My True Name Is A Growl @circlet-and-sarissa - Tumblr Blog

Intro

Hello! We’re Kingspear System, been in the community... awhile? Let’s get the respectability points out of the way:

-our therapist knows

-been like this all our lives

I’m not going to bother with a DNI because the people I care about avoiding don’t do basic respect, so! Welcome to the blog, we’re a system of 6. For those of you who know us from Kinmunity, we might be familiar!

Thrak, Thrakeina: ušumgallu, gorgon

Teresa: lava demon/elemental

Kiya Binesi: lightning bird

Hex: antivirus

Haisha: smoke elemental

Chrysokokkis: sword

We’re open for questions about our kintypes, any kith/hearttypes (unlisted), and we’ll be writing about how that intersects with our identity as a system, as well as our sexuality and relationships. Also possibly some sanguinarian stuff.

Zines: If you’re making a zine, know about a zine, have heard a vague whisper about an otherkin zine, we are WRITERS and we will POUNCE ON THAT. Feel free to toss them our way!

See you around!

#blog intro #otherkin #alterhuman #actually osdd

oleksiignievyshev

My new painting from the Therians series is ready! "Hazel", oil on canvas, 100x80 cm. A huge thank you to the wonderful Hazel for the inspiration and support in creating this portrait!

#i want one of these so badly

oleksiignievyshev

Phenic’s portrait is finally done! Obsessed with these colors and the vibes.

Oil on canvas 80x60 cm

beastlybardou

How do you want to species transition?

A lot of ways, some of which I am sure to accidentally forget about right now and then be mad I forgot later.

Body Changes:

- Continue to build muscle bulk and functional strength

- Continue to build long-distance endurance

- Get tattoos resembling stylized wolverine chest markings

I like these ones a lot

- Continue to encourage maximum body and facial hair growth

- Grow out nails and file into claws

- Tattoo pawpads

- Short, messy haircut like fur

- If at all possible, get tapetum lucidum implants

Accessories:

- Subtle daily wear custom fangs for both sets of canines

- Wardrobe mostly in dark browns and blacks, prioritizing rugged, practical, outdoors items. I really like genuine leather jackets for this

Lifestyle/behaviors:

- Continue to eat an animalistic, whole foods diet with lots of wild game, berries, whole grains and greens

- Hunt and fish for most of my own meat

- Add more local foraged plants to my diet

- Get back into sparring

- Practice climbing (bouldering, trees, structures, etc)

- Get back to being able to walk barefoot outside

- Live up north in historic wolverine range some day

- Integrate animalistic body language into my communication (already done, but I'll still put it here)

- Learn throat singing to do better deep growls and throaty animal noises

- Do scent training to strengthen sense of smell

iconicname

low quality test animations of both day and night mode of the chimera form of my oc

steverogeres

REBLOG IF YOU'RE A DRAGON

digitalderg

small-bambi

Harrison Wood Hsiang

talon-dragonbeast

microdosing on flapping my wings by opening and closing an umbrella real fast

barrel-fish

A comic based on this poem

alt--h

As an FYI, the original Elfinkind Digest mailing list - the one where the term "otherkin" was coined, and all that - has sent out a "last call" message. It's shutting down and telling its membership to send in any final notes for one last compilation/digest to be sent out at the end of the month, and then that's it. 1990-2018 and... done.

i can’t find a source on this, but i assume that’s because the message was sent to the mailing list itself, and not outside of it. nevertheless [the homepage] has been updated in a fashion that corroborates what you’re saying - as of the 20th of January, 2018, the first header reads ‘what was it?’ instead of the previous ‘what is it?’

though i was never subscribed, the digest was still a pretty big cornerstone of the internet otherkin community when i first stepped into it over ten years ago, and if you call yourself otherkin, you’ve got this list to thank. so to say it’s been important to the history of the alterhuman communities is a pretty big understatement.

thanks for bringing this to our attention, anon, so that we can give it the sending off it deserves.

~ vagabond sun

blackrosesociety-vampyres

Vampire Community Research: Social History and Narrative Identity Themes Within Self-Identified Vampires

This article has originally been published on Black Rose Society's website: https://blackrosesociety.sauromatos.com/vampire-community-research-social-functioning-and-narrative-identity-themes-within-self-identified-vampires/

We interviewed our very own Luna Luv about her ongoing research project on the narrative themes in identity development and social history of people within the Vampire Community. In providing you with a closer look into some of the goals, challenges and other details pertaining to this research effort, it is our hope you will be motivated to be part of the survey and tell your friends.

Black Rose Society is assisting Vampire Community Researcher Luna Luv with hosting a survey that hopes to identify trends in the social history and identity formation of self-identified vampires. The results of this independent study will be drafted up into an article/paper titled “Social Functioning and Narrative Identity Themes Within Self-Identified Vampires,” which will be published and distributed exclusively within the vampire community, including the Black Rose Society’s website.

who-is-page

CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS: Inky Paws #3

Inky Paws is a nonhuman anthology zine for original fiction writings by nonhumans and alterhumans about nonhumanity, alterhumanity, and similar, related themes. This zine is primarily literature focused, but will also be open to more illustrative methods of story-telling such as comics. The zine’s focus is on fictional pieces that are centered around nonhumanity, alterhumanity, therianthropy, and similar (see Submission Guidelines section for more details).

You are welcome to submit:

Short stories

Microfiction

Satire

Poetry

Song lyrics

Experimental fiction (fake newspapers, fake recipes, fake blogs, fake posters, etc.)

Mixed media

Comics

And more! If you're unsure, just ask! Seriously, please just ask. I promise I would 10000% love to hear about your idea even if you're unsure about submitting it, there is no such thing as a bad idea and I cannot stress this enough.

How to participate:

You can submit your pieces in this Google Form!

OR

Email invisibleotherkin(@)gmail(.)com with your submission, and please title the email "Inky Paws Zine #3 Submission". With your submission, please include:

The piece's title or name,

A name or pen name to attribute the piece to,

Any content warnings that you feel are necessary for the piece,

Any social media handle or personal website you’d like to be published alongside your name with the piece (optional), and

Any relevant author notes or author biographical information (optional).

Anonymous pieces are also welcome.

Once submissions have been collected and the deadline has passed, these submissions will be put into the zine and it will be posted online as a free PDF. Submissions are due by April 30th, 2024.

Please see the Submission Guidelines, and Submission FAQ, below cut.

who-is-page

REMINDER: Submissions for Inky Paws #3 close in just over one month! ⏰

ternwithatmblr

ANXIETY

Drawn on my laptop with a mouse in 20 minutes because I be feeling ANXIOUS

baumarius

Therian Study Alert

The Jackal in the City: An Empirical Phenomenological Study of Embodied Experience Among Therians and Otherkin

The result of FurScience's interviews and focus groups with therians at Anthrocon since 2016 is finally out. Tens, possibly hundreds of therians were interviewed one-on-one in close to hour-long sessions, their responses recorded, transcribed, and later analyzed anonymously. The study was published in The Humanistic Psychologist and is 20 pages long, detailing the experiences of therians and otherkin, along with associated analyses and a suggested re-terming of what we call "mental shifts," at least in the context of psychology.

While most therians will already be familiar with the what this study will reveal, I'd consider this the closest thing to a "therapist's guide" to therianthropy/otherkin that currently exists. It's accessible for $20 through the APA website linked above. For those who would not like to pay for it, I will summarize below:

The study analyzes the experiences of many therians and otherkin and seeks to "destigmatize and depathologize" our experiences. They provide well-structured examples of what we experience, as well as its psychosocial connotations starting from early childhood and into adult life.

They define a therian as "an individual who believes that they

are not human—or at least not completely human. Instead, they identify as a species of non-human animal that either currently exists or has existed and is now extinct," and an otherkin as a person identifying "as a nonhuman being that is typically considered mythical or fantasy-based (e.g., fairy, elf, unicorn)."

They apply Sara Ahmed's work on the ideas of orientation, disorientation, and reorientation to alterhumanity. They dive into our preference for natural environments over manmade ones, our disconnect from other humans and our own bodies, species dysphoria (which they describe but do not explicitly name), and reorientation by means of our own personal image, shifting, seeking out community, and "ontological doubling" - "living [a] human life with its human demands, alongside a pervasive feeling of being out of place."

They suggest the "re-terming" of what we call "mental shifts" and "phantom shifts" and the like as embodied shifts instead, seeing as they involve more than just a shift in consciousness and can include physical sensations (such as phantom limbs) and can occur in response to the environment, by one's own volition, or spontaneously. While some may be against outside individuals coining terms for us, these are professional psychologists and this likely has more to do with their own understanding of us. Per the study:

"Therianthropy and otherkinship are often experienced as an attunement and orientation toward, and a belonging with, nonhuman animals and to the natural world. In connection with their environment, therians and otherkin experience profound changes in which they are less likely to be mindful of their humanness; instead they experience heightened sensations (especially those sensations that are sharp for their theriotype/kintype), increased spatial awareness, phantom limbs (feeling limbs and body parts belonging to their theriotype/kintype), and personality changes (e.g., from passivity to aggressiveness or assertiveness, from anxiety to calmness, introversion to extraversion, etc.). These changes were conceptualized as mental shifts by Grivell et al. (2014), but due to how this experience involves not just a shift in thoughts and emotion, but in the body and their relationship to their environment and to others, we here use the term embodied shifts. By conceptualizing shifting as an embodied experience, we reaffirm that affective [for the uninitiated, "affect" in psychology regards one's physical expression of emotions - gestures, postures, vocalizations, etc.] and behavioral changes, alongside altered states of consciousness, are not experiences located within the individual, but take place in the intersubjective field (e.g., as a reaction to changes in the environment, feeling threatened at work, or experiencing comfort in isolated spaces or with groups of accepting people). Although these experiences can be orienting in terms of the therian’s or otherkin’s experiences of self, allowing them to become reoriented to their environment or situation, it can also be disorienting for them and their social interlocutors."

The conclusion to the paper encourages professionals (therapists and such) to understand us through a lens of cultural humility and provides some hope in that "(perhaps ironically) humanistic psychotherapy..." can provide therians and otherkin some sense of wellbeing.

Overall, this is really good for us. If you are in therapy, do consider forwarding this study to your therapist.

baumarius

To everyone who reblogged this who I could not send a message: Thank you! This is really embarrassing but unfortunately I made a bit of a blunder and didn't realize how the APA protects their information. Disseminating information requires permission/fees unless the texts extracted total under 400 words, and the original excerpt I took did not. I edited the original post to fix this but it doesn't change reblogs. To respect their copyright rules and protect your account, please delete your reblog, and if desired, reblog the original with the changes. Thank you!

@creatureheart @wyverncreachur72 @milesmeles @rossisrad @grovedogs @wolven-fang @fangsnclaws @skylarrikin @vir-et-machina @maid-of-timey-wimey @lesbiantherian @edgar-allen-woe

joowee-feftynn

hey do otherkin peeps have a "typeable" symbol? like the therian θ∆? I'm pretty sure there isn't a heptagram emoji available

a-dragons-journal

I've seen ☆^7 used occasionally, but not often.

mechanical-sunchild

Yeah, I use ☆⁷! (Not sure if the star is typeable from just the keyboard using an English keyboard, I use a Japanese one but the smaller 7 should just be there when you long press 7. Not sure about desktop keyboards!)

mouseteeths

If your keyboard has a number pad (all keyboards SHOULD but alas) you can use alt + 9734 for the star.

circlet-and-sarissa

Mostly I need this reminder for myself, so here goes!

When questioning a new kintype, the most important thing is to remove as much influential stuff as possible. If you think you’re a dragon, and you keep researching what’s Normal for dragonkin, or immersing yourself in Flight Rising, you’re not learning about yourself as much as you are impressing an external idea into yourself. Asking yourself what feels right is more important than seeing how you compare, in the early stages and frankly in general.

Especially considering how startlingly easy it is to give yourself false memories based on external influence or internal expectation, as hard as it is I recommend leaving it alone for awhile as opposed to trying to label and box and define and display Right Now. It’s harder to unlearn something than it is to learn it, and if you’re convinced that you must be A Thing and then you talk about it with all of your friends, multiple layers of perceived pressure can prevent you from considering the idea that you might be wrong.

Let it percolate a little and come back to it before you start poking it with a stick. If it’s a kintype at all, it’ll come back louder and more defined when you can’t ignore it anymore, in my experience.

revoltradio

This is something I talked about a little bit ago in a Discord server, at length. It’s important that this community sort of re-learns the art of introspection and grilling yourself. Introspection, in my own words, would mean looking inward to first understand how you feel, when you feel it, why you might feel it, and how those feelings affect you. Grilling, again, in my own words, would be basically the same process, although now you’re involving multiple outside parties to ask you these same questions. These processes serve a few vital purposes, IMHO, that should not really be “skipped over,” and I will elaborate why I think so. Not only does extensive introspection & grilling by outside parties helps keep you safer from the influences of echo chambers (which are not always a bad thing!), predatory manipulators, or simply “trendiness” of a kintype affecting the ‘outcome’ of your identity, but it can help you better understand yourself and even strengthen your confidence and understanding about your kintype in general. (Although many people avoid this process [grilling and introspection] because they are very insecure of criticism or are insecure in their identity and do not want to endure the uncomfortable process of having to justify or explain themselves - I do understand that many people simply cannot deal with the social pressure of having their identity poked at, or cannot deal with introspection either due to difficulty with identity for any reason.... I will however reiterate I still think that building your identity up, breaking your identity down, both with yourself and others, can be an extremely beneficial thing that I would encourage all those that fall under the alterhuman or otherkin umbrella to do.)

Elaborating more about the “echo-chambers-influencing-your-identity-questioning-process” bit, let’s run with the example of dragonkin, above.

If you feel like you may be dragonkin, but you’re unsure... You might seek out various kin social groups to help you figure all this out. Especially if you are new to the concept of otherkin in-general. Since you are participating in the enjoyment of various dragon media, joining dragonkin social groups and only consulting dragons on identity-related questions, you WILL be subject to a little bit of bias. If you present the topic of conversation to dragonkin, “I feel x and y and z, do you guys think this sounds draconic?” - well, first off, this is a group of dragons, so they are very likely to give you answers that encourage you in the direction of reassurance and reaffirmation. But the entire POINT of introspection is to question yourself and make absolutely sure you’re comfortable in your assessment. Another thing to mention, as well, is that a lot of the community (of alterhumans in general) seem to base questioning PURELY off of personality and character traits. I’m not just talking about KFF either, therian and otherkin spaces frequently encounter people who present questions like this: “I like to collect things, I am strong, and I like to stand up for my friends. This counts towards being a dragonkin [or insert other species]?” To continue with the “dragon theme” as an example.. Dragons are such a broad/vast concept in general. You can apply almost any experience to a dragon. There are large, looming, powerful, domineering dragons. There are smart, calculated, methodical, wise dragons. There are small, meek, timid, fairy-like dragons. There are eager, excitable, motivated, and heroic dragons. So by presenting a dragonkin group of otherkin with “I feel sorta like a dragon, do you think these traits sound draconic?” questions.... How do I put it lightly? It doesn’t narrow anything down, it doesn’t really help to ask “am I [x] thing based on my personality and character?” because you can apply almost any human emotion or experience to almost any animal, fantasy creature, fictional character, etc. So hopefully now my stance tends to make a bit more sense, right? I find it just a tad bit concerning that people often just sit back and let others reaffirm them when not much work has gone into really investigating themselves in the first place. Otherkin who are new to the community I find are often lonely, impressionable, and often seeking companionship or a sense of belonging. The fact that many otherkin communities also, lately, seem to trend towards rushing to only quickly reaffirm people’s identities, and not encourage the questioning of people’s thought processes, identity, and kin-feelings in a more methodical method, might actually lead to newbies being fed exactly what they want to hear by manipulators or by (not necessarily bad!) a sort of echo chamber, such as wolf pack groups, or kintype-focused-servers, for example. Ask me how I know. “So, you have all these complaints, Rev, but what is your advice? Do you have any suggested remedies?” Great question, and good criticism.

I would personally encourage all questioning otherkin, new and old to the community, to be a little more patient and extend the period of questioning yourself. I know, I know, it’s uncomfortable and a little anxious to have kin-feelings and not immediately understand where they come from or what they’re attributed to. I also understand it’s exciting and beautiful to discover new things about yourself! But it’s important to keep in mind a few questions, especially if you involve others in your questioning process. Ask yourself: 1. Is anyone other than myself benefiting, in any way, from me adopting or acknowledging my suspected kintype?

2. Why, how, and when do I feel the kin-feelings? (it’s ok to not have an answer to “why” - but answering the “how” and the “when” might help you) Do my feelings change, or cease, when I am no longer interacting with people who are affirming my identity? (your kintypes are for you, not for other people - if you notice your feelings fading during the questioning process when you are not being actively reaffirmed, it might be a good time to step back and do some introspection on your own to see if this is really an identity that is true to you or not)

3. When others are interacting with me, what sort of bias may they have towards our shared identity, or towards reinforcing my identity? I would also personally say that hesitating for a few months before joining any kintype-focused servers/groups/chats might also help. It may be useful to take some time for yourself to research and try to put things into your own words, before letting any potential social pressure reach you.

scarsmood-deactivated20240624

Might as well toss in my methods/ perspective:

One thing that helped me develop my identity into something i could understand more was having multiple ideas for what your type might be. Note what may be attributed to what. I will say though identity isn’t a fact id argue its pretty normal for identity to change or shift. How we express these things is up to us. What Id say is find what is comfortable to you and follow that feeling with every question. What gives you euphoria? What makes you feel at home? Try learning about and acting as a hyena for a day does it fit? Is it fulfilling? Do you enjoy the mannerisms displayed? Does it match your internal mannerisms? If not back to researching. Its an active alive process. It is also never finished it just gets easier.

I didn’t identify as a parasite in a mimicry body for many years. Because how could I know something that tricky off the bat. Or conversely. The way I’ve grown and developed as a person has also made my identity grow and change.

I feel like most people have at least a general gut idea of what they are. Whether its super apparent or not at the surface. It’s our job to take that feeling and interpret it in a way that brings us joy. I’d argue there is no final answer there isn’t a final pin you place and go “thats it” rather an ever changing identity we use to describe ourselves. For some that change may be in animalistic behavior for others it could be the animal or kintype.

If you wander into a dragonkin server questioning being a dragon and be a dragon for awhile id say that isnt wasted time. It only becomes a problem when you feel that those experiences are not benefiting your identity anymore. That your forcing a connection. If you feel you have to force a connection with something to fit in thats not a great time at all

Its normal to hop between communities and experiment to. I’m in a chosen ones server, hyena kin, werewolf kin, ive tried dragon kin, dinosaur kin. You get the idea. Exploring is apart of the adventure. It can be stressful jumping from identity ideas just know everyone experiences those shifts as well.

Id also point out that inital identity is just that, initial. I don’t see anything wrong with it being encouraged or nurtured until a newbie feels strong enough to question something more diverse or deep because learning or becoming aware of your non humanity is a long process that takes a new level of self awareness. I dont think a majority of new otherkin that are joining asking “am i x?” Are participating or being led into echo chambers. An echo chamber would actively silence an opposition. I dont think most spaces im in at this point harbor an attitude where they silence someone for diviating from their identity group.

Bit of a retort so far but my advice for newbies can be summarized as follows:

If you have to force something about your identity that is most likely a red flag, reconsider why this aspect is so important.

If you find yourself unable to make choices for yourself take a step back and evaluate what might be going on in this situation. Do you feel safe? What do you need to feel more confident in yourself?

Fludity is normal and expected pinning down your identity is more like understanding yourself in the present its more about self awareness rather than finding a hard definite “this is me forever”

Experimenting is fun and okay! I made scientist logs when experimenting with my parasite kintype, drew my threatening wolf kintype, i make poetry to express myself and see what fits and what doesnt.

Dont see a species that fits you? Just fucking make it. Threatening wolves are an original species for me. I made the name for them. I defined them. If something doesn’t fit sometimes making it your way TM works better

Multiple kintypes are valid! Have many, have few, fuse them as a form of expression, hybrid em, mix em in a pot and see what happens, take turns interacting with each aspect of yourself go nuts.

A journal helps, but so do mood boards, horny posting in an animal way, drawing, poetry, howling or screaming like your kin type, finding items at a thrift shop that may remind you of your kintype. Be who you are unbashadly, you deserve to be yourself whatever that may be. watching/playing source media is also very fun!

Most importantly it is your journey not anyone elses. We can give advice, we can make suggestions but ultimately it is your choice to figure out what methods you like and what you dont.

Talk about it! See what others say make connections and friends. It makes the process much less stressful when you have a good support group.

mechanical-sunchild

This already a long post and I'm sure it's longer somewhere else but I'm adding a bit in as someone who was (I'm using this word semi-lightly) saved by introspection.

My most solid and long lasting identities emerged well before I was on the internet, let alone learning what otherkin or therian was. However, I can't say I did any 'questioning' or 'introspection'. The awakening came naturally. The werewolf identity (now being questioned, ironically) was somewhat a result of being exposed to werewolf media but persisted even without that media. The android identity formed itself naturally, with information and depth occuring steadily through introspection without any media exposure.

Do I know if I'm 'right'? Well, I'll never know that. But it feels right now and that's what matters.

One can be drawn to media containing ones -type without that media actually being the 'reason' you feel that way. This could actually be a natural part of discovering yourself. So it's not necessarily always going to be that the media is imposing an identity on you. It could be distressing in fact to isolate yourself completely from media that makes you feel connected to that identity. But chances are if you need the media to feel the identity, you're fictionflickering/experience taking or possibly constelic. All of which is completely fine and lovely to be. Otherkin/therian are not the only 'valid' identities.

There's never ever going to be a time where external factors aren't influential if you engage heavily with the community, but if you still feel how you feel after a few days of no interaction that's worth some time reflecting for sure.

If you have found a sense of self and belonging in your identity we are not saying you can't ever talk to others or engage in media to do with it or you're faking, just see if it persists alone after a while or if it fades away. Might not be a -type but could be something else, ya know? Not necessarily that you're not alterhuman. There's no one true way to introspect. It's important to balance engaging with media and the community, and spending some time alone away from those influences.

Scenario time!

A is a young person new to the alterhuman community. They saw some cool wolves on tiktok, then talked to some cool wolves on Tumblr, then joined a server for wolves and asked some questions. They started to identify as a wolf, making a Tumblr account just for the wolf identity, making theriotype outline pictures, wearing gear, doing quads, learning community history, defending the community etc. They felt at home in the community as a wolf from day one.

How do they discover if they're not a wolf then (or were a wolf whilst it felt right but actually something else feels more right and or are something else and maybe also a wolf)? Especially when having shifts (including instinct shifts and phantom limbs), memories of being that thing etc aren't a requirment. Especially when it brought them so much happiness.

Well, maybe they suddenly learn what a coyote is and something clicks. Or look at a husky and realise how those typically behave makes them feel better than the wildness of a wolf. Or maybe they're just not a canine at all and suddenly realise they are actually a dragon with canine-like movements and behaviour. Or they suddenly just don't feel right identifying as a wolf any more but don't feel human. They might disengage with the community, still feel like a wolf weeks later, and come back as a polytherian or wolf therian again. Identity is fluid!

THINK!

Therian isn't the only identity and it doesn't have to be spiritual. Are there other labels you feel fit you more? Do you understand the identities you're looking at fully, not just the basics/stereotypes of being that identity? How does calling yourself that animal or that characters name make you feel? How does acting like them feel? It should feel as natural or even more natural than using your current name and just existing as yourself day by day. Is anything or anyone around you making you unsure if you are that thing or do you fear losing community/a friend if you aren't that thing? Never be afraid to be wrong or to change how you feel, real friends won't reject you for being wrong. Know your own limits, when it stops feeling right stop engaging with that identity and let it sit and never feel the need to list or label yourself.

Rushing into any label or specifics can cause confusion and a deeper sense of internal disturbance. Trust me, I know. Story time!

When I was done being a stupid self-denying anti, I started to list basically every fictional character I'd ever roleplayed, cosplayed or liked a lot. Uh oh! (Having lots of kintypes isn't the issue here btw, it was my methodology). I even 'took on' kintypes that matched the source or types of a friend I was trying to connect with. This relationship ended up being particularly toxic with me doing a lot of giving and him a lot of taking and not much in reverse, ending in him suddenly blocking me entirely for 'being bad for his mental health' and 'talking about stuff he didn't care about' and 'making a joke he didn't like'.

But this kicked me in the arse and made me blink at the sun for a bit. Why...had I been trying to impress this person? A person who didn't even want to know me properly, and simply accepted my dependency on him, returning my affections only to keep me keen? I started to go through the kintypes one by one using the THINK method. The THINK method really did work for me and still does.

Maybe none of us will ever actually know our 'true' species or identity. The important thing is that you feel like you got to actually choose to be this way (by choose I mean, nobody told you 'you are this' or made you feel you had to identify a certain way). The important thing is that being this identity makes you actually happy, connected to yourself, to the world, to your sense of being. If you're later wrong about the specifics, so be it!

Try to ask a general question of many otherkin/therians/fictionkin like "what does it feel like to be otherkin?" "how did you know you were a therian?" "how do you know if you're fictionkin?"

These are vague questions that will result in multiple different answers from each person you ask and this can create a deeper web of information worthy of unpicking and introspecting on.

In the end, you can also try otherlinking. You might not be sure if you are a wolf, but you can become a wolf this way anyway. So long as, again, you are doing it for you and not because it would please someone else or because you've got FOMO.

I'm still introspecting my identities. Sometimes I just sit and be quiet for a bit and think on it. It's difficult. There's no one question you can ask yourself that might not result in accidentally leading yourself. You just have to trust what you feel in the moment.

Nobody is going to or should tell a questioning person 'no, you are not this because you're working on stereotypes!' but I do think more of us need to gently say "I can't tell you what you are. Only you can tell you what you are. If being a dragon makes you happy, then be a dragon, but don't let others influence you." or something along the lines of this.

We need to balance support with encouragement to introspect because we don't want to chase anyone away.

Unfortunately some are just looking for instant affirmations. But without introspection, or the encouragment of being wrong and changing and it being ok to change and be wrong, we're just going to end up with a bunch of bitter 'ex-kin' etc people who have incorrect ideas about what goes on here. The average wolf who affirms another wolf is not trying to be manipulative after all, but a human who thought they were a wolf looking back on this time in embarassment might contextualise it as such. There's no one answer to anything. But like I said, gently encouragement to reflect and advice to not rely on others due to potential to be influenced will go a long way.

#fantastic addition

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