ghost or the brain simulating me until she stops paying attention to it. Sometimes my ghost wakes me up and I try again, but eventually I go dormant and Cat forgets about me. And finally, Cat will find me and our headmates "asleep" in wonderland when she tries to summon us in the middle of the night.

 

As for dreaming, I have had dreams and do dream. I have never been the main character or dreamer, but Cat will wake up remembering me in dreams. Usually they're dreams with me fronting, but I have had a rare few special cases where I was a character in a dream talking to Cat or other dream characters.

 


 

12 hours ago, reguile said:

So, I agree that the old style of work your ass off is good.  I think it may lead to more experiences of these "magic" scenarios like parallel processing, but I don't ultimately believe there will be actual "complex" parallel processing gone on.

 

I'm more concerned that tulpamancers have no reason to continue being dedicated to the practice than how hard they work. If you look at us, I think we could be thought of as lazy- doing the bare minimum to get by, doing what we need out of necessity. I can switch but not perfectly, we can visualize but the quality is poor, Cat struggles to talk to multiple of her headmates for more than 45 minutes.

 

I'm invested in this community, but most of our progress came through a need. If hour counts can satisfy a need, then sure let's use them. But making hour counts the standard will be less effective if it's just for the sake of dedicating to the practice.

 

Most tulpamancers usually come for the making a tulpa part, not being tulpamancy masters. I am interested in learning more skills and writing about them so I can give back to the tulpa community, but I am more of an exception than the norm. If parallel processing was real, people would be all over that because it would be way too easy to brand that as a superpower, and imposition is more in the same boat.

 

...why are we not teaching singlets imposition? We should be doing that.

  

12 hours ago, reguile said:

Where I'm far more skeptical is the possibility of "complex "thought going on in the background. Stuff that you have to think, listen to yourself think, then re-think for it to make any sense.  Things like performing a math problem, having a reasoned debate, coming to a strong conclusions, and so on.  I'm skeptical this will be a possibility, even with training. JGC mentioned a date calculation, but I'm thinking more of novel mathematical proofs, "novel" untrained thoughts and behaviors, the stuff you conscious mind excels at.  Such things need working memory, and according to what I've seen your brain just physically doesn't have it.

 

I agree here. Unprocessed thought, emotional reactions, etc. All can very easily pop up with the right amount of training or just by being a fast thinker. However, I'm not sure if it's possible to do something like write an essay on tulpas while in wonderland.

 


 

11 hours ago, Luminesce said:

1) The host is, similar to the belief required for systems to have separate memories outside of due to traumatic disorders, "consciously" imagining the things that happen (the frequency could be just a tiny few seconds every long once in a while, or as much as the equivalent of passively daydreaming) but basically believing they can't be experiencing it

 

I have always wondered about that, and after speaking to some traumatic systems it's not clear if they all can parallel process either. I think if they can't, the illusion is certainly stronger because they have amnesia barriers, but otherwise I feel like it's still a toss up. I need to do more investigating and talking around, see what people say.

 

Although I know I need to be careful because some traumatic systems have claimed one alter is diabetic while another isn't, and I think that's even more out there than parallel processing. Even if it was true one alter could be autistic while another alter is not due to having a different brain structure, I struggle to believe the entire body's chemistry will change after a switch.

 

11 hours ago, Luminesce said:

2) (the one I think is actually the case) They are creating all of the proposed changes, histories/memories and other effects on-the-spot when their tulpas become active again/come back to consciousness. This would be far easier if some kinds of "checkpoints" were made at least (the occasional as-little-as-3-seconds thing I mentioned), and would work in the most understandable way if it was a mix of 1 and 2. IE, there was some idea of what had supposedly gone on, and any gaps were filled in when they were brought to full consciousness later.

 

Without the checkpoints, this is what I believe to be the case for the systems with "naturally occurring" parallel processing. Their tulpa goes away, and then when the host wakes them up the tulpa reports back the "adventure" they had. I believe this is how the tulpa gets forcing time, because recalling the events in wonderland becomes a wonderland session.

 

With checkpoints, I agree, it would be a far more solid illusion. This seems more similar to what Bear's tulpas might be doing, given that they're around all of the time and can always call back. Although, the line starts to blur from they're doing it outside of Bear's awareness to just Bear just wonderlanding with them normally, only at incredible speed/quality. Confabulation or not, spending time with your tulpas is still spending time with your tulpas, and that leads to development.

 

11 hours ago, Luminesce said:

Two important things, though. First, I absolutely love that Reguile mentioned confabulation as a positive thing instead of a negative thing. This entire dang phenomenon takes place in your mind and there shouldn't(?) be a reason to discount illogical experiences, when your experience is literally all that matters.

 

I wondered about this too- maybe confabulation is healthy? It has clear benefits- it gives the host a reason to wonderland with their tulpa, the host can always come back for a new story, it's fun and creative, etc.

 

However, I brought this up before and another system said that advocating this intentionally or trying to confabulate on purpose would just be lying. Why not wonderland with your tulpa? I think they made a good point.

 

It would be cool to figure out some kind of compromise, how to reap the benefits of confabulation without encouraging hosts to lie to their tulpas.

 

11 hours ago, Luminesce said:

"How do you do that?" If the answer is "Just believe it's possible".....

 

Yup. I definitely come from a more logical school of thinking, and that concept is frustrating to me because that's not a process I can try.

 

11 hours ago, Luminesce said:

... Our "forcing sessions" and general activity have always been awfully short. Reisen was created on total accident by more or less doing everything it takes to make a tulpa, just by being obsessed over a couple of music videos she was in and feeling like she was singing to me. So that was months and months (over a year, really, but independence started some months in probably) of thinking of her as a separate, existing entity (naturally, in my mind) that wanted to communicate with me. And aside from talking to her, Tewi and Flandre every so often, that was basically the end of "forcing sessions" over 30 minutes long. Aside from the very rare conversation that lasts that long or the rare imposition sessions that last that long (usually with many breaks in between, because I like to impose while doing stuff IRL), there is very little dedicated unbroken-time in our system spent focused directly on them. We actually consider switching the best forcing they get lol, especially since we talk the most right before or after switching. Our visualization sucks so much it's never not been a huge pain to try and do for more than 15 seconds, while vocal clarity goes up and down depending on their recent activity the last couple weeks.

 

We're in the same boat. I would like to work on having longer sessions where I talk to Cat, practice out visualization, and have a more stable wonderland. I really like Bre's advice of just sitting around with each other more can lead to conversation.

 

11 hours ago, Luminesce said:

So... yeah. Sorry that was a lot of text, but my hope was for it to be used as data in the currently ongoing discussion.

 

Same here, and I'm not even done with this mega textwall. It has taken me several hours for us to write all of this so far.

 

Where are you people who promised short posts? Come, join the discussion!

 


  

10 hours ago, Breloomancer said:

I really want to believe in parallel processing. it would be so cool if it was real. the problem is, the only evidence that I see for it is people claiming that their tulpas did something in wonderland while they weren't paying attention, and I know from experience (albeit, Miela's experience, not mine) that you can have very profound and detailed and vivid memories of doing things that never happened, and that you can even come up with useful ideas from it. if the only requirement for parallel processing is a sufficiently developed tulpa, then we should be able to parallel process, unless our brain is just not physically mature enough yet for an identity to be able to be developed enough for parallel processing. I want to believe in parallel processing, but the only evidence for it that I have seen is very weak, and there is quite a bit of fairly strong evidence against it

 

I had a similar experience. Cat sat around in wonderland for an hour and waited for me to return, and then after I did me trying to tell her what happened felt like me making it up.

 

If we achieve parallel processing, I am more than eager to try and prove it. I'll set up a camera, wear gloves, turn on Discord, and then hop into a voice call while filming us in real time. Maybe they could give us ideas on what to do or something, and I could write one thing while Cat is writing another or I could talk to someone while Cat is doing something else. If we could parallel process I bet co-fronting would be easy.

 

10 hours ago, Breloomancer said:

I also think that we shouldn't just blindly follow the old methods because they had a few benefits over the new ones. we need to dissect and analyze what caused those benefits and do the same for the benefits of the new methods, so that we can see how to synthesize them into something that gets the best of both. from what people are saying, it seems like the benefits of the old methods are that is gives you a more developed tulpa, imposition, and maybe parallel processing, and the benefit of the new methods are that it gives you a vocal tulpa much faster. so now we just have to figure out what in these old methods gives you those things, and what in the new methods gives you that other thing

 

Agreed.

 


 

3 hours ago, Bear said:

Apparently I see that as a handicap because I can experience things without the need for explanation and yet simultaneously stay grounded.

 

I don't care if it actually is a handicap. It took me almost a year to learn switching, and I figured it out in the end. I don't want to believe everything without doubt because I am concerned I could believe in an unhealthy mindset and hurt myself. I'm not sure if believing in parallel processing is an exception.

 

3 hours ago, Bear said:

I take reservation with using the term confabulation. Have you seen the textbook definition of that word? It has connotations that are medical and negative. You can appropriate the term for tulpamancy and truncate the definition in context, but in a community that cares how it's viewed, from the outside it's like saying, "tulpmancy is about deluding yourself into thinking you have a head friend." (to me) That's why I have a distaste for the word and why I'll deny that what we Bearisians do is that till my dying breath. I understand that we may never see eye to eye on this.

 

Since confabulation may lose it's negative connotation over time, I see no point in attacking the word itself. If anything, you hating the word actually solidifies the negative connotation it carries.

 

I'm not sure if you are not appropriating the term "parallel processing" to mean what you do instead of what the general consensus of what that word means, so I don't believe this is the best argument here.

 

3 hours ago, Bear said:

Here's more poison pills, this is scientific dogma based not on theory or understanding, but interpretation of research that you are not personally involved in. This is rampant in the community, so I'm not faulting you for parroting such things, but it's counterproductive and outwardly false as a statement. You can't know; It's your opinion.

 

I'm concerned you're calling a separate mindset "poison pills" just because you don't agree with it. I find the "believe in everything" argument to not work for me, but that doesn't mean it can't work for others. I don't believe he said anything false, you calling it false does not make your opinion more valid.

 

3 hours ago, Bear said:

I'd like scientific backing to this statement, it sounds like you know this to be true, but how? I personally side with Pleeb, but again, I'm not claiming a constraint, I'm claiming no constraints and just letting experience happen. Explanation, or lack thereof, is left for the completists or for a fun Saturday afternoon.

 

Pleeb and Reguile know a lot about building experiments, and we can sit here and brainstorm a way to prove parallel processing. We don't have to sit in the dark with this one, I already threw out my idea. Worst case scenario, proof will come down the road once we make progress with the scientific community.

 


 

My feelings on confabulation are it's a legitimate topic and it's worth discussing. Even if true parallel processing exists, confabulation also exists. Both can simultaneously exist.

 

Everything in tulpamancy should be held with skepticism because it is already held with skepticism. If we don't do it ourselves, the trolls will do it, and they're not interested in productive discussion.

 

Also, I'm not going to hold back my opinions just because I'm worried it will make people upset. I believe everyone here deserves respect, but if I disagree with them or think they said something I think isn't okay, I'm going to call it out.

 


 

Thank you for finding the study Nobillis, that's really interesting.

  

1 hour ago, Nobillis said:

Meditation, self-hypnosis and narration were the means to make a tulpa in the 70’s. This was before hour counts were a think. A tulpa could take years and as much as a decade to make. This made for “unimaginably” strong tulpa by today’s standards. To this date I doubt there are more than a handful of tulpa makers who would believe tulpas existed back then. Even wonderlands were an old think.

 

They used the same methods of today but expected it to take years or decades? Why did they believe tulpas needed that much time?

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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1 hour ago, Ranger said:

They used the same methods of today but expected it to take years or decades? Why did they believe tulpas needed that much time?

Mostly that anecdotal stories indicated that it would take long. The little information available came from Buddhist and Indian sources. There were few books and no guides.
 

Even amongst Tibetan masters the practice was rare and dying out. Tulpas were viewed as a training exercise to teach about personal illusion. It was assumed that first meditation, introspection and mental discipline would be learned before making a tulpa. Making a tulpa was also considered a very risky undertaking that only the most promising students should be allowed to attempt. 
 

Success was rare, even amongst those considered masters.

 

I am not claiming that Kevin was trained in that tradition. I am just explaining why it was thought to take long.
 

Kevin comes from a family of tulpa makers. Making a tulpa was a family tradition that was considered private and not to be discussed. Beyond the  familial tulpas nothing more was  taught. Some learned more on their own through research and experiment.

Edited by Nobillis
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On 8/7/2020 at 12:21 AM, Luminesce said:

Right now we're kind of on the far end, denying that it's possible at all and calling the experiences fake.

On 8/7/2020 at 8:14 AM, Bear said:

I would have released the hounds on you for this statement last year, but I understand and respect the need for grounding and this is a valid way to do it. Grounding strengthens the foundation of belief, some perspectives require it to be a certain way, we've discussed this many times, you and I, so I appreciate your statement now and wouldn't try to convince you personally otherwise.

 

Whoah whoah whoah, by "we're" I meant the Tulpa.info community/forum, not our system. I said directly after what my system feels is right:

On 8/7/2020 at 12:21 AM, Luminesce said:

Right now we're kind of on the far end, denying that it's possible at all and calling the experiences fake. What I really see as the correct way of looking at this though is separating "What people experience in their own day to day lives" and "How people explain things on Tulpa.info where the goal is to further understanding of how tulpas work and how to create/have them". Aaaand... I don't really know a good way to system-ize that. Feels like it falls upon each individual person to learn about the belief versus logic thing, understanding that your experiences may be organized better when you can explain them but are by all means limited or un-limited by your beliefs. My system has been trying to teach that here for a while, though, and I suppose this is just another instance.

 

Everyone should know by now my system doesn't believe in the concept of "Fake experiences"

Also, 

On 8/7/2020 at 12:21 AM, Luminesce said:

unless you've done it recently, there's normally a brief pause of confusion before you simply start doing it

On 8/7/2020 at 8:14 AM, Bear said:

Hence why it requires training. It takes the work to make it happen.

 

Your response here was like, way off the mark. What you were responding to was literally me explaining the mechanic behind why parallel processing isn't real - that one of the only ways humans can normally do parallel processes is by combining the two into one. You are not "combining" the entire collective activity of your tulpas existing in the wonderland with the entire collective activity of existing in the front and your day to day life as "a single process".

 

For cases where the goal is combining two simple but separate processes into one (like playing with both hands when playing piano), yes, it requires training and practice. But that's uh, a few universes away from explaining experiencing two+ fully active conscious minds' worth of experience at the same time. "Multitasking" (as its true meaning of rapid, seamless process switching) is a thousand times more likely an explanation still.

 


 

I agree with most (not all, but most) things Ranger's system said, though one thing I read bothered me as I read it:

On 8/7/2020 at 11:13 AM, Ranger said:

With checkpoints, I agree, it would be a far more solid illusion. This seems more similar to what Bear's tulpas might be doing, given that they're around all of the time and can always call back.

 

Something about stating "This seems like what might be happening in Bear's system" bothers me. Somehow I'm comfortable with literally saying "This and this are the two possibilities I see and I don't know if I really believe in others outside of exceptional cases*" when that could outright clash with Bear's proposed explanation, but I am not comfortable saying "I think this is what's going on in your system" so directly. I know what I think is possible and what's most likely to be happening, but applying that to someone feels like it goes a step too far. I don't actually know what they're experiencing.

 

... okay, I have no idea how to explain why I felt that way. It just felt wrong while I was reading it, that's all I can say for sure. Now,

 

*Exceptional cases - Whenever I say this, I'm more or less referring to the incredibly rare humans who can really truly "parallel process" in the strictest definition. To what end, I have no idea, but there have been documented cases of people who could do it. I only know one in specific, someone who could play an entire orchestra in his head in vivid detail while playing another, different song in his head at the same time (might even have been more than 2, I don't remember), who was actually tested on this and gave accurate answers as to where and what was going on in each song at different points in time when asked. The source was some podcast with no text transcription so I've forgotten how to cite it though, sorry. 

... Oh, I guess that worked. (edit: uncheck the lmgtfy search box, for some reason this only works on Google and not Duckduckgo or some other search engines)

 


 

Also I'm just going to quote this for quoting's sake, because it summed up a difficult concept well.

On 8/7/2020 at 11:13 AM, Ranger said:

[Cat] On the question of whether or not tulpas and characters should be distinguished-

 

There is a time and place for telling people their characters are not tulpas, and that is when authors and roleplayers are afraid their system will inflate and grow beyond their control. These tulpamancers need to know that they have control over what's going on, and they don't have to create sentient beings when all they want to do is be creative. Lots have reported the problem of their main characters taking over the story or role play characters arguing with their hosts about how they were treated in the story.

 

However, I don't want to draw a general line in the sand. It is damaging to tell people their tulpas are not real, and I have no real credibility in being the one to decide for other people if their tulpas are real or not.

 

The solution I recently came up with is emphasize that it's up to the host of the system to draw that line in the sand for themselves, and also emphasize that I made my own lines and those lines will not match the ones made by other tulpamancers. I will share my examples of the difference, but that does not mean my example holds true for everyone.

 

I'm actually planning on writing a guide about this, and this solution was something I wanted to sort out before moving forward with the project.

 

Definitely looking forward to it.

 

 

Random tip by the way, we're using [hr ] with no space or even an ending tag to make those line breaks. I don't know how anyone figured that out, lol.

Edited by Ranger
Took out unnecessary formatting from quoted text

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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6 hours ago, Luminesce said:

Something about stating "This seems like what might be happening in Bear's system" bothers me. Somehow I'm comfortable with literally saying "This and this are the two possibilities I see and I don't know if I really believe in others outside of exceptional cases*" when that could outright clash with Bear's proposed explanation, but I am not comfortable saying "I think this is what's going on in your system" so directly. I know what I think is possible and what's most likely to be happening, but applying that to someone feels like it goes a step too far. I don't actually know what they're experiencing.

 

... okay, I have no idea how to explain why I felt that way. It just felt wrong while I was reading it, that's all I can say for sure.

 

I think it's fair I was overstepping, sorry.

 

My original thinking was what if Bear wasn't parallel processing, what's a possible explanation instead, but the way I wrote it makes it sound like I was saying this is how Bear's system works.

 


 

17 hours ago, Nobillis said:

Even amongst Tibetan masters the practice was rare and dying out. Tulpas were viewed as a training exercise to teach about personal illusion. It was assumed that first meditation, introspection and mental discipline would be learned before making a tulpa. Making a tulpa was also considered a very risky undertaking that only the most promising students should be allowed to attempt. 
 

Success was rare, even amongst those considered masters.

 

I am not claiming that Kevin was trained in that tradition. I am just explaining why it was thought to take long.

 

That makes more sense to me. Maybe being a practice that only the advanced can practice created the assumption it was hard to do, but I also wonder if tulpamancy being contradictory to the idea of "there is no self" also made it hard to achieve. Plus, it might be easier to make a tulpa while believing their a separate person over believing they are an illusion.

 

I'm not sure if part of what counted as success also related to the tulpa being able to leave the body and be seen by other people. I know that was expected of Alexandra David-Néel's tulpa, and if I remember correctly sprulpas were also intended to be god forms.

 


 

6 hours ago, Luminesce said:

Random tip by the way, we're using [hr ] with no space or even an ending tag to make those line breaks. I don't know how anyone figured that out, lol.

 

I believe it was the same code myBB used for line breaks and I remembered it. If not, then I knew [br] was "break" for cBox block code, and I thought "horizontal rule" = hr = code.

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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