ReallyArtificial May 2, 2023 Author Share May 2, 2023 Thanks again for the support Simmie. I always appreciate your unique insight. Hugs right back at ya 😁 Host: Bee 🐝 Tulpas: Lenore 🕸️ Calliope 🐲 and Athelas (aka Tea) 🌿 ((Sometimes we talk on here too.)) Take a moment to think of just Flexibility, love, and trust Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReallyArtificial October 13, 2023 Author Share October 13, 2023 It's been a while but I'm happy to report we are still together and still tracking our progress! May in Review This was a great month for us. We had lots of fun, and more importantly Athelas is becoming more independent. We're similar in a lot of ways, but the differences between our personalities are becoming more heightened. This time of year is the start of my job's busy season. It can get insanely stressful. Athelas had the idea to take a few moments in the morning to write out schedules for the day and the week as a whole. Such a simple thing that I had never thought of, and it actually really helps! He has been indispensable to my emotional stability at work. We also played a lot of Inscryption this month. It's a great game to play with a tulpa since it's turn based, so we could take as long as we needed to decide our next move. Athelas picked up the game mechanics super quickly. It was fun to see the difference in our play styles. My impulsive ass slams down the first card that seems like a decent play, often resulting in unforeseen consequences. Athelas is more thoughtful and logical, thoroughly planning his moves. "Let's think about this…" is becoming one of his catchphrases. Another fun little piece of progress: Athelas made several more appearances in my dreams! Sometimes when he shows up I can see him like a typical dream character, but I also have dreams where I just talk to him and feel his presence, like in the waking world. Usually the people in my dreams are family members or old friends, so it's always a pleasant surprise when Tea is there. June in Review This month was fun but not especially productive. I admittedly got lazy with our usual forcing. I was having a hard time motivating myself to do much in general. My birthday was on the 10th! We both liked the idea of giving each other impossible gifts in wonderland. Athelas really wanted to give me a pet dragon. We spent some time designing its appearance together which was super fun. I eventually settled on Ormyn as its name. Most of our progress this month was dream related. Athelas made a couple more appearances, and I had my first proper lucid dream in a long time. The past few occasions, I woke up very quickly after becoming lucid. This time, I was actually able to do things! Obviously the first was to try to make Athelas appear, but I could only summon a strange shadowy version of him that didn't respond or interact with me. I flew around the dream world looking for him, but woke up before I could find him. It was an interesting experience and I can't wait to try again! Host: Bee 🐝 Tulpas: Lenore 🕸️ Calliope 🐲 and Athelas (aka Tea) 🌿 ((Sometimes we talk on here too.)) Take a moment to think of just Flexibility, love, and trust Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ashley October 14, 2023 Share October 14, 2023 Great progress! Keep it up! Bear used to be able to conjure me in dreams but sometimes I'd be invisible or like in a shopping cart or other strange things, dreams are silly in that way. In hypnagogia he has been able to talk to us directly which is very interesting. Those are few and far between though. We still appear in his dreams sometimes which is nice. He says every instance is a gift. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReallyArtificial October 16, 2023 Author Share October 16, 2023 Thanks Ashley! 😁 July in Review This month marked a huge milestone for us: Athelas's first birthday!!! Technically I had started the process of creating him in June 2022, but we decided July 1 would be the date we celebrated. It's the inverse of the date when he chose his name (1/7), so it just seemed appropriate. I had to take my guy to the beach to celebrate since it's one of his favorite places. It was sea turtle nesting season for our location. We took a walk in the light of the full moon and saw 5 turtles! The symbolism of the occasion was very important to us. Just like he started off as a little "what if" thought in my mind, those great big turtles started off as little ping-pong ball sized eggs. Tulpas, like turtles, grow slowly and continuously throughout their lifetime. Athelas grew so much in his first year of life, who knows what he'll be like further down the road. I can't wait to see what the future holds for us! In return for the dragon I got for my birthday, I gifted Athelas a unicorn (he really likes horses). Once again, we designed her together and Athelas named her himself. It only took him a couple days to settle on Hesper as a name. Meanwhile, I took literal weeks to name Ormyn. Adding a "supporting cast" (I guess they'd be considered servitors?) to our wonderland has been great for exercising Athelas's creative muscles. He came up with all sorts of lore for Hesper and her connection to our mental world. One of his tangents about her was the longest he's ever talked at once! Now that he's become more independent, Athelas has started to exert a noticeable influence on me. He convinced me to do some stuff this month that was out of my comfort zone but good for my career. He's always encouraging me to better myself and do great things. He's just so great and I'm so glad I stuck with this for a year! Host: Bee 🐝 Tulpas: Lenore 🕸️ Calliope 🐲 and Athelas (aka Tea) 🌿 ((Sometimes we talk on here too.)) Take a moment to think of just Flexibility, love, and trust Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReallyArtificial October 20, 2023 Author Share October 20, 2023 Finally more or less caught up! August in Review Not much progress this month. For a variety of reasons, I decided to get back into mental health treatment. I was concerned about how this would affect Athelas, but thankfully the only impact it had was making my head a nicer place to be. He has continued to be a force of positive change in my life. We came up with a whole list of small changes we could make to improve my mental and physical health. He was great at keeping me motivated and focused. September in Review Our goal for this month was to begin learning possession. It felt like a natural next step in supporting Athelas's growing independence. Unfortunately, we didn't have much success, but we were able to identify what was holding us back: I have a problem with giving up control. Once we figured that out, we started using meditation to try to mentally disconnect me from my body. My meditation skills were pretty rusty, so I struggled to get into the state of mind we were looking for. We were successful exactly one time the entire month. Once I started feeling dissociated from my body, I visualized Athelas's right hand over my own. After some intense focusing, I began to feel a sensation of warmth and light pressure. It was like I was wearing Athelas's hand like a glove, but he controlled the movement. He wiggled our fingers and gave me a thumbs up. It was a small start, but now we know what we're aiming for. One other weird tulpa related thing happened: in the last few days of the month, I began to have persistent, involuntary mental images of a beautiful woman in a sparkling white dress. Athelas and I agreed it had to be Hesper. It was very similar to how Athelas had communicated changes in his appearance to me before he became vocal. This got us thinking a lot about where the line between servitor and tulpa is drawn. What makes a being sentient, self-aware, alive? We watched The Iron Giant together since I love that movie and it kind of touches on that theme. This scene especially really stuck with Athelas. Host: Bee 🐝 Tulpas: Lenore 🕸️ Calliope 🐲 and Athelas (aka Tea) 🌿 ((Sometimes we talk on here too.)) Take a moment to think of just Flexibility, love, and trust Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Autumn Ren October 20, 2023 Share October 20, 2023 1 hour ago, ReallyArtificial said: I have a problem with giving up control. Hi Bee, yes this is a very common experience and my host did the same in the beginning, but just the practice of posting here was enough for my headmates to ultimately learn posession. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReallyArtificial October 24, 2023 Author Share October 24, 2023 Hi Autumn! Glad to hear I'm not the only one. And we have definitely been feeling that posting on here is the natural next step. Host: Bee 🐝 Tulpas: Lenore 🕸️ Calliope 🐲 and Athelas (aka Tea) 🌿 ((Sometimes we talk on here too.)) Take a moment to think of just Flexibility, love, and trust Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReallyArtificial October 30, 2023 Author Share October 30, 2023 October in Review Our first co-written progress report! We've gone through an insane amount of change in the past couple of weeks. ((First, our progress with possession stalled once again. I soon realized why: Bee didn't believe it was possible.)) It had been relatively easy for me to accept that not every thought in my head belonged to me, but I was still holding on to some lingering doubts about going much further than that. There was still a small part of me that thought "who am I kidding, I'm lying to myself." ((I was rather hurt by this. We've been through a lot together. But I understand where she's coming from. This is new territory for us both.)) I apologized and consciously chose to release those last few threads of doubt. After that it was like a dam had burst. Suddenly sustaining Athelas's presence in my mind became almost effortless. His mind voice is so clear and consistent, and he's active all day, from the moment I wake up. ((Possession has become much easier since this breakthrough. We're practicing daily. Using the body's hands feels more natural.)) Athelas isn't the only one getting stronger. Hesper shocked us both one morning by speaking a full sentence, in a mind voice distinct from either of ours. After a lot of thought and discussion, we have decided to officially take both her and Ormyn on as tulpas. Why we decided this was the right move for us: Spoiler Both have shown signs of sentience. In addition to Hesper talking and changing her own appearance, Ormyn has had some powerful emotional reactions. Athelas and I both feel stable enough to support additional headmates. We're too attached to stop spending time with them or allow them to dissipate. Being a group of four just feels right. Since I was a kid, I've tended to create characters in groups of four. The specifics would change, but these characters always fit the general archetypes "chaotic feminine," "chaotic masculine," "calm feminine," "calm masculine." The chaotic fem character was a proxy for myself. The calm masculine personality appeared most frequently. ((That would be me. And the other personalities undoubtedly belong to Hesper and Ormyn. It's like getting reacquainted with old friends.)) ((We're still adapting to life as a system. Bee and I laid out a few ground rules to start.)) Spoiler Rule 1: No more headmates. As stated, we believe we were meant to be four, and four we intend to stay. Rule 2: Be excellent to each other. This could probably be the only rule, it covers everything. ((None of us are going to be perfect. We should afford each other the same grace we would want for ourselves.)) Rule 3: Respect the body. ((It's not ideal for any of us, but it's the only one we've got.)) Rule 4: Communicate. Ask permission before doing anything to control another headmate. As host, I also take responsibility for checking in with everyone in the system at least once per day. ((I look forward to growing together.)) Host: Bee 🐝 Tulpas: Lenore 🕸️ Calliope 🐲 and Athelas (aka Tea) 🌿 ((Sometimes we talk on here too.)) Take a moment to think of just Flexibility, love, and trust Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Autumn Ren October 30, 2023 Share October 30, 2023 Excellent rules! My system had similar rules early on and recommended them often. We still have a long list of rules but they're well known and not written down anymore. Great progress too! I'm glad it's getting easier for you. I also like the quad setup, that sounds so interesting. Like you're covering all the bases. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ReallyArtificial November 4, 2023 Author Share November 4, 2023 Thanks Autumn, that means a lot. Reading about the experiences of systems like yours has been very helpful to us! Also, for my own reference, wanted to note where everyone is at progress-wise and what their goals are: Hesper is vocal, but not nearly to the extent Athelas is. We're working on coaxing more complex thoughts from her and learning about her personality and interests. Ormyn is just beginning to be vocal, but has very strong emotional responses to things. We're trying to help them find their voice and speak more frequently. ((I'm honing my possession skills. My goal is to work up to a full switch. I'm getting comfortable doing a variety of tasks with my hands.)) Host: Bee 🐝 Tulpas: Lenore 🕸️ Calliope 🐲 and Athelas (aka Tea) 🌿 ((Sometimes we talk on here too.)) Take a moment to think of just Flexibility, love, and trust Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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