Tulpas and The Rake

All right, so every day I sit and I wait for Michael to get out of school, right? Well, I people watch, you know me. I like looking at people. I noticed all these teen girls at his school, they walked together in like groups of three, five, or seven. And I couldn't figure out why. And then I realized it's because they literally can't even. I did not. I did not see where you were going. I like it. Good evening everybody and welcome to the graveyard. Thank you for joining us tonight. My name is Adam and my name's Matt. Now we'll have a tombstone or settle into your casket and get comfortable because this is graveyard tails. All right everybody here we are again Matt. How you doing tonight brother? I'm doing all right man. Good. How about you? I'm doing better than I was. I went and had a dental appointment and they fixed me up. I had a crown and all that stuff. I thought I was going to have a root canal. That didn't happen. So it's been good. You're lucky man. I know, I lucked out on that one. I had a tight sphincter for a while and until she said now you don't need one. And it wasn't because of the pain. It was because of the cost. Oh yeah. Yeah, 100% 100% I can deal with the pain man. I can't stomach the cost. It's like getting work done on your car or your teeth. It's like you need a second more. Yeah. Yeah. Oh I've got insurance. You know how much dental insurance covers? Nothing. Like if you go outside cleaning, you in trouble. Before we get into it we want to say go check out the podbellynetwork at podbelly.com. You can find a list of shows that we're happy to be associated with and I guarantee you're going to find something on there that you're going to enjoy and it may be something that you don't find anywhere else. So go check them out at podbelly.com. 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More bonus stuff coming up tonight for an episode that we've got coming out here in the next few days. We've already got bonus content created for it. So yeah, check it out. I think there's a lot of stuff that you'll enjoy because it's different. It's outside of what we normally talk about in a lot of ways. So give it a shot. Yep. All right, Matt, so let's take a second and let's talk about one of our long-time sponsors and now Carob is a subscription service that ships high quality, personalized vitamins, supplements, and powders conveniently to your door every month. And if you want to change your life, you have to change your habits. With Carob, you get the tools and motivation that makes it easy to build and stick with a routine as you move from summer into fall. And as you're shifting into a new routine this fall, focus on the habits you are going to adapt and changes you want to make in the new season. 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And it's just so easy and it takes all the hassle out of digging through all those bottles or standing in line at the at the health food section and trying to figure out where is this? Where is that? Should I take this? Or you know, it makes it so much easier. So for graveyard tells listeners, you can get 50% off your first carob order. All you have to do is go to takecarob.com that's T-A-K-E-C-A-R-E-O-F dot com and enter our promo code grave50-G-R-A-V-E-5-0. That's right. For 50% off your first carob order, go to takecarob.com and enter our code grave50 that's G-R-A-V-E-5-0. So Matt, that's all I've got. So why don't you tell us? What are we talking about tonight, brother? Okay, so I asked Adam this question a few weeks ago and I told him no, I don't wear those anymore. That was okay. I'm done with it. No, well, I brought up the question. We've talked about this before, okay? We've talked about the idea of Tulpas, okay? You know, that somebody could actually manifest something physical with their mind. And we're going to get into, Adam's going to get into what a Tulpa is and how we do. We've talked about this a long time ago in a kind of a half of a show. But my question was, what if a lot of these, I'm just going to say monsters, because they're not really cryptids. You know, they're not really anything that would be unidentified. These are monsters. What if these fictional monsters are actually Tulpas? Because the stories and the thought process of a large group of people produce a manifestation? Because a lot of these fictional monsters have reported sightings and interactions. And you're like, wait a minute. That's not that's not even real. I mean, it's not even suspected to be real. We know where it came from. But yet, there are eyewitness accounts of all kinds of fictional monsters. And more than what you could just blow off as somebody looking for attention or just pulling a prank or having a good time. Right. Right. So we're going to dig into this tonight and talk about this question. But we need to know what is a Tulpa? How does the idea of a Tulpa work? And Adam is going to explain that to us tonight. Right. So as we always say, go check our sources down on bottom of the show notes. You can find where we found all the information. And you can continue the research if you so desire. Now, like Matt said, we talked about this. It was long time ago. And it was a half episode. It was where I presented the idea to Matt. And then the second half he presented a topic to me. So we've never really, we've never really gone in depth into it. We've right. Yeah. Briefly touched on it. And we talk about it quite often. But you know, there's probably some people out there that either haven't listened to the old episode or they have. And they're still like, well, you keep saying this word. But I'm not sure what you mean by it. So we need to get into that. How? What they are? What people believe they are? How they can be created and all this kind of stuff. So atopa is a mental entity. And it's created through the power of thought and acts independently and in parallel to our own consciousness according to our own beliefs. So there's a lot of modern practitioners that describe them as like imaginary friends, which we all we know kids who have had imaginary friends. And right. You know, this thought is could these quote imaginary friends be more real to these people? To these kids or even adults who have quote imaginary friends? Then we want to give credit to like, maybe it's not just in all in their mind. But like I said, topas are thought forms. And they're believed to be created entirely from the power of the mind through meditation and visual visualization practices. Now it's originating in Tibetan Buddhism. So topas are considered to be beings that can take any form or appearance and are believed to be able to interact with the physical world. So according to Tibetan monks, it is a quote thought entity that is created as a result of long-term disciplined desires and focused trans work. So it goes back to Tibetan Buddhism. And it said that Tibetan monks will spend years sometimes sitting and in a translike state meditating on a thought form long enough for this thought form to become real, to be able to be seen by others, to be able to interact with others and in the physical world. It's kind of changed in the newer age of theosophy and spiritualism and all that stuff. But 20th century theosifist adapted the concept of quote emanation body. So the nearamita, the talku and others, it kind of to the concept of talpa and thought form. So the term thought form was used as early as 1927 in the translation of the Tibetan book of the dead by Evans Wentz. In a note in the English translation of the life story of Garab Dors, John Mairdhen Reynolds defines a talpa as an emanation or manifestation. But according to spiritualist Alexandra David Neal, and I feel like we've talked about her before may not have, it may just be something that is in my head because I've researched her a little bit, but she claimed to have observed these mystical practices into bet in the 20th century. She described the talpas as quote magical creations produced by a strong concentration of thought. David Neal believed that that talpas were capable of developing their own mind. Quote, when the talpa becomes sufficiently vital to play the role of a real being, it tends to free itself from the control of the creator. This takes place almost mechanically as a child leaving the maternal womb when it has reached full development and can live independently. So what it's saying is for what she means is for a long time in the beginning of the creation of this talpa, the talpa is tied to the creator. So it can't be seen by others, it lives off of the beliefs and morals and thoughts of its creator. But after a certain time, when it has been manifest for a certain period, it basically becomes its own entity and can break free of that. So then it thinks for itself and it does things according to its beliefs, rather than the creator's beliefs. Well, this opens up a lot of doors that are hard to close. What have you created? Not life, necessarily. I think this is more of you've created a projection of your own consciousness that can learn and develop just as you can. And then eventually get to the point where it can interpret and make decisions and you know, form a logical thought process and an opinion. You know, that's a lot of what people have been worried about with AI is that is this thing? Is it formulating opinions? Is it developing somewhat of a moral code? And a lot of the AI stuff you see nowadays is pretty fascinating. Yep. But, you know, I'm not scared that robots or Tulpas or AI is going to destroy us just yet. I can see the potential. So, you know, the whole idea that something that is not human could be manifested and just go, all right, I'm going to do my own thing now. See you. I don't know. It's a hard pill to swallow. It is. But, you know, it's a concept that's been around for millennia. Right. And it's still being practiced today. David Neil actually claimed to have created a Tulpa. And she said it was in the form of this friar tulk-like monk. And later it ended up developing its own life. So, it had to be destroyed because it had moved on and done its own thing. Well, David Neil raised the possibility that her experience might be deceptive. Quote, I may have created my own hallucinations, quote, but she also said that others could see the thought forms she created, which if you can see my hallucination, it's not a hallucination anymore. That's what I was about to say that that is completely opposite of what a hallucination is. Right. Right. Now, the concept of thought forms in Western esotericism is believed by some to have come about as an interpretation of the Tibetan concept of Tulpa's like we talked about. But the concept is related to Western philosophy and energetic practices. So, in his book, the human aura, a cultist William Walker defined thought forms as a simple, aetheric object, emanating from the aura's surrounding people, which are derived from their thoughts and emotions. They can serve as reflections of the person creating or as an invisible astral projection that can be seen by those with, quote, awakened astral senses or as illusions that can be perceived by anyone. So he's saying, depending on what type of thought form that's created, it can either only be seen by, quote, enlightened people or by if it's strong enough, then it can be seen by everyone. Yeah. And I mean, I get that idea about this awakened astral sense that Walker talks about. It's what we, I mean, I would say that's what we call people that are sensitives. They have a heightened sense to the spirit realm or, you know, mediums, people with psychic ability. They would have this awakened astral sense. And, you know, it's again, most psychics will tell you that, you know, everybody's a little bit psychic. Yeah. You just have to learn how to tap into that and focus your energy there to utilize it. Right. And so this, this may very well be something similar. If, if you have an inkling that you have this, this sense, then you might be one that could explore this even further and take the next step. Um, what, after you hear more, Adam talk more about it, you may think twice about it. I mean, you know, I, yeah, I'd love to have a little friar-tuck guy that I could make do the dishes or mow the grass or whatever, you know, do menial chores that I don't have time or desire to do. Um, that, that sounds great. But it doesn't necessarily in there. And just like, you know, David Neil said, you know, hers kind of started doing its own thing. So it had to be destroyed. Right. Right. Because what, what could the next own thing be? Right. You know, it, it may not just want to go and watch a movie or go to the farmer's market, you know, it may want to go and actually cause some havoc. Right. So you, you just can't let your Tulpa run wild. Right. Right. Does it may not have the same moral compass that you do? So once it breaks free of your morals and thoughts, it may not have your moral compass anymore. So you're holding me back. Yeah. Yep. Now, there's a theosophist named Annie Besont. And she wrote a book called Thought Forms. In there, she divided these thought forms into three categories. Those in the form of the person creating them, those resembling objects for people, and those representing, quote, inner qualities from astral or mental planes, such as, quote, nature spirits or the spirits of the deceased or emotions that can take on a, quote, soul condition. So she, she broke it down even further than just Tulpas and thought forms to there are three different types that you can create when you're doing these. Yeah. Now, in modern times, the concept of Tulpas has gained a popularity in the Western world through fiction. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, it became popular on television since 2009, online communities devoted to Tulpas have emerged on 4chan and Reddit. These communities, which refer to themselves as Tulpa makers or Tulpa Mansors, provide guides and support for other Tulpa Mansors. These communities gained popularity when fans of the adult animated series My Little Pony created forums for the Tulpas of characters in the show. And we talked about this on the last Tulpa episode, but fans attempted to use meditation and lucid dreaming techniques to create imaginary friends. So there was a whole group. The reason this got super popular on Reddit is there was My Little Pony fans that wanted to create their own My Little Pony's through Tulpa Mansi. And it started to hold that. Now, I couldn't find whether some of them were successful or not, but I don't know. And do imagine seeing a grown man, the big buff dude walking on the street with his little My Little Pony. Pink and purple Starshine Pony with his big long mane and I can pick her out with him. I can. Now, the idea of thought forms is not wholly a Tibetan idea. Several cultures have similar creatures. In Germanic and Celtic cultures, they're known as Puka. And it can be found in the works of Shakespeare. Actually, the character Puk in a mid-summer nights dream originates from the Germanic Celtic Puka. So it's been in literature for a while. So the concept of thought forms carries obvious implications for the understanding of consciousness and the quote, sigh phenomena yet so far up to this point, there's been no experimental research in this area. So haven't had scientists actually tried to study this, which I think they should. I mean, it's worth the investigation. And I think now it would be even more accepted to enter into this type of research because there is so much talk about what the human consciousness really is. Are we all connected? Are we just these individual parts of a more vast collective consciousness throughout the universe? So we've heard a lot of the people like Neil deGrasse Tyson talking about this idea of when you die, where does the human consciousness go? Does it stop? Is it energy? Does it move on? What happens? And I think the idea of you being able to put your consciousness to work and actually develop a physical entity, it's worth looking at. Right. And as this goes on to say, it says if consciousness has the ability to divide and extend itself, then it gives a little bit of context for understanding a lot of other phenomena like operational experiences, entities encountered in mediumship and poltergeist episodes. So they're saying if we find out that you can divide your consciousness, say create a topa, you divide into your consciousness, put part of it into this other creature. Then could that explain poltergeist activity to some degree in some cases? Could it explain what mediums speak to? They might be speaking to a more enlightened version of themselves that has access to other realms and can tell them things or somebody else's topic creature that has access to this information. Could it be any of these things? And I think if we did some study on consciousness and try to figure out where, why, when, and how, we might be able to understand this better, plus understand ourselves a little better. Yeah. Yeah. And you know, this poltergeist is something that I have not considered in this. If you listen to our poltergeist episode, there is a lot of speculation that people that deal with poltergeist activity most likely have a young teen daughter in the house. And the hormonal changes that occurred during puberty can produce these emotions that are so strong that it actually manifests as poltergeist activity. You know, and we saw a lot of cases where that was the case as far as there was a teenage, a young teenage girl in the house. You know, maybe that's low-hanging fruit because of that theory. But it was, it was a common thread. And we weren't the only ones that noticed it for them to say, this is what we think may be going on. I think we kind of blew that idea off. Maybe not completely. But when you consider the idea of Tulpa or splitting the human consciousness, maybe it's not way off base. I mean, I've got a poltergeist in my house now. We're having some poltergeist activity. We have for about the last six months. You know, you hear doors open and shut real hard. You'll hear footsteps at night. You'll hear the refrigerator door open rattling around and stuff. And the cats will go missing for periods of time and we'll find them in rooms. But, you know, we call our poltergeist Piper and she's 11 years old and she's in middle school. Right. And I mean, that's kind of how that's how life is right now for her. And, you know, it's, it's okay. It's what she does. But we understand that she's going through all these, you know, these really strong emotions and these changes and these hormones. And it just makes life seem so impossible at times. And we understand because we've got three daughters older than her. We've already been down this road. But it is curious to me when you mentioned poltergeists of maybe that is a possibility. You know, maybe your emotions are so strong at that point in development that you get so angry at your parents or at your best friend or whatever that door slam and lights flicker and things like that. And you don't understand that you're causing it. It frightens you. And now you're now you're afraid on top of all of those emotions and it just heightens everything. Who knows? Yep. That could be, you know, it could be that some, if not most or all poltergeist activity are topos because it would go in the same vein if you're at that point in life with that much hormonal changes and you're thinking about something, could you create a topic form that does all this stuff around your house without anybody's knowledge? And think about not just, you know, we're not picking on, you know, teen girls going through puberty. What about adults, male or female that are struggling with mental illness? You know, that have strong emotions about something that they cannot process. You know, their brain is not doing what it's supposed to do, whether because of a chemical imbalance or, you know, some other mental illness. And those emotions get really strong. And and could they be manifesting something? Right. You know, manifesting a tormentor in some cases. And I've read, I've read case studies about people that were suffering from schizophrenia, schizophrenia, having a tormentor, you know, either a voice or an apparition that is just there to tell you how terrible you are. I mean, that would be a horrible way to live. And you hear that so much, your emotions just really, you know, they, they, they, they, they so close to the surface and they're so intense that you really do manifest something. Yeah. That's possible. So how exactly is a Tulpa created? And I found this on the How to Lucid website. We have a whole section of how to create a Tulpa and all sorts of other stuff. You can find the link in the show notes. But so step one, plan out your Tulpa. Take the time to really think about what and who you want your Tulpa to be. You'll find that after a while they sort of change into what they want to be. And that's okay. But still take this time at the start to really think about how, who and why you want your Tulpa to be. Consider why you're wanting a Tulpa and what you'll ask it when it's there. Will you just want a friend or will you want something more serious like a life advisor or even a guide. Consider these things long before you try and manifest one. Step two, consider its beliefs and personality. Think about what sort of personality you want your Tulpa to have. Do you want it to be funny? Someone you can have a laugh with. This is all important to think about and will influence the sort of entity you create. Step three, practice speaking and interacting with it. Once you've got a clear idea of what you think it should look like and how it should act, you should practice talking to it. Give it a name or open your mind and hear it tell you its own name. The more you open your mind to this and be creative, the more you'll enjoy the experience. Let it decide its own name and practice sort of hearing it without forcing it to speak or thinking too much about what it should say. If you find this difficult, it says that's perfectly normal as well and so you should practice imagining what you think it should say before naturally hearing it. Step four, practice keeping it in the background. This is where you'll make it more a part of your life. Practice just sort of keeping the thought of your Tulpa in the background of your mind and thoughts. Whatever you're doing, try and keep thinking a little bit about your Tulpa and imagine it's there with you all the time. Practice hearing it say things about what you're currently doing and practice interacting with it in your mind and experiencing the world together as a couple. This will help to strengthen the image and make it more likely that you'll be able to interact with it without trying to imagine its responses. Remember, the goal here is to create an entity with which you can interact with with which you can interact without being aware of the fact that you're creating its answers. It should feel like eventually you're interacting with something or someone that you have no control over. This is basically the imaginary friend route of Tulpas. I've seen it said other places where this then becomes you do this long enough and then the thing will actually manifest and be able to be seen by others and all that stuff. Right. So what you and I have talked about, Matt, is what happens when a group of individuals, you know, what Tibetan monks maybe, but let's say in our day and age, you've got a community on maybe Reddit, whatever, and they're all trying to create a being. So they all on their own time sit and do this topic practice to create a Tulpa. If one person can create a Tulpa, what could hundreds, maybe thousands, tens of thousands of people thinking about the same thing create? Could it quickly manifest a being? You know, what if they aren't actually trying to create this thing, but they're doing these steps unbeknownst to them. And think about it like in wika or voodoo or who do something like that. You have incantations, you have spells that you say and it will create, it will create something, either an action or a physical thing. If you don't know you're saying that spell, it might still work because it's a succession of words. Right. So what if you're doing these steps? Don't know that what you're doing are the steps to creating a Tulpa. And there's a bunch of people doing that same thing thinking about this one being, could it have effects on the world when there's enough people doing it? Yeah. And so we want to take that a step further and say, could you possibly come together and create a monster that fully manifests that other people or at least sensitive people could see and interact with? Oh, and hey, I just found this. I've been looking for this. This idea, as Adam said, you know, it's not solely Tibetan and it's not modern either. So I remember one of the first, the first times I ever heard about a Tulpa and I don't even, I don't even recall it was using that type of language. But I've said before, I really am a fan of the author's Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child and their Pindergast series of books. And in one of those books, and I could not find it, it wasn't in the list, but it's wheel of darkness. And one of the main themes of this is that, you know, they're on a cruise ship and these murders happen. And they're trying to figure out, you know, who's committing these murders. And because there's always a little underlying supernatural, we learn that the murders are being committed by a Tulpa. And how this, and this one is not one that this is more or less something that you summon that had been summoned ages ago. And the way you did it was through mentally untying this knot. You know, there was, it was like on a tapestry and it was this very intricate knot. And the way you focused hard enough to manifest this being was you mentally worked through and tried to untangle the knot. Yeah. And it was like said, extraordinarily complex that that's what allows you to block everything out so that your conscious could manifest this thing and manifest into a physical entity that could attack and kill. So, you know, of course, that's a work of fiction. These things we're going to talk about tonight are also works of fiction. But as I said at the top of the show, we seem to have eyewitness accounts of these things existing. So we're going to see, could, could people be concentrating on this or thinking about it enough enough people that these things actually manifest? I mean, it's worth a thought. And some of these you've probably heard of, you know, one of these you may not have this, it's fairly new to me. And this is siren head. You know, I had you heard of siren head before we did this at them? I had not. No. It was a first for me. You were talking about it. And I had to look it up because I had never, I never heard about it. So I guess it was probably about maybe six months to a year ago. I first heard about siren head. And I saw the videos, I saw the, you know, the stories and everything. And I thought, well, this, this is really weird. I've never heard of this before. I figured out why it was, you know, fairly new. But siren head is, it's distinctly known for its tall stature, which is about 40 feet tall. And it has these very unique sirens that take the place of its head. So if you look up on a pole and you see a storm siren that, you know, trumpet-looking thing that goes off when there's a tornado or something like that, that's what this thing has instead of a head strike fear into me when I hear them. Oh, yeah. I hate those things. But it says this creature is known to be hostile and hunts people as if they were prey, although it usually hangs out in rural towns and wooded areas. It is implied heavily that siren head has been around since the beginning of mankind because it appears in cave paintings. Yeah. So it will throw a little wrench in there. Yeah. Ancient drawings of this thing that has become known as siren head. Its limbs are disproportionately long and thin with arms almost as long as its entire body. Remember, this thing is about 40 feet tall. It has these huge bony hands. And the neck is more like a pole that comes out, you know, from between the shoulders and has these sirens attached facing in opposite directions. There are also several black wires that snake around its, you know, neck and they go into the upper shoulders. The speakers are fused to the neck by tendrils of skin and they're capable of swiveling around much like the head of an owl. Now, some images depict siren head speakers with this toothy, lipless human-like mouth and a long retractable snake-like tongue. Okay. But they don't know if it eats. They just know that it kills, but it's got a mouth and teeth and a pretty scary-looking tongue. I mean, you know, humans are like a moose-boosh. Maybe. I lost my spot. Now siren head is not supposed to be a being of our reality, but siren head is not limited by the laws of our nature because he is a constantly changing manifestation, which almost always appears different in the victim's view of siren head. The information changes all knowledge that we have, which opens up various theories about the creature. Now, it's not known how siren head came to have sirens in the distant past before actually s-actual sirens were invented, which makes sense. We hadn't had sirens for all that along, you know, but 150 years. But, you know, we see cave paintings with this figure on it. Really, really strange. There's also ideas that siren head is interdimensional, and that, you know, not only has he been around since the beginning of mankind, he was around way before that as well. So if you think about the interdimensional aspect of it, you know, it doesn't matter that we didn't have sirens for that long. They probably existed in another dimension, okay? But that siren head, big, scary, fast, hunched humans. I say that it can, it plays these bizarre sounds, you know, very unnerving, meant to confuse. Oftentimes, you'll hear your own name being spoken as if it's coming through a loudspeaker. And that's got one of the stories where if you hear your name, it's too late. You know, it's already on yet. Siren Head was created back in 2018 by the Canadian designer artist and comic maker known as Trevor Henderson. Now, siren head kind of came about in the same manner of other creepy positive villains like the slender man who we're going to talk about here in just a few minutes. Now, the first photo of siren head to ever exist was an image featuring siren head standing still at a graveyard. Now, Henderson later started making more and more images of siren head expanding on the creature story and the disappearances of numerous victims all over the world. So now it's gone from, you know, a story to an urban legend. The first reported siren head occurred in 1966, when a family on vacation in the Arizona desert captured an image of the creature in a graveyard. 20 years later, on July 16, 1995, Chad and his friends were hiking in the woods of tenured creek where they found siren head to be lurking. According to Chad, his friends got snatched by something gigantic striding through the trees that mimicked their voices. Chad was found alive with a few injuries, but the friends were nowhere to be found, either taken or killed by siren head. In total, there have been 13 reports of siren head and all of the stories were released by the victims. Now, one example of these photos is a photo of siren head in Indiana, where citizens started disappearing. And it was seen on the streets in a photo. And these ancient rot paintings that I mentioned earlier, they've been found all over North America, which also indicates that siren head is not a new species or a creature on Earth. And there have also been sightings of creatures that resemble siren head, but they lack similar features. For example, a photo of siren head was released where it appears to have a street light for a head, like it's trying to blend in with other street lights by standing still. It's also possible that siren head has the ability to transform into various urban structures in order to resemble and lure his victims. However, there are theories that siren head is actually a hostile species and that there used to be a lot of creatures similar to siren head, but they are now deceased and siren head is the last remaining member of his species. Now, this is, it says this is just speculation and not confirmed by by Trevor Henderson. Okay. So we've got fan fan fiction and creation going forward. So you started with an idea that you've expounded on it. You've created a backstory and origin story and people have created it in Minecraft. Yes. That's a popular gut. Yeah. So you've got all these people now focusing on these stories. People come across these stories and they don't know the background. And so you read this story like the one from 1966 where this family called a picture of siren head. And you don't go and find all the background. You don't go and read the origin story. But now you've got this thing in your hand that says, oh crap, there is some kind of weird monster that looks like a giant pole with sirens on the top of it. And he's hunting humans. So you may do that. How many other people might do the exact same thing? So even though you, you know, if somebody came up to you and said, do you believe in siren head? You'd be like siren head. What are you to? Oh, is that the thing with the sirens that big tall? Oh, yeah, I remember reading about that. I don't know. I haven't heard any, you know. Okay. So, you know, it just keeps spinning around. You're not out there, you know, holding the sign, talking about, you know, let's save siren head. He's real, you know. But it's in your head. It's in your consciousness. And it's in the consciousness of all these other people. So if they focus and read the stories and these fans, they write the fan fiction, they do these artist renderings, they make videos. All of this has happened. Okay. All of this has already happened. There is tons of fan fiction out there. There is, there are tons of videos that people have made just to showcase, you know, their, their editing skills and you see one or two and it just sticks in your head because it's out there now. So, and you're constantly thinking about it, like in the back ground, which is exactly what the idea of creating a topa says to do. Keep it in the background. Let it just hang out back there. And if enough people are doing that, are they producing an actual siren head, even briefly that somebody could see or snap a picture of, you know, or you do it yourself, you're out in the woods, you're hiking, you're having a good time and then something in the back of your head says, Hey, you remember that siren head thing? Look over there in the woods. And now you're like, do I see something moving over there? You know, that looks like sirens up above those trees. You know, next thing, you know, you're, you're manifesting a vision even if it's just for you. So, how much further are you from manifesting it where other people would notice it as well? Right. Or if there's a ton of people that are doing that due to this urban legend story, the creepypasta story that got created. This is now spread worldwide. People are reading this. There's a bunch of people thinking about it. Could that create siren head that actually goes out and does some of these things that people are saying, oh, it does. And here's something to think about that. I know the cave painting thing is part of the lore. This deal. What if and go with me? This is woo woo that you might had to put on your foil hat for this one. Oh, we're all, we're all in for the woo woo if we're doing this. That's true. That's that's that's this episode. So we have the Mandela effect. We have, you know, get deja vu, all this kind of stuff. All of that is thought to be what if you're always either traversing universes or where we go back in time and stuff changes and then it comes back and then we all know time is not linear. Time is all over the map. So what if in the creation of this topa of siren head? Because there is the lore that it has been here since before mankind. What if in the creation of this topa it actually was created before mankind. So we created something now that our ancestors saw then because of us and it got put on cave paintings because of us. And then we forget about it and then it comes back into consciousness later. We start thinking about again, created again, right? So what if we are the, you know, our thought about this thing, our topa that we created of siren head not only has effects in our timeline and our generation, but in past generations, not just future ones, but what if because of the belief that it was ancient, we made it ancient. Yeah. Yeah. Man, that is that is deep and a little twisty in there, but quite, quite twisty. I mean, you know, when you when you when you begin to open your mind the idea of how time and space work and how we know that time is not linear. And that the universe doesn't necessarily obey the rules for time and space that we may want to impose on it. I mean, it's absolutely plausible. You know, and understand when I say that it's plausible, you know, again, we're we're opening our minds to the woo woo here. A lot of factors have to be in place for it to be plausible. Absolutely. If the factors are in place, then we're talking about a lot of unknowns here, but it's again, it's just, it's just a thought. It's just an idea if, if, you know, a collective consciousness could do this. So let's talk about slender man. I teased it. I think slender man is is more well known. It's been it's been around a lot longer and it, you know, popular video games with with slender man, but slender man was actually created on June 10, 2009 on a thread in the something awful internet forum. Now the thread was a Photoshop contest in which users were challenged to quote create paranormal images. The forum poster Eric Nudson under the pseudonym Victor Surge contributed two black and white images of groups of children to which he added a tall thin spectral figure wearing a black suit. Now, although previous entries had consisted solely of photographs, Surge supplemented his submission with snatches of text supposedly from witnesses describing the abductions of the groups of children and giving the character the name the slender man. Now, these additions effectively transformed the photographs into a work of fiction and subsequent posters expanded upon the character adding their own visual or textual contributions. So they've done this before. Okay. And and slender man took off in in tremendous popularity. But in in her book folklore horror stories and the slender man, the development of an internet mythology, Professor Shira Chess of the University of Georgia connected the slender man to ancient folklore about fairies. Now, like fairies, the slender man is otherworldly with motives that are often difficult to grasp. Like fairies, his appearance is vague and often shifts to reflect what the viewer wants or fears to see. And like fairies, the slender man lives in the woods and wild places and kidnaps children. So after the creation of slender man, it pretty much went viral and it spawned numerous works of fan art, cosplay and online fiction that we we know is creepypasta. And you know, one person puts out a creepypasta about slender man and another one takes that, gets an idea from it and expands on that idea. So pretty soon, you have this in-depth story with with branches, you know, with, okay, well, this person mentioned that slender man did X, Y, and Z. You know, nobody ever talked about that. Somebody else did. Somebody said, ooh, they can do X, Y, Z. Let's talk about that. And come up with a backstory and everything for this aspect of the slender man. And now it seems even more real. But because of the slender man's fictional mythology, it has evolved without what an official canon would be considered. So there's no, there's no actual work of fiction for the slender man that is the end all be all, okay. Some things go in different directions, some things contradict one another. But that means that his appearance, his motives, his habits, his abilities, they're not fixed and they can change depending on who the storyteller is. I mean, now he is most commonly described as a very tall, as being very tall and thin with unnaturally long tentacle like arms. He can extend these tentacles to intimidate or capture his prey. Me too. In most stories, his face is white and featureless, but occasionally his face appears differently to anyone who sees it. He appears to be wearing a dark suit and tie, and the slender man is often associated with the forest and or abandoned locations, and he has the ability to teleport. Proximity to the slender man is said to trigger a quote, slender sickness, which is a rapid onset of paranoia, nightmares and delusions accompanied by nosebleeds. Now, early stories feature him targeting children or young adults. Some featured young adults driven insane or to act on his behalf while others claim that the investigating the slender man will draw his attention. When you look into the void, the void looks back, you know. Right. It's a very paranormal thought because it's very true in the case of paranormal. You and I have experienced that with paranormal stuff. So it's not too far out of the realm for something. If slender man were real, then it would fit in with that. But how real could he possibly be? I mean, he is a work of fiction. He's my neighbor. He cuts my grass and he cleans out my gutters with them long tentacle arms. His real name is Phil. Good dude. Hard to read his face, though. You can't tell what his mood is. Phil Slenderman. Well, he hates the bad rap he's got. That's right. Well, it became so real for two young teenagers that on May 31st and 2014, two 12-year-old girls in Wakesha, Wisconsin held down and stabbed another 12-year-old classmate 19 times. When questioned later by authorities, they reported to claim that they wish to commit a murder as a first step to becoming proxies for the slender man, having read about it online. They also stated that they were afraid that the slender man would kill their families if they did not commit the murder. After the perpetrators left the scene, the victim crawled out of the woods to a roadway and a passing cyclist alerted authorities and the victim would subsequently survive. Both attackers were diagnosed with mental illnesses, but were also charged as adults and faced up to 65 years in prison at 12 years old. One of the girls reportedly said that Slenderman watches her he can read minds and that he could tell her poor. Both girls were initially found to be unable to stand trial due to mental illness. After receiving treatment, a judge ruled that both were competent to stand trial and would be tried as adults. A Nessa Weir played guilty to attempted second-degree homicide, but stated that due to mental illness was not responsible for her actions. She was sentenced to 25 years in a mental institution. Morgan Geiser played guilty to attempted first-degree homicide and was given the maximum sentence allowed 40 years in a mental facility. Much like siren head, the internet is full of videos, Reddit posts, creepypastas of people claiming to have seen the slender man. Even now, despite all the evidence that slender man is fictional, people still claim to have been tormented by him. You know, so you got to have to weed through is this story of slender man coming after me or me seeing him is this more creepypasta? Or is this somebody that believes that they have interacted with this entity? And again, just think this was so real to these two girls that they, you know, attempted murder in order to appease this entity. And, you know, I know, you know, everybody can go, you know, they were 12 and they were influenced. You know, they read stuff online. You know, it changed how they thought they were already predisposed to do something like this and this just pushed them over there. Okay, you can argue all of that. But at the end of the day, we know of two people that believed that slender man, I almost said slender man, slender man was real. How many more were out there that also thought slender man was real and what they were reading was real and believed it in the back of their head. They may not have driven them to commit an act of violence, but it's in their head that maybe I'm going to think about this if I go out in the woods at night or if I see an abandoned woodshed, you know, that looks like somewhere where slender man would be. And maybe it's not even something they would share, just something in the back of their head to the point that they manifest slender man in there. You know, they manifest slender man then he terrified these girls to and the only way they knew that they could they could appease him, you know, was to take the life of one of their classmates. I mean, it's horribly, horribly tragic. But I think it goes to our question of, can we manifest these things? No matter how strange or bizarre, could we manifest something that is totally fictional? Well, and there's a bunch of videos out, 2021, 22, 23 of people saying, you know, we saw slender man in the woods. Slender man was following us. Oh yeah. And they put these videos out on YouTube and all that. Now, like you said, are they just perpetuating the creepy pasta or maybe they have such a belief in it that when they went out in the woods, they created them and their friends that went looking for it actually created a thought form that did chase them. And they're not they're not lying. Right. They really did experience this. However, if you and I had gone out there same time, not with the group that had been thinking about it, but we're out there in the same area just run into these people. We wouldn't have seen it. Right. Because we were not creating this topic form. You know, and I mean, you got to think about that in other situations too, in any paranormal thing, could you be creating a topa? Yeah. But slender man is one of those. Maybe it's because I know more about the slender man creepy pasta than I do the siren head thing, but I can really see how people could get the slender man thing in their head so much that it becomes real to them. It's it's been around. It feels like forever. Oh, I know. It hasn't even though it hadn't been that long. It feels like forever. And I remember when I first heard about it, when I first heard it, I went, is this something people really believe or is this a story? And I had to go look it up because I mean, there's the movie. There's so much. So could the movie have perpetuated the topic creation? Even more so because now you've got it in the back of the mind of maybe millions of people I saw that movie. And you don't even have to think about what it looks like or what its actions could be, which are things that you have to do in the creation of a topa. That's already provided to you. You've already got the mental image. This is how it's supposed to look. This is how it's supposed to behave. So you're you're already, you know, three or four steps into it with with just that information. Now all you have to do is is believe it and and keep it as a part of your conscious. Yeah. Yep. Um, and but I thought of something when you said that if if if we were to see people that thought they were being chased by Slenderman and we Slenderman and we wouldn't see it. Okay. So imagine this scenario. You got two people out in the woods. They get they get scared. They believe that Slenderman's that Slenderman. I can't get off it now. Slenderman. Mm hmm. Slenderman is there and he's chasing them and they come across two other friends and they don't see it but they see the fear in their friends faces and in their voices and they see them running for their lives. What are they going to do? Yeah. Okay. I'm not going to stick around here and find out if they're lying or not. So they begin to run and go with it and if they know what Slenderman is, now it's in their head. So now we've doubled the amount of consciousness that is thinking of him and is that making it worse? Stronger. Yeah. I mean, now we're actually getting into more than just an apparition. We're getting into maybe we're creating an actual physical entity that's coming after these people. Mm hmm. I mean, it's just, I mean, this, this, this is the crap that I think about it night when I'm trying to go to sleep. So yeah, no joke. No joke. Well, this last one that we're going to talk about, I actually discussed, I, I think it was on our urban legends to show that I talked about this. But this being is, of course, it's been around longer than siren head and Slenderman. This is the rake. And like I said, if you go, but I think it's the urban legends to show where I discussed the rake. Um, because I remember we talked about it and I'll reiterate what I said then is if any of them are going to scare me, it's going to be this mofo. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Now the rake is described as humanoid about six feet tall when standing, but it usually crouches and walks on our all fours. It has very pale skin. The face is blank, um, as in no nose, no mouth. However, it has three solid green eyes, one in the middle of its forehead and the other two on either side of its head. What's interestingly enough, that wasn't a fact that I recall from previous research, the three-eyed deal. That's really the it's the first time I remember reading that. Um, but it's usually seen in the front yards and suburban areas. It usually just watches the observer, but will stand up and attack if approached. When it attacks, a mouth opens up as if a hinged skull that opened at the chin and it reveals all these tiny, but dull teeth, which is kind of even more creepy that it's not fangs or sharp teeth. It's just these weird little nasty baby teeth just crammed in its face. Now, a little tooth nub. Now, the character spindly limbs, it's low to the ground lurking and the many teeth help contribute to the name, the rake. Now, in the fictitious origin story, early signings of the monster occurred as early as 20, uh, 2003 when reported encounters with the curious, frightening creature began to crop up in northeastern America before a media blackout on the subject, apparently began. As a result, urban legend has it that there was little to no known information on the rake until around 2006 when victims began collaborating to research the creature and discovered close to two dozen documents with dates ranging across centuries, all describing similar encounters with the rake. Some of the supposed artifacts included a suicide note from 1964, a journal entry translated from Spanish dated 1880, which I did discuss in that episode, and a mariners log from 1691, which we also talked about. The most famous story of the rake involves a woman waking to find the monster sitting at the edge of her bed. This is the story that I found when I initially learned about the rake. The character is often said to creep into bedrooms, induce nightmares, and observe the dreamers for a time before killing them. Now, probably the most common photo of the rake is taken from a trail camera with night vision. You can see trees and foliage indicative of a wooded area, but off to the right of the picture. You see this white emaciated figure that appears to be down on all fours with its thin, spindly arms extending downward from larger bulb of shoulders. The glowing eyes seem to be looking directly at the camera, and YouTube and TikTok are loaded with supposed photographs and videos of a similar creature that is often thought to be the rake. So, and if you go and you look up the rake picture, you've seen it. I guarantee you've seen it. It's been posted as something else, but it is generally considered to be the photographic evidence of the existence of the rake. So, again, just like with the other two, you combine all that together, and you really amp up the fear and the thought that you don't have to go find this thing, it will come to your neighborhood. And the idea that these people that had witnessed it or been victimized found all these other documented cases of people with very similar stories, it's feeding that fire to the point that the rake has almost just become like Dracula or Bigfoot. It's just, oh yeah, yeah, I know what the rake is. You know, I've heard the story, you know, yeah, I know it. Well, and here's a question. Another one of my tenfold questions. We know that we hear a lot of artists and people that create things. They say they didn't have this idea. It was given to them. You know, I didn't invent this toaster oven. You know, the idea for the whole thing fully formed just was given to me by something. And I just built it. Okay. We hear that for paintings and story writers. I mean, Stephen King says he would get obliterated on drugs, write a whole story and not remember it. And so it was like it wasn't maybe him doing it. It was just he was the vessel that it was coming through. Yeah. So here's my question. What if the rake has been around? It's a legit thing. The story of the rake was given to this guy in a dream in a, you know, flow state, whatever, to perpetuate the tale because it's like Tinkerbell and it needs to be believed in. Yeah. You got to clap and believe in it. Yeah. So he was given this to perpetuate the tale of the rake so that it could manifest through topic belief and and a topic making structure. Yeah. And that's how it has persisted through centuries. Right. Right. So I like that even better than the other one you came up with. And I liked it too. That's pretty good. Adam has, I mean, he has really got his tinful hat on at night. It might as well. He's got a Dallas Cowboys hat on. So it might as well be tinful. You know, we all got to believe in something. And if it's that the belief that the Cowboys might go to the Super Bowl, I'm gonna hold onto it. No matter how bad that belief may be. Yeah. We're in the middle of the belief in the Titans that this is their year right now. So ask me again in a month if everybody is still feeling that way. So since we're on that topic to all the Cowboys fans that are listening, let's all create a topa of a team that can win the Super. Yeah. Maybe this is our year. If we all believe that's it's concentrate in the back of our minds all the time about winning the Super Bowl and maybe a topa will happen. Oh yeah. So I mean, these are just three examples. They're good examples, but they're three examples of fictional characters that have taken on literally a life of their own. And to the point of being being seen, you know, being interacted with. So how is this even possible? And the answer that Adam and I come up with is topus. You know, and the one that you and I have talked about that it didn't warrant you finding stories about or anything, but I wanted to bring it up anyway. Santa Claus. Sure. Okay. That's a belief that has spanned how many generations. And I'm not talking about the Coca-Cola Santa. I know where that came from. I'm talking about Saint Nicholas. You know, the story of Saint Nicholas, it's spanned how many generations. And then it comes to the Coca-Cola Santa of the jolly old red guy in a suit with reindeer. That has been put in the heads of so many children for so long. And they believe wholeheartedly in it. And they're constantly thinking about, you know, he sees you when you're sleeping. He's a creep and a pervert to or whatever the song is. And what if there is now an entity due to topic practices that resembles jolly old Saint Nicholas. Yeah. Due to the thoughts of how many people for how long and what something I wonder about. Yeah. And even in in this case, there were so many real individuals in history that inspired what we know now is Santa Claus. You've got not only do you have background and origin stories. You have real people, you know, five, six hundred years ago that carried these traits. You know, that you know, was was favored by children was was kind and gift giving. Um, you know, was was helpful and it all came around Christmas. And it just it builds and it builds and the legends build and the story builds. But there it's just like anybody else, you know, you could take Daniel Boone. We know Daniel Boone was a real person. We know what he did. But there are so many stories about Daniel Boone that have just become larger than he himself. You know, because his life was so fascinating. Um, you know, I think Santa Claus, St. Nicholas, it's the same way. You know, there were so many actual people that took on this persona that we're looking at it in, you know, the 21st century. And maybe after hundreds and hundreds of years, we have manifested what we as a as a collective conscious view to be Santa Claus. I mean, you're you're not going to show up if you show up at a mall and there's a guy in a blue suit with the fur and everything. And, you know, instead of giving out candy canes, he's giving out, um, you know, flyers. He said, he said it out pamphlets, you know, clean shaven, short hair, baseball cap. Yeah, you're you're not going to say, hey, that's Santa Claus. No, you could say, man, that guy's weird suit looks like a blue Santa suit. But it's not, it's not Santa. You know, you you immediately pick up the name and that's because it's just ingrained. And you know, you said something the other night, we were talking about this. Maybe maybe this is what they track on the radar. It's everybody's dope at creation that's flying around. Yeah. Um, it's incredible. And there's there's so many others. Um, that if you if you think about it, it could potentially, you know, maybe maybe we have, you know, maybe maybe we have manifested this thing. So what do you guys think? You know, Adam and I were, we're really just spitballing this idea. Um, but do you think we're way off base? Do you think this, this idea has some merit? Did you know about siren head and slender man and the rake and and all these other things that we've talked about tonight? And you know, maybe you have a better understanding of what a topple would be or maybe it sparked your interest to go research it further, whatever it is. Hey, let us know. Let us know. And the best place to do that is in our Facebook group. Um, it's called the graveyard thousands of people in there. It is it's active. It's a safe place. Share these experiences, share these thoughts. We love to hear them. Uh, when you're done there, you can go to our website, which is graveyard podcast.com. And there you can find links to the show. You can find links to purchase graveyard tells merchandise. You can listen to the show. And you can become a patron. And like I said at the beginning, go check out that huge catalog of bonus episodes. It's it's great. There's some really, really awesome content in there. Don't forget to rate and review us on iTunes. It brings us up the charts. It just makes it easier for people to find the show. So until next time, we'll save you a seat in the graveyard. See you soon.