Rapid Switching

[redrainstorm.livejournal.com]

When in a chatroom with alleged multiples, they seem to switch very quickly between their mates. In one comment they're a little, and two seconds later they're a big, and three seconds after that they're an "angry alter", etc. For many reasons other then this though, I believe they're faking. But just wondered if this is possible for others.
I've tried to have my group better at rapid switching where we can switch out quickly and be completely separate while fronting because I think it would benefit certain situations, and I can't do it that fast.
Cofronting is even difficult... Our thoughts are kind of meshed... Or come out as one thought between the two of us. But they don't come out "I want to go!" "Me too!" All in one blurb.
I was wondering if people can truly switch as fast as these people in the chatroom do, because we can't do it even when trying!

Comments

[elenbarathi.livejournal.com]

Crist-Erui is lightning-fast - he 'flickers' in and out of corporeality all the time, often for just a few seconds. He can be so subtle about it that I don't even realize he's done it until I go to talk or move, and find I can't because he's 'taken the helm'. Then he'll laugh at me, flicker out, and I have volition once more. It can get pretty annoying when I'm trying to do something.

He isn't online, though. He won't even look at the computer screen when he's 'up' (though he can see it, as we determined by posting photos of his puppy online); when he flickers in while I'm typing, invariably he gets up and walks away from the computer.

I'm pretty fast myself - at least, when one of my 'brothers' relinquishes the helm, I can take it over without much of a hesitation, although it's harder to do if I've been incorporeal for a long time. Still, I don't think the pause would be noticeable to anyone who didn't already know what was going on.

Kír's fairly slow, though he's gotten faster in the past year or so. Partly it depends on what he's doing - it takes him longer to be ready to talk, type or stand up than it does for him to drive, for instance. He likes to drive, and he's good at it - yeah, better than me, I admit - so he does a lot of it when we're alone in the car, or on long road-trips when all our passengers are asleep or being quiet.

He's able to 'switch in' very fast, but he's only done it three or four times - the first time was in November 1971, in a serious crisis, and that was the only time he took corporeal form until February 1998. It's a painful and very disorienting thing to do, so he doesn't do it unless it's really necessary. What he prefers is to take form while sitting quietly with his back straight and supported, so he can take his time to get used to corporeality before he has to try moving.

Neither of us are willing to 'take dictation'. I do a fair amount of relaying (brief) messages for him verbally, because I'm 'up' a lot more than he is - it doesn't make sense for him to have to go through the whole process of taking form just to say "hello" when I'm already there and can just say "Kír says hello". I'll help him type, as best I can, but I won't type for him, because that just leads to tedious disputes between us, especially if the topic is a controversial one. Nope nope - I won't be responsible for his opinions or whatever, and he's sure as heck not responsible for mine; we speak for ourselves alone.

Heh, I guess one could say Crist-Erui speaks for himself alone too, but not because we disagree with his opinions (to whatever extent he actually has them.) He used to not speak English at all, so the only way we had to understand what was going on with him was through emotions and impulses, and that wasn't very clear. He still doesn't really speak it to us, except a few words he uses to express his desires ("mine dog", "echo dark", "berries", "north") but he's gotten to where he can hold a somewhat-comprehensible conversation with his friends.

By 'comprehensible' I mean there's enough English in it that one can more-or-less figure out what he's saying, though what he means by it may still be completely obscure. His sentences tend to be something like this: "Mine a [unknown] is a go, mine Kírusai say [unknown unknown], I take it, is a thing say no, is a big bird [unknown] fly in a place mine, I jump on a water, hoo, is mine a cold, mine Kírusai say no no, hah! so bad me!

LOL, Kír says I'm exaggerating, and I guess I am, but only a bit. There's no WAY I would ever sit and try to 'take dictation' for that kind of stuff - it would drive me crazy, it would make no sense to a reader, and everybody except his realtime friends would think it was faked bullshit. I totally don't see how adults in 'systems' with children can stand to sit there and watch them type in Lilspeak.

If I'm talking to one person in a 'system', I'm talking to that person, not to the whole 'system'. I don't appreciate other people popping in to take over, any more than I'd appreciate it if I was talking to a singleton and the other members of their household kept grabbing the phone or keyboard away without warning to stick their $.02 in.