Tulpamancy failures due to traditional mindset.

Traditional model of tulpamancy in my point of view isn’t just wrong, it causes real problems for people. Following it can lead you to getting stuck (as you don’t want to control independent mind of your tulpa) or delusional (as you want to see tulpa independent mind’s agency in various places).

Here I’ll tell you about practical problems that people experience often, are related to traditional tulpamancy and can be solved easily just by switching to pragmatic approach.

Getting stuck due to not “parroting”

In traditional tulpamancy there is a concept of parroting - purposely making up tulpa’s words and actions.

Approaches to parroting varies but often is discouraged at all or since tulpa starts talking back.

No parroting at all implies no fantasizing. Unless you already have some ability to feel characters talking back to you, it will likely make you stuck.

No parroting after hearing your tulpa will make your progress dependent on IIA completely. As I said in the guide, it isn’t always reliable and sometimes you won’t be able to interact with your tulpa everyday until you learn switching. Which might also be harder in tradmancy, more on it below.

Getting stressed out due to “parrotnoia”

Another problem with parroting is that people might struggle with distinguishing parroting from tulpa’s “genuine” activity.

In our pragmatic approach we realize that IIA doesn’t have inherently more validity than purposely “parroted” words. It’s worth mentioning that switching in our pragmatic model also could be seen as parroting and therefore “not genuine”.

Getting delusional due to seeking tulpa’s agency everywhere.

Tradmancers tend to seek tulpa’s agency in everything we don’t control consciously.

You experience tulpa talking back to you? It’s your tulpa’s doing. Ok, that one makes sense although in our model it’s seen a little differently. But it doesn’t end with that.

You experience headaches due to talking to your tulpa for hours and dehydrating? It must be your tulpa trying to communicate with you! Your imaginary place looks a little different compared to yesterday? Your tulpa must have changed it! Feeling emotions you don’t understand? It’s what your tulpa feels! Feeling shivers on your skin? It’s your tulpa wanting your attention!

Few people apply tulpa’s activity to literally everything beyond conscious control but many people get tempted to associate tulpa’s activity to at least some of examples above.

Getting stuck due to misconceptions about switching

Switching in traditional tulpamancy is often made more complicated that it should be. Implying that tulpa’s consciousness might be different than host’s (in our model, there is only one consciousness) leads to expectations of blacking out or going to wonderland (see imaginary place and imaginary time) while you switch with your tulpa.

It’s not how it works. Tulpa and host don’t have separate consciousness or separate memory. If you imagine that a tulpa has some fictional life in a wonderland, you can convince yourself that the original identity has it too. But activity experienced in fictional time is purely fictional, you won’t actually experience it, you can make it up after the fact.

Also, you shouldn’t blackout when switching with your tulpa. If switching tampers with your feeling of memory in any way, you most likely have a dissociative disorder. “Blackout switching” doesn’t happen to people who purposely made a tulpa but to people who dissociate as a coping mechanism for a trauma.

Tradmancers often learn possession as a prerequisite for learning switching in a roundabout way.

Summary

If you got stuck waiting for tulpa talking back to you, you better forget about “parroting” nonsense and fantasize about your tulpa unconstrained.

If you can’t distinguish “parroting” from tulpa’s genuine agency, forget about “parroting” nonsense again. Read our guide again until you understand that it’s arbitrary in the end and tulpa’s thought from fantasizing or switching can be as genuine as those from IIA. IIA might increase immersion but shouldn’t be seen as a condition for validity.

There are children that imagine their imaginary friend’s absence due to them living their own lives on the moon. And there are adults who rationalize stuff happening beyond their conscious control as their imaginary friend’s activity. The first is cute childhood fantasy, the latter is being delusional.

If you expect a blackout when switching, you better learn that it’s not how switching is supposed to look like for people who aren’t affected with dissociative disorders. If you expect to move to a fantasy world while your tulpa is in control, you can only imagine it the same way you imagine what your tulpa was doing there.