(no subject)

[pengke.livejournal.com]

I’m sure everyone has read someone’s post on this community or read a comment that made you stop and think, “I don’t believe you.” If you haven’t, either you don’t read the threads very closely or you work very hard not to think critically about anything you read here, because there have been some very outrageous claims made here over the years. (But that’s an entirely different discussion.) I want to know what people think when they come across one of these statements that they just can’t believe.

Do you:

A) Think the person is lying.
B) Think the person is knowingly role playing
C) Think the person believes that they are multiple but is probably unintentionally role playing or some other form of imagination
D) Think the system is lying about the experiences
E) Think the system is knowingly or unintentionally role playing the experiences
F) Think the system is adhering to the community’s cultural norms/trying to fit in
G) Think the system probably honestly believes their claims even though another explanation seems more logical to you
H) Think the system probably started out making things up but has since convinced themselves that their claims are true
I) Worry that you might be making things up too or that someone else might think you are
J) Think something else entirely – please share

Also, do your thoughts change depending on why you can’t believe the statement? For example, is there a difference between someone claiming to do/be something that you think is impossible and someone contradicting themselves or claiming that something happened in real life that could not have happened?

Comments

[sethrenn.livejournal.com]

I've read several things on this community that I don't necessarily believe-- things that seem unlikely at best to me, and/or that contradict my own spiritual beliefs, and/or resemble the behavior of people I've known in the past who were deliberately making a play for attention. I tend to assume more of them are sincerely misguided than making a deliberate attempt to lie and manipulate others.

Usually I don't address it for two reasons, if they seem to be sincere,
a) if they're just doing something like roleplaying or naming different parts of their personality or experimenting with a new identity, I figure their ability to keep up the act consistently, if these aren't real people, will give out after awhile.

b) if they're deliberately acting or making a play for attention, I figure someone will call them on it eventually. (OTOH, maybe I'm overly optimistic in assuming frauds will always be spotted by someone.)

c) if it has to do with someone believing certain things in a religious/spiritual sense that I don't, I don't want to address that at all, unless they try to push their belief system on me or insist it applies to everybody.

On the other hand, I might also encourage them to work within the context of a belief system I don't subscribe to, if it seems to be working for or helpful to them.

For example, is there a difference between someone claiming to do/be something that you think is impossible and someone contradicting themselves or claiming that something happened in real life that could not have happened?

In the first instance I'd be more likely to see them as sincerely misguided; if someone repeatedly contradicts themselves in their claims I am more likely to suspect that someone is trying to pull something over on me (partly because I've been led on by a few people in the past, and all the discrepancies in their stories started to add up after awhile).

Roleplaying as a Means of Creation.

[effrenata.livejournal.com]

Roleplaying can be a means of consciously creating inner personality aspects. I created my thoughtforms through roleplaying, and I've had them around for fifteen years (with some changes in active roster).

I think the distinction is not so much "roleplaying vs. non-roleplaying" as "serious identification vs. entertainment", although there are grey areas between the two, as when someone creates a purely fictional character which then develops into a soulbond, identity-bond or similar autonomous entity (the terminology depends on the person(s) and their belief system).

Inner roleplaying has always been a part of my identity. I can recall doing it almost as soon as I could use language. I regard identity as a very fluid thing, more or less what a person believes, imagines and wills it to be.

As for finding other people's stories unbelievable: my opinion on this is that in subjective reality, as in dreams, anything is possible. Now, this does not mean that everything is equally true in intersubjective terms. Not all things "show up" in the shared, public world. So, a person can claim that an experience has more "objectivity", or intersubjective applicability, than it actually does.

I don't expect others to "believe in" my thoughtforms, necessarily. They aren't things that can be weighed and measured. They're a part of my life in the way that ideals, values, imagination, etc., can be a real and valid, if unobservable, part of a person's life.