Love Begins
ellievsbear
TMBGareOK. The Official They Might Be Giants tumblr
izzy's playlists!
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"I'm Dorothy Gale from Kansas"
almost home
The Bright Sessions
Sweet Seals For You, Always
I'd rather be in outer space 🛸
Phantogram Three
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$LAYYYTER
official daine visual archive
cherry valley forever
EXPECTATIONS
NASA
Fai_Ryy
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@the-soulbonded-teaparty
Making a post about this so y'all know we know, but unfortunately our subscription to carrds paid plan ran out and now the soulbonding info carrd is a bit broken- 😭
We'll try and finish the neocities website we've had in development for it this weekend and link it on the carrd, so hopefully the info shouldn't be missing for too long!
─── Plural App Survey
[ pt: plural app survey. ]
Hello, this is a survey conducted by Intervallos on Tumblr. This survey is created with the primary goal of figuring out the demographic of
This is not what I usually post, but I wanted to conduct a small personal research project regarding Plural/System apps, the demographic that uses them & how social media + system-related discourse impacts that usage.
This is a long-form survey that could well take you over 30 minutes (estimated), which will go over what you like, dislike, and must have within three categories: Plural-Specific apps (ie. Octocon, Simply Plural, etc), Non-Plural specific apps/sites (ie. Obsidian, Notion, etc), and proxy bots (ie. Pluralkit, Tupperbox, etc).
I encourage all systems regardless of origin, syscourse/discourse stances or age to take part in it if possible, I would like as much input as physically possible.
Thank you for your time, if you could share or reblog this that would be appreciated as well. I know that I am primarily a liomogai blog, but it is my biggest platform.
Alternatives To Simply Plural We Use
Hello darlings! Since simply plural and octocon are being shutdown, I'll share our little set up. I'll be focusing more on non system oriented apps and websites since there are several posts about system oriented alternatives already.
A great post I recommend reading is this one by slightly-sigilant! Along with this website. They have a lot more suggestions for alternatives than this post will. I might be making full tutorials on how we personally use each of these in the future and will likely share inspiration + templates for some of them.
Obsidian 🟣
Our personal app of choice is obsidian! It's highly customizable with tons of themes and plug ins. We use it for logging system information, writing stories, taking notes, and our digital link garden! It's very versatile. It's available on Android, PC, and iOS.
The link to their website
While they are optional, here are some plug ins we use:
Templater - A plug in that boosts obsidians core template mechanic, it's very helpful that way we can have templates for logging information at the ready and easily insert them into a new note.
Style settings - A plug in that makes themes way more customizable! If you're into things looking aesthetic or need some extra options for accessibility purposes we'd definitely suggest getting it. It doesn't work with every theme, but it does work with all the popular ones!
Homepage - This will open a specific note, workspace, canvas, or base when opening the app. We haven't set ours up yet, but it'd probably be helpful to have links for new headmates + any important information you want your headmates to see there.
Iconize - A plug in for icons! If you happen to like notions options for having icons for notes and folders then we'd suggest getting this.
Editing Toolbar - This is a plug in for a word-like editing toolbar! It's helpful for doing quick text + formatting adjustments.
Extended Markdown Syntax - Helpful for people not used to HTML, it allows you to do more markdown rather than having to use HTML tags for some things.
Some notes:
Yes the syncing between devices is paid, but there are ways you can sync them for free! This is the tutorial we used for syncing ours for free. Tutorial here.
There's also tons of tutorials on YouTube on how to use obsidian in general + their documentation.
Simple Time Tracker ⏱️
This is a time tracking app meant for productivity, but it's pretty feature rich with a built-in statistics option like simply plural had. I'll call the members being tracked activities with quotations here since that's what they're called in the app. It's an option if you want to track fronting times and have statistics. It's Android only though I think.
Disclaimer: This app wasn't intended for systems, so we're unsure of the exact limits of how much it can track.
Link to it on the play store
It's notable features:
Multitasking - There is an option in the settings at the top to turn this on so you can track multiple fronters at once. We haven't added everyone in our system, but we were able to add all 38 "activities" as being tracked at once when testing it.
Comments - You can add comments to individual "activities" records and there's even the option to automatically prompt you to add a comment when you start tracking them.
Statistics - As mentioned there's a built-in statistics option! It's in the form of a pie chart with the individual "activites" time below it and you can choose specific time ranges for how much data you want to see.
Categories and tags - Categories act like folders so you can group specific "activities" together and you're able to select specific ones to see just their statistics on the statistics page. It doesn't sort the "activities" in the activities page though. There is also a tag option that applies to specific records.
Customization - There's a ton of settings so you can change how certain parts of the app work, and you can also change the color and icon of the "activities"! We have ours as our sp colors + our emoji sign offs.
Notes: There's also an option to have a permanent notification you can toggle on in the settings! This app won't track anything besides stuff you want a timer for though. There's also backup + exporting options.
Draw Note ✏️
A bullet journal styled notes app. It's got several widgets you can add to your home screen including the option to have a specific note displayed. It works well for our specific flavor of memory issues. I believe it's only for Android though.
Link to it on the play store
Some notable features:
Drawing - As the name suggests you can draw on it! Lots of people use it to do little sketches and doodles. It's also good for making things pretty.
Widgets - There are several different types of widgets you can add to your home screen for easy access! We personally use the one that displays a specific note, our to do list, and our recent notes.
To do list - It has a built-in to do list page, you can make specific categories of to do lists as well as mark their priority level. You can also link notes to specific tasks as well as pinning tasks to your notifications bar.
Mind mapping - It also has a built-in mind mapping option for notes, we haven't used it yet though.
Any App/Website that Tracks OCs + World building 🌐
This is something we actually used a lot when we first soulbonded, though we have since stopped using the specific app we used back then and wouldn't suggest it- it was what we first had on hand since we enjoy making ocs and stories.
We've seen foretelling suggested a lot, though there are other apps out there for it!
Documentation
With the recent announcement about SimplyPlural winding down, a lot of people are looking to move their information elsewhere.
Different people will have different priorities when deciding where to put their system documentation. It's okay if you want to keep using online services to track your system if that's what works for you! (Please keep backups, though- I promise that losing all of your documentation when a service goes down is a bigger loss of time than keeping a local copy of it all.)
If you'd rather not shuffle your information from online service to online service in the future, then there are a lot of different ways to track who's in your system that don't depend on someone else's computer being kept on. We personally find art-based methods to be the most helpful for our group, but you might find that other methods work better for you. Try out a few different options and see what sticks!
In case anyone wants the documentation panels without the intro panels.
With Simply Plural being discontinued, I'll re-share our list of software for plural folks:
I'm also going to rec @semiplural's post about analog tools and its followup (thanks, Blue!). I also wrote this post about the tools we personally use and would like to expand on it at some point that I'm not being steamrollered by health issues.
Also maybe relevant: buncha posts from the pluralquestions community over on Dreamwidth.
Habits, tricks, tools, etc
Memory problems
Communication
Indicating who's fronting
With Simply Plural being discontinued, I'll re-share our list of software for plural folks:
I'm also going to rec @semiplural's post about analog tools and its followup (thanks, Blue!). I also wrote this post about the tools we personally use and would like to expand on it at some point that I'm not being steamrollered by health issues.
Soulbonding is not inherently serious.
Sorry, I like going against the grain and that’s a big title LOL. By this, I don’t mean the practice of soulbonding is unserious, no. Or that they aren’t real connections. What I mean is soulbonding is not some thing you need to prep extensively for. Soulbonding does not inherently mean you plan to share a life, a body, or anything with them. Because soulbonding is only one thing — a connection. And you can have any relationship with this connection, from emotionally close to an acquaintance you see once in a while. Bodily present or no interest in the body/your life at all! The cool thing about soulbonding is it tends to allow for relationships you genuinely might find hard to hold up in this world — complicated ones, messy ones, ones you can’t easily label to people but are invaluable and unique. I have various relationships with those I’m connected to.
Some are deeply, truly close to my heart. I couldn’t imagine ever being without them. Others are my ride or die even if we talk less often and I still trust them with everything. Some I’m just befriending and feels so comfortable, safe, and happy around them, just like my casual irl buddies! Some are a mentor figure, some are complicated, and some I see many times a week while others are more sporadic, spur of the moment. I’m not yet so deeply, emotionally connected to every person. But connecting does mean I feel a deep sense of care, and this care creates different, varying and valid relationships between all of them. After all, different people exist to have different relationships, not all be the same. And you know? Some I connected simply by reaching out and going “You’re cool. This is what soulbonding is. Wanna try it and be my friend?”
【 FATUM — BOND / KEEPSAKE 】
( SOULBOND SUBTERM )
⊱ A ( spiritual ) soulbond who shares a source with their ( fictionfolk ) soulbonder ; emphasis being on the connection between the bond & bonder through source material as well as possible past life memories . These soulbonds can be quite intense , their relationship to the soulbonder spanning across the vast multiverse in order to rekindle in this life . It's like fate ! ⌣
⌕ For example : my Jon is a fatumbond (aka keepsake) because we're in a relationship in our source material & we have memories from countless past lives we've spent together . Basically think of it as the "do you think we'll be together in every universe?" trope with the answer being YES !
꒰ This term can be used for any kind of relationship — friend , significant other , and so on . The symbol is a mixture of the fictionfolk inkwell and the soulbond rings to show the connection between the 2 concepts . ꒱
Soul Muse
Meaning
A term for a soulbond who is always co conscious when the body is awake, in a way that's basically in synchronization with the soulbonder. Likely because the soulbond and soulbonder have a very deep relationship in some way. Said relationship can be platonic or romantic.
Flag
The top and bottom lines have a pink to purple to cyan gradient. It represents the synchronization of the soulbonder and their soulbond. The very light purple was just to have a plain area to have the symbols tbh. The symbols are the soulbonding symbol and romantic soulbonding symbol respectively (both are by lunar solstice)
Dividers by Cafekitsune
hi, wanted to make a term to fill a lexical gap we& have and figured others could find it useful.
neighbor: a term for those a soulbonder knows from their soulbond's reality (and that their soulbond knows), but that has never interacted (i.e. visited/communicated) with the soulbonder themself. they may or may not know of the soulbonder. think of it as a term for a "person of interest". you are also free to use this term for walk-ins and anyone else who may come from a separate reality/lives another life; feel free to replace the words "soulbonder"/"soulbond" with whatever makes it relevant to your usage.
this is inspired by these (link) flags (link) here (link) by the now deactivated soularsys. the mailbox is a recolored icon from flaticon (link). you're welcome to use this for whatever. cheers
Munbonding
Pt: Munbonding :end pt
Flag id: a 5 stripe vertical flag with a oval on the 2nd and 4th stripe. The oval on the 2nd stripe is positioned near the top of the flag, with the 4th stripe oval positioned towards the bottom. From left to right the colours are dark pink, pink, pale orange, beige and yellow. Inside the ovals is a smaller circle, the first coloured light pink and the second coloured light beige. :end id
A flag for munbonding which is a term that "is a subset of soulbonding that specifically denotes it as a psychological phenomenon, viewing bonds as "powered by the mind" rather than a spiritual or metaphysical experience."
This flag was modeled after the soulbonding flag as this is a subterm under it, with it being rotated 90 degrees to help it stand out. The pinks are meant to symbolize the mind and such, with the yellows being the energy used to "power" the munbond(s).
Mention / tags: @sys-terms, @radiomogai, @rwuffles, @scr-ppup, @discrophy, @colablob, @winreyplace
Banner transcript: This term was made by an Endogenic. Anyone can use it however (So don't repost or recoin, ask before adding to wikis) :End Transcript
【 WATCHER 】
( SOULBOND SUBTERM )
⊱ A soulbond that can watch the soulbonder without being present — you may or may not be able to feel the bond's gaze .
⌕ For example : my Jon is a Watcher because he always has some of his eyes on me, even when he's in his world and can't communicate with me for one reason or another ( usually busyness ) !
꒰ This term can be used for both a temporary state a bond takes on and a more permanent ability . ꒱
Heya! I'm writing this post to notify people, but if anyone wants their terms and/or flags added to our soulbonding carrd feel free to @ us in the post or message us about it!
System Roles: History and Commentary
(A mirror of a post that I made first on Reddit, and then to our website.)
In a discussion about system member roles, it was brought up that much of the history around roles has been buried. There is no reference for who came up with the concept of roles or where the older roles like "protector" originated. My system is in contact with LB Lee, who are an older system with a great dedication to researching and documenting plural history. We reached out to them to ask if they had any knowledge regarding the origins of system roles, and they wrote a post about their findings.
The post itself is extremely well-cited: it delves through medical texts and biographies from as far back as the 1970s. It is worth your time if you have an interest in plural history. But I think the most important takeaways come from these paragraphs:
[...]of all these other terms, all of them come from medical contexts. If they aren't outright, obviously created by therapists themselves (Ralph Allison, Cornelia Wilbur), they're cited in books that they were involved in--like Sybil or the Minds of Billy Milligan. These are terms created by medical personnel to compartmentalize and organize headmates like a stamp collection... and often deny us the right to self-determine or grow. There's an icky historical context there; there's a reason these terms were considered unfashionable tools of the oppressor when we came on the scene in 2007! These therapists are not little tin gods you should worship. There's a reason Allison, Ross, and Wilbur have controversies about them! [...]
To be clear, I am not sharing this to shame systems for using roles. Nor am I sharing this to claim that roles are for trauma-formed systems only and that it is appropriation for other systems to have roles. Please do not use this post as grounds to start yet another exclusionary slapfight.
What I do want us, as a community, to do instead:
(continued under cut)
people have been enjoying the one throwaway post I made about "The Real One" centrism in plurality so I nudged lark to put his much more high-effort and extremely relevant post about system roles and plural community norms/history on here. we constantly see people going "is it okay if my headmates don't have roles?" and "which role should I assign to this guy who just arrived?" and "why do I exist if I don't have a role??" and it's just. important to remember that none of this stuff is set in stone. roles are constructs, not Rules(tm) made by god or nature, and their entire history is very fraught.
you're still allowed to use them if you want, but please don't use them as a way to box yourselves or others in. you are more than a function.
(also a point that I feel like some folks missed on the original throwaway post is that you can still have damaging Real One centrist ideas and pigeonholing of headmates even if you disavow role labels. we're certainly still working on that! and even singlets run into this all the time in their friend groups and families. that being said, we do feel like roles can "formalize" these things in a way that make them harder to break out of.)
a while ago I had this convo with Lark that I feel like speaks for itself:
Lark: "I want to stay up late playing Minecraft, but... I have to be the responsible one..."
me:
me: "Okay so. There's this particularly insidious bit of thinking that I feel like circulates unaddressed around the plural community, and that's that anyone who isn't perceived as the 'host' or the 'core' or the 'primary' or whatever centrist term is automatically held to a higher standard of behavior."
me: "Like we all know already how 'persecutors' are unpersoned and 'protectors' and 'caretakers' and suchlike are also unpersoned by being expected to be bottomless pools of strength and love, but it also happens outside of role labels, in a much more subtle way. If you're not the Assigned Most Real One By Society, then any kind of flaw or vice you have becomes a mark against your very existence. If you're the 'host' and you, like, maybe spend a little more money than you should, well, everyone's a person and that's okay! If you're not the 'host' and you spend a little too much money? Well, clearly you are a fucking nuisance and a burden upon the life of The Real One and you should be so ashamed of yourself, don't you know that healthy plurality is all about having saintly role models in your head who always help you Make Good Choices and never ever have a little Suboptimal Fun themselves?? You are not a person being a person - you are a Problem to be Fixed."
me: "And I could get into dignity of risk and all the bullshit double-standards towards disabled folks, fat folks, and so on, but lemme just cut to the chase. Lark. It is One Hundred Percent within your right to do this Mildly Irresponsible Fun Thing. It is your body and your life as well. Would you like to do the Mildly Irresponsible Fun Thing."
Lark: (small voice) "...Yes. I would like to do the Mildly Irresponsible Fun Thing."
me: "FUCK YEAH"
plural zine interest check!! please dm me with any and all questions
basic premise: endo friendly zine discussing and expressing different plural experiences through the form of visual art, made by and for other plurals. there would also be written portions discussing different experiences and educating singlets on what exactly its like being plural! participants would be able to choose what sort of experiences theyd like to cover, though some guidelines may be provided to give folks a starting point
are you interested?
i am interested in participating as an artist
i am interested in participating as a writer
i am interested in participating as an admin assisstant
i am interested in participating as a pinch hitter/beta reader
i am interested in participating as multiple of these
i am interested in reading/downloading, but not participating
i am not interested
reblogs would be appreciated!
We were talking about this on discord, but decided it should probably be a post here instead. We had a dream the other night that was actually one of our headmates dreams that bled into front- which is interesting because that's never happened to us before. In general we actually don't get many dreams (at least that we can remember) that involve our plurality in anyway and we normally dream from the perspective of the body/being masked. Which is certainly a thing-
The few times we have had plurality evident in our dreams have all mostly been interesting though. We had a dream where we sort of instinctually knew Damascus was the one fronting once which was interesting! We've also switched in a dream two separate times before, one of them having been a nightmare that one of our soulbonds decided to intervene in and turned it into a somewhat better dream. We have also had a dream where someone was doing a presentation on plurality before, but we didn't get to see it unfortunately because we got there after the event was over- 😭
