Abvieon’s Guide to Fast and Effective Tulpa Creation

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Creating a tulpa doesn’t have to take a long time, and it doesn’t have to be filled with obstacles.

This guide’s main purpose is to help you create a tulpa relatively quickly while avoiding issues
and roadblocks along the way. I have noticed many people giving up or progressing slowly with
their tulpa’s development for reasons that can be remedied with just a bit of extra knowledge.
My hope is that this guide will help that happen a little less often.

A large part of what tends to cause slow progress in tulpa creation is incomplete knowledge of
what you’re getting yourself into, or not enough preparation. Many people get preoccupied and
distracted with things that could have been practiced before starting to create their tulpa,
instead of afterwards. You will be encouraged to get some of the hardest parts out of the way
before and soon after you start creating your tulpa, rather than stumbling through certain
unnecessary aspects of trial and error later on in the process. You will preemptively build a
strong mindset and foundation for your tulpa to grow from instead of piecing it together after
you’ve already begun trying to get your tulpa to “come to life.” This guide is based on what I’ve
learned from my own experiences and about 7 years of observations of what does and doesn’t
work well for others.

A few things to keep in mind while reading this guide:

As you could probably tell due to its length, this guide is not for those who are looking for a
quick and simple explanation of tulpa creation. It is meant for those who want to learn
everything they can and don’t mind a lot of details. But don’t feel like you need to read it all in
one go! You might ask “If this is a guide for fast creation, why is it so long? Seems ironic.” The
answer is that fast tulpa creation comes with the tradeoff of plenty of preparation and learning
beforehand. If you were looking for an easy shortcut, sorry, but this isn’t it.

Make sure you recognize the fact that there is no one universal set of steps required to create a
tulpa. It is possible to successfully create a tulpa in several different ways. This guide does not
focus on the very broad idea of simply creating a tulpa, but rather creating a tulpa in a way
specifically for helping the process to go quickly and avoiding certain things that trip people up.
Some of the instructions here are not required in general, instead only important to this
particular method. Also, many of the things said here are based on personal opinions,
experiences, and theories, so don’t come into this expecting pure objectivity, and recognize
that things may work a little differently for you.

Most of this guide will be fairly structured and specific. There are a lot of people who feel lost
without a specific framework to follow and this was written with those people in mind. If you
are not one of these people and this level of structure is unnecessary for you, don’t feel
compelled to follow these steps closely. Just take the bits and pieces that you feel are useful to
you and mash them together in any way and any order you’d like.

This guide is newcomer friendly, and will cover information that those new to the concept of
tulpas may not yet know. Whether you first learned about tulpas a day ago or a decade ago,
you can make use of this guide.

If you would like to find the section for a particular topic without needing to scroll, take a look
at the document outline on the left. If it is not already open, click the grey icon that looks like a
list. If you are on mobile, tap the three dots in the upper right hand corner, and then go to
‘Document Outline’.

What You Need to Know

There are certain things that are helpful to know before delving into tulpa creation, so I will give
background on what tulpas are and how they work.

What is a tulpa?
To understand what a tulpa is, it is important to talk about “plurality.” Plurality, also sometimes
called multiplicity, is an umbrella term used to describe any instance of more than one mind,
identity, or consciousness existing simultaneously within a single brain and body.

What does it mean to have more than one consciousness existing within your brain? What is it
like to be plural? Think about it this way: When you are asked what a person is, the first thing
that may come to mind is the body. If not, you might think of the brain. The body and brain are
part of yourself, but the thing that is really “you” at the core is your consciousness. Your
subjective experience and your ability to be aware and observe. This is what your
consciousness is.

Now, if one consciousness already exists within your head - which is you - what would prevent
the possibility of there being another one? The answer is: Nothing.
This runs counter to the traditionally accepted idea of “one body, one person” or “body =
person” that is often assumed to be true without a second thought. In reality, consciousness
and the brain are extremely malleable, and there is no principle or limitation that dictates there
must be only one single awareness present. Because of its malleable and adaptive nature,
consciousness can be reconfigured in such a way that there can be multiple of these
awarenesses, each with their own separate agency and sense of self. This is a strange concept
to think about if you’re new to this, but there is a long history of these instances that far
predates any kind of internet community, and it’s more common than you might think.

Imagine that another consciousness and cognitive process were to exist alongside your own,
that is self aware and sees themselves as a person. Imagine that they have their own thoughts,
personality, emotions, and preferences that vary from your own. Imagine that you do not
control or decide their words and actions, and that they act independently of your will. This is
what it is like to be plural.

Here is a metaphorical way of looking at it: Imagine that you are living in a house with another
person, and that you are going to be living in that same house together for the rest of your
lives. Neither of you can move out. You’ll be in close proximity, frequently involved in each
other’s lives, and you’ll talk quite often. But, despite forever living under the same roof and
being heavily bound together by that one thing, both of you do what you please. It is important
to follow certain “house rules” and compromise, yet you are still independent and separate
people. Your housemate might play the piano as a hobby whereas you paint. The two of you
might like different types of movies. You can ask your housemate to do the dishes for you, but
you can’t force them to.

- Terminology
Plurality is the experience of having a person or more than one person other than yourself co-
inhabiting your brain and body with you. A group of multiple people within a single brain and
body is often called a “system.” System members are typically aware of one another and are
able to communicate with one another via thoughts. This communication can consist of words,
images, emotions or concepts. A system member may have their own “form”, or imagined
appearance that may differ from the appearance of the physical body. They are typically able to
share and utilize certain aspects of one another’s minds, for example sharing memories with
one another. Any system member is able to control the physical body with practice and
consent.
There are several different types of plurality, which are differentiated mainly by how they are
induced and how they affect a person’s life. There are a wide variety of things that can cause
someone to become plural, and it can be induced either intentionally or accidentally. One of
the main things that sets tulpas apart from other types of plurality is the aspect of intention -
most would say that in order for a system member to be given the label of “tulpa”, they must
have been created intentionally. The practice of creating tulpas is often called “tulpamancy.” (I
know it’s kind of a weird term, but it’s fun and it works.)

In most plural systems, there is what is called the “host.” The host is often considered to be the
“main” member of the system, and is usually the first person to have existed in the brain,
having been around before a second consciousness was introduced. However, system members
who did not begin as the host can take on the role and capabilities of a host, and the host is not
necessarily any more “real” or important than other system members.

- Differences between tulpas and imaginary friends/characters

When first hearing about tulpas or plurality, one may gain the impression that being plural is no
different from having imaginary friends or having a very active imagination. However, the
experience of having a tulpa is very different from these things. Tulpas show sentience
whereas imaginary friends and characters generally do not. Most imaginary friends/characters
do not display independent agency and their every word and action is decided by the person
imagining them. They are not considered “real” in the sense that they have no mind or
independent will of their own. When you imagine a conversation with an imaginary
friend/character, you are providing both sides of the conversation. When you have a
conversation with a tulpa, you do not come up with what they are saying. Imaginary characters
also tend to disappear immediately if you stop thinking about them, whereas a tulpa has a
much more persistent and “solid” existence.

Some do experience their imaginary friends/characters acting autonomously - but their

behavior is typically less complex than a tulpa’s behavior, and people who have had both tulpas
and autonomous imaginary friends/characters are usually able to clearly tell the difference
between the two. Most people with tulpas consider a tulpa to be no less of a real person than
themselves, and consider imaginary friends to be just that: Imaginary.

However, it is likely that tulpas and imaginary friends do not exist in entirely separate
categories, but are instead on opposite ends of the same spectrum. Ordinary non autonomous
imaginary friends at one far end, tulpas (and hosts) at the other far end, and imaginary friends
that exhibit autonomy but seem less person-like than tulpas somewhere in the middle. It is
possible that imaginary friends that exhibit some autonomy are actually sentient to a small
degree, just less developed, and therefore seem less person-like than a typical tulpa. Sentience
and personhood probably does not exist in a binary black and white way - it is a spectrum,
from less sentient to more sentient.

Knowing this helps with understanding how a tulpa develops, as they grow from nothing more
than an imaginary idea into a fully fledged consciousness.

How does all of this work?

How is it possible for more than one mind to co-inhabit a single brain? Nobody is sure, as there
is still much to be learned about the human brain, especially when it comes to anything
involving consciousness. The exact nature of what consciousness is and how it works is
unknown. This means that the internal mechanics of plurality are mostly shrouded in mystery. If
you’re looking to science or psychology for a straightforward and definite answer on plurality or
consciousness, you won’t get one.

Does this uncertainty mean that tulpas cannot be proven as “real”, in the sense that they are
legitimately sentient beings and not just some sort of illusion or mind trick, imitating sentience
but not actually possessing it? Yes, but keep in mind that proving the existence of anyone’s
consciousness as a “real” thing is no different. You cannot truly know if anyone other than
yourself is conscious in the same way you are, because the experience of consciousness is
completely subjective. See the concept of the “philosophical zombie.” Yet, we still think of
others as being conscious. Like you would with any person, it makes sense to give tulpas the
benefit of the doubt, as doubting the sentience of a tulpa isn’t very different from doubting the
sentience of anyone who isn’t a tulpa. This is because a tulpa is indistinguishable from a person
in behavior, function, and capability. In order to know the objective “truth” behind plurality, we
must first know much more about the inner workings of the brain, and possibly the universe at
large, than we currently do.

Different people hold different beliefs about what exactly a person is in the mental sense, and
what consciousness is. For example, if you have religious or spiritual beliefs you may see a
person’s consciousness as being a soul which can exist independently of the body, or if you
have no religious or spiritual beliefs you may see a person’s consciousness as being a system of
neurological processes that exist solely as a product of the brain. However, we do at least know
what consciousness looks like on the surface, despite the uncertainty of what makes it tick
under the hood. Because a tulpa acts and functions exactly as a person does, it is reasonable to
assume that the process behind a tulpa’s existence is the same thing as the process behind the
existence of your own consciousness. This can make sense regardless of what types of beliefs
you hold - If you believe that you are a soul, it makes sense to believe that tulpas are also souls,
and if you believe you are a neurological process, it makes sense to believe that tulpas are also
that same kind of neurological process.

Does a tulpa have any sort of tangible existence within the brain? Yes, in the same way that you
do. The configurations of your neurons, and the signals firing between them, are what facilitate
your thoughts. When a tulpa thinks, neural activity is happening in the same way as it would
with you. There probably aren’t neurons that belong exclusively to the tulpa - every part of the
entire “hardware” of the brain is shared between the two of you. You both have equal access
and ability to use any part of the brain. Yet, the “software,” or your thoughts, are different
distinct patterns within that hardware.

- Theory on the mechanisms of tulpas

But, there are theories as to how plurality and tulpas are possible. I will explain one of my
theories. Keep in mind that this is more metaphorical than literal.

I believe that tulpas come about in a way that is almost identical to how any person’s mind
develops. There is a central mechanism or process through which all minds and identities
(including your own) are created with small variations in how it is achieved. I think of
consciousness as being similar to water - it is only pure awareness and has no particular shape
or form and exists with no function or identity until it is “poured” into a “container” in which it
gains a sense of identity, shape, and separation, when before there was none. Think of
consciousness as an ocean, and your identity as a cup that you submerge in the ocean, then
scooping up a portion of the water which then takes on the shape of the cup. Every person’s
cup is shaped differently, giving them unique attributes and giving them the experience of
differentiation.

Every person is born with consciousness, but it exists in this undifferentiated state of pure
awareness with no identity or distinction for the first several months of life. Note how babies
do not perceive any separation between themselves and their environment. Then, through
genetic and environmental factors, the child begins to develop their identity and personality.
Input and stimuli from interaction with others creates this container for consciousness, a sort of
filter through which you view and process the world. It is what gives you your personality traits,
opinions, likes and dislikes, and the ability to identify with thoughts and claim them as a part of
yourself. This is what some call the “ego.”

You may already be catching onto how what I am saying applies to tulpas. More than one of
these “containers” for consciousness can exist within a single brain and body. Another useful
way to describe this container would be a “hub.” In most people, only one hub exists, because
most of the time there is no necessity for more than one, so it rarely ends up happening
without deliberate intention or some other catalyst. All experiences and stimuli are directed
towards this single central hub, think of it like a dip in a flat plane, something that things
gravitate towards and are integrated into. But, this does not have to be the case. What if there
were two or more “dips” in this flat plane, both made out of the same basic essence of
consciousness, but shaped differently from one another, “pooling” consciousness into different
compartments and processing/experiencing stimuli through different filters and perspectives?

In your case, it was mainly your parents and your early environment that “shaped” the
container for consciousness to flow into. (Though it continues to grow and change throughout
your entire life.) In a tulpa’s case, it is their host that shapes this container. The host does this
just by having the idea and impression that a second container exists, that is enough for it to
start existing. You create the impression that there is a being that is separate from yourself, and
give that imagined being input by talking to them and feeding them attention. This causes some
thoughts and stimuli that would normally be integrated into your own hub to be redirected
into this second hub. An analogy for this would be splitting a single stream of water into two
streams, each flowing into different compartments. Or, a single beam of white light shining
through a prism and splitting into multiple colors on the other side. At first this hub starts out as
a very small and shallow dip in this flat plane, not yet a fully fledged person, but as you continue
“pouring” experiences and stimuli into it by giving it attention, over time it gets “pushed down”
by the weight of experience and becomes deeper and more entrenched, and eventually
reaches a level of depth and complexity that is similar to your own hub. Then, you have a well
developed tulpa. The same mechanism creates both your ego/identity and your tulpa’s
ego/identity, just through slightly different means.

It is the act of directing attention towards something in your head you label as “not me” that
creates a tulpa. This is the #1 most essential aspect of tulpa creation. If you do not label it as
“not me”, and instead view it as an aspect of yourself or something wholly under your control,
this will prevent it from gaining a sense of separation, which is why talking to yourself or having
an imaginary friend usually doesn’t result in a tulpa. If you talk to yourself, you are directing
those thoughts to yourself and not another being. If you have an imaginary friend, chances are
you view it as a puppet under your control and not an independent being.

You do not have to believe my theory, or the idea that tulpas are sentient in the same way you
are, in order to create a tulpa or make use of this guide, but it is helpful to consider it as a real
possibility. Considering the possibility of tulpas being sentient is helpful because that
consideration often results in a better outcome for a tulpa. The idea that it is impossible or very
unlikely for a tulpa to be sentient causes some to feel as if it is ok to treat their tulpa as if they
are not a person, disregarding their wellbeing. Treating a tulpa as a real being rather than a
figment of your imagination also tends to do wonders for the speed of their development, as
such a mindset can increase your enthusiasm and improve your tulpa’s confidence and
capabilities.

You will probably get more out of tulpa creation than just a companion in your head - you may
also learn things about the nature of the mind, consciousness, and identity. Get ready for a
fascinating journey.

Preparation
It is very important to not instantly jump into creating a tulpa without forethought. If you do,
you are more likely to encounter issues which can slow down your progress.

Why have a tulpa?

There are countless possible reasons someone might have for wanting to create a tulpa, one of
the most common of which is curiosity. The possibility of having a second person in your head
might be too fascinating to pass up. Another common reason is a desire for companionship.
Because a tulpa shares your brain, they can be there for you at almost any time and understand
you more deeply than a person in a separate body could. It is a surreal and comforting
experience to feel the presence of another being sharing your mental space with you. Tulpas
can also provide you with ideas, insights, and life advice that you would not have come up with
yourself, as they can have a vastly different personality and think about things from a different
perspective and mindset.

Tulpamancy turns out to be a positive and sometimes even life changing experience for most
people who try it. Many experience an increase in overall happiness and quality of life after
creating a tulpa. Having a close friend around at almost all times who is capable of seeing
directly into your mind is a very unique way of life that is likely to result in less loneliness and
boredom, even for those who were already happy with their life.

Although the positives tend to vastly outnumber the negatives, having a tulpa can come with
some challenges. No tulpa is a flawless angel and will have imperfections and troubles just like
any other person. Would you expect a friend of yours to always be 100% helpful, agreeable,
and fun, no matter what is going on in their life? You wouldn’t, so you shouldn’t expect that
from a tulpa either, because they are just a person, nothing more and nothing less. Some
misinterpret tulpas to be precisely crafted and programmed robot-like constructs that will only
follow a specific narrow set of purposes and behaviors that you assign to them or expect of
them, but this is far from the truth. They are a person, and come with the full package of
personhood, with all the ups and downs. A well developed tulpa will inevitably possess all of
the same complexity, depth, variability, needs, and unpredictability that you could expect from
any person. So, do not only think about how your tulpa may be able to help you - but also think
about how you may be able to help them when they need it.

Any kind of relationship issue that could be experienced with a non-tulpa could also potentially
happen with a tulpa. You will have a few arguments or disagreements with them eventually, for
the exact same reasons why being in close proximity with anyone for long enough leads to high
odds of conflict. A tulpa and their host will usually have a good relationship due to sharing a
brain and having the ability to understand each other very easily, clearly seeing the motivations
and thought process behind whatever the other does. But, your tulpa probably won’t like every
single thing about you or agree with every single thing you do. They are an individual with their
own perspective and will not act as your personal “yes-man.”

Also, creating a tulpa means giving up some of the free time and energy you would have
otherwise used for other things. Whatever you normally do during your leisure time, you will
inevitably have to cut back on some of it. Though most do not mind this much because the
payoff is absolutely worth the time and effort, and the process can be fun a lot of the time.

- Is my reason for wanting a tulpa ok?

Regardless of what reasons you have for wanting to create a tulpa, you might think about
whether they are “right” or “wrong” or “good enough.” You might think about whether or not
you should even create a tulpa at all. When you consider the idea that tulpas are fully fledged
people, the question of whether or not you should create a tulpa can seem less like deciding
what to have for lunch and more like deciding whether or not to have a child. There is some
truth to this thought, as creating a tulpa is a big undertaking and commitment (although not
quite on the level of an actual child.)

However, some people worry to an unnecessary extent about their reasoning and motivations.
They might think that if their life and circumstances aren’t absolutely perfect to bring a tulpa
into, they shouldn’t go through with it. Just know that if you are one of these people - your
motivations probably aren’t “wrong” or “not good enough”, because many of the motivations
for tulpa creation that are often believed to be harmful are not actually as bad as they are made
out to be, nor do you have to be perfectly suited for a tulpa in every way (nobody is.)
The difference between a good reason to make a tulpa and a bad reason to make a tulpa boils
down to your answer to this one question: “Would I be ok with it if my tulpa does not align with
the purpose I want them to fulfill?”

For example, say that you want to create a tulpa based on your favorite fictional character. This
could be either a harmful or harmless motivation depending on whether you plan to force your
tulpa to adhere to the identity of that character even if they want to become someone else, or
would be okay with your tulpa changing if they wanted to. Another example would be creating
a tulpa with the intention of having them help you with school work, your job, or other tasks. It
is fine to want them to do these things and ask them to do these things as long as you don’t
make it a requirement, or the only reason for their existence.

The following are both the same motivation, just with different levels of flexibility and
attachment. The amount of flexibility is the key difference.

“It would definitely be nice if my tulpa helps me with my lucid dreaming practice. But if they
aren’t interested and things end up going in a different direction, I’d be ok with that too.”

“Creating a tulpa interests me only because of the ways a tulpa can be applied to lucid
dreaming. If my tulpa doesn’t help me with this, there is no reason to have one.”

It is very possible that your tulpa will end up filling the role you want them to take - but not
guaranteed. There is no way to ensure that your tulpa will turn out the way you intend them to,
because your tulpa will have their own will that is independent of yours. They won’t necessarily
want to do what you expect of them. Still, it is perfectly fine to have a role in mind for your
tulpa so long as you would still be alright with them potentially not going with what you
planned. You can gently encourage them to go along with what you want - you just cannot
force them to. If they express a desire for personal change that goes against what you want, it is
best to allow it. Doing otherwise may be very detrimental to their development as a person and
mental health.

As long as you apply this principle of not requiring that your tulpa do what you want, you will
find that there are very few inherently bad reasons to want to create a tulpa. If you allow your
tulpa freedom of choice, your motivations for tulpa creation no longer matter as much. You can
go in with almost any initial intention so long as you allow them to freely expand beyond this
initial intention, and you do not have too much attachment or strong expectations surrounding
that initial intention.
Yes, this does mean that there is no inherent harm in creating a tulpa for reasons that would be
considered shallow, because that does not automatically mean it will bring harm to your tulpa.
Another unnecessary worry many people have about their motivations is whether or not they
are justified, as if they need some sort of special or profound reason to create a tulpa. You
don’t. “Having a tulpa just sounds like it would be cool” or “I want to try to create a tulpa just to
see if it actually works” are shallow reasons, but they do not necessarily mean that you are
going to mistreat your tulpa or give them a bad life. For instance, you may start a friendship
with someone for a shallow reason. You might have no reason for approaching them other than
“we both like this book series!” But, later on they might end up being your best friend. The
relationship may bloom into something deep, positive, and lasting, growing far beyond the
reason you started the friendship.

Another common concern people have about their motivations is whether or not they are
selfish in nature. What many do not realize is the fact that there is not a single reason in
existence for wanting a tulpa that is not at least slightly selfish. Whatever reason you have for
wanting a tulpa, it is partially to benefit yourself in some way. There is no avoiding this. It is
important to realize that there is nothing wrong with selfishness that does not come at the
expense of others, so judging your motivations on this basis is useless. In fact, almost
everything you do in your everyday life has a selfish side to it, whether you realize it or not.

- The capabilities of tulpas

Something else to keep in mind is what tulpas are and aren’t capable of. The most important
thing to know is that tulpas are people. Anything that would be impossible for a person to do is
also impossible for a tulpa. Tulpas under certain circumstances can hold skills and talents that
you lack, but if you want them to do something that people in general can’t do, they probably
won’t be able to do it. You may be limited or enabled by what you believe is and isn’t possible,
so whatever makes sense for you to believe a tulpa can do depends on what you believe people
in general are capable of. I will not attempt to provide an objective list of what tulpas can and
can’t do because beliefs vary widely. For instance, a spiritually minded person may have a very
different take on what people in general are capable of as opposed to a materialist. It is just
that tulpas are not different from non-tulpas in terms of what they can do, whatever those
things may be.

Also, know that simply thinking your tulpa will be good at a certain thing does not
automatically make them good at it. They may have a predisposition for it, allowing them to
become skilled at it faster and easier than you would be able to, but in order for a tulpa to be
good at something you are not, they must actually practice it and put time into it. If you want
your tulpa to be a good artist, the most you can do is introduce them to drawing and encourage
them to try it out - they will need to practice art themselves to actually become skilled at it.

- Commitment and the future

You should also think about how having a tulpa might affect you and your life. The most
important thing to consider here is the fact that your tulpa may stick around for the rest of your
life. Tulpas don’t easily disappear, and may end up becoming just as much of a present and
regular part of your brain as you are. It is possible to “get rid” of a tulpa, but this has ethical
implications and might be very difficult depending on how developed your tulpa is. Tulpas who
have been around for a long time, such as 1-2 years or longer, are often almost impossible to
get rid of and will likely attempt to stick around despite your efforts. So, don’t come into this
with the idea that it will be temporary. Do not treat it like a casual side project that you can set
aside at any time. It is not just a little hobby that you pick up for a while, say “huh, this is kinda
cool”, and set it back down. It is much deeper than that - if you have been at it for long enough,
you will have rewired your neurology in a way that may not be entirely reversible.

Since creating a tulpa is a long term commitment, you might be wondering what kinds of effects
having a tulpa may have on your life and whether or not there might be any potential “deal
breakers” for you. The next section will cover these things.

Addressing common concerns

When coming into tulpamancy, you might have a few worries or pressing questions about it. I
will give some insight into some of the common concerns people have.

- Could my tulpa become “evil” and turn against me or try to sabotage my life?
This kind of thing almost never happens. As long as you do not abuse them or treat them
horribly, the chance of this happening is next to none. Tulpas generally care about the
wellbeing of their host and would not want to cause you any unnecessary trouble. Also, they
share your body, so there would be little reason for them to physically harm you, as that would
also harm them. There are horror stories of tulpas suddenly becoming monster-like without any
apparent reason and severely harassing their host - most of which are fictional, greatly
exaggerated, or a misinterpretation of a mental health issue that is unrelated to the tulpa.
Don’t let these stories worry you. A tulpa is not any sort of mysterious otherworldly demonic
entity - a tulpa is a person and operates on the same motivations and psychology that a
person has. A tulpa will not become malicious if not given a very good reason for doing so. If
you do have a significant conflict with your tulpa, the problem can be worked through by
talking to them about it in almost all cases. Tulpas are not something to be feared.
 - Will creating a tulpa damage my mental health or make me more prone to developing
new mental disorders?
No. The state of having a tulpa is not a mental illness, nor does creating a tulpa open any sort of
“gateway” to new mental illnesses. Some compare tulpamancy to various mental disorders, for
example schizophrenia, due to the fact that both of these things can involve “hearing voices”
other than your own inside your head. Tulpamancy is not schizophrenia, as schizophrenia is
impossible to self-induce due to being caused mainly by genetic factors, and the voices
experienced by many people with schizophrenia are different from the experience of tulpas in
numerous ways. These voices are not like full personalities or people, they are typically very
one dimensional and repeat the same things over and over, and don’t respond to you or have
conversations in the same way a tulpa would. They also tend to be focused purely on negative
things, whereas tulpas are capable of a full range of emotions.

Tulpas are also frequently compared to Dissociative Identity Disorder (formerly known as
Multiple Personality Disorder.) While tulpas and DID share the commonality of both being a
form of plurality, they do not work quite the same way and have different impacts on a
person’s life. DID involves distress and dysfunction, and is induced unintentionally through
repeated trauma. DID is a psychological defense mechanism against trauma - when trauma
becomes too much for one person to handle, new consciousnesses will form to take on and
hide some of the memories and experiences so the host does not have to handle the full impact
on their own. This cultivates a strong barrier that often results in the following things: a lack of
sharing important knowledge and memories, poor communication with system members or
even lack of awareness that the others exist, and uncontrolled and unintentional swapping
control of the body.

Tulpas, on the other hand, are created in a very different manner that rarely ever leads to those
issues. It is important to know that the presence of multiple personalities in a single body is
not what constitutes a disorder - there must be significant distress or inability to function
normally in daily life alongside the plurality in order for it to be considered a disorder by
mental health professionals. Plurality itself does not lead to these things, it is just that certain
catalysts that can sometimes cause plurality, such as trauma, can also cause issues to manifest
simultaneously (for example, PTSD and amnesia) alongside the plurality in such a way that they
become partially intertwined and might not appear separate at all.

Mental illness generally isn’t something you can willfully induce. When you create a tulpa, you
certainly are making your brain work in a way that is different from the norm, but an
abnormality does not equate to a problem or disorder.
 - Will I have any privacy or time alone if I have a tulpa?
Yes. Some get the impression that having a tulpa is like having someone handcuffed to you,
constantly following you around and looking over your shoulder. This is not always the case.
While you are going about your day, there will be times where your tulpa is unconscious/asleep
or just directing their attention somewhere other than to what you are doing. Also, they’ll
probably leave you alone at any time you ask them to. You will have time to yourself without
your tulpa being aware of what you are doing. However - in most cases a tulpa will have access
to a large portion of your thoughts and memories, meaning they might know most or all things
about you. But, it is easy to feel comfortable with a tulpa knowing you on a deep level. It will
not feel the same as a stranger prying through your business. But if you want to, it is possible to
decrease your tulpa’s awareness of your thoughts, which will be covered later on.

- If I have a mental condition, will my tulpa have it as well?

Most mental conditions are a result of your brain’s neurology rather than being tied to
individual personalities, so generally a condition will have some effect on every member of a
system. However, the condition may be “filtered” by and affected by one’s personality, so it
may manifest in very different ways between different system members. For example, if the
host and tulpa are both autistic, the host may have trouble with social interactions while the
tulpa doesn’t have trouble with social interactions, but the tulpa may have sensory processing
issues while the host doesn’t have sensory processing issues. A tulpa and host may also be
affected to different degrees by the same mental condition. For example, depression being
debilitating for the host but very mild for the tulpa.

- Is it ok for me to make a tulpa if I have a mental condition?

Generally yes. Some worry that they may not be suited to creating a tulpa if they do not have
an entirely clean bill for mental health. But, recognize that some mental conditions such as
anxiety, depression and ADD are exceedingly common and you will find that an enormous
portion of successful tulpa creators have a condition of some type. Having a mental condition
does not automatically make tulpamancy dangerous or a bad idea. In fact, tulpas generally have
a very beneficial effect on mental health and may help mitigate the symptoms of your
condition. They can talk you out of negative or obsessive thought patterns, prompt you to get
back on track if you have poor attention/focus, and provide amazing emotional support.

However, please do not have this as your sole motivation for creating a tulpa, because they are
not guaranteed to help you with your condition nor should they be your only way of dealing
with your condition. Whatever you already use to manage your condition - whether that be
therapy, medication, meditation, or peer support - continue to utilize these things and do not
expect your tulpa to completely replace these things.
Note that the inward-focused nature of tulpamancy can cause you to delve into aspects of your
mind you don’t normally pay attention to, figuratively “stirring the pot.” This can potentially
cause the symptoms of some mental disorders to temporarily become more noticeable. For
example, you might notice intrusive thoughts more often due to increased attention towards
things inside your mind. Tulpamancy is not a gateway to developing new conditions, it just
may cause you to take more notice of what was already present and pre existing. This can
sometimes actually act as a catalyst for recognizing and working on issues that were previously
not acknowledged. So, be prepared for the possibility that by starting tulpamancy you may be
getting yourself into a little more than just introducing a companion into your head. Be sure to
take care of yourself and take a short break from tulpamancy if needed.

There is sometimes special concern for those who have schizophrenia, psychotic episodes, or
any other condition that may cause delusional reasoning and beliefs. It is assumed that if a
person already has difficulties with determining what is real and what is not, tulpamancy could
exacerbate this issue. While this is occasionally true, this should be handled on a case by case
basis. I will never make blanket statements such as “People with schizophrenia should never
make tulpas” or “It is always safe for people with schizophrenia to make tulpas” because
neither of these statements are true. If you have any of these conditions, you may want to take
a bit of extra caution towards this practice, but do not assume that it is guaranteed to be
detrimental or dangerous for you.

Tulpamancy is often completely harmless for those with schizophrenia or related conditions
because tulpamancy does not necessarily involve any sort of detachment from reality, or
imposing false beliefs. It is sometimes assumed that tulpa creation necessitates the blurring of
lines between imagination and reality, or self-delusion. And therefore, the practice is inherently
dangerous for anyone who is already prone to experiencing this “blurring of lines” in an
uncontrolled and dysfunctional way. But - I believe this perspective comes from a
misunderstanding of what tulpas are.

Those who have this perspective may see tulpas as the hallucination of a person - or the belief
that a person is there when they are not - rather than the actual neurological presence of a
person. Under this model, creating a tulpa would be creating a false impression. However,
tulpas show consistency, complexity, and capability that is not characteristic of a hallucination.
A hallucination is typically sporadic and fleeting, inconsistent in its behavior, and does not
display a coherent thought process or human reasoning. If a person with schizophrenia or a
related condition creates a tulpa, most often their tulpa matches the typical non-disordered
experience of what a tulpa is like, rather than matching the experience of a delusion or
hallucination. For this reason, the person usually will be able to separate the two and not
confuse them, and will be able to gain the same benefits and positive impacts from tulpamancy
that any non-disordered person may experience. In fact, their tulpa may end up decreasing the
symptoms of their condition by giving them a second opinion and emotional support, and as a
result help anchor their host into reality, rather than doing the opposite.

If you’re still unsure if it would be safe for you to create a tulpa because of your mental
condition, make a post in an online tulpa community asking about other people with your
particular condition and how it affected their experience with tulpamancy.

- I am (insert age here), is it ok for me to make a tulpa?

Age does not matter very much as long as you understand that tulpa creation is a long term
commitment that should be thoroughly thought about before you jump into it. It is a decision
that will alter the course of the rest of your life, which is especially important to take into
consideration if you are young. If you are a teenager and you learned about tulpas for the first
time very recently, don’t start quite yet and do some more research. Read about more people’s
experiences with tulpas to give yourself a better idea of the rabbit hole you are getting yourself
into. It really is as life changing as people claim it is.

Many worry that teenagers will make the decision to create a tulpa on a whim without thinking
it through, become unable to handle the responsibility, or treat their tulpas like toys or
imaginary friends with a lack of a serious or respectful approach. These worries are
understandable, but not universally true. Whether or not someone will handle tulpas in a
healthy and responsible way is not directly connected to age, and anyone of any age can be
irresponsible or responsible with tulpamancy. Respect and kindness towards your tulpa is by
far the most important factor in how your experience with tulpamancy will unfold, and
people of any age are fully capable of this. Of course there are instances of teenagers
neglecting their tulpas or treating them poorly, but I have seen the same thing from people in
their 20’s just as often, if not more often.

There is no such thing as being “too old” to create a tulpa as long as you do not have any
condition that severely inhibits information or skill retention. There has been at least one
known case of someone in their 70’s successfully creating tulpas, as well as multiple instances
of people in their 40’s-50’s creating tulpas. If you are capable of learning and retaining a new
skill, you are capable of creating a tulpa, no matter what.

How do I ensure that I can create a tulpa?

Before you start creating your tulpa, you should do everything in your power to maximize the
chance that you will be able to do so successfully. The main key to doing this is ensuring that
you can be consistent during the creation process.

The act of working to develop a tulpa in any way is often referred to as “forcing”. Forcing is a
broad term that covers many different aspects of tulpa creation - but it is best described as
simply spending time with your tulpa with the intent of developing them in some way. The
more often you force, the faster they will become sentient and vocal. You should be forcing at
least once every single day as soon as you start. You should force for a minimum of thirty
minutes per day, preferably more. About one or two hours a day is good to aim for. However, it
is always best to force for as long as possible each day. You should force for longer than this if
you have enough time and energy. If you find that you are able to pay attention to your tulpa
every waking minute - go for it! There is no such thing as “too much forcing” unless you are
putting yourself under extreme exhaustion or neglecting other important things because of it.

However, I don’t recommend that you immediately start attempting to force for long periods of
time if you have difficulties with prolonged focus or if your mental energy is quickly drained -
otherwise you may find yourself repeatedly failing to meet your target time which might result
in frustration or discouragement. Maybe start with something such as two separate 15 minute
sessions in a day, and gradually work your way up to your ideal time.

You might be thinking “Wait, if I’m going to have my tulpa for the rest of my life, does that
mean I will need to force for thirty plus minutes every day for the rest of my life?” Not exactly.
Eventually, after your tulpa is sentient and vocal, there will come a point where you will not
be working to develop them, because they are already developed enough. Instead, you’ll just
be spending time with them in a way that doesn’t feel like work at all. You won’t need to set
aside very many specific time slots for your tulpa because you will be easily and naturally
interacting with them off and on as you go about your day. As long as you are fairly consistent
from the beginning, the hardest part of having a tulpa will probably be within the first few
months - after that, everything will be relatively easy and natural.

Do not beat yourself up or think you have somehow ruined your tulpa if you miss a few days of
forcing here and there - because you haven’t. Just pick right back up where you left off, your
tulpa will be fine. Very few people are perfectly 100% consistent with this and you should not
expect yourself to be.

If you are having a tough time in life, or you “crash” and lose motivation for forcing, doing just a
little bit every day is far better than nothing at all. Avoid an “all or nothing” or perfectionist
mindset with tulpamancy. If you are having a bad day and your usual hour seems
insurmountable, go for 10 minutes. If even that is too difficult at the time, just a couple minutes
will do. Is visualization much more difficult than usual? Are you having trouble focusing? Is your
tulpa’s presence weaker than it was yesterday? None of that matters. The only thing that
matters is the fact that you still decided to force on a bad day. Congratulate yourself for that.

The importance of speed

Why is the speed at which a tulpa develops important? If you see little to no progress over a
long period of time, you might feel compelled to give up or become riddled with doubts. Some
end up entirely abandoning tulpamancy if they go too long without seeing results. I will not tell
you that you lack the responsibility or drive to create a tulpa if this happens to you, because
that is not true. Nobody’s patience is infinite. Still, if you have fast results, you will not run into
this problem in the first place. It is best to prevent a problem before it starts rather than fixing
it after it has already happened.

If your tulpa starts to show strong signs of progression within, for example, just a few days after
beginning creation, your excitement and optimism will receive a massive boost and you will be
far less likely to be slowed down or experience a large amount of doubt. Tulpamancy works
best when you are excited about it. Without this excitement, it could end up seeming like a
tedious chore, making it easier to give up or progress slowly. The longer you go without
significant progress, the harder it becomes to retain excitement, and the easier it becomes to
fall into repetitive cycles of low effort, discouragement, and doubt. This is what happened to
me many times and I hope to help others avoid this.

It is also best for a tulpa to be able to start communicating and acting on their own as soon as
possible after their initial creation, so they will not be in a “half baked” state for a long period of
time in which they are not able to do much of anything. When a tulpa has little to no
communication with you, they will be very limited and will not be able to experience life to its
fullest extent - this is a state that nobody would want to be in for a long time. Your tulpa will be
glad to be able to start talking and whatnot as soon as possible. For these reasons, it is best for
both you and your tulpa that your tulpa develop as quickly as possible.

Note that this does not mean rushing through necessary steps and skimming through the
process. “Fast” does not imply “easy” or “lazy” and the last thing I want is for this guide to be
misinterpreted that way. Fast development comes with the tradeoff of a lot of preparation
and effort. Tulpa creation is not a contest or a race to a finish line. Quick development is
important only for the sake of not getting stuck in cycles of doubt and poor motivation, and
allowing your tulpa to experience the full extent of life sooner. That is why it is important - not
because of being impatient or being the “best” at tulpamancy.

“Quickly” is a vague descriptor, so what exactly do I mean by that? What it means can vary from
person to person. To some it might mean seeing significant progress within a few days and to
others it might mean seeing the same within a few weeks. It is dependent on what you see as
the average time taken to create a tulpa - Some see a few weeks taken to create a tulpa as
average, so they see a few days as being fast. Others might consider a few months to be
normal, so they see a few weeks as being fast. More objectively speaking, it is difficult to
pinpoint a true average time due to a very wide variation in how long it takes - On the extreme
and unlikely ends of the spectrum, it has taken as little as almost instantaneously and as long as
several years. However, if I had to choose, I would pin the average at about one month based
on what I have seen.

Do not set strict expectations for when your tulpa will start showing progress, such as “It’s not
possible for my tulpa to start talking until I have completed at least 100 hours of forcing” or
“My tulpa will start talking within one day.” If you think that your tulpa cannot do X thing
before X time, you may stifle your ability to see progress before X time, mistaking real progress
as being confabulation. If you think that your tulpa will certainly do X thing before X time, you
may be setting yourself up for disappointment and frustration in the case that they take longer.
Be open to multiple possibilities - your tulpa could develop faster or slower than you think they
will. Still, it is okay to strongly believe that your tulpa will develop quickly - doing so can actually
help a lot - so long as in the back of your mind you still consider multiple possibilities.

Plural susceptibility
Plural susceptibility is the degree to which your brain is naturally “primed” for developing more
than one person. Those with high plural susceptibility will have an unusually fast or easy time
creating a tulpa and those with low plural susceptibility will have to work harder than most to
create a tulpa. This is why some people who put in the same amount of work and use similar
methods may still end up developing their tulpas at vastly different rates. You cannot be certain
of your level of plural susceptibility until you actually try to create a tulpa. However, there are
certain things to look out for that may indicate that you are the type of person who is likely to
have high plural susceptibility:

- Writing works of fiction on a regular basis, especially long works of fiction.

- Having had characters in stories you have written that act independently of your
control, making the story take on a “life of its own.”
- Having had imaginary friends which acted independently of your control.
 - Daydreaming much more often than the average person, especially if these daydreams
follow a recurring story format and are very complex. This is often called “maladaptive
daydreaming.”
- Having stronger than average empathy.
- Being able to easily fall into trance or be hypnotized.
- Having Dissociative Identity Disorder (or something similar, such as OSDD)
- Experiencing dissociation often. “Dissociation” refers to temporarily losing connection or
association with your emotions, identity, or physical senses for any reason. (Dissociation
is typically regarded as a negative thing, but it can sometimes be experienced in a
positive or neutral way.)

Keep in mind that these are only common indicators and are not true in all cases. Even if none
of these things apply to you, you might still have high plural susceptibility. Or, even if several of
these things apply to you, you might have low plural susceptibility.

If you think you may have low plural susceptibility, don’t let that discourage you. The effort you
put into creating a tulpa is more influential in the speed of their creation than this is. You may
still be able to create a tulpa quickly if you work hard at it. Additionally, it may be possible to
raise your plural susceptibility by practicing certain skills such as fiction writing.

Evaluating yourself
Now, you need to identify any factors in your life that could potentially impede your ability to
force as often as is ideal. This can involve numerous things, including your personality, your
habits, your mental conditions, your environment, and your schedule. A good place to start is to
ask yourself the following questions:

- Do I have an extremely busy schedule?

- Do I have significant trouble with focus or motivation?
- Do I procrastinate often?
- Do I strongly doubt my ability to successfully create a tulpa and allow these doubts to
bother or worry me?

If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, these things could possibly get in the way of
your ability to force often, so you should find ways to mitigate them to whatever extent is
possible and do-able for you. Most people have at least one of these four problems, so do not
feel as if you are at a relative disadvantage if you have any of them, these things are common
and normaI.
 - If you have an extremely busy schedule:
If you don’t have much free time, it may be difficult to regularly find time to work on your tulpa.
However, there is a specific way of forcing that is accommodating to those who are extremely
busy: passive forcing. Passive forcing refers to forcing while doing something else
simultaneously, such as driving, working, reading, etc. The alternative to passive forcing is
active forcing, which refers to focusing exclusively on your tulpa and not doing anything else
at the same time. Because active forcing requires you to have specific time slots for working on
your tulpa, it may not be suitable to do every day for those whose schedules are packed.
Passive forcing allows you to develop your tulpa while at school, work, or anywhere else. There
will be more information on this later.

- If you have trouble with focus or motivation:

In the case of poor focus, you can apply passive forcing. Those who have trouble focusing tend
to also have trouble with active forcing because it requires stronger focus than passive forcing.
However, if you have poor focus and still want to active force, you can simply break up your
active forcing sessions into pieces - if your goal is to force for an hour per day, you can break
that hour up into four separate fifteen minute sessions instead of attempting to do the entire
hour all at once. In the case of poor motivation, it may be helpful to do whatever you can to
convince yourself that having a tulpa is a good thing that will be worth the effort. Reading other
people’s experiences is a good idea - search through tulpa forum posts and find examples of
success stories and positive experiences. “Hype” yourself up about tulpas in general.

- If you procrastinate often:

Be certain that you make a schedule for forcing. If you have specific, predetermined times in
which you will be working on your tulpa, it is less likely that you will put it off. You might tell
yourself “I’ll do it later”, and before you know it, the day is almost over and you don’t have
enough time to do what you were trying to do. The key to stopping this is to make habits out of
things. Habits are surprisingly strong and can potentially override your tendency to
procrastinate. Making a schedule will do just that - let’s say that you make a schedule that
states you will force from 7 to 9 PM every day. Once you get used to this repeated pattern, it
becomes a habit and you will no longer procrastinate on it nearly as often. I recommend setting
alarms to remind you when it’s time to force.

If this doesn’t work, try giving yourself deadlines. Tell yourself that you must have forced a
certain number of hours by a certain date. If you are motivated by pressure, try giving yourself
some kind of reward if you meet the deadline, and denying yourself the reward if you do not.
Some type of external incentive, rather than just self imposed incentive, can also be a great
help. If you have a friend who knows about your tulpa, ask them to sometimes remind you to
force, and tell them about your progress from time to time. Keeping a regularly updated
progress report on a tulpa forum can also be a good external incentive.

- If you strongly doubt your ability to create a tulpa:

Doubt itself doesn’t do very much to hinder tulpa creation, but rather allowing doubts to
impede you or decrease your effort. The key is to be able to have doubts but still persist despite
those doubts and not allow them to get in your way. Keep in mind that doubt is natural,
especially with a practice as unusual and unfamiliar as tulpamancy. Just about everybody will
have some doubt. You might doubt your abilities, wondering if you “have what it takes” to do
this. You might doubt the legitimacy of tulpas themselves, thinking that they are “too good to
be true.” Consider this - countless people who doubted strongly were still able to create a
tulpa. I have seen this happen many times. Whether or not you can make a tulpa is not entirely
dictated by your beliefs. While belief is a powerful tool and makes things easier, it is not 100%
necessary. It is best that you try to decrease doubt and increase belief to some extent for the
sake of making things go smoothly, but you can have doubt and still be able to do this if you try
hard enough. The simple action of forcing is what matters most, the belief behind it is
secondary.

There is a common misconception that you need to strongly believe in tulpas or even “delude
yourself” in order to create one - this is not true, as is shown by the many skeptics who have
successfully created tulpas. Strong skepticism can sometimes be impeding but it is still possible
to succeed despite it. Trying to remove every last bit of skepticism or doubt is like going on a
wild goose chase, so don’t attempt to do that, you will get nowhere and slow everything down.
Even experienced tulpamancers who have had tulpas for years experience bits of doubt here
and there. Just persist despite the doubt, you are stronger than your doubt and your tulpa is
stronger than your doubt.

Evaluating your skills

When you create a tulpa, there are certain mental skills that are helpful to have. Tulpa creation
will have a faster and smoother start if you are already experienced in some of these skills prior
to starting. You will most likely not need to learn anything completely new, but rather sharpen
your already existing abilities. The things listed below are skills that nearly everyone has, but
have varying degrees of proficiency in.

- Sensory imagination
“Sensory imagination”, also called “visualization” or “the mind’s eye”, refers to the ability to
see, hear, feel, taste, and smell things within your mind. This is something that most people
utilize on a daily basis. For example, when you read a description of something in a book, you
may see a mental image of whatever is being described. Even something as simple as “imagine
an apple” can kickstart your sensory imagination. Just now, you most likely saw an apple in your
mind. Maybe it was a blurry and dull outline, or a sharp and bright photorealistic image.
Visualisation is like a mental muscle that can be strengthened, so don’t worry if the image
wasn’t that clear, you can get better at this. This applies to senses other than sight as well.

Sensory imagination is a useful skill to integrate into tulpamancy as it can allow you to very
vividly and clearly see your tulpa’s form. It is also needed for creating and immersing yourself
within a “mindscape”, an imagined area that can have a variety of uses in tulpamancy. It also
allows you to utilize symbolism, which is a powerful mental tool. This will be elaborated upon
later.

To improve your sensory imagination, start with the basics and work your way up. Here is a
small exercise you can try out: Imagine a circle. Now, imagine a slightly larger square or triangle
of another color behind that circle, so that it is partially obscured by the circle in front but it’s
edges are visible around the circle. Repeat, imagining another shape of another color around
the square or triangle while making sure you can still see the other shapes. Try to make sure
that they stay mostly still, not distorting or moving about too much. Keep stacking shapes to
increase its complexity. This is a way of learning to visualize increasingly complex things while
also keeping them stable and consistent.

You might ask yourself whether you should visualize with your eyes open or closed. There are
pros and cons to both options - open eye visualization might be more difficult in the sense that
images may not look as clear or detailed as they would be if your eyes were closed. This is due
to the fact that you are also seeing your physical environment simultaneously, which comprises
some of your focus and visual processing power. However, you will generally have more control
over your visualization - things are less likely to jump about and get out of your control. Closed
eye visualization makes it easier to visualize but you will likely be a little less stability in what
you see. It is a good idea to try both options and swap between them occasionally.

When visualizing anything, whether it be your mindscape or your tulpa’s form, it is usually best
to prioritize the big picture over the smaller details. For instance - imagine your tulpa’s basic
silhouette before you try to imagine the texture of their hair or the threads of the fabric on
their shirt. If you prioritize the details over the big picture, you may find yourself visualizing the
image in non-cohesive “bits and pieces” and it will be harder to see the entire image at once.
An excellent visualization guide I recommend is JD’s Guide to Visualization. It explains the
common problems one may have with visualization and how to work past them, moving on to
different ‘levels’ of visualization. It also includes visual aids.

Developing or using visual sensory imagination is only necessary if you care about being able to
see and interact with your tulpa’s form or having a mindscape. If you don’t care about
visualization at all, you can skip this step entirely. Most people do care about this to some
degree, so that is the main reason why I am suggesting it as something that should be worked
on. This is important to clarify because it is possible to create a tulpa without using any
visualisation at all, which is something that some people do not realize. This also means that
people with aphantasia (Complete inability to experience sensory imagination) can create
tulpas. Visualization is not the foundation that tulpamancy is built on. It is just an add-on skill.

- Mindvoice
“Mindvoice,” a form of auditory sensory imagination, is the ability to speak within your head.
You may notice your mindvoice most prominently while reading, and you are likely hearing your
mindvoice reading out these very words right now. The majority of most people’s thoughts are
comprised of pictures, emotions and concepts rather than words, which sets mindvoice apart
from most ordinary thoughts - mindvoice is instead speaking in complete words or sentences
just as you would out loud, except within your mind.

Mindvoice is important because of something called “narration”, which is the act of speaking
to your tulpa in a sort of one sided conversation. Narration is the primary way of developing a
tulpa before your tulpa is able to speak and is generally the most important part of forcing. Of
course, you could also do this by speaking aloud, but that would be impractical to do very often
for privacy reasons.

Unlike visual sensory imagination, most people don’t have many issues with using their
mindvoice. However, if your mindvoice is hard to notice or seems quiet and fleeting, you may
need to strengthen it. The easiest way to do this is by reading - if you don’t do a lot of reading in
general, increase the frequency at which you read. Find a book that strongly interests you, the
type of story you could get lost in. While you read, pay more attention to your mindvoice than
you usually do. Read slowly and mindfully, paying attention to the tone and volume of the voice
in your head reading out each word. If your mindvoice seems too quiet, you can increase the
volume by imagining yourself yelling out the words. Symbolism can also be used for this -
imagine that your mindvoice is connected to a volume dial, and turn the dial up.
Mindvoice is somewhat more important than visual sensory imagination because
communicating with a tulpa may be more difficult without it. If you are unable to use a
mindvoice, your tulpa is likely to have difficulty using a mindvoice as well, leaving fewer options
for communication. However, if you have auditory aphantasia or have trouble hearing your
mindvoice you can still use concepts or “raw thoughts” to communicate. These are general
ideas and information that have no auditory or sensory element at all. This is experienced as
just suddenly “knowing” what your tulpa wants to convey.

- Focus
The ability to concentrate for long periods of time is helpful in numerous aspects of tulpamancy
and will help you progress faster. You may want to evaluate how well you can focus and
attempt to improve your focus if you are not satisfied with it before you create a tulpa.

While passive forcing may be most convenient for many people, it has its downsides - if your
attention is split between your tulpa and the task at hand, as is the case when passive forcing, it
will be of somewhat less quality than forcing while focusing exclusively on your tulpa, or active
forcing. To illustrate what I mean - passive forcing for two hours may be equivalent to one hour
of active forcing in terms of what your tulpa gets out of it. Tulpas who are mostly or exclusively
passive forced tend to develop at a much slower rate than those that are active forced
regularly. It is best that you active force as often as possible and only completely replace it with
passive forcing if absolutely necessary, such as if you have a packed schedule.

I bring up active forcing because learning to focus well will improve your ability to active force.
Learning to meditate is an excellent way of improving your focus - and there are an abundance
of mediation guides online. Alternatively, you can do something such as staring at an object and
thinking about nothing but that object for an extended period of time, bringing your focus back
to the object whenever your gaze or thoughts begin to drift elsewhere. Taking up meditation as
a daily practice will result in large and long term changes in your focus and clarity of mind. It
may also be a good idea to do a short meditation session before each active forcing session to
get yourself in a centered and calm mindset.

Keep in mind that meditation and strong focus is not about completely clearing your mind of
all irrelevant thoughts. Random intrusive thoughts will still pop into your mind at times, that
is inevitable. The key is to learn to not be distracted by or caught up in those thoughts and only
very briefly notice them, allowing them to quickly pass by.
Once your tulpa is sentient, it is a good idea to ask them to pull you back into the task at hand if
you start to drift off. They may even do this without needing to be asked. Many tulpas can be a
great helping hand for staying focused, whether it be on forcing or something unrelated.

- Mindfulness
Mindfulness is the practice of being immersed in the present moment and noticing everything
going on around you, experiencing it richly and deeply rather than quickly or shallowly. Let’s say
that you are walking to a bus stop, and you are running late, so you have to get there quickly.
You won’t notice or remember much of what you pass on your way because you are focused on
where you need to go rather than enjoying the walk. The whole walk will go by in a frantic non
distinct blur. On another day you have plenty of time to get to the bus stop, so you can enjoy
the scenery. You notice bees buzzing around a rose bush, the heat of the sun on your skin, the
sound of songbirds in the distance, and the fluffy shapes of the clouds in the sky.

This is what mindfulness is and it is incredibly valuable for tulpamancy, especially when you are
looking for your tulpa’s first signs of sentience. These first signs can sometimes be very subtle,
like a tiny whisper in the back of your mind amid all of the other noise, so if you are rushing
through things or not fully immersed in the present moment it’s much easier to gloss over
those small signs of your tulpa coming to life.

Are you ready?

It’s almost time to move onto the actual process of creating a tulpa. Go over these things and
see if they are true for you:

- I realize that my tulpa may turn out to be different from how I want them to be in terms
of their form, their personality, or the role they play in my life, and if this happens I will
not try to force them back into my original vision against their will.
- I am ok with the idea of having a tulpa for the rest of my life.
- I have identified factors in my mind or life that could hinder tulpa creation and I am
making efforts to mitigate them to the extent that is possible for me.

If you agree with all of this, you are ready to move on from this point. If not, spend some more
time thinking and preparing before you start.

Creation
Before I go into detail, I’ll summarize the entire creation process in a simple way. When the
process is boiled down to its bare bones, this is all that is needed to create a tulpa:

1. Create the idea and concept of a person or being. This can include an appearance and
personality. This idea can be basic or complex.
2. Imagine that this being is conscious and capable of thinking and acting on their own
outside of your control.
3. Regularly give this being attention and mentally speak to them with the intention that
they will hear you. Keep your mind open to the possibility of replies.

Building the framework

The very first step in creating a tulpa is choosing and planning a base or starting point for your
tulpa. This consists of their form and personality. You are essentially creating a character in this
step, and after this will move forward into turning this character into a tulpa.

Giving your tulpa a form and personality at the start is useful for various reasons - a form gives
you something to focus on and direct your thoughts at while forcing, acting as something to
symbolically represent your tulpa. A personality gives your tulpa a sense of identity and
stability, allowing them to develop faster in the beginning due to having a sort of pre-built
scaffold to stand on.

If they want to, your tulpa will be able to change their form and personality once they are more
developed - this means that you are not permanently locking them into anything by assigning
them traits in the beginning, so do not worry about that. But, this does not mean that giving
them an initial identity is pointless - even if the form or personality you give them is discarded
later, it is still useful as a placeholder.

- Creating the form

A tulpa’s form can be absolutely anything you can imagine. A human, animal, fictional creature,
inanimate object, etc. It can appear realistic, cartoonish, or somewhere in-between. Go wild
and be creative! Maybe you already have an idea of what you want your tulpa to look like - if
so, great. If not, start brainstorming possible forms. Prior experience with character design or
drawing can come in handy here, you can sketch out or visualize different ideas until you find
one that sticks. You can also search through art online. Perhaps there is a pre-existing character
from a tv show, video game, book, comic, etc. that you like the appearance of.

Do not dwell too much on finding or creating the “perfect” form, as it can always be changed or
improved at a later date. If you have poor visualization skills, to avoid frustration I would
recommend at first choosing something simplistic that you know you will not have too much
trouble visualizing. For example, a featureless ball of light, or something like Kirby.

Once you have decided on a form, take at least a few minutes, preferably longer, focusing on it
and visualizing it in as much detail as possible. Start by visualizing it in a very basic and “big
picture” way, and add smaller details afterwards. First, imagine the form’s flat silhouette, its
general size and shape, as if it were a shadow. Now, think of what colors are most prominent
and cover the largest area on the form. Add those colors to the silhouette and have them fall
into their proper places. Then think of any other less prominent colors and add those as well.
Next, imagine depth and the 3D structure within the form. Visualize shadows. Look at it from
multiple angles. Now, think of the smaller details and textures. For example, if your tulpa’s form
is a dragon, they won’t just have a flat textureless surface on their body, they will have scales.
Imagine what it feels like to touch the form as well. Push on the form and feel its solidity and
resistance against your hand. Pay attention to both the weight and texture.

Next, look at the form from every angle, imagine it under different lighting conditions, and
imagine it moving. Imagine different poses and facial expressions, and imagine the form sitting,
laying, walking, running, jumping, etc. Imagine the form both close to you and far away from
you - this helps you nail down its exact size and proportions. If the form is that of a pre-existing
character, look at many different pieces of art of the character. These things help solidify the
form in your mind and makes it easier to recall when visualizing it in the future. Visualizing the
form doing different poses and movements prevents it from appearing as a static image and
makes it more lifelike. If you have trouble visualizing a certain pose or movement, look for art,
animations, photos, or videos of that pose/movement and then use it as a sort of reference to
visualize your tulpa’s form on top of. Look at the reference, memorize the pose/movement, and
then replicate it in your head, except with your tulpa’s form instead.

You can repeat all of this at any point in the creation process if you feel your ability to visualize
their form is starting to decrease. If being able to see your tulpa’s form well means a lot to you,
you might want to make this a daily thing. It is a good idea to find a way to integrate
visualization into your ordinary daily life. Imagine your tulpa walking by your side throughout
the day. Imagine your tulpa dancing any time you listen to a song.

When you are done making the form look the way you want it to, it is helpful to start thinking
of it as something that exists outside of your deliberate, conscious imagination. Think of all of
its features as constantly existing independently of you, including when you are not thinking
about it. Think of visualizing the form as more like “peeking in” on something that already exists
rather than “re-building” it every time you visualize it. This will help it take less effort to
visualize by letting the unconscious mind take on some of the work for you.

- Creating the personality

Creating a tulpa’s personality starts with thinking of a list of traits or imagining the overall type
of person you want them to be. If you have ever created a character for a story, skills utilized in
doing that will come in handy here.

You can begin by writing down a few important traits, traits that you want to be a core part of
your tulpa’s personality. Then, write down secondary traits that are less prominent in order to
flesh the personality out and make it less one dimensional. I would recommend a minimum of
around ten traits total. Alternatively, if you have trouble coming up with a personality from
scratch, you can think of a character you have seen who displays a personality similar to what
you would like to see in your tulpa, then break down their personality into individual traits and
write them down. A personality template you can use if you do not want to base your tulpa’s
personality on that of a specific character is one of the sixteen Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
personalities.

To give you a better idea of what such a list might look like, here are the main traits I came up
with for my tulpa.

Extroverted
Intuitive
Humorous and mischievous
Expressive
Talkative
Bold
Ambitious
Charismatic
Strategic
Direct and blunt
Adventurous
Independent
Confident

After coming up with a basic list, think in more detail about how each of these traits would be
expressed in your tulpa. Here is an example using my tulpa’s traits.
“Alex is extroverted and talkative - having a social life is important to him and energizes him
rather than wearing him down. He always has something to say and he is charismatic, he has no
problem jumping into conversations. He is very expressive and shows himself openly and
honestly, with no need to hide or be shy. He is very bold, direct, and blunt, he sees no reason to
beat around the bush and will get straight to the point, even if others don’t like what he says.
The truth is more important to him than people’s sensitivities. Yet, Alex is not a serious or stoic
person at all, he enjoys injecting humor into almost everything and is the type of person who
would play pranks. Despite being lighthearted, he is very ambitious, focused, and driven when it
comes to goals he wants to accomplish. Mastery means a lot to him and he will stop at nothing
to achieve what he wants. He has an intuitive way of seeing how to accomplish something, his
mind makes connections quickly and automatically in a very strategic manner. He is
independent and individualistic. Symbols that relate to him include fire, air, golden light, pyrite,
arrows, and eagles/hawks.”

Imagine how your tulpa would think and act based on the traits you have come up with.
Imagine your tulpa being put into different hypothetical scenarios and how they would respond
to them. Perhaps compare your tulpa’s personality to your own to spot similarities and
differences, imagining how both of you would react to the same scenario. Think about how
your tulpa’s different personality traits interact with and complement one another. This allows
you to gain a practical understanding of how your tulpa’s personality works and will later help
your tulpa know how to take on these traits. Try to understand your tulpa’s personality as well
as you understand your own personality or your closest friend’s personality.

Another way of doing this is through writing a story with your tulpa as the main character.
Maybe write multiple short stories that put your tulpa into different settings and scenarios.
Writing about your tulpa may actually be much more effective than just thinking about your
tulpa’s personality, so I highly recommend this. In fact, many fiction authors have inadvertently
created tulpas by putting a lot of time and deep thought into how their characters act. What
you write doesn’t have to be long or good, all that matters is that it helps you get a better feel
for the kind of person you want your tulpa to be.

The personality you created may not yet be completely a part of your tulpa, you may need to
“give” your tulpa this personality through the use of “personality forcing”, which you will start
soon after you begin forcing. Personality forcing will be covered later.

Mindscapes and symbolism

A mindscape, also sometimes called a “wonderland” or “headspace,” is an imagined place
which you can immerse yourself in with your sensory imagination. It could be described as
daydreaming but with a consistent setting. There is no limit to what a mindscape can look like -
it can be an area from real life, something you came up with on your own, or a location from a
book, movie, video game, etc. It can be small and simplistic, such as a single small room, or
large and detailed, like a city or forest. Mindscapes are relevant to tulpamancy as they can be
used as a place to do activities with a tulpa and conduct forcing sessions. Many tulpas also use
the mindscape as a sort of home in which they retreat to and occupy themselves with
whenever their host is not spending time with them. I recommend creating a mindscape before
beginning to force your tulpa so you will have these useful things available to you early on.

Mindscapes also allow for a convenient platform in which to utilize symbolism. Symbolism is the
practice of using imagined objects, places, actions, etc. as a tool to cause real effects on your
mind and perception. For example, let’s say that there is a specific tree in your mindscape. You
designate this tree as being “special” - you imagine that whenever you touch the tree, you will
be flooded with a sense of calm and relaxation. Then, when you touch the tree, you find that
you actually do become relaxed. This, among many more things, are all possible with
symbolism. It will be incredibly useful to “learn the ropes” of symbolism as it is something that
will come up several times throughout this guide and can be applied to literally any part of
tulpamancy.

- Creating a mindscape
Imagine a room in real life that you have been in frequently, one that you can recall well. Now,
imagine that you are physically within that room, not a disembodied outsider looking in. Look at
things from a first person perspective. Look down at your imagined body. Feel the pressure of
the floor beneath your feet. Rotate and look at all of the walls - what is on them? Windows,
picture frames, posters? What furniture is present in the room? How large is the room? How is
it shaped? What are the colors and lighting like? Once you are aware of all of these things, start
walking around. Notice how long it takes to walk from one end of the room to the other. Get
closer to different objects, examining their smaller details. For example, the texture of the
walls, the threads on a rug, etc. Touch things as well, and keep an ear open for any sounds that
may be present in the room. Maybe there is a particular smell this room has.

Doing all of this may be fairly easy as it is a room you are familiar with - you are working mainly
with your memory of the room. Now for something slightly harder - try to change things about
the room. Make the walls become a different color, move furniture around, or add completely
new objects. You now have a good idea of how to immerse yourself within a mindscape as well
as build and change it. You can do anything you want from this point onwards - you can scrap
the mindscape you just created and start an entirely new one, or alter this one to your liking.
You should not expect things to look and feel quite as real as the real world, however - being
within a mindscape feels identical to being within a daydream and nothing more, unless you are
especially good at immersion or put a lot of practice into making everything feel as real as
possible. It is possible to make a mindscape feel nearly identical to physical reality but it is
unlikely it will be this way at first.

Like with your tulpa’s form, you should think of the mindscape as constantly existing outside of
your deliberate imagination. Think of it as an already existing place you can go to rather than
something you consciously render every time you enter it. Over time, this mindset will help the
mindscape be much more consistent and solid than a random thing you visualize on the spot.
For example, you will not need to try to remember the position of chairs in a room, they will
automatically be in their usual positions as soon as you enter the room without any effort on
your part.

Your tulpa will be able to collaborate with you on designing the mindscape. You can ask them to
create their own area or room, and you might be surprised at what they come up with.

As a way to help yourself remember the location of everything, it may be helpful to draw a top-
down map of the mindscape. It doesn’t need to be detailed, you can just have simple shapes
representing everything.

- Staying in the mindscape

If you have trouble staying immersed in your mindscape, for example if your mind wanders and
you start thinking about something completely different or you keep refocusing on the real
world, try this. Think of some kind of quest or storyline, a specific series of tasks to complete in
the mindscape. Maybe a series of locations you need to travel to, a set of items you need to
retrieve, or opponents to battle and defeat. If you have a specific series of goals and objectives,
this will help you stay focused on what’s going on in the mindscape and will keep you more
engaged and immersed. It will capture your attention more than just idly wandering around
without much to do.

- Procedural generation method

There is another method of creating a mindscape where you allow your unconscious to mostly
or entirely create it for you. You might find that if you imagine a forest, your mind will fill in a
lot of the gaps for you. You don’t deliberately place every single tree, every rock, or every bush,
many of those things seem to just pop up on their own in a somewhat randomized pattern. This
is also the means through which environments in dreams are created.
First, have a basic starting idea for the mindscape you want, such as a certain theme and color
palette. Then, imagine yourself within this hypothetical location and start walking or flying
around. As you move, it will likely start to “procedurally generate” itself. You won’t be entirely
sure what you find next beyond a vague prediction based on your initial idea. You can of course
insert deliberately created areas or objects alongside the automatically generated ones. If this
process is stubborn and the environment is not being generated easily or smoothly, try entering
a trance or meditative state in which your conscious mind will interfere less, allowing your
unconscious to run the show.

- Mindscape mechanics
Utilizing symbolism, you can give your mindscape a set of consistent rules, much like how the
laws of physics are the set of mechanics that govern the physical world. As for why somebody
would want to do this - it allows the mindscape to be both a more interesting and useful place.
Symbolism adds a layer of depth and importance to things that you would not have otherwise.
This is entirely optional, but I thought I should include information on this in case it is
something you would want to do. Feel free to delve into this long after you start creating your
tulpa, this does not need to be done when you initially create your mindscape beforehand.

How exactly does symbolism work? Symbolism works via unconscious associations you make
with imaginary objects, places, actions, etc. You first start consciously making yourself feel a
certain way or for something specific to happen when doing said imaginary thing, and over time
this conscious thing becomes unconscious. It is a way of automating things within your mind,
making it take no conscious effort for these things to happen. The unconscious mind (which I
will define as any kind of mental process that takes place automatically outside of conscious
control) actually plays a vital role in your daily life - you would be constantly overloaded with
data and mental processes if all of it had to be handled by your conscious mind. Your
unconscious is like a hidden sorting and filing system constantly operating in the background
that takes on anything that would be inconvenient to handle with your limited “thinking
space.”

For instance, you do not have constant conscious awareness of all of your memories, yet they
are still “stored” beyond your awareness and can be recalled later. Also, think about your
behavior patterns. You are not always consciously deciding every tiny aspect of the way you
talk, the way you act, and the way you react to things - many of these things are ingrained on
an unconscious level.

Let’s say that there is a door in your mindscape that is locked and can be opened by putting in a
code on a keypad next to the door. Normally, you would be able to instantly open the door just
by willing it to open, without needing to type in the code. This is the way imagination typically
works, and while this is convenient in some circumstances, you might want things to work more
like they would in the real world for the sake of immersion, or like a video game without cheats.
So, your goal would be to make it so the door can’t be opened and there’s no way to get into
the room unless you type in the correct code. Here’s how to do that.

First, just hold the idea in your mind that the door/room are “special” and work differently from
other things in your imagination. Then, use symbolism to assert the idea that the door is locked,
for example some type of force holding it closed, and also assert that you can’t see inside of the
room from the outside. Decide on a code for the door. Now, type in an incorrect code, and then
try to open the door. Purposefully make it so the door stays shut. Repeat this several more
times with different incorrect codes and attempt/fail to open the door each time. Then, try
alternate methods of getting into the room. Try to teleport inside, try to drill a hole with a laser,
try to blow it open with a bomb, try to phase through the wall, and make yourself fail every
time. Finally, type in the correct code and allow the door to open.

Repeat this whole process multiple times for best results. Try to speed up your actions bit by
bit as you go along and put less thought into them, because the more you are deliberately
thinking about making yourself fail to get into the room, the more you will hold it in your
conscious awareness, making it harder to find its way into your unconscious. When it starts to
feel like you aren’t consciously making yourself fail when you try to get into the room, that is
how you know it is working. Your unconscious is picking up on the message “I can’t get in here
unless I do this one specific thing” and is ingraining that as a persistent pattern that exists
independently from your conscious intentions. Even if you forget this room exists, or forget the
code to the room, these rules you have established will continue to persist as they have been
ingrained on a level that is deeper than your conscious mind. It may even be permanent.
Months or years in the future you might stumble across this room in your mindscape long after
you forgot about it and the rules you applied to it, and upon trying to open the door you find
you can’t get in unless you manage to remember the code.

When you are able to automate things within your mindscape, it opens up a world of
possibilities. You can create elaborate setups for you and your tulpa to have fun with, much like
a video game. The above process can be applied to many different things, and you can probably
see how you can alter it to fit your desired outcome.

Your first forcing session

I have noticed that many people aren’t quite sure how to start forcing, or what exactly a forcing
session looks like, so I will provide a bit of structure to follow in case you aren’t sure what to do.
This is what I would consider the “official” start of a tulpa’s existence, everything before this
point was building the foundation for your tulpa to launch off from.

First of all, you should make sure that your first session will take place during a time in which
you will be able to continue forcing daily immediately afterwards. This means you should not
start right before something like exams or moving. If you procrastinate often, also make sure
that you create a forcing schedule before you start.

Find a time and place in which you will be alone and unlikely to be disturbed. Sit down and
relax, clearing your mind of distractions. Knowing how to meditate is helpful but not required
here. Focus on the fact that you are going to be forcing. Once you are fairly relaxed, imagine
yourself within your mindscape. Become aware of your mindscape form. After this, visualize
your tulpa’s form in front of you in the mindscape. Spend a few minutes doing nothing but
focusing on the form.

Now, attach a feeling of “presence” to your tulpa’s form. Make it feel as if another person (your
tulpa) is in the mindscape with you - replicate the feeling you get when another person is near
you, whatever that may feel like to you. If you’re not sure what this should feel like, think about
what it feels like when you are alone in a room versus when there is another person in a room
with you. Most people can feel a difference in some way that goes beyond just seeing the other
person, almost like a “sixth sense.” Thinking about the personality you want them to have may
also help you feel their presence.

Examining what your own mental presence feels like is a good way to learn how to do this. In
my personal experience, I can feel my own “essence” in an abstract way that is difficult to
describe in words. The best way to do this is to enter a focused or meditative state and then
hold the intention of observing your consciousness, emotions, thought processes, anything
whatsoever that you consider to be yourself, and see if there is a particular unique feeling or
“flavor” associated with all of it. Don’t try to create it or force it, just impartially observe what’s
already there.

Do not worry if you have trouble with this - The simple idea that there is a presence, even if you
don’t actually feel it, is enough. All you need is the idea of “Someone other than me is here.” If
you do not feel a presence at first, that does not mean you never will, it just might take a little
time. Also, it may be more effective to send an “invitation” for your tulpa to make their
presence felt, rather than trying to generate it yourself.
Think of this presence (or idea of a presence) as being your tulpa’s consciousness, soul, or the
core of their being. Think of it as being contained within or originating from your tulpa’s form -
this is a way of using your tulpa’s form to symbolically represent your tulpa. Now, imagine that
this presence is able to see, hear, and otherwise sense things, and that it has a subjective
experience and perspective of its own that is separate from yours. Focus heavily on this
presence for at least a few minutes, really getting a feel for it. Leave yourself open to the
possibility that you may feel aspects of their presence that you wouldn’t expect to feel. Once
you have done this, you have created the initial “hub” for your tulpa to start existing and
growing from. Doing this may be all you will need to make your tulpa become conscious for the
first time, but they probably will need more time to be able to start showing their sentience.

But, if your tulpa appears to move or speak on their own during this very first session, don’t
immediately jump to the conclusion that it must just be your imagination or wishful thinking. It
is never too early for this to happen, especially if you have put a lot of forethought and
planning into your tulpa before this point.

From this point onwards, always treat your tulpa as if they are conscious and listening to you
- they likely actually are, even if you are unable to tell. Always think and live with the mindset
that your tulpa is already sentient and present. Do not think “I will have a tulpa” or “I am
creating a tulpa” - instead think “I have a tulpa” or “I have created a tulpa.”

You should treat the rest of the session as a sort of greeting to your tulpa. Direct your words at
your tulpa with the intention that they will hear you. Tell the tulpa about yourself - your name,
the fact that you are their host, and any other basic information about yourself. Then, explain
what tulpamancy is and the fact that they are your tulpa. Explain why you chose to create
them. Tell the tulpa about themselves, for example a summary of their personality.

Now, tell your tulpa that their form belongs to them and they can move it and use it in any way
they want, and that it is under their control, not yours. Also tell them they can say anything
they want and are free to speak up at any time.

At the end of the session, tell you tulpa that after you leave they can stay present and do
whatever they want in the mindscape, or watch what you are doing in the outside world. This
may be difficult for them to do at first but if you do not tell them about this, they may not think
to attempt it. The more time your tulpa spends conscious, the faster they will develop. Assert
that your tulpa is the source of their own energy and processing power. Put plenty of emphasis
on your tulpa’s strength and independence throughout their entire creation.
Do not purposefully imagine your tulpa reacting or responding to you while you talk to them -
this is called “parroting”, or making your tulpa speak under your own control as if they were
an imaginary friend or puppet. Of course, have the expectation that they can and will talk to
you, but not in a way that is controlled by yourself. If done often, parroting may lead to higher
odds of having difficulty in distinguishing your tulpa’s thoughts from your own when they
actually do start speaking of their own volition. This is because frequent parroting may cause
you to associate the idea of “My tulpa talking” with “Coming up with words for my tulpa” so
these two things become harder to distinguish. Being unable to tell a tulpa’s thoughts apart
from your own can significantly slow down progress and is best avoided.

What next?
After your first session, I recommend that you write a rough plan, or just a list of potential
ideas, for what to do in future forcing sessions. This is so you do not feel lost or directionless,
and always have ideas lined up so you don’t run out. You can be as specific or general as you
want, whatever works best for you. This can include, for example, a list of potential
conversation topics and which types of forcing you will be doing (personality forcing,
visualization, narration, mindscape adventures, hypnosis, etc.) It is best that you come up with
enough ideas/plans to last for several days. Search through tulpa related discussions and posts
online to find ideas if you aren’t sure what to do. There are also types of forcing that I have not
covered yet which you will read about shortly.

It is a good idea to keep a journal about your tulpa. Write journal entries near the end of every
day, summarizing everything tulpa related that happened that day. Some examples of things to
write about: How long your session(s) were, what you worked on, anything your tulpa said/did,
what you feel like you did well, and what you feel like you need to improve on. Documenting
your tulpa’s progress has several benefits. Writing about something regularly tends to send the
persistent message to yourself that whatever you are doing is important and a part of your
routine. It will also give you something fun to look back on months or years from now - you will
have records of your tulpa’s early days that you might have forgotten otherwise. If writing an
entry every day seems annoying or you are not much of a writer, keep in mind that it doesn’t
have to be long or detailed, a few sentences is good enough.

If possible, have your last forcing session of the day and your journal writing time shortly before
you go to bed. Your unconscious mind “works through” things the most when you are asleep,
and some find that if they think about something a lot right before sleep, they are suddenly
better at it the next day. This also increases the likelihood that your tulpa will be in your dreams
with you, which is a fun and fascinating experience.
 - Lifestyle accommodations for tulpamancy
Something that does not occur to a lot of people is that regular forcing often necessitates some
changes to sleeping and eating habits. You might find that the amount of sleep, food and water
that you are normally satisfied with is not quite enough for you anymore because you are
exerting more mental energy than usual on a daily basis, and this can sometimes be almost as
taxing as physical exercise. This is most noticeable within the first couple months of forcing as
you are still adjusting to the changes to your mind and life, it is less of a concern after this
period but it’s still a good idea to keep the new habits. Here are my recommendations.

- If you start tulpamancy and then you find that it is harder than usual to wake up in the
morning, or you feel the need for a nap in the middle of the day and that doesn’t usually
happen, it means you need to tack on some more time to your usual hours at night. Try
getting in bed 30 minutes earlier, and if that’s not enough, make it an hour earlier. Avoid
screens for at least 30 minutes before bed to make this easier. If you’re usually online at
this time and you’re bored without your phone - occupy yourself with some forcing
instead! Before too long this will become a habit and the urge to check your phone will
diminish.

- Diet has a massive impact on how your mental energy will fluctuate throughout the day,
so it’s important to take a look at the times you eat, the nutritional content of the food,
and the portion sizes. First off - if you normally eat 2-3 large meals a day but with no
snacks in between, it is a good idea to shift your diet so that those 2-3 meals are smaller,
and you also have small snacks in between them. If you have only large meals with no
snacks in between, you will be hungry and drained before you eat as you haven’t eaten
in awhile, and you will be sluggish after you eat as your body needs to allocate more
energy to process larger portions. Frequent small snacks mean you will not be as hungry
before you eat, and you will not be as sluggish after you eat, keeping your energy at a
steady pace throughout the day instead of going up and down on a rollercoaster. Also,
avoid large amounts of sugar or caffeine for this same reason. This is great for a short
energy boost for forcing, but it does not last for long and will lead to a crash, so the
negatives outweigh the positives. As for the types of foods that will give you sustained
consistent energy without crashing - go for nuts, fruits, beans, eggs, granola bars, and
poultry. Protein is a must for sustaining mental energy, it is much more important than
carbs or sugar.

- You will definitely need to drink more water to accommodate daily forcing, even if it
feels like you don’t. Even if you do nothing but sit while forcing, you are burning energy
as if you were walking around. Start carrying a water bottle everywhere you go if you do
 not already do this, and habitually take sips several times an hour. If you feel your eyes
get dry or tired while forcing, this is a sign that you aren’t quite hydrated enough. And
yes, most of what you drink does need to be regular water, juice or carbonated drinks
are not a replacement.

Narration
A tulpa needs stimuli and attention in order to develop - narration is the easiest and most
convenient way to go about giving your tulpa the stimuli they need. As mentioned before,
narration is the act of directing a stream of thoughts in mindvoice at your tulpa with the
intention that they will hear you, much like a one-sided conversation. It is a staple of both
active and passive forcing.

Narration can consist of literally anything - you can ramble about how your day went, your
work, your school, your hobbies and interests, your friends and family, etc. You could even read
a book to your tulpa or commentate a video game as you play it. The particular topic doesn’t
matter at all so long as you keep talking. Some people worry that they are boring their tulpa if
they aren’t talking about a very exciting topic or if they’re repetitive, but that doesn’t happen
often. Your tulpa will appreciate and benefit from any kind of attention, exciting or not.

Here are some more ideas for what to talk about:

- Describe the strangest or most vivid dream you have ever had.
- Talk about what you predict or hope an average day with your tulpa will look like once
they are vocal and more developed.
- Talk about a skill that you want to learn, or a hobby you want to get into, that you have
not tried yet.
- Delve into your personal theories and beliefs about tulpamancy.
- Describe your surroundings in detail. The sights, the sounds, the sensations, everything.
(This doubles as a mindfulness exercise!)
- Go into detail about the plot of your favorite book, movie, or video game.
- Describe what you believe it is like to be a tulpa. Ask your tulpa if your idea is accurate.
- Talk about your taste in music and play your favorite songs for your tulpa to listen to.
Ask your tulpa about their taste in music.
- Talk about the various people who are a part of your life, and ask which of them your
tulpa likes the most or is most interested in potentially interacting with.
- Tell your tulpa about why tulpamancy appeals to you.
- Go over your greatest strengths and accomplishments, as well as your greatest flaws
and mistakes.
 - Talk about the best day of your life and the worst day of your life.
- Ask your tulpa what they would do if they had a separate physical body of their own.
- Bring up your views on various controversial topics, for example things related to
politics, religion, morality, etc. and ask your tulpa if they disagree with any of your
opinions.
- Talk about what your reaction would be if/when intelligent alien life is contacted, and
ask your tulpa how they would react.
- If you could live any year of your life over again, which year would you choose? Also,
which year would you LEAST want to relive?
- If you suddenly became an extremely skilled artist (Or your abilities improved if you
already are an artist) what is the first thing you would draw?
- Talk about your pet peeves and things that annoy you the most.
- Look through old photos that involve you, maybe yearbook photos or things from your
camera roll. Talk about your memories involving these pictures.
- Other than tulpas/plurality, what do you think is the most interesting or strange thing
about the human mind?
- Walk on a route you have not been on before, and describe whatever you see/discover.
- Talk about ideas or plans for expanding and improving your mindscape. Ask your tulpa
what they want to add.
- Browse random Wikipedia articles and talk a little about each one.
- Talk about how you think your life would have been different if you had become plural
several years ago.
- Look at the most recent posts on tulpa forums and give your input on them. Ask your
tulpa about their thoughts on the posts too.

While you are narrating, make sure that you have your tulpa in mind and are not getting
completely lost in the topic and your own thoughts. Keep a portion of your focus on your tulpa,
whether this means being aware of their form, presence, or anything else. Always keep in the
back of your mind the idea that you are talking to someone else, not just yourself. If you forget
about the fact that you are talking to your tulpa, they may go unconscious and may be unable
to hear what you are saying until you re-focus on them. Young tulpas often need their host to
be focusing on them in order to remain conscious. This may change with time, but it is
something you must be mindful of while your tulpa is young.

In order to keep some of your focus on your tulpa while narrating, it is helpful to say their name
frequently, such as “It’s a nice day out, isn’t it, (Name)?” or “(Name), look at that weird rock.”
This reinforces the mindset that you are talking to someone else, not just yourself. You can also
give yourself a visual reminder - wear something such as a wristband, ring, or necklace that you
associate with your tulpa - every time you look at it, you will be reminded of them. If you find
that you lose awareness of your tulpa while narrating, get their attention by saying something
such as “Are you there, (Name)?” which will be enough to make them become conscious again.
You can then continue narrating as usual. Make sure to pause and listen every once in awhile
while narrating, especially after asking questions - if you talk nonstop you will not give your
tulpa an easy opportunity to respond to you. They can interrupt you, but that might be slightly
harder for them.

It is a good idea to build a habit of narrating throughout the day, no matter what you are
doing. This way, you’ll become accustomed to paying attention to your tulpa while doing your
normal everyday activities, instead of only inviting your tulpa into your life when you sit down
to active force. When your tulpa becomes vocal, this habit will also make it easier for them to
be present and talk when you don’t have 100% of your focus on them. Keep in mind that
narrating while doing another activity unrelated to tulpas at the same time is passive forcing, so
only do this in addition to your active forcing sessions and do not entirely replace active forcing
with this. Do not expect yourself to narrate every minute of every day, sometimes you will not
be able to focus on your tulpa. Just narrate whenever you have the ability to do so.

If you already have a habit of talking to yourself, funnel that habit into passive forcing.
Whenever you would normally just talk to yourself, direct those thoughts towards your tulpa
instead.

At first, narration may feel strange, it may feel as if you are talking to yourself or a brick wall.
But as long as you have your tulpa in mind and intend for them to hear you, they will, and the
fact that they are present and listening becomes more apparent with time.

Personality forcing
Personality forcing is the act of “applying” the personality you previously designed to your
tulpa. This is typically done through narration - describing the personality to your tulpa while
implying that it is their personality. There are also ways of personality forcing that utilize
symbolism. This process helps your tulpa understand and integrate traits, more than they
would be able to if you had only planned their personality.

An example of something you would say during personality forcing is “You are extroverted. This
means that you are energized by social interaction and prefer being around others over being
alone.” It is a good idea to go into further depth than this, describing how the trait may affect
and interact with many different possible scenarios. This helps your tulpa gain a well rounded
understanding of the traits you are giving them. Also ask them to try to feel the trait within
themselves and any emotions, ideas, and symbols associated with the trait. If you have written
a story about your tulpa, read it to them.

How does personality forcing work? At first glance, it may seem as if simply saying “You are
(trait)” may not do anything to add to your tulpa’s personality - after all, you are simply making
statements. However, saying “You are (trait)” is enough to actually give your tulpa said trait.
This is primarily because tulpas that are not yet well developed tend to be like sponges,
automatically “soaking up” anything that is presented to them. Because they do not yet have a
strong pre-established sense of self, it is very easy for them to latch onto traits and assimilate
them. Almost every tulpa will do this automatically because of the necessity of establishing an
identity, whether or not personality forcing is used in their creation. If personality forcing is not
present, they will instead take cues from how you act, other people they observe, and possibly
characters from media. Personality forcing is just a way of refining and laser-focusing this
process. Though they will not end up as an exact copy of anyone, but rather a mish-mash of
traits that results in a unique individual.

You can use symbolism to personality force as well. Rather than describing traits to your tulpa,
you can use imagined objects to symbolize each trait - orbs of light are a simple and popular
choice. Let’s say that you imagine an orb of light and designate it as symbolizing cheerfulness.
Imagine everything you associate with being cheerful being contained within that orb - this can
include emotions, concepts, memories, colors, and more. Then, imagine the orb being absorbed
into your tulpa’s form, everything it symbolizes becoming a part of them.

I would recommend including some personality forcing in most active forcing sessions up until
your tulpa is regularly communicating with you and having conversations where their traits are
clearly being expressed. It is no longer needed at all once your tulpa is developed to that
extent.

As mentioned early on in this guide, there is no guarantee that you will shape your tulpa to be
exactly the way you want them to be. Try not to become heavily attached to your original idea
in case it doesn’t stick. And remember, if your tulpa ever ends up defying your expectations for
their personality, don’t try to push them back into your original vision.

Just like any person, a tulpa’s personality is partially formed through their life experiences, and
some parts of it may come about for no apparent reason. This means that your tulpa will gain
traits on their own in addition to the traits you give them. Their personality will be an
amalgamation of both traits you gave them and traits they developed through life
experiences. Regardless of how expansive your list of traits is, it is impossible to specify every
last nuance of someone’s personality, so any gaps in your personality forcing will naturally fill
themselves in.

Hypnosis
Hypnosis is an effective method of creating tulpas and in recent years has become increasingly
popular for that purpose. Using hypnosis to help you create a tulpa is completely optional, and
hypnosis is not inherently related to tulpamancy, it is just a technique that can have strong
applications for any kind of mental practice, including tulpas.

Hypnosis is a technique and tool used to incur mental changes of all types, including but not
limited to altering thinking patterns, beliefs, habits, identity, and emotions. It has a very wide
variety of uses, such as utility, therapy, or recreation. People have used it to stop bad habits
such as nail biting or smoking, and induce interesting experiences such as changing their
personality or experiencing controlled hallucinations. Hypnosis is unique because it allows said
mental changes to happen within a fraction of the time it would take to achieve them
otherwise. Anything that can be done with hypnosis can be done without - but it will take
longer and be more difficult. I’m sure you can see where I am going with this in relation to
tulpas.

How does hypnosis work? These mental changes are achieved via “suggestions” - things that
one is told while being hypnotized. For example, if someone is told “Having a healthy diet is
important to you” (though it would be stated in a more detailed and specific way) they will
likely experience an increased desire to eat healthy food or a decreased desire to eat unhealthy
food. What allows these suggestions to affect someone in this way? When being hypnotized,
you will first be put into an altered state of mind called a “trance.” There are many ways of
inducing a trance, but it is usually achieved by guiding the listener through a relaxation exercise
of some sort, such as releasing all tension in their muscles. While in a trance, one’s ability to
“filter” incoming information is diminished - what someone is told while in a trance becomes
fact in their mind. A trance puts your conscious mind into a sort of temporary dormancy, which
significantly reduces its ability to block or filter things you are told, allowing information and
instructions to easily reach your unconscious mind.

The idea of trance seems scary to some at first, but trance is actually a completely natural
state of mind that most people enter on a regular basis. Have you ever been driving or walking
somewhere familiar, only to arrive at your destination and realize you have very little
recollection of how you got there? While taking a shower, have you ever zoned out and lost
track of time due to the calming drone of the water? These are common examples of trance. It
is important to realize that trance and hypnosis are not as unfamiliar or difficult as they may
seem. This is a natural built-in ability within everyone.

Hypnosis is useful for tulpa creation because identity itself seems to have roots in the
unconscious mind. In order for an identity to be created, the unconscious must exist first. Think
of the unconscious as a tree trunk, and think of you and your tulpa as separate branches
extending from the trunk. The unconscious mind is where identity is initially formed - in a way,
it created you, and it is part of what creates your tulpa as well. It seems to be the main thing
that automatically organizes different processes and traits into coherent, unified identities.
Therefore, directly giving your unconscious instructions and encouragement to create a tulpa is
by far the most effective way to go about creating one. While the unconscious is a part of your
everyday life and is always being affected in some way, trance allows for a more direct and
quick impact on it.

So long as you are receptive to hypnosis, it will almost certainly be the fastest possible way for
you to create a tulpa. In some cases, only a single hypnosis session is needed for one to have a
sentient and vocal tulpa. There are some audio hypnosis recordings made for the purpose of
helping the listener create a tulpa, and several have reported success with them. I wrote the
script for the recording linked below. It was not voiced by me.

MP3 Download

This can be used as a first forcing session with your tulpa, or it can be used anytime afterwards.
It can be used as many times as you want. It can be used for tulpas that are already somewhat
developed, it is not only for initial creation. It both instills hypnotic effects to help your tulpa
develop and acts as a sort of guided forcing session. You can also read the script here. I
recommend reading the script before listening to the recording in case there are any effects or
suggestions that you personally do not want. You should also do this for any other tulpa related
hypnosis recordings you find online. If no script is available, listen to the recording while doing
something to make sure you do not heavily focus or become extremely relaxed, so you won’t
fall into a trance.

If you find that it does not work well for you the first time around, you should try again. Not
everyone is equally receptive to being hypnotized. It may work perfectly the first time around,
but there is a chance it may not. Repetition can enhance your ability to be receptive to
hypnosis, so it will likely end up working if you keep at it. If it still has no effect on you after long
term use, consider finding a hypnotist who has experience with tulpa or plurality related
hypnosis. Many find that live hypnosis is more effective for them than pre-recorded files.
Here is another file, written by someone else, that was based on my script. This contains most
of the same elements found in the original. This is shorter (30 minutes), so it is great if you have
trouble staying in a trance for prolonged periods.

- Hypnosis safety precautions

When seeking out any person to perform hypnosis on you, keep an eye out for red flags that
may indicate abusive and manipulative intentions. While the majority of hypnotists are simply
looking to have fun and help people and nothing more, there are a minority of hypnotists who
use hypnosis for the purpose of manipulation. For instance, they may slip in suggestions
unrelated to the session that you did not want or anticipate, or may attempt to get you to do
things you would not otherwise do. While in a trance, you still have control over yourself and
you are not entirely handing yourself over to the hypnotist, but this altered state of mind does
make it easier for you to be influenced in ways that may be either positive or negative. So, it is
important to preemptively make sure that they are trustworthy. Over the course of at least a
few days, talk to them and get to know them a little bit before you allow them to perform any
kind of hypnosis session on you.

If you notice any of the following things during these conversations, that is a large red flag and
you should not allow them to hypnotize you no matter how tempting it is.

- Strongly insisting on types of hypnosis that you are not mentioning or asking for.
- Rushing things along, trying to have a session as soon as possible, not caring about
planning the session or getting to know you.
- Using hypnotic techniques when you are not in a session.
- Ignoring or dancing around questions that you have about your potential session, or
their skills in hypnosis.
- Lack of interest or knowledge in the type of hypnosis you want, but still insisting on
doing it despite that. (Example: they don’t know anything about how to create tulpas.)
- Mentioning or suggesting “slave” hypnosis, which aims to make the subject do whatever
is asked of them and disregard their own wants in favor of the hypnotist’s wants.
- Attempting to make you reliant and dependent on them, for example claiming that they
are better than all other hypnotists, or that hypnosis is required to create a tulpa.

Never feel obligated to have a session with anyone, and don’t worry about hurting someone’s
feelings by saying no. If they are actually well-meaning, they will not attempt to guilt you or
pressure you.
Keep in mind that accidental mistakes during a session may happen, and that this is very
different from purposeful maliciousness or manipulation. This is possible regardless of how
trustworthy and well-meaning the hypnotist is. If you have a negative experience or
unanticipated effects from a session, it was not necessarily the hypnotist’s intention and it does
not necessarily mean they are a bad hypnotist. If you did not see any red flags before or during
the session, it was most likely an accident. A suggestion could be worded in a way that makes
its effects be different from what was intended, or you could misinterpret the suggestion. It is
the hypnotist’s responsibility to try to prevent this to the best of their ability, but there is
always a possibility of small unintentional error regardless of how experienced and careful they
are, and this possibility should be accepted if you are allowing anyone to hypnotize you.

Contrary to popular belief, you do not necessarily need another hypnosis session in order to
reverse unwanted effects from hypnosis - it may naturally fade away on its own over time if not
reinforced, and if not, simply asserting to yourself that the suggestion has no power over you
and means nothing is usually enough to undo it.

- Self hypnosis and creating your own hypnosis scripts

Or - better yet - you can learn to do this yourself without needing another person or recording.
This way, you can create completely custom hypnosis sessions for your tulpa specifically. The
first thing to do is learn the basic fundamentals of how hypnosis works, and how to effectively
interact with the unconscious mind. “Hypnotherapy” by Dave Elman is a good resource for this.
Also look into what several other hypnotists have said about the practice for a wider
perspective on hypnosis. Here are some tips:

Use affirmative statements, such as “You see -” or “You are feeling -” rather than “You do not
see -” or “You do not feel -” If you mention something, it’ll immediately come to mind, whether
or not you preface it with “You do not”. For instance, if someone says to you “Do not think of a
purple unicorn.” You will immediately visualize a purple unicorn, even though they said “Do
not.”

Use fairly simple language that doesn’t take a lot of thinking to understand and process. During
a trance, you’ll want to stay as relaxed as possible, minimizing conscious thought. Also, take
things slowly and gradually. Don’t overstimulate yourself with a fast barrage of instructions, as
that may snap you out of trance. But ironically, a fast barrage of instructions and splitting
someone’s attention between several things (Called a confusion induction) can sometimes be
an effective way of getting someone into a trance, especially for those who have trouble
focusing and relaxing. It works by distracting the conscious mind and keeping it too occupied to
filter and block suggestions. This was the method used in the hypnosis script I wrote. Note that
this is only a method for initially getting into a trance and generally should not be used after
you are already in a trance.

Word things in the present tense, not future tense. Say “You are deeply relaxed” or “You are
feeling your tulpa’s presence” rather than “You will be deeply relaxed” or “You will feel your
tulpa’s presence.”

The unconscious responds better to emotions and symbolism than it does plain language. Elicit
plenty of emotion and visualisation in the session. Describe beautiful scenes and emotional
states.

Read several hypnosis scripts and take notice of the techniques and language used within them,
and apply that understanding to your own scripts.

If a hypnosis technique you hear about does not feel right for you, it probably isn’t. Do not go
purely “by the book” and take into account your own mind and individuality.

Once you’ve got a good grasp on how hypnosis works, you can write your own script, and then
read it to yourself and follow along with the instructions as you read. Or you can record
yourself reading it out loud, and then play the recording back to yourself. Maybe ask someone
else to voice it for you if you have trouble listening to your own voice. Also, you can perform
hypnosis on yourself without a script. Just have a rough idea of what you want to do
beforehand, and then guide yourself through the process. This allows for the session to be
flexible and adaptable. It can be fun to ask your tulpa to perform hypnosis on you - this can be
surprisingly effective, and it’s possible for you to be in a trance while your tulpa is not.

Here are some scripts and resources to use or incorporate ideas from.

Signs of sentience
At some point, you will begin to notice indications of your tulpa’s sentience. This could happen
at any moment in any situation. These signs may be very subtle and easy to miss, or they might
metaphorically blast you in your face and leave you shocked and dumbfounded. Either way, the
days when your tulpa first starts to show “signs of life” tend to be some of the most exciting
and memorable times in the creation process.

Note that when your tulpa first shows a sign of sentience is not when your tulpa first becomes
sentient - they are typically sentient for awhile beforehand, just not showing it. Also keep in
mind that tulpas still have a long ways to go in their development after this point. You should
continue to give them your full effort. Now, as for what these signs are:

- Speech
This refers to your tulpa vocalizing in mindvoice. It may be in response to something you said,
or happen completely out of the blue. As for what it feels like when a tulpa speaks - it will feel
similar to when you speak with your own mindvoice, but instead coming from an “alien”
source, originating from somewhere outside of your own stream of thoughts. You should not
feel as if you are producing or controlling their words. This will be elaborated upon in the
vocality section. However, their communication may not always come in the form of words. It
might be the intent behind their thoughts that you notice at first, general concepts and ideas
without being put into language.

- Emotional bleedover
“Emotional bleedover” is when you sense an emotion your tulpa is feeling. An emotion
originating in your tulpa might for whatever reason “bleed over” into your own mind, and you
will be able to tell the emotion did not come from yourself, either because it felt “alien” or did
not make sense for the situation. For example - let’s say that you and your tulpa see something
that scares your tulpa but does not scare you. Your tulpa feels fearful, and shortly after you
start feeling fear too - leaving you feeling confused as to why “you” felt that way, as what you
saw would not normally scare you. Or, you might be listening to a song that you feel neutral
about or don’t like very much, when suddenly you notice an alien feeling of positivity and
enjoyment towards the song that contradicts how you feel about it.

- Form movement
This is self explanatory - seeing your tulpa’s form suddenly move on its own without your
influence while visualizing it. They can learn to communicate through body language and
gestures this way before they are vocal.

- Unexpected form/personality changes

Early in development, you may notice that your tulpa’s form or personality changes without
you expecting it to. For instance, you may be visualizing your tulpa when suddenly they have a
different eye color, different hair color, or different clothes. This is an early sign of sentience
that shows their budding ability to form ideas, have preferences, and make independent
decisions without your help.

- Resistance
When you are visualizing your tulpa’s form or doing personality forcing, you may sense a feeling
of resistance coming from your tulpa, indicating they are opposed to whatever specific thing
you are doing in that moment. It might feel as if it is harder to visualize something or add a
personality trait than it normally is for you to do so for no apparent reason. If this happens,
stop what you are doing in that moment, and don’t continue with that specific thing unless you
have your tulpa’s approval.

- Head pressure
This is different from the other items on this list in the sense that it is not always caused directly
by the tulpa themselves, but is sometimes instead a byproduct of your tulpa developing and
progressing or being present. Head pressure is just what it sounds like - a sensation of pressure
felt anywhere on the head. It is often localized to a specific part of the head. It may feel vaguely
similar to a headache, but it is not the same thing. It is typically not painful at all and is easy to
tell apart from a headache.

Head pressure in the context of tulpamancy is likely an indicator of a tulpa developing or being
present because the majority of those who experience it report that they did not experience it
before creating a tulpa, first started feeling it shortly after starting to create their tulpa, and
either feel it exclusively when doing tulpa related things or very rarely outside of doing tulpa
related things. Here are some statistics. Some tulpas are able to purposefully cause or
manipulate head pressure, changing its location or intensity. If your tulpa can do this, head
pressure can be used as a binary yes/no system of communication before your tulpa is vocal.
For example, pressure on the left side of the head for no, pressure on the right side for yes.

Not everyone will see all of these signs of sentience. For example, you may experience
emotional bleedover but never have any head pressure. Do not worry if you experience only
one or two of these signs.

When you notice any of these things happening, keep the momentum going and keep
engaging them. If they said something, ask them to elaborate on their thoughts. If you feel
emotional bleedover, ask them to try to intensify the emotion. If they move their form, ask
them to make some more movements. If your tulpa did one thing, they will probably be able to
do more in that moment. It is good to push and challenge them to do as much as they can.
However, do not be harsh or commanding, and hold an aura of gentle encouragement and
excitement rather than strictness and high expectations.

Vocality
Other than seeing signs of sentience, vocality is the main milestone people generally reach for
in the creation process. After all, one of the main appeals of tulpamancy is having someone in
your head who talks to you.

You can’t exactly make a tulpa speak - you don’t create their words in the same way you might
create their form or personality. A tulpa must learn to speak on their own, which will happen
naturally as they develop. Of course, you could parrot, but that would not actually be your tulpa
speaking, it would be you pretending that your tulpa is speaking, putting words in their mouth
for them. When I talk about vocality, I am referring to your tulpa speaking of their own volition.

A tulpa will learn to speak both from hearing you talk to them and accessing your prior
knowledge of language. You probably won’t need to teach them the ABC’s or treat them as if
they are a toddler. Speak to them like you would speak to someone your own age.

When your tulpa first speaks, it will almost certainly be with mindvoice - do not expect to hear
them as if they were a physical person talking out loud right next to you. While possible, this
usually does not happen early on. They will not sound like an auditory hallucination or external
sound. You will hear them inside your head in the same way you hear your own thoughts and
mindvoice. The sound and tone of their mindvoice may be similar or identical to your own, or it
might be very different.

At first, your tulpa might speak only a few words at a time, have a small vocabulary, or have
trouble holding conversations. These things are normal. Over time this will change - eventually
they will be capable of having long and complex conversations and their speaking abilities will
be on par with your own.

- Speeding up vocality
Despite the fact that it is your tulpa’s job to learn how to talk, there are some things you can do
to help them along. If a large portion of your overall forcing consists of something other than
narration, consider scaling that back and narrating more, or incorporating narration into things
that don’t normally involve narration. For instance, if you do a lot of silent visualizing, start
narrating simultaneously while you visualize them. The more your tulpa is spoken to, the more
quickly they will learn how to talk.

Another way to help them is to ask them plenty of questions. Ask them about their likes and
dislikes, opinions on things, things about themself, anything you can think of, even things you
think they wouldn’t be able to answer. Questions, unlike statements, are quite literally asking
for a response, so they are useful for coaxing your tulpa into talking. Also, they encourage your
tulpa to think more than they might otherwise. For example, a young tulpa might not think
about their political views or their favorite genre of music until you ask them about it. So,
questions are also useful for developing your tulpa’s identity, making them a more well
rounded person. Be sure to inform them about views that don’t match your own so they can
have more of an opportunity to choose their own ideas instead of purely piggybacking off of
yours. Note that your tulpa probably will end up sharing a lot of your opinions, and there’s
nothing wrong with that, nor does it mean your tulpa is not independent enough. It’s just
important to grant them the opportunity and knowledge to think in ways that don’t match your
lines of thought.

A good way to teach your tulpa what works and what doesn’t when they are learning to speak
is to tell them every time you even slightly suspect they might have said something, even if you
are 99% sure it was not actually them. Say something along the lines of “Hey, I think I might
have heard you say hello just now, but I’m not sure. Just letting you know I heard that in case it
actually was you.” If you let your tulpa know about every time you think they may have said
something, this will let them know when the things they are saying are actually being heard by
you and may give them some insight on what works and what doesn’t when trying to
communicate with you.

Once your tulpa is at least slightly vocal, another way to speed things up is encouraging your
tulpa to speak to people other than yourself. One way to do this is to join a tulpa related
Discord server or other chat platform and proxy their words into the chat. “Proxy” in this
context refers to when your tulpa tells you what to say, after which you type it on their behalf.
You could also do this with any friend of yours who knows about and is accepting of your tulpa.
This will give your tulpa a more varied conversational experience than they would get if they
spoke to nobody other than you.

- Was it me or my tulpa?
You might be able to easily distinguish your tulpa’s words from your own thoughts, or you
might have trouble telling which is which. Many hosts normally experience an “alien” feeling
when their tulpa speaks, the recognition that the tulpa’s words are coming from a separate
source other than the host’s own stream of thoughts. Others at first don’t experience this
feeling of separateness very much or at all and as a result end up having trouble telling if they
are simply imagining their tulpa’s vocality or if their tulpa is speaking on their own. They might
feel as if they are somehow unintentionally producing their tulpa’s thoughts.

This is by far the most common obstacle in the early days of tulpa creation. In fact, the first time
your tulpa speaks it is more likely for you to mistake it for one of your own thoughts than it is
for you to immediately recognize it as coming from your tulpa. However, those who don’t feel
this separateness at first will eventually be able to recognize it. The confusion won’t last
forever.

Why might you confuse their thoughts for your own? There are multiple possible answers to
this question.

- Thought ownership
When you create your first tulpa, you are becoming plural for the first time ever. Having never
experienced it before, you don’t quite know what it feels like to have anybody other than
yourself talking in your head. You are used to associating all thoughts going on in your head
with yourself. This means that even when there is another person in your head and they’re
speaking - you will have been so used to hearing nothing but your own thoughts all of your life
that you may continue to perceive all thoughts going on in your head, even those that don’t
belong to you, as your own.

If you have this issue, it is likely that it will resolve on its own over time without any kind of
conscious intervention on your part, as it does for most people. However, you’ll probably feel
the need to speed this process up. To do this, let go of the mindset that everything you hear
and perceive in your head is being created by yourself. Tell yourself that you are not necessarily
in ownership of everything that happens in your head. Only the thoughts that you consciously
decide upon are your own. Do everything you can to strongly believe this principle and enforce
it as a sort of “rule” within your mind.

If your tulpa carries a distinct mental presence/essence, try to see whether or not you feel that
presence along with a thought you hear. Many tulpa’s thoughts will be “infused” with their
presence and this can be a very effective way of telling their thoughts apart from your own.

Some experience their tulpa’s thoughts and presence as coming from a specific place in their
head or in the space around them. For example, you might feel as if your own presence is
located on the right side of your head, and their tulpa’s presence is located on the left side of
your head. It might feel as if the tulpa’s thoughts are originating from that location. If this is
true for you, this is another useful method of differentiation. Pay close attention to the location
thoughts are coming from.

- Mindvoice similarity
Chances are your mindvoice has a particular sound, tone and pitch. Maybe it sounds like your
out-loud speaking voice, maybe not. As mentioned before, your tulpa’s mindvoice might sound
similar or even exactly the same as your own mindvoice. This can cause confusion for obvious
reasons. Even if you feel some degree of separation between your tulpa’s thoughts and your
own, if your tulpa’s voice sounds just like your own you still might feel as if it’s just you.

Your tulpa’s mindvoice might sound like your own for similar reasons as to why you might think
all thoughts in your head are yours. Your mindvoice thoughts most likely sound one particular
way most of the time. This might cause you to perceive your tulpa’s voice as sounding the
same, because you aren’t used to anything different.

To alleviate this, encourage your tulpa to adopt a different voice. Tell them to talk in a different
pitch, or to mimic somebody else’s voice. Maybe there is a voice actor or singer’s voice you
want your tulpa to have. Listen to a lot of their material while forcing - this way your tulpa can
get a good grasp on what the voice sounds like. If you have a good auditory imagination, you
can come up with an entirely new voice from scratch. Tell your tulpa to make a conscious effort
to use the new voice so they don’t inadvertently slip into using your mindvoice out of habit. If
your tulpa still has trouble using the new voice, you can do a small amount of parroting for your
tulpa using the new voice.

- Intrusive thoughts
Have you ever had images or words pop into your head that seem to come out of nowhere and
at random? Those that you did not seem to consciously create and might have nothing to do
with what you’re currently thinking or doing? If so, like most people, you have experienced
intrusive thoughts, also called stray thoughts. These thoughts are unconsciously generated,
meaning you have no direct control over them. In a sense, they aren’t really your thoughts. But,
they aren’t your tulpa’s thoughts either. Not everything that happens in the mind is neatly
categorized or can be traced back to a system member, and this is something to bear in mind
with vocality. Some thoughts will have no discernable source.

Just from my description of intrusive thoughts, you can probably see why these can be a
problem when you’re trying to learn to listen to your tulpa. Sometimes intrusive thoughts are
mistaken for a tulpa communicating because they are spontaneous and you do not control or
initiate them. On the other hand, a tulpa’s actual thoughts can be mistaken for intrusive
thoughts for that same reason.

Here are some things to look out for to determine whether something is coming from your
tulpa or just an intrusive thought.

- Coherency
Does the thought make sense, and if it consists of more than one word, do the words make
sense together? If the thought is comprised of nonsense words or words that don’t make sense
when put together, it’s probably an intrusive thought.

- Context
Does the thought make sense when you consider what you are currently thinking or doing? If it
is something completely out of left field, it’s likely to be an intrusive thought. For example,
hearing “I love pepperoni pizza” when you haven’t had pizza recently, haven’t been thinking
about pizza, have not said anything about pizza to your tulpa, and haven’t asked your tulpa
what their favorite food is. However, it’s possible that there is context behind it, and you just
aren’t aware of it. Ask your tulpa for context before dismissing the words.

- State of mind
There are certain states of mind that greatly increase your propensity towards having intrusive
thoughts. The most common example of such is when you are close to falling asleep or just
waking up. This transitional period is very prone to producing what are called hypnagogic or
hypnopompic hallucinations. These hallucinations aren’t quite like normal hallucinations - they
usually don’t seem “real” as if they are coming from an external source, they instead more
closely resemble intrusive thoughts. The only difference is that they typically seem slightly more
vivid than intrusive thoughts one might experience in a normal state of mind.
Hypnagogic/hypnopompic hallucinations are most often auditory, so be discerning of any
thoughts you hear while falling asleep or waking up.

On the other hand, some tulpas have reported that this mental state allows their host to hear
them more easily, so this state can be used to your advantage if you are discerning. This is
because you are in a trance-like state when you are halfway asleep, and mental barriers are
lessened.

- Personality relevance
Think about whether what your tulpa is saying makes sense considering your tulpa’s personality
and things they have said before. If your tulpa says something that is very unusual for who they
are as a person, completely unlike anything they’ve said before, there is a good chance it was
an intrusive thought. This is especially true when it comes to extremely negative thoughts.
Tulpas do of course have negative thoughts just like anyone else and they should be allowed to
express these thoughts, but intrusive thoughts are more likely to be negative than positive.

This is important: If there is nothing that strongly indicates a thought didn’t come from your
tulpa, it is best to lean on the side of assuming it was your tulpa. There are countless cases of
tulpas becoming upset because of their host doubting their responses. Discernment is good,
but dismissing everything that isn’t 100% clearly your tulpa is not good. Constantly dismissing
“weak” responses will stifle their growth. Even if you’re not sure something was them, it’s best
to respond as if it was.

- Vocality troubleshooting
- Tulpa is vocal but then suddenly becomes much less vocal or stops speaking entirely
It could be that your tulpa exhausted themselves - young tulpas usually have very low reserves
of mental energy, so they might get tired with even simple mental tasks like talking. Due to this
mental exhaustion they may suddenly go inactive without even being able to inform you what
is happening. Sometimes, a tulpa who spontaneously stops talking or “disappears” will end up
being gone for days at a time. Don’t panic if this happens - your tulpa will return in time. Here
are some more tips on what to do in this situation. Sometimes, this disappearance acts as a
rejuvenating rest, and once your tulpa comes back they may actually be suddenly more
developed.

- Tulpa’s mindvoice is so quiet that it is difficult to hear

This is likely due to your focus being compromised when you are interacting with your tulpa.
Your head may not be clear enough to easily hear your tulpa, which can translate into
perceiving your tulpa’s voice as being quiet. Try clearing away distractions, meditating, or taking
a break to refresh yourself if you are in a bad mood.

- Tulpa doesn’t talk when I’m tired, sick, stressed, sad, angry, etc.
Your ability to hear your tulpa can be affected by how you feel. It’s very common to temporarily
lose contact with your tulpa if you don’t feel so great. This probably won’t always be the case,
as your tulpa will have a more persistent and “unbreakable” presence as they develop further.
Your ability to interact with your tulpa is relatively fragile and easily interfered with when they
are less developed.

- Tulpa only talks after I talk to them first, they never speak up randomly or initiate
conversations
This will happen if your tulpa is unconscious at all times when you are not paying attention to
them, which is often the case with young or less developed tulpas. If this is the case, your tulpa
won’t be able to interject at random times throughout the day when you are occupied with
other things, they’ll only be able to talk to you when you are paying attention to them. See the
‘parallel processing’ and ‘self sufficiency’ sections for information on how to change this.
Alternatively, you can practice building a habit of passively focusing on your tulpa more often
throughout the day.
 - My tulpa gives contradicting answers to questions
When you ask your tulpa something, they might give multiple different answers that contradict
one another. For example, if you ask them their favorite color, they might reply with both
“blue” and “green”. Or, they might say both “yes” and “no” to a yes/no question. There are
multiple reasons why this might happen. First, they might simply be indecisive, they aren’t sure
about their feelings on the matter or haven’t thought about it before. If this is the case, ask
your tulpa to think it through before they give their response. Second, if they are very young
their cognition might be “glitchy” because they are still in the process of developing the ability
to think. Third, one of the replies might be your tulpa’s actual response while the other reply is
your own thought of how you would expect them to reply. Fourth, they might be thinking
through multiple possible answers, and you hear their entire preliminary thought process
rather than just their final answer.

- I know what my tulpa is going to say before they say it

Although this can feel disconcerting, it isn’t necessarily a problem. This happens due to the fact
that you and your tulpa are capable of directly seeing into one another’s thought processes.
Your tulpa might form a vague idea and concept, or “raw thought” of what they are going to say
a second before they actually say it in words, which you may become aware of. This might
make it feel as if you are unconsciously “pre-generating” your tulpa’s thoughts, but that’s not
what is actually going on, your tulpa is choosing their own thoughts. This may also happen
because you know your tulpa very well and have a deep understanding of their personality,
which may allow you to easily predict their behavior. However, it is possible to learn to hide
your thought processes from one another, which you should consider if this bothers you a lot.
How to do this will be covered later on.

Nothing’s happening!
There is the possibility that you have been forcing for several months or a few years but have
yet to see anything you would consider a real sign of sentience from your tulpa, or you have hit
a plateau where your tulpa isn’t moving past a certain early level of development. At this point,
you might feel like this is impossible for you. But, I firmly believe that any apparent “inability”
to create a tulpa is not due to an unchangeable problem with your brain or neurology, but
rather a changeable problem with your mindset or effort. It is possible, no matter what you
might think. I have included this section just in case this ends up happening so you have an idea
of what to do about it. However, before taking my advice here, answer these questions:

- For how long have you been at this?

If you have been forcing for less than about three months - you don’t have anything to worry
about, as your case is not unusual. You are still at the point where it is fairly common to not
have had much noticeable progress yet. Just keep forcing as you have been, there is no need to
make any significant changes to how you are doing things. “Three months” may seem oddly
specific, but I am basing that off of the idea that three months is roughly the maximum amount
of time it takes to strongly ingrain a significant new change, skill or habit into your mind (As
long as there is consistent effort throughout that time period.) This maximum period may be six
months if you are over 25, due to decreased neuroplasticity. Note that there will always be
some exceptions to this general trend.

- How frequently are you forcing?

If you have been at this for a year but have frequent and long gaps between sessions, you
should not be surprised that you haven’t made much progress yet. Frequency matters much
more than the actual amount of time that has passed since you first started working on your
tulpa. Your tulpa could be a year old with the developmental level of an average week old tulpa
if you only force every once in awhile.

- How much active forcing have you been doing?

Passive forcing is notorious for leading to slow tulpa development if not supplemented with
enough active forcing. If most or all of your forcing has been passive, that is likely what is to
blame. Active forcing is far more conducive to progress because your focus is not compromised.

Your circumstance is unusual only if you have been forcing for over three months, have very
frequently forced during that time, and have been doing a substantial amount of active forcing.
It’s easy to doubt yourself heavily if this happens, but many people have overcome this and
ended up successfully creating a tulpa.

Now, here’s what to do about it:

- Seeing what you didn’t before

Your tulpa might actually be developing and making progress - but for some reason you just
have not noticed it. You might mistake your tulpa’s words for intrusive thoughts, or fail to hear
them altogether. Some tulpas inform their hosts about several instances in which they spoke
but their host did not realize it was the tulpa speaking. You may be able to recognize previously
unnoticed signs of sentience with some thinking and self reflection. Think deeply about past
instances where you have even just slightly suspected your tulpa could have been speaking or
showing sentience. You might just end up realizing something you didn’t before. I have had
personal experience with this - my tulpa had been talking more often than I thought he was for
a very long time and I realized that it was my OCD that compelled me to severely doubt, nitpick,
and disregard most instances.

- Suspending your skepticism and changing your expectations

It could be that you have a very skeptical mindset, leading you to write off your tulpa’s thoughts
and actions as being made-up. Not everyone will have a “I just knew it” moment when creating
a tulpa, meaning that the signs of sentience they display may not feel as real, profound, or
undeniable as you might expect them to be. It could be that you have a very specific idea of
what it will feel like when your tulpa speaks or shows sentience, which can halt your progress
by leading you to write off anything that doesn’t fit the specific expectation you have set. For
example, let’s say you expect your tulpa’s voice to sound like an external sound or auditory
hallucination when they speak. But, like most tulpas they speak in thoughts, in a way that
doesn’t sound like an external sound. Because you expect your tulpa to sound one specific way,
it leads you to write off every instance of your tulpa speaking to you simply because they are
doing it in a way you aren’t expecting and accounting for.

- Maintaining motivation
It can be difficult to stay motivated if you have been at this for a long time without much to
show for it. However, it is important to maintain your motivation for as long as it is needed, as
motivation is one of the main things stopping you from slacking off or giving up. Take some
advice I gave earlier in this guide - “hype” yourself up about tulpas by any means necessary, for
example by reading positive or exciting tulpa related things online. Do this as many times as you
need to, and repeat whenever you feel your motivation is lacking. Another thing that might
help with motivation is reminding yourself that you might be on the verge of a breakthrough,
even if it doesn’t seem like it - some people actually do experience complete silence for a long
time before coming upon a sudden, unexpected, and enormous leap in progress. One day their
tulpa might be completely non-vocal and the next they are capable of full conversations. It
definitely isn’t a gradual “bit by bit” process for everyone. Every day, tell yourself that today
could be the day your tulpa breaks through.

- Trying new techniques

Sometimes, stagnant progress is caused by doing the same thing over and over without any
novelty. Repetition and sameness usually isn’t bad in forcing - so long as whatever you’re doing
is actually effective and works for you. You might believe that a certain way of forcing is
working or should work for you, when in reality it doesn’t. You might have even seen it work
perfectly for other people, but not everyone responds the same way to the same thing. If you
suspect this might be happening, don’t be afraid to try something you haven’t before. Search
for new techniques and jump straight into using them. You might see a world of difference
when you do. However, do not jump rapidly between techniques - if something doesn’t start
working the first day you do it, that does not mean it will never work. Give it time before you
move onto something else. Trying new things can also be useful if you are bored with doing the
same thing over and over. Excitement will carry you a long way.

- Longer sessions
Longer active forcing sessions are more conducive to progress - the longer you stay in a session,
the more of a “flow” and trance-like mindset you will get into. This mindset is more conducive
to making changes to your brain than your normal state of mind is. For this reason, the majority
of large and sudden breakthroughs in tulpa development tend to happen while one is in this
mental state. It takes most people’s brains awhile to truly become invested in the task at hand.
This means that if most of your sessions are, for example, 20 minutes or shorter, you may rarely
or never reach this state of mind. Try making it a habit to force for at least 30 minutes straight.

- Thinking of your tulpa as a current reality

Understandably, a lot of people will think of their tulpa’s existence as a far-off future or an
intangible dream. You might think of your tulpa’s sentience, vocality, etc. as some kind of
hypothetical mystical fantasy, and you have a hard time seeing it as something that could
actually realistically happen. It is important to move past this mindset as it keeps you rooted in
a mode where it is difficult to “let your tulpa in” - your mind will have difficulty reconfiguring
itself to allow your tulpa to interact with you. Your tulpa could very well already be there, but
you are focusing on a narrow perspective rather than expanding your perspective to include
your tulpa’s presence in your life. Here is an exercise to help see your tulpa as real and tangible,
not a hypothetical dream.

Write a script of what you imagine a day with your tulpa will look like when they are
sentient/vocal. It should be a detailed and realistic description going through almost every
detail of the day, starting from when you wake up and ending when you go to sleep. Write it
from a first person perspective and in the present tense. Some examples of things to include:
Your tulpa greeting you as you wake up. Feeling your tulpa’s presence throughout the day.
Having a funny conversation together while you are brushing your teeth. Your tulpa making
comments about a video you’re watching. Your tulpa giving you advice on a homework
assignment. Looking over and seeing your tulpa by your side during a walk. If you want to
master skills like possession, switching, parallel processing, and imposition, also include
instances of these things happening.

When you’re finished writing, slowly and mindfully read through it while visualizing the events
from a first person perspective. Try to lose yourself in it, like you would while reading an
engaging book. Get to a point where the text is automatically being translated into a vivid
daydream and you’re hardly even aware that you are reading text. Memorize it through
repetition so you can go through this daydream without needing to read it. (Though it does not
need to stay consistent, details can change.) Also try this while you are in a trance or halfway
asleep. Go through this process daily if you can. This will immerse you into a very detailed and
practical outlook of what having a tulpa is like, allowing your perspective to expand.

Here is another good method of doing this.

Further Development
Although a tulpa may be considered “finished” when they are fluently vocal, no tulpa is ever
truly done developing. Just like any person, no matter how old they are and no matter how
many achievements they have made, they will continue to learn and grow. The things below
are optional and do not have to do with the creation process, but are an excellent way of
making the experience of having a tulpa even more interesting and fulfilling, improving your
tulpa’s life, and giving you something extra to work on achieving after your tulpa is vocal.

Life as a tulpa
What is life like for a tulpa on a day to day basis? How do they experience and perceive things?
You may have pondered this at some point.

Some tulpas are heavily attached to the mindscape and their imagined form within the
mindscape. This means that they will most often experience things through their form and will
not be aware of the host’s physical body’s senses unless they actively try to be. The mindscape
will be the majority or entirety of what they see and experience in their day to day life. This is
often the case for tulpas that are initially created while their host is immersed in the mindscape
and visualizing their tulpa within the mindscape. They might experience the mindscape like a
hazy dream, or more tangible and vivid, comparable to physical reality.

On the other hand, there are tulpas who spend most or all of their time seeing out of the
physical body’s eyes and experiencing the outside world. Being “attached” to the physical
body’s senses, they will experience most things through their host’s physical body. They may
still have an imagined form of their own, but do not experience said form as if it were actually
their body due to being aware of their host’s body all of the time.
Of course, there are also those whose lives are comprised of a mix of these two states of being.
It is also possible to transfer from being in one state to the other state. A tulpa can go from
living within the mindscape to being aware of the outside world all of the time or vice versa.
Tulpas that transfer from living in the mindscape to being “within” their host’s body may
sometimes experience discomfort or dysphoria, as their host’s body will not feel like their own.
This is because prior to the transfer they became used to being within an entirely different
imagined body. This is most common for tulpas with non-human forms or tulpas of a different
gender than their host. Some tulpas even experience phantom limbs and body parts. Say that
your tulpa’s form has a tail. They might still feel their tail when they focus on the outside world.

A tulpa may not be awake and conscious all of the time. They can sleep or go unconscious
independently of the host. This applies to tulpas in both of the states of being described above.
Some tulpas, primarily those that are young or not yet well developed, are unconscious at all
times when their host is not forcing or focusing on them. Why this is will be explained in the
next section.

Processing power and plurality

Creating a tulpa will not increase your brain’s total “processing power”, the resources and
“thinking space” used to be conscious/aware, have trains of thought, and process information.
To put it simply, having a tulpa does not give your brain the processing power of two brains.
This means that your brain’s existing processing power must be shared, divided and swapped
between you and your tulpa.

How does processing power work when it comes to having more than one person in a head?
There are three possible configurations - sharing, swapping, and dividing. I will walk you
through a symbolic demonstration of how I believe each of these configurations work.

Imagine two small circles, one labeled “host” and the other labeled “tulpa”. Now, imagine a
larger circle labeled “processing power.”

- Sharing
In the first configuration, both the host and tulpa circles are inside of the processing power
circle. This means that both the host and tulpa are conscious but are taking in the same
information and sensory input. They are both focusing on the same thing. Each is aware of
everything the other is aware of. Interactions between the tulpa and host in this state must be
alternating - if they are having a conversation, they cannot speak at the exact same time and
will instead take turns thinking and speaking. The one not doing the thinking or speaking at any
given time will be doing nothing but observing.
 - Swapping
Either the host or tulpa circle is inside of the processing power circle and the other is outside of
it. This means that one is conscious while the other is unconscious. This may happen if one
becomes involved in a highly mentally intensive task, forcing them to take all of the processing
power for themselves and leaving none left over for the other to use. If one has no processing
power to use for themselves, not only do they lose the ability to think, but they also go
unconscious.

- Dividing
Now, imagine that the processing power circle has been split into two separate circles. The host
circle is inside of one and the tulpa circle is inside of the other. Because the processing power
circle was split rather than multiplied, each “half” of the circle is smaller than the original. This
means that the host and tulpa each have a smaller pool of resources to work with than if they
were in the sharing configuration. However, this configuration allows for the host and tulpa to
each think about different things simultaneously, unlike in the sharing configuration. They will
be focusing on separate things and may not be aware of everything the other is aware of.

Parallel processing
The “dividing” configuration described above is what is known as “parallel processing.” During
parallel processing, the host and tulpa will be thinking about or focusing on different things at
the same time, operating in parallel to one another. One example of such is when a host goes
about their day while their tulpa occupies themselves with something else in the mindscape.
Another example is when a tulpa has private thoughts isolated within their own awareness that
the host cannot hear. Parallel processing is a skill that some systems exercise by default with
hardly any effort, possessing a natural talent for it, while other systems may find it very difficult,
needing to put in significant effort to achieve it.

Parallel processing is not to be confused with multitasking. Multitasking deals with a single
consciousness while parallel processing deals with more than one consciousness. The word
“multitasking” itself is a misnomer - a single consciousness is a single stream of awareness and
experience, and therefore cannot have more than one focus at a time. A single consciousness
can quickly switch between different focuses, which can give off a vague impression of doing
more than one thing at a time, though that isn’t what is actually happening. This is what
multitasking actually is. When a second stream of awareness and experience is present, that
second consciousness can focus on something else at the same time.
Still, parallel processing is hardly a superpower of any sort - as mentioned before, this division
does not give your brain any more resources to work with than it had prior to containing more
than one consciousness. This means that it is very difficult, for some even impossible, for a host
and tulpa to be involved in different highly mentally intensive activities simultaneously. For
example, both doing different difficult math problems. However, it is more feasible for one to
work on a math problem while the other does something far less intensive, such as taking a
walk in the mindscape. The more processing power one is using, the less the other will have to
work with. It is a balancing act. Note that “processing power” is a metaphorical term as this
aspect of the mind is difficult to explain in literal terms.

Young or not yet well developed tulpas tend to have trouble with “grabbing” processing power
for themselves, needing their host to be directly feeding them processing power in the form of
attention in order to remain conscious. The moment their host directs their attention
elsewhere, even if it is not to something mentally strenuous, the tulpa will go unconscious. This
is best avoided as it can easily lead to the tulpa spending large chunks of time not doing
anything that could have better been used for any number of things, and does not allow for
them to be self sufficient. In order to have this not happen, the tulpa must learn to either “latch
onto” and share their host’s processing power without their host giving them attention, or learn
to divide it. The former often happens naturally with nothing more than time and development,
but the latter will often need to be actively pursued in order to achieve. Dividing processing
power is typically more desirable than sharing it because the tulpa will not have to constantly
watch whatever the host is doing or vice versa.

- Learning to parallel process

In order to learn to parallel process, you must start small and work your way up. Certain things
in parallel processing are more difficult than others - if you don’t have a natural affinity for
parallel processing and try to jump straight into trying to go about your day while your tulpa
does activities in the mindscape you will fail to do so, possibly frustrating yourself or leading
yourself to believe that it is not possible for you to parallel process.

The very first thing you must do is split you and your tulpa’s observation, taking in different
sensory input at the same time. This is the first step to break out of the standard “sharing”
configuration, and is the very baseline of all parallel processing. Observation and thinking are
not the same thing - one can remain conscious and aware without thinking. Observation also
uses up far less processing power than thinking does, meaning that it is easier for a host and
tulpa to observe different things simultaneously than it is for them to think about different
things simultaneously.
 - Splitting observation
You don’t have another set of eyes on the back of your head, so the best way of doing this is by
utilizing your mindscape. First, immerse yourself in the mindscape and make sure your tulpa is
as well. Then, identify an object to look at, for example a tree. Now, identify another object and
have it be out of the field of vision of where your own object can be seen. Also make sure that it
looks very different from the object you will be looking at. If you are going to be looking at a
pine tree, have the other object be a deciduous tree.

Though not required, it is ideal for this activity that your mindscape is fleshed out and
consistent. This means that objects, areas, rooms, etc. and their locations are generally the
same and can be clearly recalled with little to no mental effort. If the layout of rooms or
locations of objects in your mindscape are inconsistent or hard to remember, this activity will
probably be harder.

Some tulpas by default see things via their host’s perspective in the mindscape even if they
have a form of their own. If they do this, tell your tulpa to shift their perspective to their own
form. They should imagine that they are seeing out of their form’s eyes rather than yours.

Now, look at your object, and tell your tulpa to look at the other object. You might notice that
your senses start to “overlap” - you might start seeing what you tulpa sees on top of what you
are looking at, almost as if they are morphing together - if this happens, try to ignore what your
tulpa is seeing. You can do this by focusing more heavily on your own object. Examine its
smaller details, take note of its every little aspect. Fill your mind with observations of your
object until everything else, anything you are not choosing to focus on, is pushed out of your
awareness. Your tulpa should do the same. Try to keep this up for as long as you can. You and
your tulpa may only be able to maintain this for seconds at a time at first, but if you continue to
practice those seconds will turn into minutes, and so on.

Splitting sensory input between you and your tulpa creates the capability for isolated
experience within your system. Isolated experience is just what it sounds like - The tulpa being
aware of things that the host is not aware of, or vise versa.

- Thought concealment
Once you have had some success with the previous exercise, you can move on to slightly harder
things. This exercise does not deal with isolating sensory observation, it instead deals with
isolating thought.
The idea here is to have your tulpa be able to have thoughts which you are not aware of, and
for you to be able to have thoughts your tulpa is not aware of. You should start by forming a
sort of divide between mindvoice vocalization directed at your tulpa and ordinary background
thoughts within your mind. Recognize them as being different things. One is meant to be heard
by your tulpa, the other not. You can use symbolism to form this distinction - “attach” a certain
feeling or image to the thoughts you want your tulpa to be able to hear. Be consistent and do
this every single time you talk to your tulpa, and keep it up for a long period of time - over time
your mind will start to recognize your interactions with your tulpa as in some way being
different from your ordinary thoughts. However, this does not automatically make it so your
tulpa cannot hear certain thoughts of yours, it only establishes the necessary separation
between what you do and do not want your tulpa to hear. You and your tulpa will need to do a
bit more to actually hide certain thoughts.

Next, your tulpa will need to teach themselves to automatically ignore and block out any
thoughts of yours that are not being “sent” along with the symbol you chose. They can start by
consciously choosing to ignore any of said thoughts - as soon as they notice them, they should
distract themselves with something else to avoid continued awareness of them. They should
think of them as being insignificant, not worth paying attention to. If done consistently, over
time this process of ignoring said thoughts will become automatic and unconscious. The
thoughts you do not direct specifically at your tulpa will automatically avoid your tulpa’s
awareness. Your tulpa won’t need to make an effort to ignore them any longer, as they won’t
even enter your tulpa’s awareness in the first place. The process needed for your tulpa to be
able to hide certain thoughts from you is the same as this, just with reversed roles.

I did not suggest that you instead associate a symbol with the thoughts you don’t want your
tulpa to hear because it may be annoying and more difficult to have to associate a symbol with
all of your personal thoughts - such thoughts are typically more free-flowing and less stringently
directed than thoughts you would direct at your tulpa, so it would be more difficult to
consistently associate a symbol with them.

- Counting exercise
Once you have had some success with thought concealment, this next exercise becomes
possible. What you will do here is have your tulpa count in private thoughts - thoughts you
can’t hear - after which you will check on them to verify that they have actually been counting
outside of your awareness.

First, find a timer, preferably a digital one. Your tulpa should become familiar with the pace of
the timer, internalizing how long each second takes. This is the pace your tulpa should count at.
If your tulpa counts too slow or too fast relative to the timer, it will be more difficult to see
whether or not your tulpa did the exercise correctly.

Use the stopwatch mode on the timer. When you press start should be the moment your tulpa
starts counting. Now, you need to put the timer somewhere you cannot see it. If it makes noise
or ticks, put it somewhere you can’t hear it.

Now, go do something for a minute or two that does not require a great deal of mental effort.
Maybe read some of a book you’re read before or go on a short walk. If you do not occupy
yourself with something else while your tulpa counts you are at a greater risk of accidentally
becoming aware of their thought process. But, it cannot be mentally strenuous, otherwise you
risk stealing too much processing power from your tulpa, the processing power they need in
order to count.

Now, go back to the timer - without looking at the face so you can’t see what number it is at -
and press stop. Your tulpa should stop counting when you do this. Before looking at the
number on the timer, ask your tulpa what number they counted to. Now, flip the timer around
and see what it stopped at. If the number your tulpa counted to is very close to the number of
seconds the timer was at, this means your tulpa was successfully able to count while you did
something else at the same time. Counting may take very little mental effort, but it is a start.
This skill can evolve into far more advanced things.

You can increase the difficulty of this exercise by increasing the amount of time your tulpa
counts for or doing something more mentally strenuous while they count. Of course, you can
also replace the counting with a more mentally strenuous activity. Once you are good enough
at this, your tulpa will be able to do a wide variety of things outside of your awareness.

- The role of the unconscious mind and mindscapes in parallel processing

I’ll go into more depth about the mechanics of how parallel processing works so you can apply
this understanding to your efforts. There are strong indications that the unconscious mind plays
a large role in the ability to parallel process. The unconscious seems to utilize a different type of
processing power that works a little differently from conscious processing power.

What exactly is unconscious processing power and how is it different from conscious processing
power? Think about what things are like when you dream. Even though your environment and
the people in your dreams are being generated by your own mind, it doesn’t feel this way
unless you are lucid dreaming. The unconscious is the part of you that operates automatically
outside of your awareness, so it is what is creating the events in your dreams. It can quickly
create entire emulated conversations, areas, storylines, and more, so it is clear that it has quite
a bit of processing power at its disposal. In fact, it holds a lot more processing power than your
conscious mind has. It would be much more difficult for you to consciously and deliberately
come up with all of these things so quickly.

When you “burn” something into memory, for example when you make your mindscape stable
and consistent so you don’t need to consciously think of all objects/areas, you are utilizing the
unconscious and its unique form of processing power. When a tulpa is parallel processing while
in the mindscape, they will be partially relying on this mechanism in order to do so. By default,
more conscious processing power is allocated to whoever is currently in control of the body
or paying attention to the outside world, so unconscious processing power must make up for
the lack of abundant mental resources and “bandwidth” during parallel processing. This helps
the perpetuation of your tulpa and mindscape’s existence outside of your attention.

For this reason, parallel processing in the mindscape is usually experienced differently from
ordinary consciousness. Many tulpas experience it as a partially lucid dream-like state, where
their actions and thoughts are more automatic with a little less conscious thought put into
things. A tulpa might act in a hasty or out of character manner, just like you would during a
dream. Complex and logical lines of thinking may be more difficult. When they move out of this
state and back into ordinary consciousness, memories of their experiences in the mindscape
may be hazy or difficult to retain, because it tends to be difficult for memories to clearly carry
over between different “modes” of consciousness, just like when you wake up from a dream
and it quickly starts to slip away. Though your tulpa’s expectations of what will happen can
influence what actually happens, so if they go in with the expectation that they will have a more
clear and lucid experience, it may be so.

- Memory separation
Memory separation is the ability to hold memories that your tulpa is unaware of, and vice
versa. This is somewhat related to parallel processing as it involves information
compartmentalization, though it is also possible without parallel processing, as it can occur as a
result of either the dividing or swapping configurations.

In most tulpa systems with memory separation, all memories can be accessed by any system
member through conscious will, and blocking out memories is entirely deliberate. It is not
uncontrolled or unintentional. If you are worried about possibly developing the dysfunctional
type of memory separation found in DID systems, that is not a concern as long as you and your
tulpa have reliable and consistent communication. I would not recommend attempting to
completely prevent a system member’s ability to access memories and information, and if
something is blocked out, it should be with their consent.

Memory separation has interesting and useful applications. For instance, if your tulpa wants to
buy you a gift for your birthday, but wants to keep knowledge of the gift hidden until your
birthday comes up, memory separation can come in handy. If you are playing a turn based
game against each other, you can block out knowledge of each other’s thought process and
next moves to make the game more fair and challenging. If you have read a book or watched a
TV series but your tulpa wants to experience it as a completely new and fresh thing with no
spoilers, memory separation will allow that.

In order to form separate memories while both you and your tulpa are conscious, parallel
processing is needed. If both of you are constantly perceiving the same thoughts and sensory
input, you’ll remember all of the same things. While you practice parallel processing, assert that
mindvoice communication should be your main means of relaying info rather than
automatically sharing thoughts. Assert that information that “flows” into one compartment
should stay in that compartment afterwards (not just in the moment) and not bleed out
unless intended. This is the part that differentiates memory separation from ordinary parallel
processing. Imagine you and your tulpa as separate compartments with clearly defined
boundaries, the only bridge between the two being deliberate mindvoice communication.
Deliberately ignore things other than purposeful communication, and over time that ignoring
will become easier and easier until it is completely automatic. Test these boundaries to make
sure you can still access information through conscious will if needed - for example, imagine a
symbolic “key” that allows you to access your tulpa’s memories.

Memory separation can also be achieved through the swapping configuration described earlier,
where one of you is conscious and the other is unconscious. Let’s say that your tulpa is
unconscious for an hour while you are playing a game. When they become conscious again,
instead of telling them about what you did in the game, immediately engage them in something
different and unrelated to whatever you did while they were gone, so they won’t have time to
start thinking about what happened while they were unconscious. Try to do this as often as you
can. Over time, their mind will default towards not ruminating on your memories, instead
focusing purely on the time they spend conscious. (Be sure to tell your tulpa that you want to
practice this beforehand so it will not seem like you are trying to hide things from them without
their approval.) This can also be achieved with reversed roles through “blackout switching,”
which will be covered later.
For systems who do not separate any information or memories, there is a “lesser” degree of
memory separation that is extremely common and often occurs by default. A tulpa may
remember the raw facts of everything that happens in their host’s life. For instance, they might
be aware of an embarrassing moment at school that the host went through before they even
existed. However, they feel no emotional or personal connection to the memory. The memory
will not feel as if it happened to them, because it didn’t. They are just observing it after the fact.
For the host, reliving the memory may feel like playing an immersive VR video game. But for the
tulpa, it will feel like watching a movie from a distance. This also means that the tulpa will not
directly suffer the effects that the experience had on the host.

Self sufficiency
Forcing doesn’t have to last forever. You may not need to continue putting work into
maintaining your tulpa and keeping them around, or at least anything that feels like work. It’s
possible to stop forcing entirely but have your tulpa continue existing as they have been
without in any way regressing or becoming less active. This is achieved by your tulpa becoming
self-sufficient.

Self sufficiency is possible only when your tulpa is able to hold onto processing power for
themselves without you giving it to them. They must be able to be conscious at their own
discretion, not only when you are paying attention to them. As mentioned before, there are
two different ways for your tulpa to do this- sharing your processing power or dividing it.

Because I already went over parallel processing, I’ll explain how your tulpa can share your
processing power. The sharing of processing power is typically easier and more prone to
occuring naturally than parallel processing is, but it is still helpful to know how to “brute force”
it in case it doesn’t end up happening naturally as your tulpa develops.

When your tulpa shares your processing power, they will be sharing your experience at all
times, staying with you throughout the day no matter what you are doing. Seeing what you are
seeing, hearing what you are hearing, etc. This replaces the function that your forcing and
attention previously had. They won’t need you to direct thoughts and stimuli towards them,
because they will be automatically receiving it by themselves. Sharing processing power works
best when your tulpa is aware of your physical body and its senses rather than the mindscape
and their form within the mindscape. So, in order for your tulpa to do this they should first
learn to be connected to your senses if that is not already a regular thing for them.

To start off, have a long active forcing session so your tulpa is as present and mentally active as
possible. Then, start passive forcing immediately afterwards while you go and do something
else. Maybe start out with something that isn’t very mentally demanding. At this point your
tulpa should connect to your senses if they weren’t already. As you passive force, gradually
start paying less and less attention to your tulpa. Space out your conversation so that wider
gaps of time go in-between you talking to one another. It’s important that your tulpa do
anything they can to stay awake and thinking during these gaps. If they have difficulty forming
their own thoughts to keep themselves busy, they can resort to examining your physical
environment, taking note of every detail. Or, they can just listen to your thoughts if you haven’t
practiced thought concealment.

After awhile, stop talking to and paying attention to your tulpa entirely. If successful, your tulpa
should still be conscious. In this state, a tulpa will be able to chime in and talk to you at any
time without prompting. A tulpa who is proficient enough at this will be able to do this 24/7,
minus when you are asleep, of course.

This should go without saying, but you should not use this as a way to abandon your tulpa. It
should only be used to reduce the workload of having a tulpa by mostly removing the
maintenance aspect. Even if your tulpa is perfectly self sufficient, chances are they will still want
to spend some of their time with you. It is important that you still acknowledge them and talk
to them every once in awhile. This is especially true if you have just one tulpa, as your tulpa will
need some socialization in their life in order to stay happy and mentally healthy.

Possession
Tulpas are able to move and control your physical body in the exact same way you do. This is
often referred to as “possession.” Possession opens up opportunities for your tulpa that would
otherwise be impossible. Anything you can do, your tulpa will also be able to do if they can
control your body. Possession is required for your tulpa to directly partake in activities that
require the use of the physical body, for example sports or drawing. Many tulpas want to
pursue these types of things, rather than living life entirely as a passenger in someone else’s
head. Additionally, this is another way for your tulpa to be self-sufficient, albeit with the
compromise of you having to give up some of your time controlling the body.

The idea of allowing your body to be puppeted by someone else might seem scary at first - and
for good reason! It may feel similar to when a parent allows their child to drive their car for the
first time. However, there are three things to know about possession that may alleviate some of
your fears:

Tulpas do not usually take control of the body without permission and this can also be very
difficult for them to do. Your tulpa probably wouldn’t seriously consider doing this in the first
place to avoid causing trouble, but I thought I should mention this in case you were worried
about unanticipated possession being likely to happen. In the uncommon cases when this does
happen, it is usually out of sheer necessity and in the host’s best interests, for example when
the host is in some kind of immediate physical danger and their tulpa would be better at
handling the situation than them.

You will be conscious and aware of everything that is going on while your tulpa is possessing
you. You will not black out or become unaware of your physical senses. But, it is actually
possible for this to happen while your tulpa controls your body, via something similar but
different called “switching.” Switching will be further explained later on.

You will be able to take back control of your body at any time. You will not be “locked out” of
your body. So, if your tulpa is about to crash your car or walk off the edge of a cliff you will be
able to stop them at a moment’s notice.

- Connecting to the senses

If your tulpa wants to possess, the very first thing they will need to be able to do is become
aware of your physical body’s senses. Seeing through your eyes, hearing through your ears,
being aware of your body’s position in space (proprioception) etc. Prior to starting possession,
your tulpa should be able to access every one of your senses, not just a couple. Your tulpa
might already know how to do this, or even already do it on a regular basis. If so, you won’t
need to take advice from this section.

Why is this a prerequisite for possession? Well, possession is much harder if your tulpa is trying
to operate your body in a state where they do not feel as if they are “in” the body. They should
be able to feel the body as if it is their own body, not a puppet whose strings are being pulled
from far away. Connecting to the body’s senses also allows your tulpa to access your muscle
memory, which makes everything much easier.

First, ask your tulpa to simply try to connect to the body’s senses. Even if they’ve never done it
before, they might intuitively know how to do so. It comes naturally to many tulpas. Try
describing what you see/hear/feel to your tulpa as a way of getting them used to focusing on
the outside world. If they find that they can do it right away, you won’t need to go through the
next steps.

If your tulpa has difficulty accessing the body’s senses, it is likely because they are highly
attached to the mindscape and their form within the mindscape. It makes sense that they
would find it hard to be aware of what is going on in the outside world when all of their
attention is focused on other things. They will need to learn how to temporarily block out
awareness of those things, after which awareness of the physical body is likely to “fill the void”
of the things they left behind.

If they don’t have one already, they should adopt a temporary human or human-like form
before doing this, as it will make the transition smoother. It doesn’t have to look anything like
your own body, it just has to have a human-like shape. For example, if they didn’t have hands
before, they should have hands in their new form.

You or your tulpa should now create a new area in your mindscape, an area that is meant to act
as a sensory deprivation tank of sorts. It doesn’t matter what it looks like so long as it can serve
this purpose. Maybe a dark empty room, a portal to a “pocket dimension”, or a literal sensory
deprivation tank. When your tulpa goes into this area, they should not be able to see, hear, or
feel anything. After going in, your tulpa should relax, or meditate if they know how to do so.
Then, they should focus their efforts on accessing your senses - they might find they can do so
just by willing themselves to even if they couldn’t before, just because they are not being
distracted by the mindscape. One thing they can do to help themselves is to assert that they are
“travelling” to the outside world and are no longer within the mindscape. Symbolism might
help as well - they can imagine that the sensory deprivation area is rocketing out of the
mindscape or disappearing altogether, leaving a vacuum that only input from the physical world
is able to fill. You may be able to help them by imagining their body being “pulled” into yours,
and occupying the same space that your body is. Make sure that you are not immersed in your
mindscape while doing this, remain focused on the outside world.

Most tulpas find that they have the same level of sensory clarity that their host does. However,
some do not. For example, they might have tunnel vision or a dulled sense of touch. Something
else that may happen is a difficulty with remaining connected to the senses for a long period of
time. If either of these things happen, it may be due to them not using enough of the brain’s
processing power. This may happen either because you are currently using too much of it, or
because your tulpa has difficulty grabbing the amount of processing power required to clearly
process input from the physical senses. Being aware of the body’s senses sometimes requires
more processing power than being within the mindscape does, which is why this might happen.
This issue may rectify itself after your tulpa spends some more time in the body, they may just
not be used to it yet.

If it still doesn’t change after a long time, try this: Quiet your own mind a bit and think less,
after which your tulpa should fill their mind with thoughts and become more mentally active.
By letting go of some of the processing power you had been using, you are freeing up some of it
to be used elsewhere, and by pushing themselves to become more mentally active, they are
taking hold of the processing power you let go of. However, note that doing this may possibly
lead to switching instead of possession.

- Mindset for possession

There is a certain mindset that will make possession much easier for your tulpa. You should let
go of the idea that the physical body is “your body.” Instead, think of it as “THE body”, or
“OUR body.” The mindset that the physical body you inhabit is solely your body can cause you
to unconsciously block or hinder your tulpa’s ability to take control of it. If your unconscious
expects that only one person - you - should be piloting your body, it may resist the efforts of
any other consciousness that tries to do so.

To help yourself adopt this mindset, create an imagined form for yourself that you use in the
same way that a tulpa has a form if you haven’t already. Make sure that it looks different from
the physical body. Try to make it something that resonates with you, something you can easily
identify with. Spend time using this form whenever you enter your mindscape. Doing this will
help segregate the concepts of “my identity” and “the physical body” in your mind.

- Starting possession
Once your tulpa can connect to your senses with a good level of clarity, they are already very
close to being able to possess. Next, your tulpa will need to command the body, via thoughts
and intentions, to move according to their will.

First, make sure that your tulpa is present, mentally active, and connected to the body’s senses.
Now, sit or lie down and get comfortable. Make sure that you are in a position where all of your
muscles can easily become relaxed. Now, let your body go limp and surrender all control of
your muscles. If you had been holding any part of your body in a specific position, let go of that
tension and allow gravity to be the only force acting on your body. By doing this, you are letting
go of your “hold” on the body, making more room for your tulpa and not restricting them.
However, make sure that you are not trying to make the body stay still, and don’t expect it to
stay still. This could override your tulpa’s intentions to move the body.

All of your movements, other than reflexes and unconscious functions such as blinking and
breathing, are initiated by your conscious intentions. If you do not intend to move, you won’t.
The same goes for your tulpa. Your tulpa will need to set an intention for the specific
movements and actions they want to make, and hold that intention in mind. Visualizing
themselves doing whatever they want to do may help. Your tulpa shouldn’t think “I am going
to move,” they should be specific about what they want to do and instead think something
along the lines of “I am going to wiggle the right pointer finger.” Your tulpa should also look
into your memories and experiences of what it feels like to move the body.

Your tulpa should first try to gain control of the entire body all at once, as some tulpas actually
find this to come more naturally than just moving one specific body part. If they find they can
do this right off the bat, they are already much further along in possession than tulpas who can
only move a few specific body parts. A good way for them to go about doing this is sitting up if
the body is in a lying position, or standing up if it is in a sitting position, as moving in this way
utilizes many different muscles.

If they find that they cannot do that after a few attempts, they should try possessing one small
part of the body instead. The eyes are a good place to start, as muscles around your eyes are
more closely and directly tied to thinking than any other part of your body. To possess your
eyes, your tulpa should try to focus on something in the corner of your vision, something you
are not looking directly at. When they do, you might find that your eyes move towards
whatever your tulpa was trying to focus on. If this happens - that was possession! After this,
they should try other small movements such as tapping a finger. From here, they can work on
moving more and more parts of your body, one at a time, until there is nothing left to work on.
Then, work on moving everything in tandem. At this point, they will have achieved full body
possession.

Contrary to this method, some tulpas can take control more easily when the body is already
moving or tensed in some way, rather than being completely relaxed and limp. This is because
there will already be “momentum” of sorts that can be “handed over” to the tulpa, rather than
them trying to initiate the initial movements of something that is completely still. Try this if the
relaxation method seems difficult.

Learning to possess well happens almost immediately for some tulpas, but for others it might
take consistent practice. I suggest integrating possession practice into your daily schedule.

- Advancing possession
The degree to which your tulpa advances in possession depends on what they plan on using
possession for. For example, if your tulpa only wants to use possession to play video games and
nothing else, then they will only need to be able to take control of your hands. If they plan on
living an entire day or longer in your shoes, not only will they need to be able to control the
entire body, but also move it with the same level of dexterity that you do and know how to do
all of the things you need to do in your daily life.
Before your tulpa jumps into doing anything like that, they should first practice while you are
alone. Things such as walking and talking need to be able to come naturally to your tulpa, and
be just as easy for them as they are for you. There will come a point when this happens, and at
that point you will probably be able to trust your tulpa to do most of what you can do.

Do not push your tulpa into doing anything that they are not ready for - the outside world can
be a stressful place for a tulpa who is new to possession. For example, if they are not yet
comfortable with the idea of talking to other people while pretending to be you, don’t put them
in a situation where they will need to do so and take back control of the body whenever it is
necessary.

Once your tulpa gets used to full body possession, they might find that some of their body
mannerisms are different from your own. They might talk in a different pitch, they might walk
with a different gait, they might have different handwriting, they might sit in a different way,
they might relax or tense muscles in a different pattern. They may even have a different set of
physiological traits and responses. Their eyesight might be better or worse than yours, they
might have a different heart rate, the body might react to certain foods differently. This can be
fascinating to see, and shows how strongly consciousness can affect the body.

- Possession troubleshooting
Here are some common problems encountered with possession that I have not mentioned yet,
and how to fix them.

- When my tulpa possesses, it feels no different from when I am moving the body
At first you may have trouble telling whether you or your tulpa is moving the body, similarly to
how you may have trouble telling which thoughts belong to whom. The reason why this
happens is because all of your life you have only experienced the body moving of your own
volition, not anybody else’s, so you might continue to interpret any movement the body makes
as being yours. To move past this, work on being more mindful of the thoughts and intentions
behind every movement the body makes. Become more aware of the intentions behind your
movements, so when the body makes a movement, you will be able to trace it back to either
yourself or your tulpa. Tell yourself that if you can’t trace a movement the body made back to
your own intentions, it was not you. This is very similar to how you would learn to distinguish
between you and your tulpa’s thoughts, so a lot of the same advice applies.

- I keep accidentally taking back control of the body while my tulpa possesses
There are multiple reasons as to why this might happen. You may be anxious or fearful about
something, either related to possession or not, which makes you instinctively take hold of the
body again in order to be capable of dealing with the situation. It is difficult to let go of control,
especially for long periods of time, if you are anxious for any reason. You will need to identify
what is making you anxious and work on lessening the anxiety surrounding that thing.

On the other hand, this may happen if you are thinking about and wanting to do things using
the physical body. For example, let’s say that while your tulpa is possessing there is a cookie
sitting next to you, and you are wanting to eat it. Your tulpa might be typing at the computer,
not paying any attention to the cookie, but because you want it you may accidentally take
control of the body to grab it. One way to combat this is to tell your tulpa whenever you feel
the need to do something using the body and ask if they can do it for you. Assuming that you
are connected to the senses while your tulpa is possessing, you would be able to experience
whatever it is despite the fact that your tulpa is doing it. Alternatively, if you can parallel
process, you can direct your attention towards something in the mindscape or think about
something else as a way to distract yourself from wanting to do things in the real world.

- My tulpa becomes exhausted after possession or has trouble possessing for long periods
of time
This is common among tulpas who are still new to possession, and happens simply because
they are using their mind in a way they are not yet used to. This will go away with time, but if
you and your tulpa would like to avoid this in the meantime you should temporarily cut back on
the duration of time your tulpa possesses for. Find a length of time where your tulpa finds they
aren’t exhausted afterwards, and gradually make that duration longer. This will build your
tulpa’s endurance.

- My tulpa is uncomfortable when using the body or feels as if it is “unwieldy”

You have two options if this is happening to your tulpa. Your tulpa can spend more time being
connected to the body’s senses when they are not possessing it, as a way of getting used to
how it feels. If your tulpa tends to spend most of their time in the mindscape when not
possessing, have them cut down on their time in the mindscape and replace it with time being
aware of the body. Or, they can temporarily change their imagined form into something that is
very similar to your own body, as a way of getting used to it without having to give up on time
in the mindscape.

Switching
Switching is possession, except with a change in the host’s consciousness. With possession, the
host will not feel very different from usual. They will be fully conscious and present, aware of
the outside world, the body, and everything the tulpa is doing while possessing. However, with
switching, the host will experience a significant change in awareness or thinking while the
tulpa is in control of the body. It usually involves becoming less aware of the body and outside
world in some way, or becoming less of a prominent presence than your tulpa. Switching can
mean different things that depend on how your system functions and what you intend to
experience. I will explain a few different types of switching. I will refer to these different types
as “backseat switching”, “mindscape switching”, and “blackout switching.” Keep in mind that
what you experience may not fall strictly into one of these categories, and instead may be a
blend of two or something completely different from what is described here.

Here is an analogy to help understand the differences between these types of switching.
Imagine that the body is a car, and you and your tulpa’s consciousnesses are people in the car.
Normally, when your tulpa is not controlling the body, you are in the driver’s seat. During
possession, your tulpa will be in the driver’s seat, and you will be in the front passenger seat.
Your tulpa will be driving the car, but you will also be there clearly seeing everything from that
frontal position, and you can quickly reach over and grab the steering wheel at any time. With
backseat switching, you will instead be in the back seat of the car - you can still see the road
ahead, but not quite as clearly as your tulpa can, and you can’t quickly reach and grab the
steering wheel. With mindscape switching, you will be in the back seat but seldom paying
attention to what’s outside, instead drifting off in a half-conscious daydream as can so easily
happen during those long car rides. Finally, with blackout switching, you will be in the trunk of
the car. You will have no windows to see out of, no idea what’s going on or where the car is
going.

Because of this change in the “position” of your consciousness during switching, it may be
harder or slower for you to take back control of the body than it would be during possession.
When switched, your tulpa may be able to block you from taking control of the body, just like
you would be able to block your tulpa from doing so when you are in control of the body. For
this reason, trust is a very important prerequisite for switching, and so is reliable
communication. If you do not fully trust your tulpa to “step into your shoes” and handle things
in your daily life, you will need to work on that. If you have spotty communication, you will
need to work on that too. It is best if your tulpa has had ample experience with full body
possession before attempting switching.

The differences in body mannerisms and physiological traits that were mentioned earlier may
be more prevalent with switching than they are with possession. This is because the host will
be much more “out of the way” with switching, so your consciousness will have less of an
influence on the body.

- Backseat switching
With this type of switching, the host will experience themselves becoming less prominent and
“dominant” than the tulpa. The tulpa will have a greater and stronger presence, sometimes
with clearer and louder thoughts, while the host’s mind takes a “backseat.” The host will still be
conscious, but may feel “weaker” than the tulpa and have a harder time forming complex lines
of thought than usual. The host may still be aware of the body and the outside world, but their
senses may be less sharp than usual and they will have less of an ability to grab control of the
body.

This is much what it is like to be a tulpa when not in control of the body, it is a lot like
“swapping places” where the tulpa experiences things in the way a host typically does, and the
host experiences things in the way a tulpa typically does.

- Learning backseat switching

What you will be doing here is “shrinking” your own awareness and presence while your tulpa
grows and strengthens their awareness and presence. There are many ways of doing this. I’ll go
over a couple methods. If your tulpa has a lot of experience with full body possession, there is a
good chance that you have already experienced backseat switching at least once without
knowing it, so you may already have a foothold in this.

- Push out method

Your tulpa should first take control of the entire body through possession. Now, they should
start doing something that they enjoy doing. The more enthusiastic and engaged they are, the
better. For instance, playing their favorite video game, or texting a friend. It is best if the activity
is one that your tulpa is more interested in than you are. Make sure it doesn’t require your
involvement in any way. While doing this, your tulpa should avoid thoughts and reminders of
you. They shouldn’t talk to you or think about you. Do not help them with anything or comment
on what they’re doing. The less thinking you do, the better. This intense engagement of theirs
will take much of the brain’s resources, pushing you out of the frontal mental position. Your
tulpa is now the brain’s first priority and you are the brain’s second priority. You can still think
while in this secondary mental position, but don’t do that too much when you’re first practicing
this.

- Essence relocation method

In the “your first forcing session” section of this guide, I mentioned that a system member’s
presence may have a particular unique feeling or “essence” attached to it. If you do not already
have experience doing so, identify and clearly define your essence and your tulpa’s essence.
Follow the advice given earlier on how to feel an essence.
As you notice how these essences feel, write down anything noteworthy. Especially pay
attention to how they are different from one another so you can form more of a clear division
and compartmentalization between them in your mind, as that is useful for switching. A mental
presence can come along with a lot of sensory and symbolic elements. Maybe your tulpa’s
essence is yellow and yours is blue. Maybe yours feels like water whereas theirs feels like
electricity. Maybe theirs feels like it is vibrating rapidly while yours is slow and smooth. Maybe
a certain emotion is heavily present in their essence, but less so in your essence. You may not
be able to describe everything you feel in words (this is how it is in my experience, some of it is
very abstract and doesn’t translate into language) but still pay close attention to those abstract
aspects as well. Ask your tulpa to partake in this exercise along with you, paying attention to
what you notice as well as chiming in with any discoveries of their own.

Also pay attention to how “large” or “strong” your essence is in comparison to your tulpa’s
essence, as well as if it tends to be in a different “location” than your tulpa’s essence. For
instance, some feel as if their thoughts and presence are located in a more “central” place,
whereas the tulpa’s thoughts and presence are more off to the side.

Now, once you have a good idea of how both feel and have a sense of clear distinction between
the two, you and your tulpa should work together to symbolically “move” and reconfigure your
essences so that your tulpa’s is larger, stronger, and in a more central location, taking the place
that your consciousness typically resides in. Your tulpa should put more effort and thought into
this than you do, leading the way instead of following along.

Let’s say that your tulpa’s essence is symbolized with a yellow orb of light and yours is
symbolized with a blue orb of light. The yellow orb should move away from the side of the head
and into the center of the head, while growing larger. It may also be helpful for your tulpa to
visualize their essence, and any colors/symbols associated with it, spreading and flowing
throughout the whole body, into every limb, like liquid light. As your tulpa pushes their
essence into these places, you may feel it grow stronger and easier to notice. Whatever
attributes you felt earlier, they may become exaggerated. Throughout this process your tulpa
should assert to themselves things along the lines of “I am here, I am strong, I am in control, the
body belongs to me right now, I am at the forefront.”

Meanwhile, allow the blue orb to fall out of the central location, making room for the yellow
orb to take its previous place. Imagine yourself symbolically “letting go” of and retracting from
your previous position, simply calmly floating away. Being calm is all that is needed, but
meditation or trance can make this easier. Your tulpa should now do something they enjoy to
help themselves stay within the frontal mental position. As for you, just sit back and relax as a
passenger. As with the previous method, don’t think too much until your tulpa is more
experienced with holding onto the frontal mental position.

- Mindscape switching
This is when the host redirects their attention to the mindscape and loses most or all awareness
of the body and outside world. They will likely experience the mindscape in the same way a
tulpa would because they have “swapped places” with the tulpa and are in a “tulpa-like” state
of being. Some tulpas actually experience the mindscape in a much more vivid and immersive
way than their host typically does, because of less attachment and focus towards the physical
body’s senses.

If a host enters the mindscape while the tulpa controls the body, the host will often experience
the mindscape in an unusually vivid way, just as the tulpa does. Your tulpa likely will not be
aware of what you are doing while in the mindscape unless they choose to pay attention to
you. Note that some amount of parallel processing and the ability to dissociate from your
physical senses is needed in order for this to happen.

You may have already unintentionally experienced some dissociation with backseat switching. If
you felt disconnected from your body at any point, like you were not entirely “in” it, or you lost
awareness of one or more of the body’s senses, that was dissociation.

- Learning mindscape switching

First, enter backseat switching as a preliminary step. Now, this time you’re going to need to do
a bit more than just relax as a passenger, but try not to slip back into the frontal mental
position. Like with everything involving switching, let your tulpa lead the way. And remember,
your expectations of what will happen can massively influence what actually happens.

You might remember the section giving instructions on connecting to the body’s senses.
Dissociation is the exact opposite of that. It is removing your association and connection to all
of the five senses your body is experiencing. The mindset to take on here is the idea that these
five senses are not you, or attached to you in any way - they are just something the body is
experiencing. You are your consciousness, not the body. So, your consciousness can move away
from these senses. You can choose to detach. There are many ways to go about doing this, but
it all starts with relaxation. When you are tense, it’s harder to dissociate. Use whatever
relaxation technique works well for you. Hypnosis, meditation, etc.

Now, you and your tulpa should both enter the mindscape. Some special symbolic method
(such as a portal leading to the mindscape or visualizing your soul temporarily exiting your
body) can help with dissociation. Even though your tulpa isn’t focused on the body while doing
this, they should still remain in the frontal mental position. Next, find something engaging to do
in the mindscape with a pre-planned set of goals and objectives, for the purpose of keeping you
anchored into the mindscape. Your tulpa should stay here for a little while with you to help get
you immersed. Perhaps they can guide you through an exercise to help you vividly see, hear
and feel the mindscape environment. This helps you dissociate and detach from the outside
world. Then, they should slowly start to re-focus on the body - while expecting that you will
not “follow” them. You should remain immersed in whatever you are doing in the mindscape,
and always have some idea of what you’re going to do next so you don’t drift back to the
physical body out of boredom. The “slowly” aspect here is important, because you don’t want
to be jolted back to awareness of the body along with your tulpa.

Your tulpa, now refocused on the external world, should do something low-effort for a short
time and then check back in on you to give you another “boost” of attention. Then, they should
return to the external world again. Your tulpa should repeat this over and over, slightly
increasing the duration they leave you alone each time.

If you start to see, hear or feel anything going on in the outside world, just think about what to
do next in the mindscape. It helps if your tulpa isn’t up to anything too exciting out there at
first. If the mindscape is all you care about at the moment, the experiences you have here will
completely override any need to peek at the outside world. With practice, your experiences and
sensory input in the mindscape will become completely disconnected from the experiences
your tulpa is having in the body. You’ll be in your own world isolated from what is going on out
there until your tulpa calls you back. It’s ok if it feels strange, this tends to be a dream-like
experience. Just flow along with it and have fun.

- Blackout switching
This is when the host goes completely unconscious while the tulpa is in control of the body. It
will be the same as when a tulpa goes unconscious, and will happen for the same reasons. This
is unlikely to happen accidentally unless your tulpa is not paying any attention to you and you
are not making any efforts to stay awake. You may later regain consciousness randomly on your
own at any time, or your tulpa may need to reach out to you in order for you to wake up. If you
and your tulpa share all memories, you will automatically gain knowledge of everything your
tulpa did as soon as you regain consciousness, but if not, your tulpa should inform you of
anything important that happened while you were away.

- Learning blackout switching

Like with mindscape switching, this also involves dissociation. But, the goal here isn’t to jump
into an imagined dream-like world, but rather to skip that step and instead float into
unconsciousness. The first steps are to enter backseat switching, and then relax and use your
preferred method of dissociation.

It is nearly impossible to go unconscious (other than by sleeping) when you are associated with
the body’s senses, as that gives you a persistent stream of sensory input, so this is why
dissociation is necessary for blackout switching.

Once dissociated, you might find yourself in your mindscape if you’ve practiced mindscape
switching. Instead of finding something to do, just lie down somewhere comfortable, or maybe
enter an area that is meant to deprive you of distractions. Even if you’re not very tired, focus on
what it feels like to be tuckered out at the end of a long day and fall deeper into that feeling.

Meanwhile, your tulpa should be focused on the outside world, but relaxing like you are. Just
without the intention to fall asleep. After some time, you will fall asleep while your tulpa stays
awake. If your tulpa finds themselves falling asleep along with you, they should find a low-effort
distraction. Your tulpa should not check on you to see if you are asleep or not, in fact it is best if
they think about you as little as possible during this time, as thinking about you too much may
accidentally wake you up. After a while, they can do whatever they want while you are asleep.
There have likely been many times where you were awake while your tulpa was unconscious
- very few tulpas are awake every minute their host is awake, and this works exactly the
same, just with reversed roles.

- Permanent switching
Permanent switching refers to a long term or indefinite switch of the roles between a host and
tulpa. The tulpa will become the primary person controlling the body and living daily life, taking
on the role that the host used to occupy, whereas the host will become more like a typical
tulpa, being a passenger and not piloting the body most of the time. There is some controversy
and misconceptions surrounding this in the tulpa community, so I must clarify a few things.
Permanent switching does not necessarily mean that the host will go dormant or “die.”
Permanent switching is not a hostile takeover, the host is ok with this and allows it to happen in
every single case I have seen.

The idea of such a thing is strange or undesirable to some, and I understand why. You were the
one born into the body, so it may seem like you should always be the “owner” of your body and
life. However, different systems will have different ways of structuring their lives based on
what works best for them, and some tulpas truly are best suited to be a long term pilot rather
than a passenger, and some hosts do best when taking a backseat. A tulpa might have several
goals and aspirations in the physical world, and will want the time and ability to pursue them.

It may feel tempting to pursue permanent switching purely as a way of escapism and avoiding
problems, but this is not a good idea. If there is a difficult situation in your life, there is no
guarantee that your tulpa will be better at handling it than you, and they may be subject to all
of the same problems you experience. Also, do not push your tulpa to permanently switch with
you if they are hesitant or do not feel confident with handling it. Permanent switching should
be 100% agreed upon by both parties. If you are considering it, have a thorough discussion
with your tulpa to make sure they truly, genuinely want to do it. Does your tulpa agree to
permanent switching just because they want to appease you? Your tulpa should be doing this
not only to help you, but also for themselves. Permanent switching should give them more
opportunity and freedom in life, rather than feeling only like a burden. Many tulpas are
extraordinarily selfless and making their host happy is a motivating factor for almost everything
they do, and while there is nothing wrong with this, they need to take into account their own
needs and limits as well.

Consider that your tulpa may need to pretend to be you around people who do not know that
you are plural (if their personality is very noticeably and externally different from yours.) If they
are not ok with this, permanent switching may not be right for your system.

To get used to the idea of permanent switching, your tulpa should first try controlling the body
nonstop for a week or two, taking on every aspect of daily life without any help from you. Any
necessary knowledge of work, classes, etc. should be passed onto your tulpa if it is not
automatically shared. If they handle this well, they may be ready to permanently switch. Your
tulpa might be a little worse than you at certain things due to differences in personality, and
this is ok as long as they are still capable of doing it in some capacity. They also of course may
be better than you are at certain things.

As mentioned before, permanent switching does not mean you will go dormant, unless that is
something you want. You can still stay conscious most of the time and talk to your tulpa and
watch what they are doing. And of course you can take control of the body again if you want to,
you can resume your role as a host if you and your tulpa ever change your minds.

Imposition
“Imposition” in the context of tulpamancy is the act of purposefully hallucinating your tulpa’s
form. This is different from sensory imagination. With sensory imagination, the things you are
seeing will look noticeably different from the physical world. With imposition, your tulpa will
look mostly or entirely as if they are actually physically there. However, you will still maintain
the obvious knowledge that your tulpa’s form isn’t a physical thing, so this won’t lead to
delusions or any other kind of mental dysfunction as some people worry. Imposition has fun
and exciting applications. For instance, hugging your tulpa can feel pretty much just like hugging
a physical person.

Your brain creates your perception of reality. What you see is not what is actually objectively
there, but rather your brain’s recreation of it. Everything is filtered through your brain before
it enters your perception. It’s possible to reconfigure this “filter” so that it interprets things
differently. This is why it is possible to create hallucinatory sensory experiences for yourself that
feel just as real as everything else.

Imposition can apply to any sense - sight, hearing, touch, etc. You do not have to train
imposition on all of your five senses - some achieve one or two and leave it at that. How far you
should go in imposition is dependent on what kind of experience you want to get out of it. If
you care about being able to see your tulpa but don’t care about being able to feel them, you
don’t need to work on touch imposition.

The ability to impose is partially related to the ability to visualize. If you have little ability to
have sensory experiences in your imagination, first work on that. You do not have to be a
visualization master before starting imposition, just recognize that things will not look any
different in terms of style and detail than they do when you visualize them in your mind. For
example, if you want your tulpa to look realistic when imposed but you are only able to see
them as cartoony when you visualize them in your head, they will also end up looking cartoony
when imposed. The only difference being that your brain will interpret the sight of your tulpa as
being a part of your physical vision rather than your imagination.

- Fundamentals of imposition
To get yourself used to how imposition works, it’s best to start with something more simple
than your tulpa’s form. Imagine that there is a marble in your hand. Any small and simple object
will do, but for this exercise I will use a marble. Don’t use your mindscape, imagine this marble
in your hand in the real world.

First, focus on how it feels. If you want to, you can close your eyes so you won’t be distracted
by the fact that it is not yet visually imposed. Physically move your hand as you do all of this.
Feel the cool smooth glass against your palm. Then, hold it between two fingers. Lightly
squeeze and feel the pressure. Roll it between your fingers. Toss it into the air and catch it and
feel it strike your hand as it lands. Tap your fingernail against it and feel the hard surfaces
colliding. At this point, it probably still feels more like ordinary imagination than a physical
thing, but that is the first step. Keep doing these things, and anything else that comes to mind,
for several minutes and it may progressively feel more and more real. If you have trouble, try
holding a real marble beforehand so you have memory of how it should feel fresh in your mind.

Now, pay attention to sound. Drop it on a table and hear the clatter as it bounces a couple
times. Roll it and hear the glass against the table as it moves. Drop it on a soft surface and hear
the dull thud.

Finally, the visual aspect. Think of a rough idea of how you want it to look. It can just be a copy
of a real marble you have if you want. Stare at the marble in your hand while expecting that it
will get progressively more and more vivid. Look through the glass and watch how it distorts
light. See the colored swirls. See the partially transparent shadow it casts. Hold it between your
fingers and rotate it. Hold it in a shadow and watch the shadow shroud the colors. Hold it in
front of a window and watch light beam through. Again, look at a real marble beforehand if you
have trouble with this.

For all of these exercises, it helps greatly to assume that you will hear/see/feel things
automatically rather than always deliberately and consciously bringing the sensations.

Repeat all of these exercises with objects of different sizes, shapes, textures, and weights. For
example: A squishy foam ball, a bouncy rubber ball, a heavy steel ball, a wooden cube, feathers,
fur, scales, water, sand, etc. Work your way up to more and more advanced shapes with many
different parts. For instance, a quartz cluster with several points and complex shapes.

You can easily practice imposition on the go in your everyday life. Look at random objects
around you at school or work and imagine how they would feel to hold, and how they would
look if you picked them up and rotated them. Integrating imposition into your everyday
activities is the fastest way to improve.

I suggest imposing an object on a place that you are frequently near, such as your desk,
nightstand, or windowsill. Intend to keep it there, and assert that it will always be there. Let’s
say that you impose a crystal on your desk. At first, you’ll need to deliberately focus on it to
notice it. While you are working or browsing the internet, take a moment to look over at it
every once in awhile to assert the fact that the crystal is there. The more often you do this, the
better. If you have trouble remembering to think about it, put a physical object that reminds
you of the imposed object near that spot. Over time it will become more and more permanent
and stable and you may begin to notice it out of the corner of your eye when you weren’t
even trying to see it. It will become a regular part of your desk just like every other object and
decoration. You can take this up another notch by imposing something that is always with you -
for instance a bracelet on your wrist, or even a new extension to your body such as a tail or
wings.

You may ask “At what point does this stop being imagination and start being imposition?” The
answer is that there isn’t a clear dividing line between the two, because they are opposite ends
of the same spectrum. Things will gradually transition from looking like your ordinary
imagination to looking more indistinguishable from physical objects. Here are some telltale
signs that you are achieving imposition:

- You start sometimes noticing imposed objects when you were not thinking about them
and not intending to see them. Occasionally their presence surprises you.
- They start to become less transparent and more opaque. Your mind prioritizes the
imposed object more than it does the physical stuff behind the object, so your
perception of things behind the object starts to be ignored. It will look less “ghostly” and
more solid, probably not entirely solid at first though.
- You glance at an imposed object, and for just a second mistake it for a physical object.
This is more likely to happen if it does not look out of place. For instance, an imposed
book next to real books.

- Visual imposition
Now that you’ve practiced, it’s time to move on to imposing your tulpa’s form. It’s ok if you
didn’t quite start actually hallucinating those imposed objects, because that was just practice.
You can work on different types of imposition (visual, tactile, auditory, etc.) in any order (or
even all at once!) but I’ll go over visual imposition first.

First, spend some time with your tulpa in the mindscape, while paying extra attention to the
visuals and your tulpa’s form. Keep it up for however long it takes for your visualization to get
to it’s best point. Now, imagine a symbolic portal in the mindscape leading to the real world.
Ask your tulpa to step through the portal, and now open your eyes. Visualize the portal in the
real world and watch your tulpa step through. Because you had just been visualizing your
tulpa’s form, the vividness and detail may carry over to your open eyed visualization.

It is best if your tulpa retains control over their imposed form, the same way they control their
form in the mindscape. If you want to see them in a certain pose, ask them to move instead of
puppeting them around.
From here on out, this involves simply repetitively and consistently looking at their form
overlaid onto the real world with the mindset that it is apart of your environment and
therefore should look like your environment. This is the difference in mindset (as opposed to
ordinary visualization) that will lead to your tulpa’s form looking more like a tangible thing. Just
like with the object imposition practice earlier, incorporating this into your everyday life is the
fastest key to success. Assume that you will see your tulpa walking around as a regular part of
your existence. Passively practicing imposition while doing other things is important, but you
can also benefit from active forcing sessions dedicated fully to imposition, where you really zero
in on every detail of the form instead of just passively glancing. Hypnosis is notably useful for
imposition, so try writing a script for yourself or performing self hypnosis.

When nobody else is around, you can immerse yourself into the the idea of “my tulpa is a
tangible part of my environment” by doing things such as holding doors open for your tulpa,
moving stuff off of a couch so they have room to sit next to you, and trying to avoid walking
through them. If you treat them as corporeal, your brain’s sensory perception of them will
adjust itself in accordance with those actions.

Here is a very interesting aspect of imposition. While imposed, your tulpa may see and feel
things from the first person perspective of their form outside of your body. Explanations
behind this phenomenon vary. For example, this could be the result of their mind artificially
generating what they expect to see from that position. Or, if you have metaphysical beliefs, this
could be interpreted to mean that their soul/consciousness is actually outside of the physical
body while they are imposed, so they do not solely rely on the body in order to perceive things.
Either way, this can be a fun experience. You can also impose yourself in this manner while your
tulpa is controlling the body.

- Tactile imposition
Next up, touch imposition. It is a good idea to practice this in tandem with visual imposition,
simultaneously feeling and looking at their form, as the two support and intensify one another.

Start by touching real objects that feel similar to your tulpa’s form. If your tulpa has a human
form, you can just touch your own skin. If they’ve got fur, touch a pet, fake fur, or a fluffy article
of clothing.

Right afterwards, hold that memory in mind and physically reach out to your tulpa’s form. Keep
temperature in mind as well. Unless they are a robot, they’ll probably be around your body
temperature. Run your hand over the form, moving your hand in accordance with the size,
shape and contour. Really treat it as a physical thing. Push on the form to feel the pressure
against your hand. Deliberately make your hand stop as it pushes to impose a sense of solidity
and resistance. With practice, your unconscious may actually stop your hand from going any
further when it makes contact with your tulpa’s form. Unless your tulpa is a 50 foot tall
dragon, you can also try picking them up. Deliberately tense your muscles to give yourself the
sense that you are holding something that actually has weight.

Ask your tulpa to jump on you, lean on you, hug you, poke you, etc. and take note of what you
feel. Touch imposition should eventually work both ways - you will automatically feel your tulpa
when you reach out to touch them, and you will also automatically feel them when they reach
out to touch you. Ask your tulpa to occasionally surprise you with sudden pokes or hugs. If you
sometimes feel them when you were not expecting it, that is a strong indicator that you are
succeeding.

- Auditory imposition
Auditory imposition will allow you to hear your tulpa’s voice like an external sound, rather than
something you hear inside your head. They can be heard just like a physical person, with the
same level of volume and clarity.

To transition from hearing your tulpa inside your head to hearing them externally, the trick is
to impose a sense of noise and vibration impacting your eardrums. When your tulpa speaks
normally via thoughts, there is probably no sensation in your eardrums. Play some music at a
(comfortably) loud volume and pay attention to all of the subtle sensations in your ears. You
may not be able to physically feel the vibration of your eardrums, but there will be a noticeable
quality within sound from an external source that differentiates it from internal noise in your
mind. Hold this feeling in mind.

First, your tulpa should be imposed or visualized somewhere in your physical space, and you
should assert to yourself “My tulpa is outside of me, so anything I hear from them will come
from them standing over there. Not inside my head.” If your tulpa is standing to your right,
expect that their voice will be heard primarily in your right ear. If they’re on your left, expect it
to be heard on the left side. As they speak, imagine their voice travelling through the air and
hitting your eardrums. Ask them to speak in different volumes, and to walk around and try
talking from different distances. Ask them to run around you in circles while making noise and
pay attention to the sound as it changes location. From here on out, this just involves a lot of
practice and repetition. If you have trouble with certain sounds, try finding sound clips or voice
clips that match up with your tulpa.

- Olfactory imposition
Finally, the sense of smell. If your tulpa has some kind of scent, this can add a lot of dimension
and realness to their presence. When you’re next to a physical person, they likely have a subtle
smell and we actually expect this to be the case.

I suggest finding a scented object - a candle, a perfume, a fruit, etc. that most closely aligns with
what you want your tulpa’s scent to be. You probably don’t want something too overpowering
since this will be something you’ll smell on a daily basis once it is imposed, so keep it at a bit of
a distance so you can only lightly smell it. Keep it around while spending time with your tulpa
(and put it away when your tulpa isn’t present) so you start to form an association between the
scent and your tulpa. Keep this up for awhile, maybe a couple weeks. Then, completely stop
using the scented object. Because of the association your mind has formed, you might start to
automatically hallucinate that smell when your tulpa is present, it will be tied to their presence.

Miscellaneous Information

Multiple tulpas
At some point you may consider creating more than one tulpa. A second tulpa will be easier to
create than your first one was, developing in a fraction of the time it took for your first one. This
is because you have already been through the process of creating a tulpa once - your brain has
been “broken in” to the process, the pathways that facilitate plurality have already been paved.
If your first tulpa took months to begin speaking, your second tulpa may start speaking within
only a few days.

Having more than one tulpa can be a good thing as it gives your first tulpa someone else to
interact with in the system besides yourself. This can add more diversity and excitement to your
system. Additionally, they may be able to spend time together in the mindscape, rather than
your tulpa being alone in the mindscape when you are not around. Still, you might feel perfectly
fine with just one tulpa and plenty of tulpas find just their host’s company to be enough.

I would recommend waiting until your first tulpa is developed to the point where they regularly
and easily communicate with you before you start creating a second. Developing your first tulpa
is enough work on its own - you run the risk of overwhelming yourself if your first and second
tulpas are both in their early stages of development simultaneously. This goes for any
subsequent tulpas as well - make sure that all of your existing tulpas are decently developed
and are being given adequate time and attention before you start creating another. Always
prioritize quality over quantity.
Try to stick to a number of tulpas that you are able to handle. This number varies dramatically
from person to person - some struggle with any more than just one and others can handle a
dozen with little trouble. The amount of tulpas you can reasonably handle largely depends on
how much time and energy you have to dedicate to them. If you have a very busy and
demanding life outside of tulpamancy you should probably never go beyond a small number of
tulpas, such as two or three. Otherwise you might end up in a situation where some tulpas are
neglected and get very little time to be present and live their lives. However, there is an
exception to this: You can handle both a busy life and several tulpas so long as the majority of
your tulpas are fairly self sufficient. If your tulpas can maintain themselves, you will not need to
have as much time dedicated to them. This relates to their ability to parallel process or share
your processing power. Or, you can learn to become very good at passive forcing while doing
other things and focusing on multiple tulpas at once. Large systems can benefit from creating a
switching or forcing schedule to make sure everyone gets their fair share of time.

Walk-ins
A “walk in” is a tulpa that simply appears, popping into existence on their own without being
consciously created or forced. They may be vocal from the very start. They may not be
desirable because they come as a surprise, not being planned or expected. This is especially
true for those who want to keep their number of tulpas to a minimum. On the other hand, they
may be welcomed and celebrated if one does not mind the spontaneous addition of a new
member to the system. It is unlikely that you will have a walk in unless you have naturally high
plural susceptibility and have already purposefully created a tulpa.

It is important to realize that not everything that appears to be a new tulpa actually is a tulpa.
Intrusive thoughts are often mistaken for new tulpas because intrusive thoughts can sometimes
masquerade as sentient beings - an intrusive thought consisting of an unfamiliar voice talking or
the sight of a new entity wandering around in the mindscape can easily be mistaken for a new
tulpa. However, an intrusive thought that did not begin as a real tulpa may turn into a real tulpa
if given continued attention after their initial appearance.

Less often, walk-ins are real tulpas as soon as they appear. This is more likely if said walk-in
previously existed as a character or imaginary friend of yours, as there has to be something to
start their existence. It can sometimes be difficult to tell the difference between a walk-in and
an intrusive thought. Some things to ask yourself are:

- Does it appear more than once?

- Does it ever appear spontaneously without you thinking about it beforehand?
 - Can you feel a presence or a sense of “depth” coming from it, something that makes it
feel more important and noticeable than a character or typical intrusive thought?
- Does its personality and manner of acting stay mostly consistent?

If you answered yes to 3-4 of these things, it is more likely that they are a tulpa. If not, it is
probably nothing more than an intrusive thought.

You and your established system members should have the final say in what you do and don’t
“let in” to your system. Don’t feel obligated to accept something just because it shows some
signs of possibly being sentient. If you allow walk-ins and intrusive thoughts to get out of hand,
your system size may spiral out of control before you know it. Don’t be afraid to put your foot
down.

- Preventing walk-ins
If you don’t want to have walk-ins, there are multiple ways of preventing them. The best way of
doing this is to get rid of any sort of expectation that you may have a walk-in. It may help to
know that there are more tulpamancers who never have walk-ins than those that do. Plenty of
people who have had tulpas for years have never had even a single walk-in. Alternatively, you
can use symbolism to prevent them from appearing. Imagine a force field, fence or wall of
some sort surrounding the entire perimeter of your mindscape, acting as a barrier to stop
anything from the “outside” getting in.

If a walk-in ends up appearing regardless, it is best to get rid of it before it develops any further.
It may be nothing more than an intrusive thought at this point - you should prevent it from
sticking around so it does not become sentient. This is done by simply ignoring the walk-in as
soon as you notice it. Do not talk to it, do not look at it, and immediately distract yourself with
something else to prevent yourself from thinking about it. If deprived of all attention, it will
cease to exist before long. You can use symbolism to drive the point home - imagine the walk in
being cast out of the mindscape.

Dissipation
“Dissipation” refers to the long term or permanent dismantling and dissolving of the
“container” or “hub” that creates a person’s individual identity and sense of separation. The
consciousness that “filled” this hub still exists, but has returned to its undifferentiated state or
has reintegrated into yourself. Consciousness itself can’t be “destroyed,” but an ego/identity
can be. It is only the container that has been dismantled and it is possible for it to be rebuilt. It
can be viewed as a type of non-physical death.
It is possible for this to happen to any member of a system, hosts included. This is something
that helps hosts realize that they are not any more “real” than a tulpa is. However, the more
developed an identity is, the more difficult it is for it to dissipate. Because a host’s mind will
have been around for the longest, it will be the most firmly implanted into the brain and will be
relatively difficult to dissipate compared to the average tulpa. However, a tulpa can be just as
difficult to dissipate as a host if they are well developed and have been around for years.

This means that not yet well developed tulpas are most prone to dissipation. Tulpas that rely
entirely on their host’s attention to function may dissipate if their host stops paying attention to
them for a very long time. This is yet another reason why it is important to force consistently,
and why self-sufficiency in tulpas is important.

It is usually impossible for a system member to dissipate if they are constantly anchored to the
physical body’s senses, as fronting gives them a persistent and guaranteed stream of sensory
input and mental stimulation. In order to be able to dissipate, they will likely need to become
unconscious and unaware of the outside world while another system member controls the
body. This is why dissipation is especially relevant to plurality - it is usually not feasible if there
is only one mind in the brain, as there will be nobody to switch with.

There has been debate in the tulpa community as to whether dissipation in some cases can be
irreversible, as in the dissipated system member is impossible to revive even with significant
effort, or in 100% of cases is reversible. People have had experiences that support both of these
possibilities. Some find that when attempting to revive a dissipated tulpa, they end up
inadvertently creating an entirely different tulpa, and are unable to recover the original one.
Others find that even after months or years of a tulpa being dissipated, they are able to bring
them back, and they are exactly the same as they were before. A third outcome that some have
experienced is their original tulpa returning, but their personality having changed or their level
of development having regressed. For example, if the tulpa could easily communicate with their
host prior to dissipation, after being revived they may find that communication is difficult, as if
they were a young tulpa again.

Based on these experiences, it seems likely that the extended inactivity of a mind often leads to
it regressing and becoming “weaker”, and in rare cases, disappearing entirely. This means that
while dissipation is usually reversible, it will still carry undesirable effects if it is long term. If a
tulpa of yours has dissipated and you want to bring them back, for best results revive them as
soon as possible.

How to revive dissipated tulpas

How do you revive a tulpa who has gone inactive? The answer is simple - talk to them, pay
attention to them, and conduct forcing sessions just as you did to bring them into existence.
The same process used to start their existence will bring them back. The longer they have been
inactive, the longer it will take for them to return. A tulpa who has been dormant for only a few
days or weeks will likely return almost immediately, while one who has been gone for months
or years will probably take at least a few days of effort to revive.

Why dissipate a tulpa?

There are many reasons why a tulpa may end up dissipating, and it can be either intentional or
accidental. If a host completely loses interest in tulpamancy or for any other reason entirely
stops giving their tulpas attention, the tulpas will eventually dissipate if they are not self
sufficient. This will take a very long time if said tulpas are well developed. On the other hand, a
host may decide to dissipate their tulpa purposefully. Depending on the reasons behind this
decision, it is not always ethical and may not be the best possible option. Rarely, dissipation is
necessary.

If you feel like you want to dissipate a tulpa of yours, it is very important to examine your
reasoning, explore other possible options, and only turn to dissipation as a last resort. Cases
where dissipation is truly the best option are fairly rare - there are usually better alternatives
that the host may not consider. Ask yourself the following questions:

- Why do you want to dissipate them?

Examples of unreasonable motivations would be wanting to do this because you are bored with
them, something they do is a mild annoyance, you want to replace them with another tulpa,
they didn’t live up to your expectations, or they made a small mistake of some sort. Tulpas are
not perfect and may not always have a purely positive effect on your life - and in most cases,
this is ok. In these instances you should deal with the situation in the same way you would deal
with a close physical friend of yours doing the same thing. Cutting someone out of your life
permanently is a weighty decision and should not be done in response to trivial issues. On the
other hand, a reasonable motivation behind wanting to dissipate a tulpa would be the unlikely
circumstance that your tulpa is causing you significant distress or impairing your ability to
function normally in daily life for a long period of time, while not showing any willingness to
stop. There are some things you should not be obligated to put up with.

- Why is your tulpa doing what they’re doing?

If your tulpa is causing severe issues for you, there is probably a significant reason behind it. Are
they acting out in response to something negative or harmful you have done? If so, think about
whatever it is you did and how it may have motivated your tulpa to do whatever it is they are
doing now. If it is an ongoing behavior of yours that is causing your tulpa to act this way, you
will need to stop immediately. If it is something you have done in the past, you will need to
apologize and make a commitment to never doing it again. Once your tulpa understands that
you are sorry and will do better in the future, they will likely stop whatever behavior is making
you consider dissipating them.

If they are acting out for no apparent reason, ask them why they are doing it. They may not be
sure themselves or unwilling to talk to you about it - if this is the case, continue trying to engage
with them and give it some time. Tulpas will rarely ever be malicious or disruptive just for the
sake of being malicious or disruptive. There will be some kind of deeper reason behind it.

- What options do you have?

One option to consider is “stasis” - stasis is “pausing” your tulpa, putting them into temporary
dormancy. This is best kept to a duration of no more than a few months to avoid too much
developmental regression. After keeping your tulpa in stasis for some time, you may find that
they have, in a way, “reset” after bringing them back. They may have stopped whatever they
were doing and returned to a calmer state.

Another thing you can do is telling your tulpa about what sort of effects their behavior is having
on your life. Some tulpas may not be entirely aware of how bad the effects of what they are
doing are until you tell them. Once they become more aware of this, they may stop. Always
make sure your tulpa is aware of the full extent of the situation before resorting to dissipation.

Always keep in mind that communication is key to defusing these situations. If you are not
properly communicating with your tulpa and being open, it will not get better, possibly leading
you to believe dissipation is the only option when in reality, you simply need to work on your
communication and relationship management skills.

How to dissipate a tulpa

Hopefully you will never have to use this advice, but there are rare cases where dissipation is
the only viable option, and in these cases it is important that you know how to do it properly.
There are right and wrong ways to go about dissipation. This approach will focus on doing it in
the most ethical way possible, minimizing pain for both you and your tulpa.

1. Inform your tulpa that you are going to dissipate them, and explain why
A mistake that many hosts make is failing to tell their tulpa that they are going to be dissipated.
Without being informed of this, the tulpa may not know what is happening and may be
confused. It is also a good idea to let them know that dissipation is not always permanent, so it
is possible for them to return in the future if you choose to bring them back. You should still do
these things even if for any reason you feel as if they aren’t listening or don’t understand.

2. Have a formal goodbye

Say any parting words you might have for your tulpa. It is a good idea to have a formal goodbye
rather than skipping straight to dissipating them, as this will symbolically cement into your mind
the fact that your tulpa is leaving. You can also do something such as visualizing your tulpa
leaving the mindscape. Do not visualize your tulpa being hurt or killed as a way of using
symbolism here, as that is not necessary and would be pointlessly unpleasant for your tulpa.

3. Stop interacting with and paying attention to your tulpa

This is where dissipation will start. You will need to entirely stop talking to your tulpa or doing
anything else where your attention is directed towards them. This may be harder than it seems
at first, especially if your tulpa has been around for a long time and paying attention to them
has become a habit for you. If you have other tulpas, spend more time interacting with them as
a way of distracting yourself from thinking about the tulpa you are dissipating.

4. Ignore any attempts to interact

Your tulpa may attempt to stick around after you stop paying attention to them. If they are well
developed and self sufficient, they may be very good at doing so. But, no matter what they do,
it is important to not acknowledge them. If they say something to you, don’t respond. Distract
yourself with other things whenever they try to get your attention if necessary. Once you have
gone a long time - at least a few months in a row - without seeing any sign of your tulpa, it is
safe to assume that they have been dissipated and will not return unless you choose to bring
them back.

Life with a tulpa

Your life isn’t quite the same as it was before. You’ve got an additional voice in your head that
chimes in. Maybe you’ve got a bustling mental landscape full of adventure. Maybe you “tag-
team” life by taking turns piloting the body. You’re rarely alone now, and a life where you don’t
share your head with someone else might seem unthinkable. Because things are so different
now, what comes next and what needs to be considered?

- Should you tell others about your tulpa?

Chances are that your tulpa has become an extremely prevalent part of your life, and you’ve
put a lot of time and passion into this practice. For this reason, you might feel compelled to tell
people in your life about your tulpa. Although the idea of sharing your experience with others is
exciting, you need to tread carefully.
Although tulpamancy is just an everyday reality for you by now, it is a very weird, foreign, and
sometimes even dangerous sounding concept to many people who have never heard of it
before. It is very easy for people to gain misconceptions about tulpas, especially if they are the
type of person to be fearful towards unusual ideas in general. You could put yourself in a very
unpleasant and possibly even dangerous situation by telling the wrong person. Unfortunately,
some can have a very extreme and unwarranted reaction to learning you participate in this,
because they perceive it to be dangerous or just too strange. They may cut off contact with you,
demand that you stop tulpamancy, or make life more difficult for you if they can. You may not
know anyone who would do this, and if so, that’s excellent. But, these warnings are necessary
for those who aren’t as lucky.

First, think about whether the person you want to tell has a history of being accepting towards
things that are generally regarded as being outside of the norm. For instance, what is their view
of LGBTQ+ people? If they show bigotry or prejudice towards any harmless group or practice,
do not tell them about tulpas no matter what.

Be especially careful about telling people who have any power or influence over your
finances, housing, employment, or other basic necessities. For instance, if you are under 18 or
financially dependent on your parents/guardians, think twice before telling them. Do they have
a history of reacting drastically or cutting your access to important things (food, social
connections, etc.) if you do something harmless that they do not like? Also, depending on your
state or country’s laws, those with legal guardianship over you may be able to have you
involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital if they believe that you are suffering from a
severe mental health issue - and tulpamancy can easily be misinterpreted as DID,
schizophrenia, or psychosis if someone gains the wrong impression.

This caution should also apply to anyone you live with or have no choice but to see on a regular
basis, whether or not they have any influence over your access to basic necessities. For
example, siblings, roommates, classmates, and co-workers. Even if they have no control over
your life, being around them may become awkward and unpleasant if you tell them and they
react badly.

Consider whether the person has religious beliefs that may negatively impact their perception
of tulpas. For instance, some Christians may equate tulpas with demonic possession and believe
that the entire practice is the act of conversing with demons or evil spirits. It could also be
equated with witchcraft or other spiritual practices that go against their religion.
 - How to introduce the concept of tulpas to others
If you’ve thoroughly analyzed whether or not it would be a good idea to tell somebody, and
you’ve come to the conclusion that they are an open minded person who won’t have an
extreme negative backlash, you can now start thinking about how to bring up the topic. There is
no one objective best way to do this, and the way you approach it might vary depending on the
person you are informing, but here are some tips and ideas.

First - to test the waters - mention tulpamancy or plurality in a way that does not imply you
have a tulpa. Something along the lines of “This thing I heard about is interesting, I can’t
believe the mind is capable of something like this.” Gauge their response to that, and then
decide whether to tell them you have a tulpa yourself.

Come up with a simple and concise definition of what a tulpa is. You don’t want your
explanation to be too drawn out or confusing. Look through simple definitions of tulpas that
others have given if you’re not sure how to best define it. r/tulpas has a good and concise
introduction: “Ever wondered what it would be like to have a mental companion who can think
and act on their own?”

Bring it up in a casual and lighthearted way. Don’t set up a special time or meeting to tell them
about it, just bring it up in the middle of another conversation. If you tell them about it in a very
serious or formal manner, as if it is your darkest secret, this may cause them to be concerned
for you when they needn’t be.

It is a good idea to find a way to compare tulpamancy to something the person is already
familiar with, in order to make it more relatable and less foreign. For example, if they are a
writer, you could say “You know how you say your characters sometimes do stuff on their own
and make the story go in a direction you weren’t expecting? What if I told you that a lot of
people who aren’t writers experience something similar?”

Be sure to mention the benefits tulpamancy has brought to your life. You don’t have to go
into the nitty gritty details of all the compliments your tulpa gives you, just a general summary
of how your life has positively changed since your tulpa came into being. Don’t give the
impression that you are heavily reliant and dependent on your tulpa for everything.

It is not a good idea to talk about the more “advanced” and “intense” tulpa related practices
like switching and imposition, at least not at first. This could be an information overload for
someone who is brand new to the idea of tulpas and it could make tulpamancy seem especially
strange or difficult to believe.
If you’re lucky, they might be fascinated by tulpas/plurality and enthusiastically discuss it with
you. Though be prepared for the possibility that they might be a little bit weirded out or
doubtful that it’s real. If they don’t seem to want to talk about it more, don’t push it.

- Finding your place in the world as a tulpa

This section is written to be directed at your tulpa rather than you. Get their attention if they’re
not already present.

Welcome to the world! Whether you’re new here or not, you can probably agree that being a
tulpa is a little bit of an unusual way of existing. You’ve always shared this body with someone
else. You’ve always been in the presence of someone else’s thoughts. You didn’t exactly grow
up in the same way your host did and didn’t have the same experience of coming into being.
You just popped into existence within an already developed brain. So you don’t have all of the
same life experiences as a typical person, and that might be a little disorienting. Maybe you
have trouble finding your place in the world because of that.

But - you still have your own life, even if it is largely shared with your host. And you are your
own being, just as much of a person as they are, even if most of the world doesn’t recognize
you as such. You might even have doubts about your own sentience, which a lot of tulpas do.
But rest assured that if you are reading these words right now, you’re real. You’re conscious. If
you’re experiencing and perceiving anything at all, that means you’re here. And, if you’re
capable of questioning your sentience, you’re real. If you weren’t real, you couldn’t think.

You should know that you don’t have to follow the typical idea of what a tulpa “should” be like
if you don’t want to. I’m talking about the idea that tulpas are just companions or helpers of
sorts. Someone meant to be an assistance to their host’s life and that’s it. And if that is what
you enjoy doing, that’s great, it’s just important to know that there are other potential options
out there. You can take more of a proactive role and lead more of your own life - you can find
your own hobbies and friends, even if they’re very different from your host’s hobbies and
friends. Sharing a body with someone does mean you have to compromise on a lot of life, but
you should get a slice of the pie too.

Spend some time dabbling in different hobbies. Drawing, woodworking, coding, knitting,
creative writing, learning an instrument, whatever seems fun. What if it’s totally out of the
realm of what your host would be interested in? That doesn’t matter as long as you’ve got the
time and resources for it. This is for YOU, not them. Finding your own hobby or interest that is
different from what your host normally does is an excellent way to grow your individuality and
find your own place in the world.

Don’t be afraid to talk to people online, through proxying or possession/switching. It’s a good
idea to stick to those who know what tulpas are and are accepting of your existence. Your social
circle can definitely extend beyond your system.

This is important - it is ok to ask for more time or freedom, and it is ok to have a conflict of
interests with your host, it is ok to disagree with them or express disapproval of something they
do. All of these things are an inevitable part of any long term connection, and tulpas are not
exempt from that. You are not an accessory to your host’s life, you are not an imaginary friend,
you are a person with all of the same needs. Despite your unusual circumstances of coming into
existence, you are a part of the world too.

Glossary
For your convenience, here is a glossary of terms and definitions that relate to tulpas and
plurality. Not all of the following terms are used in this guide, as not all of them are relevant to
this guide, but it still may be useful to know them as you may see other people use them.

Please be aware that the definitions here are not universally shared or agreed upon by
everyone in tulpa communities or broader plural communities. The way that I define a term
may be very different from the way someone else defines it, because of differences in opinions,
differences in personal experiences, and the tendency for the same words to develop separate
meanings in different communities.

Active forcing: Forcing while devoting all attention to the tulpa and not doing anything else at
the same time.

Alter: A term often used to refer to system members within DID systems. Note that not every
DID system uses this term.

Aphantasia: The complete lack of ability to experience sensory imagination.

Co-conscious: Two or more system members being simultaneously conscious and mentally
active, with the ability to communicate with one another in that state.

Co-fronting: Two or more system members simultaneously controlling or influencing the

physical body.
Dissociation: Experiencing a temporary disconnection from or lack of awareness of your
physical senses, identity, emotions, or any other aspect of yourself. Physical dissociation is
often used for the sake of switching and stronger mindscape immersion.

Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID): A subcategory of plurality that is classified as a mental

disorder. It is characterized by a lack of sharing necessary knowledge and memories between
system members, poor communication and cooperation between system members, and
uncontrolled and unintentional switching. DID typically forms as a result of trauma, though any
plural system that meets these criteria may be considered a DID system by mental health
professionals, regardless of the system’s origins.

Dissipation: The cessation of a system member’s presence that is permanent, or intended to be

permanent.
Synonyms: Egocide.

Dormant: When a system member is unconscious and inactive for an extended period of time.
Synonyms: Stasis.

Emotional bleedover: Feeling emotions that did not come from you and instead originated in
another system member.

Endogenic: A system member or system that formed through positive or neutral means, rather
than trauma or stress.

Forcing: The act of working to create or further develop a tulpa in any way.

Form: A system member’s appearance. Often visualized and utilized in the mindscape.

Fronting: Being mentally active and utilizing a large share of processing power, typically also
being aware of the outside world and controlling the body.
Synonyms: Frontal mental position.

Head pressure: A non-painful sensation of pressure that may be felt anywhere on the head and
is typically localized. A common sign of a tulpa developing or being present.

Host: The original person in the brain and body, existing before any tulpas or other system
members.
Synonyms: Original, forerunner.

Hypnosis: Inducing a trance for the purpose of being relatively receptive to instructions,
allowing for unusually fast and effective mental changes or immersive experiences due to the
lack of resistance or filtering.

Identity: The personality traits, preferences, mannerisms, and labels that one associates with
themselves and considers a component of themselves.
Synonyms: Ego.

Imaginary friend: An imagined being that does not display independent agency.
Synonyms: Character.

Imposition: Perceiving a system member’s form or voice externally rather than internally, as if
it were physical. Intentionally trained hallucination.

Independent agency: The capability for a system member to think and act of their own volition,
rather than being puppeted or parroted.

Intrusive thoughts: Mental images, words, or other forms of thought that arise spontaneously
and unintentionally, unconsciously generated rather than consciously directed.
Synonyms: Invasive thoughts, stray thoughts.

Isolated experience: A system member having thoughts or experiences that other system
members are not aware of.

Materialism: The belief that everything in existence, including consciousness and plurality, is
derived from and explainable by physical matter and neurology with no spiritual or
metaphysical forces present.

Median: A system that does not experience themselves as entirely distinct and separate
individuals, but rather sees themselves as parts or facets of a singular whole.

Meditation: The practice of entering a calm state in which one’s focus will remain fairly
consistent rather than rapidly changing, observing thoughts rather than being distracted by
them.

Memory separation: When memories are not shared equally among all system members.
Synonyms: Memory barrier.

Merging: When a system member experiences themselves as not separate from another
system member. Their sense of thoughts and identity may combine so that they feel like a
single person rather than separate people.
Synonyms: Blending, fusion.

Metaphysics: The concept of forces and principles that exist outside of physical matter or
currently established understandings of physics and science. For instance, the idea that
consciousness and tulpas exist as non-physical forces that can exist independently from the
body.

Mindfulness: The state of being highly observant and immersed within what one is currently
experiencing.

Mindvoice: Speaking within the mind. The voice you internally hear when you read or think in
words.

Mindscape: An imagined location that is experienced through daydreaming and sensory

imagination. The setting is often meant to stay consistent unlike a typical daydream.
Synonyms: Wonderland, headspace, inner world.

Mindscape mechanics: A consistent set of rules, principles, and operations within the
mindscape that run automatically without conscious effort after being applied.

Mixed origin system: A system comprised of members with different means of coming into
existence. For instance, traumagenic members, endogenic members, quiogenic members, and
tulpas all present within the same system.

Narration: Directing verbal thoughts towards a tulpa, as a means of developing them and giving
them stimuli before they are able to reply to you.

Paracosm: An especially large, detailed and complex mindscape, often with an accompanying
storyline.

Parallel processing: Two or more system members each thinking about or focusing on different
things at the same time.
Parroting: Pretending that a system member is speaking, intentionally putting words in their
mouth for them.

Passive forcing: Forcing while partially paying attention to the tulpa and doing other things at
the same time.

Personality forcing: The act of giving a system member a particular set of personality traits of
your own choosing.

Plurality: The state of having more than one person existing within a single brain and body.
Synonyms: Multiplicity.

Plural susceptibility: A person’s level of predisposition to developing plurality, based on many

factors.

Polyfragmented: A system with an unusually large number of members, typically numbering in

the hundreds. Usually occurs as a result of trauma, walk-ins, or a combination of the two.

Possession: Moving and controlling the physical body.

Proxying: Communicating on the behalf of another system member, relaying their words for
them.

Processing power: Finite mental resources and “space” used to formulate thoughts and remain
conscious.
Synonyms: Working memory.

Puppeting: Pretending that a system member is moving their form, moving their form for them.

Quiogenic: A system member or system with uncertain or unknown means of coming into
existence.

Sentience: The capability to perceive and have an internal subjective experience.

Synonyms: Consciousness, qualia.

Sensory imagination: Experiencing any of the five senses within the mind.
Synonyms: Visualization, the mind’s eye.
Singlet: Informal term for a person who is the only person within their brain and body, who is
not plural.

Switching: Swapping mental positions with a system member, typically with one becoming
more mentally active and the other becoming less mentally active.

Symbolism: Using imagined symbols, objects, actions, or locations to induce experiences or

effects associated with the imagined symbol.

System: A group of two or more people within a single brain and body.
Synonyms: Plural system.

System member: A person who is a part of a system. An umbrella term for any person in a
system, including the host.
Synonyms: Headmate, systemmate.

Trance: The altered state of consciousness of being relaxed and relatively suggestible. Can be
caused by numerous things including hypnosis, meditation, sleepiness, or doing a repetitive low
effort activity.

Traumegenic: A system member or system that formed as a result of traumatic or highly

stressful events.

Tulpa: A system member who was intentionally created, or any system member who identifies
with the term “tulpa,” regardless of their origin.

Tulpamancer: A person who creates a tulpa or tulpas.

Tulpamancy: The practice of creating tulpas, interacting with tulpas, and developing skills
relevant to tulpas.

Unconscious: Any form of mental processing or thought generation that takes place
automatically, outside of conscious control or effort.
Synonyms: Subconscious.

Vocality: The capability to communicate in verbal thoughts.

Walk-in: A system member that spontaneously comes into existence without being planned or
intentionally created.
Synonyms: Accidental tulpa.

Closing notes
Hey, you’ve reached the end of the guide! Thanks for sticking with it the whole way through.

I began writing this in February of 2018, and worked on it on-and-off until I finished it in July of
2021. It’s been a sort of passion project, and a place to put together everything I’ve learned
over the years, in a way that may be of use to others.

This is the type of guide I wish I had back when I started creating my tulpa Alex in 2014. A lot of
this is what I wish I had done, rather than what I had actually done, early on in the process. This
is the kind of advice I really needed back then.

Consider this guide tentatively complete. I might think of something to add or rework in the
future, so don’t be surprised if there’s something new at a later date.

If you have comments or questions about this guide, feel free to email me at
abvieon3@gmail.com or leave a reply wherever this guide is posted. However, please note that
I may not respond to every message.

Now, stop reading and go apply what you’ve learned. Enjoy life together with your tulpa.