Why I'm Using Cobud

[The Incans]

I’m finding this all quite complicated and still don’t really understand what the issue is! 

 

I came looking for people like me that had ‘others’ inside as can’t talk about them with Neurotypical people who more often than not don’t believe in such things. We’ve been on a very spiritual and emotional journey through the peri-menopause years and I’m finally starting to feel like I’ve actually reached 'the other side of the tunnel’. 

 

It really doesn’t matter to me whether you believe your ‘insiders’ are alters, or tulpa’s or soulbonds or cobuds. I’m aware its a worldwide site and people will have very different words (in their own language) for their companions as things don’t always translate literally from one language to another. and there will also be different religious beliefs involved between different parts of the world. 

 

We just liked the site because people were talking about their inner world more and just enjoying your life with your ‘Insiders’ …. it wasn’t all focused on trauma and therapy like DID groups often are and those groups were getting so you couldn’t breathe without needing a trigger warning incase it upset someone! 

 

Point is we all joined because we either have a natural ability to create ‘companions’ or an interest in creating one maybe due to life circumstances and feeling lonely …not everyone is in a situation where they have external support available to live a typical life (such as going out daily to work and interacting with others daily) and this group is like a safe haven to talk to like-minded people and somewhere safe to allow your Tulpa to talk to others Tulpa. 

 

 

 

 

[Lucilyn]

27 minutes ago, Ranger said:

I'm planning on studying what ADA got wrong by reading about Tibetan Buddhism

 

it's not easy, possibly not even possible, as Buddhism has always had tons and tons of offshoots teaching it in different ways, and what we read from Magic and Mystery in Tibet doesn't match anything we could find in English-speaking places like Wikipedia, meaning whatever she learned was certainly not mainstream (and it was a little too genuine-sounding for the most part to be outright made up IMO, though some things may be, like her making her own that others could see...)

 

I don't think it's possible to know whether she was really told all the things she reported or if they were made up, and while we do believe most of it (is what she was taught), we don't think it was representative of the religion as a whole, but we're not studied enough to know the granular details of what was "mainstream" and what was this-small-group-only

 

(and I don't think researching that in relation to tulpas makes sense or is right at all, we're already all aware the concept of tulpas in tulpamancy has nothing to do with Buddhist "sprul-pa"s)

[Breloomancer]

i read blueflamemagick's post, and it seems like they're saying two contradictory things: first, that the word "tulpa" is a buddhist term that tulpamancers are misusing, and second, that the word "tulpa" is not a buddhist term, but in fact comes from alexandra david neel misunderstanding and mistranslating certain buddhist concepts. and that is really my problem with the cultural appropriation argument: if the word "tulpa" is not a word that refers to anything in buddhism, then using it to refer to something unrelated to buddhism cannot be considered a misuse

 

the actual problem is that many people think that it is a tibetan buddhist practice, but it's not entirely related to the word "tulpa". if one could simply make people stop associating the word "tulpa" with buddhism, then there would be no problem

 

in our present day, the word "tulpa" is used to contribute to misunderstandings about buddhism, and that is a bad thing. it is also undeniable that the use of the word "tulpa" in the tulpamancy community has contributed to the prominence of the word as a cultural concept. however, from what i have seen, people associate the occult concept of a tulpa with buddhism, but they largely recognize that the secular concept of a tulpa is unrelated. i think it could be argued that use of the word "tulpa" in the tulpamancy community has helped to lessen the perceived association between the word "tulpa" and buddhism, although it's somewhat difficult to tell what the actual effects have been

 

i think it is also important to note that trying to change such a fundamental aspect of our vocabulary will damage the community. the tulpamancy community has been using the word "tulpa" for over 15 years now, and the community has become highly decentralized. if you try to switch to a new term, and by some miracle are able to get a significant portion of the community on board with the switch, there will inevitably be large portions of the community left behind who keep using "tulpa", and the community using new terminology will also be more cut off from the history of tulpamancy and past writings about it. a switch like this would just make it so much more difficult to talk about tulpamancy and to search for information about it. it seems like a lot of trouble to go through for what is, frankly, not that big of an issue

[Lucilyn]

that's a really good point! about plurality "tulpas" actually moving wider association with the term away from "Tibetan Buddhism"

not nearly as much as we'd like, as said, but yeah in the context of the paranormal use who no doubt go "BUDDHISTS CREATED MIND DEMONS!!!!! REAL", I think we've been a good influence the whole time of saying that this is NOT the same practice as Tibetan Buddhists describe, only inspired in name

[Ranger]

4 hours ago, The Incans said:

I’m finding this all quite complicated and still don’t really understand what the issue is! 

 

I came looking for people like me that had ‘others’ inside as can’t talk about them with Neurotypical people who more often than not don’t believe in such things. We’ve been on a very spiritual and emotional journey through the peri-menopause years and I’m finally starting to feel like I’ve actually reached 'the other side of the tunnel’. 

 

It really doesn’t matter to me whether you believe your ‘insiders’ are alters, or tulpa’s or soulbonds or cobuds. I’m aware its a worldwide site and people will have very different words (in their own language) for their companions as things don’t always translate literally from one language to another. and there will also be different religious beliefs involved between different parts of the world. 

 

We just liked the site because people were talking about their inner world more and just enjoying your life with your ‘Insiders’ …. it wasn’t all focused on trauma and therapy like DID groups often are and those groups were getting so you couldn’t breathe without needing a trigger warning incase it upset someone! 

 

Point is we all joined because we either have a natural ability to create ‘companions’ or an interest in creating one maybe due to life circumstances and feeling lonely …not everyone is in a situation where they have external support available to live a typical life (such as going out daily to work and interacting with others daily) and this group is like a safe haven to talk to like-minded people and somewhere safe to allow your Tulpa to talk to others Tulpa. 

 

I don't have a problem with creating headmates and joining an endogenic community. There's nothing wrong with that.

 

I don't like the term because it's problematic 

 

3 hours ago, Lucilyn said:

It's not easy, possibly not even possible, as Buddhism has always had tons and tons of offshoots teaching it in different ways, and what we read from Magic and Mystery in Tibet doesn't match anything we could find in English-speaking places like Wikipedia, meaning whatever she learned was certainly not mainstream (and it was a little too genuine-sounding for the most part to be outright made up IMO, though some things may be, like her making her own that others could see...)

 

I don't think it's possible to know whether she was really told all the things she reported or if they were made up, and while we do believe most of it (is what she was taught), we don't think it was representative of the religion as a whole, but we're not studied enough to know the granular details of what was "mainstream" and what was this-small-group-only

 

I see.

 

I guess what I'm trying to do is if basic agreed upon concepts almost everyone has. For instance, in Christianity everyone has Jesus, but several also believe he rose from the dead, that the bible is a legitimate source of Christianity, etc. I'm also going to try and read some books (yes I know it's triggering I'll cope) that talk about the more nuanced stuff ADA was theoretically studying.

 

Now that I think about it, I may need to study occult material from the time period as well. Then I can say "this is occult, this is Buddhism, this I don't know, etc."

 

4 hours ago, Lucilyn said:

(and I don't think researching that in relation to tulpas makes sense or is right at all, we're already all aware the concept of tulpas in tulpamancy has nothing to do with Buddhist "sprul-pa"s)

 

I heard a claim what she put down in her book is loaded with innacuracies. That's the main reason motivating this deeper dive- if she made stuff up, that's important context. It also strengths the argument she slapped new definitions to things in bad faith instead of honoring Buddhism.

 

3 hours ago, Breloomancer said:

I read blueflamemagick's post, and it seems like they're saying two contradictory things: first, that the word "tulpa" is a buddhist term that tulpamancers are misusing, and second, that the word "tulpa" is not a buddhist term, but in fact comes from alexandra david neel misunderstanding and mistranslating certain buddhist concepts. and that is really my problem with the cultural appropriation argument: if the word "tulpa" is not a word that refers to anything in buddhism, then using it to refer to something unrelated to buddhism cannot be considered a misuse

 

Sprul pa does have meaning. Sprul, which is doing the heavy lifting, is used in multiple places and Tibetan Buddhists still use it (I elaborate in an earlier post). They may not use the exact word sprul pa sure, but that word isn't removed from the Tibetan Buddhist context in both diction or connotation either. Adding the context of creating headmates without carrying along the context of emination bodys or why the Tibetan Buddhists practiced that is problematic.

 

3 hours ago, Breloomancer said:

the actual problem is that many people think that it is a tibetan buddhist practice, but it's not entirely related to the word "tulpa". if one could simply make people stop associating the word "tulpa" with buddhism, then there would be no problem

 

Tulpa is a Tibetan word. You can't ignore the Tibetan Buddhist context when it's right there.

 

While I'm aware cobud could also be associated with Tibetan Buddhism given its connection to tulpa, cobud makes it pretty clear this is at least an English practice. It also sends the message, "yeah this really isn't Tibetan Buddhism" louder because there's a new term now that isn't from Tibetan Buddhism. There's no need to drag on an association that doesn't make sense, the story of misunderstanding tulpa can entertain those who want the history lesson instead of always being there.

 

3 hours ago, Breloomancer said:

i think it is also important to note that trying to change such a fundamental aspect of our vocabulary will damage the community. the tulpamancy community has been using the word "tulpa" for over 15 years now, and the community has become highly decentralized. if you try to switch to a new term, and by some miracle are able to get a significant portion of the community on board with the switch, there will inevitably be large portions of the community left behind who keep using "tulpa", and the community using new terminology will also be more cut off from the history of tulpamancy and past writings about it. a switch like this would just make it so much more difficult to talk about tulpamancy and to search for information about it. it seems like a lot of trouble to go through for what is, frankly, not that big of an issue

 

From purely a practice standpoint, anti-guide sentiment and an overall disinterest in learning anything more than creating a cobud and maybe switching is far more damaging than anything else. If I were to create a separate community, it wouldn't take much to achieve what already exists. Plus, I bet a lot of guide material can be rewritten anyway.

 

There's also the fact there's hostility between systems with cobuds who see themselves as individuals and those who don't see their cobuds that way. That causes splits fairly frequently.

 

As for tulpamancers on 4chan and whatnot- I'm okay with leaving them behind. It was TCen who cried the loudest and straight up banned me over cobud. And I bet once an alternate term becomes mainstream, it will be the more blatant racists that clutch onto the term.

 

The broader parogenic community is very clique-like. You don't fit into our small group of friends, you're cast out. Cocreation is so personal that people's identities mix with the practice, thus creating this desire to only practice, if at all, with friends.

 

And from an emotional standpoint- I have been abused by so many people in the broader community I have grown apathetic to preserving "their" community. A lot of people didn't appreciate me for who I am. They didn't like it when I talked about cocreation. I would get shoved down because I made things "too complicated" or "guides are crap" when I talk about writing a guide. And then there was the abusive people I met, how I was treated as a staff member in its entirety, and the fact really awful people are starting to be seen as people to look up to. The owner of Tulpa Owais, Infinity, defended Mon, a horrible person who also bragged about how great incest is. How are they seen as a leader? That's not someone I want to associate myself with, or the people who are okay with them being an incest apologist.

 

I split over the idea of creating a general guide for this community. I thought it was because I didn't want to sell cocreation- which is still true, but that's not the whole story. Through trauma work, the main reason was because I was so hurt and so angry from how people treated me and the overall apathy in response to my hard work, that the idea of giving a general guide, a HUGE service... no. 

 

If people don't want to be nice and they don't even care about the practice, I'm okay with leaving them behind. A lot of ideas aren't unique when you have a community that suffers from a constant brain drain. For most people, the broader parogenic community is a cluster of friend groups, not a dedicated effort to actually practicing the skills. From what I saw on Discord, only a handful of servers bother with teaching beginners the practice to begin with. And when they do get left behind, I'm not sure if they'll even notice.

[Breloomancer]

59 minutes ago, Ranger said:

Sprul pa does have meaning. Sprul, which is doing the heavy lifting, is used in multiple places and Tibetan Buddhists still use it (I elaborate in an earlier post). They may not use the exact word sprul pa sure, but that word isn't removed from the Tibetan Buddhist context in both diction or connotation either. Adding the context of creating headmates without carrying along the context of emination bodys or why the Tibetan Buddhists practiced that is problematic.

it doesn't seem like it's difficult to tell apart the word "tulpa" from the word "sprul pa". sure, they are etymologically related, but blueflamemagick said that "tulpa" doesn't appear in any buddhist texts that they could find and that their lama didn't know what they were talking about until they wrote it down, and even then, then never confused it with the word "sprul pa"

 

as far as i can tell, the risk of someone hearing about sprul pas and thinking that people are talking about tulpas is negligible, and vice versa. and if that is the case, then i do not understand why it is a bad thing to separate the concept of a tulpa and the concept of a sprul pa

 

1 hour ago, Ranger said:

Tulpa is a Tibetan word. You can't ignore the Tibetan Buddhist context when it's right there.

most people aren't going to be familiar enough with buddhism or tibetic languages to be able to figure out the etymology just from hearing the word; they're only going to find out about it after they look into it. now, it would be disingenuous to try to hide the origins of the word, but i think it should be sufficient to just explain that the modern day usage is unrelated to it's origins. we don't need people to think that there has never been a connection, we just need them to understand that learning about tulpamancy won't inform them about buddhism and vice versa

 

1 hour ago, Ranger said:

From purely a practice standpoint, anti-guide sentiment and an overall disinterest in learning anything more than creating a cobud and maybe switching is far more damaging than anything else

1 hour ago, Ranger said:

There's also the fact there's hostility between systems with cobuds who see themselves as individuals and those who don't see their cobuds that way. That causes splits fairly frequently.

this is the same whataboutism you were criticizing earlier

 

1 hour ago, Ranger said:

If I were to create a separate community, it wouldn't take much to achieve what already exists. Plus, I bet a lot of guide material can be rewritten anyway.

i don't think it's nearly so easy as you seem to think

 

1 hour ago, Ranger said:

I bet once an alternate term becomes mainstream, it will be the more blatant racists that clutch onto the term.

you're far too optimistic. yes racist and anti social justice people will be more opposed to switching terminology for the states reasons, but there are all sorts of other motivations that people might have for not wanting to switch terms, like thinking that the new term sounds dumb, or not wanting to become disconnected from the history of tulpamancy, or just not wanting to have to change their habits

 

people have tried to make tulpamancy communities around alternative terminology multiple times in the past, and they have all ultimately been failures. frankly, if you can manage to get a handful of people actively talking about tulpamancy with your new terminology for more than a few months, i will be extremely impressed. but i really cannot see a scenario where the only people you are leaving behind are racists

 

 

it seems like you have a lot of personal grievances against the tulpamancy community that extend past just the terminology

[Ranger]

2 hours ago, Breloomancer said:

it seems like you have a lot of personal grievances against the tulpamancy community that extend past just the terminology

 

In retrospect, I realized my whataboutisms were really just sort of passive aggressive jabs (only because I add more direct context around it).

 

All of it was both a bad and disingenuous attempt to say "I don't care".

 

I have strongly associated tulpamancers who strongly stick to the "tulpa isn't racist" argument with the people who hurt me. TCen is an obvious example, but I was holding back a story that I didn't explain

 

---

 

I should start with the fact that I was banned from Tulpa Town, and for a stupid reason. But both that incident and what led up to that shapes the full story.

 

The first problem was just me being me. People would say I'm nice, but that didn't stop people from mocking me. I already talked about that though.

 

The second problem was I was split for most of it. My passion for cocreation is connected to Kay, and when she split, I just didn't have it in me to do cocreation. However, I think this just sped up the already existing problem of my frustration building up- I just had that to focus on.

 

The third problem was me learning some ugly truths about myself. Gray inherited emotionally abusive behaviors from his parents, and I inherited those from him. Being the owner of a server, suddenly I was in charge and I did a lot of things that were wrong. Lukily, I started to realize that was happening, got feedback on how to be a better administrator, and started to act on it. Me being a new admin and figuring out how to handle certain situations didn't help. I think with any staff team, it would have taken time to rebuild trust.

 

But the main crux of the issue boils down to being rejected for trying to be anti-racist. I did handle cases of racism too harshly, but soon it became an issue of me having to explain to people why something is racist. It wasn’t even about tulpas, it was other unrelated issues.

 

Before I "left the staff team" (more on that in a bit), I made a mod call that the rest of the staff disagreed with. But then it turned into to Error ripping my frame about how I'm such a "white knight" and how terrible of a staff member I was. I tried to talk to him because I noticed he was way more hostile than usual, but then he brought up something super personal as a manipulative "I'm the victim" thing. And Error and Rusty can't use that as an excuse anymore either- regrettably I was pressured into talking to them again, and when I brought up other problems, they didn't acknowledge a single thing they did wrong. Long story short, I realized my "friendship" with them was an abusive one, and I didn't realize that until I did the therapy work to realize how I really felt.

 

I had an extra Discord account that had admin access because I was worried about getting hacked. TTown was a compromise to begin with, so I figured I could trust Error and Rusty.

 

After the fight, I felt I couldn't run the server where the entirety of the staff hated me. I liked the idea of shutting it down, but Rusty logged into that account and stripped my admin roles before the conversation went anywhere.

 

I was also really mad that everyone thought Rusty disparaging me infront of the entire staff team was okay. I angrily told them I wasn't okay with that and left the staff entirely.

 

And the day I got banned? I was feeling better and testing the waters by posting there again. I was being vulnerable and admitting I was an asshole given what I learned about myself, but then Rusty got angry at me and muted me for a week. I was furious, and I demanded an explanation. I was also just angrily venting at that point- I knew they were going to ban me anyway, it was just a matter of how long did I want to wait out this process. I told them I won't keep quiet about this too. Eventually, another mod banned me for "the safety of our community". In other words? "We are banning you because we don't like you and how dare you be angry about it".

 

That's where the majority of my anger is. But as I'm unconvering more trauma, I'm realizing this is only happening because I'm starting to speak out against how I was treated. It's been going on for years.

 

I don’t want to help "their community" if they get left behind. It's clearly not my community anymore. And I find that the same people who clutch onto tulpa the hardest are the same people who hurt me and others.

 

Yes, there are people who aren't like that who may stick with tulpa. But not all mancers live in a vaccum- if a new term catches on, and they don't change their mind... In my eyes that's a choice. I understand hesitancy because an alternative isn't mainstream. But when it does, if they don't change I don't want to associate with them either.

 

I say when because when I am fully healed and get my life together, I'm making it happen. It will either be cobud or another term because people don't want to associate with me but agree tulpa is wrong. The greater good wins either way.

 

3 hours ago, Breloomancer said:

i don't think it's nearly so easy as you seem to think

 

I recreated the guide system here mostly by myself. I have experience as a staff member. And I'm working on my own site.

 

It's going to be brutal. It has been brutal. But unless something changes, that's my plan. And even if a separate community starts off really small, that will make me happy

 

3 hours ago, Breloomancer said:

it doesn't seem like it's difficult to tell apart the word "tulpa" from the word "sprul pa". sure, they are etymologically related, but blueflamemagick said that "tulpa" doesn't appear in any buddhist texts that they could find and that their lama didn't know what they were talking about until they wrote it down, and even then, then never confused it with the word "sprul pa"

 

as far as i can tell, the risk of someone hearing about sprul pas and thinking that people are talking about tulpas is negligible, and vice versa. and if that is the case, then i do not understand why it is a bad thing to separate the concept of a tulpa and the concept of a sprul pa

 

I don't know the best response to this. In my gut, I feel it's wrong. I know that there are other people who have a problem with it.

 

It just feels like bad faith? ADA didn't have the best faith, and that's what we're rolling with. And wherever there's tulpa being used to mean headmate creation, there's racism. They're connected, there's more there, I just don't have the knowledge to pinpoint what the issue there is.

 

However, I think sticking with this point could be dicey if you're not mindful of everything else. But I get the sense you are speaking in good faith. Everyone here is. It's the most productive conversation I've had on this topic ever.

[Lucilyn]

welcome to why we stay far away from all those sub-communities, everyone is unstable and no one hears anyone out

the forum format forces people to think at least a little before responding, and the rash people who can't bear that leave and use discord

(Reddit would be okay, but as a "forum" it discourages viewing old threads and wants to be used like typical social media instead, so it's not very good for information sharing community-wise, though it is decent for searching... via google, not on-site search)

 

I didn't respond to this thread when it was first posted because I see you as someone lost DEEP down the rabbit hole of "first world problem-creation of things that aren't a problem and aren't hurting anyone (except the people convincing themselves of the problems they've created)" and didn't want to fight - it's not your fault (per se, I guess the more you spread it it is), obviously it's the influence of lots of other insecure people who think this is how you improve the world, but there's a difficult line to see (for some) of practicality between such things

 

even if there's racists who don't want to change terms (as Bre mentioned, because such people are automatically against change), that has nothing to do with whether the community or term is racist in the first place

you're basically advocating for abandoning the USA because there are racists in it & it was founded by hurting native peoples hundreds of years ago

obviously if you try hard enough you can create logic that sounds right to do that, but it just isn't reflective of reality, the real way to fight bigotry is to choose your battles and make noise when it really matters, because the only people who come along with you on the first-world-insecurity level problems are similarly far-gone types who will only result in creating safespace(against criticism) bubble/echo-chambers, the normal people living their day to day lives really won't take notice because now you've shown you get upset over small (or to some, non) problems they could never afford to care about, vs taking stands on real, big problems, that empathetic people will join you on

 

the smaller you divide your teams the less influence you'll have (""snowflakes"" as they're seen will never change the mind of a bigot - but if they notice real hurt society is missing and make empathetic normal people aware, then when masses of people are putting pressure on bigots and resistant people you start to see some change, like with gay rights for example, having been helped out by all the reasonable and empathetic people who realized innocent people WERE being hurt)

 

 

something like that... I literally just woke up, but that should be close enough to what I wanted to say about the greater topic

Edited April 23, 2025 by Lucilyn

[Ranger]

If you think the issue is I'm unstable, that's not okay. That's just an attack on who I am and not constructive.

 

It's also used as an excuse to keep doing racist behaviors by saying "anything you say doesn't matter because you don't matter". Setting aside the emotionally abusive element there for now, it can shut down anything. I'm talking about tulpa being a problem because it's orientalist and the conversations about it are oftentimes racist. "Nah you're just sensitive". Scaring someone from the conversation by insulting them is a tactic to shut them down.

 

I shouldn't have to go big or go home to explain what Orientalism is and why microaggressions hurt people. Microaggressions are just racism that's mostly covert, but that doesn't make it not racist. For instance, people arguing with me- instead of saying, "you're not allowed to use cobud", they'll say "just use headmate". Same message, but the latter is more covert. "Stop using that term I don't like because you saying it makes me feel racist, and I want to keep being racist without feeling guilt and shame".

 

Even if it turns out the term doesn't matter, a lot of people don't want to talk about that part. And that part is really important. Why is me talking about it not good enough? If I point out that the Tibetan people are literally setting themselves on fire to protest China trying to invade and take over Tibet, that's dodging the conversation about Orientalism. China did something bad, the problem is China... it's so much more complicated than that. China has its own version of Orientalism. I can still focus on Orientalism without going all the way there. And me talking about that to a bunch of people on the internet probably won't inspire change anyway- it's a topic that came up before, and little to no action has come out of it. But interestingly, this is more likely to be brought up and discussed in this conversation.

 

I know people are capable of talking about Orientalism in regards to ADA. Western Orientalism is related to us, and we have seen the effects of that Orientalism in our lives. We have seen it on the internet and in media, and we saw it in past conversations (even if so far it's just been my own I broke down in the OP). We don't have to extensively study the Chinese version of Orientalism in order to have a conversation about Orientalism.

 

I did my best to raise this issue, I got rejected and shunned. I can't work with those people anymore. The line is drawn, and their line is so thick I lost access to their space. There's not much I can do about that.

 

I get really frustrated and scared when I get rejected, even if it's just a group of people not being happy with what I have to say. I don't want to always deal with that every time I want to use the word cobud. So a separate community where I have inevitable conversations only some of the time feels a lot more appealing.

 

2 hours ago, Lucilyn said:

you're basically advocating for abandoning the USA because there are racists in it & it was founded by hurting native peoples hundreds of years ago

 

This is a strawman- you came up with a completely different topic and you are saying I'm doing something that I'm not doing.

 

I didn't give up on the tulpa community immediately, and I think distancing is a good idea because those people decided they won't change their minds. I can't talk to people who refuse to let me exist in their space to begin with.

 

I'm here because I'm insecure and lonely, so I'm giving this conversation another shot. If I'm accepted or even just tolerated, then I can stay here. But if all I'm going to get are personal attacks and abuse, I'm not going to want to stick around. By the point the majority decides they want me to go away and through any means necessary, including abuse, it's pretty much over.

 

That's the other thing- when emotional abuse is brought into a conversation, it's no longer civil. And when it's the entire conversation, there's no point in staying. People said awful things to me and blamed me for it. Because apparently it became okay to harass me, call me slurs, or straight up humiliate me infront of others- over my anti-racist attitudes. You can't change minds with words if the stakes are now at abuse.

 

Emotional abuse is something we want to fight too, but that's a completely different can of worms. And we don't have the resources we need to effectively fight that now.

[Lucilyn]

oh.. I was really hoping you'd read my @'ing you posts in LOTPW before replying here

I guess I will quote them here in a second, I wasn't sure if they were entirely on topic or not but I guess they are now

even if it can be difficult for us (very logical, non-emotional types) to engage with you sometimes, we have never had any ill will nor "given up on you", and we've always made the effort to be friendly and see eye to eye no matter what's transpired before

 

3 hours ago, Ranger said:

If you think the issue is I'm unstable, that's not okay. That's just an attack on who I am and not constructive.

 

no, first of all I was referring to the groups you're in where drama crops up so often & the unreasonableness of yet-more people you just talked about your experiences with, that comment was only about why you've seen us stick to the forum and avoid getting involved in Discords/sub-communities as much as we can 

 

second, for 

6 hours ago, Lucilyn said:

I didn't respond to this thread when it was first posted because I see you as someone lost DEEP down the rabbit hole of "first world problem-creation of things that aren't a problem and aren't hurting anyone (except the people convincing themselves of the problems they've created)" and didn't want to fight

 

yes, obviously you have insecurities and problems as you admit yourself, but I didn't mean I was automatically discrediting anything you could say, only that we have seen this sort of conversation a lot before and we've never successfully gotten through to people once they're in this deep on.. whatever this sort of problem is

But I tried anyways! From LOTPW -

 

4 hours ago, Lucilyn said:

This isn't relevant to the term "tulpa" (because Tibetans have never even heard the word, and we should stop associating it with Buddhism entirely), but otherwise for "first world taking-offense-for-others"ism, we think about this a lot @Ranger

{Edit: it was removed... that's just... the exact problem that it was proving is a problem! -

https://community.tulpa.info/topic/7356-game-last-one-to-post-wins/?do=findComment&comment=463954}

 

 

just recently reposted on reddit but obviously this is a very old story, and it's an important lesson for those who, without realizing it, create problems where there were none (the dreaded result of internalized insecurity - "virtue signaling" - as you find there was neither an audience nor a victim for the issue you took)

 

I don't think this subject is done with any ill-will, people are convinced they're helping someone (versus very intentional virtue signaling, eg. by politicians who actually stand for nothing at all but their own gain)

But it kind of just isolates you and takes away your power to effect real change on more serious issues

 

I don't exactly know why rallying behind this sort of thing by mistake happens or how to avoid it - I think the cycle is "Being out of touch, but insecurity or first-world-boredom/craving-problems motivates seeking out a problem to get mad about and demand change for, then making noise and just kind of annoying average people who know it's not actually a true problem worth their energy (esp. when the world is FULL of real, serious problems)"

But yeah it'd take a HIGHLY qualified therapist or even research to figure out what leads people to this trap, all I can do is observe it and lament the misdirected effort/energy that could've been spent on real problems actually impacting lives daily

 

There are nuanced problems to take on (like microaggressions) in the world as well, but they're genuinely tricky to pinpoint and figure out how to challenge, so maybe it's best to focus on the bigger, clearer ones with ongoing movements if you find yourself naturally falling into obscure topics with no real support

  

3 hours ago, Lucilyn said:

by default you could easily think - let the people whose right it is to be offended do the speaking out, they are the only ones who will truly know

but as acknowledged by people like Ranger, or straight-cis allies to LGBT, or so on, the group doing the oppressing/offending are often the ones with the most power to fight it, so for the empathetic it makes sense to try and fight for them

so maybe the trick is checking yourself by being informed by and following the people who are saying they're facing genuine problems - and not assuming you know better and taking offense for them, because "they should be offended"

maybe they even WOULD be offended to some extent! but it's also possible that they're picking their battles with nuance and that an outsider simply doesn't know how to support their cause correctly, who knows

though I can say in the case of "tulpa", we are way out in "they've never even heard of this" territory lol.. all we can do is not make it a problem by dissuading people from comparing it to "Tibetan Buddhism" any more than it already has been (seriously, whether or not the niche groups Alexandra David-Neel learned from practiced what she reported, the mainstream/modern Tibetan-Buddhism concept of "emanation bodies" has NOTHING to do with intentional plurality/tulpamancy, so they SHOULD NOT be compared, simply say "the term was inspired by but the practice is unrelated" to people if it comes up and leave it at that)

Edited April 23, 2025 by Lucilyn