You mentioned a difference between inside people that come from splits off a core identity and other people. Please elaborate...
Some multiples originate with a single person who splits off others from a core identity, perhaps due to childhood trauma, perhaps for other reasons. As you say, these split-off selves can become full persons in their own right.
Other multiples, like ourselves, rather than splitting from a central person, never had such a central or core identity, but existed as a community from the beginning of the body's lifetime. We are a gateway system, that is, one whose actual home base is a quite material world in an alternative dimension, and we use this body to interact with the earth world and the here-and-now. Other gateway systems include Shaytar (http://www.bentspoons.com/Shaytar/) and Bravadai (http://www33.brinkster.com/bravadai/). atoa and ladydancerhouse, respectively.
Some systems call or attract people from other dimensions, often (but not always) including environments that have been portrayed, for better or worse, in film, television, books or games. (The process by which this occurs has been called "soulbonding", but it is not always exactly that.) Or they deliberately create people, not always to deal with abuse as in the cliched portrayals, but for any number of reasons; from "I wanted someone to hang out with," to "We needed someone to help out with school."
And... it appears that you have a separate icon for each voice that speaks, yet your user name remains the same. Is that an easy trick to explain?
Certainly. The LJ FAQ explains how to create and upload new user icons. A paid user may have up to fifteen icons; for a bit more money, you can have up to fifty. The named icon is a courtesy described here:
Re: Regarding terminology
Some multiples originate with a single person who splits off others from a core identity, perhaps due to childhood trauma, perhaps for other reasons. As you say, these split-off selves can become full persons in their own right.
Other multiples, like ourselves, rather than splitting from a central person, never had such a central or core identity, but existed as a community from the beginning of the body's lifetime. We are a gateway system, that is, one whose actual home base is a quite material world in an alternative dimension, and we use this body to interact with the earth world and the here-and-now. Other gateway systems include Shaytar (http://www.bentspoons.com/Shaytar/) and Bravadai (http://www33.brinkster.com/bravadai/).
Some systems call or attract people from other dimensions, often (but not always) including environments that have been portrayed, for better or worse, in film, television, books or games. (The process by which this occurs has been called "soulbonding", but it is not always exactly that.) Or they deliberately create people, not always to deal with abuse as in the cliched portrayals, but for any number of reasons; from "I wanted someone to hang out with," to "We needed someone to help out with school."
And... it appears that you have a separate icon for each voice that speaks, yet your user name remains the same. Is that an easy trick to explain?
Certainly. The LJ FAQ explains how to create and upload new user icons. A paid user may have up to fifteen icons; for a bit more money, you can have up to fifty. The named icon is a courtesy described here:
http://www.tanuki.cx/pavilion/policies/pinteract.html
(You can see more of our named icons at
http://www.livejournal.com/allpics.bml?user=ksol1460 )