33.22 - MU Podcast - The Orphan Tulpa
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Welcome to Mysterious Universe, Season 33, Episode 22. Coming up on the show, we've got the hijinks of the Hydronauts, Pollux Portals, and the birth of the Tulpa Thongden. I'm

I'm your host, Benjamin Grundy. Joining me is Aaron Wright. I thought before that Tulpa Fongden was like some subcategory of tulpic beings, but you told me that that's its name. It sounds dirty, doesn't it? It does sound... A tulpa wearing a thong. It's something disgusting. No, get your mind out of the gutter. I don't know why you're accusing me of that. It's our last episode of season 33, we decided today. Yeah, we did.

We're going to be back for our free listeners, for you free listeners on the when? Fourth of July. Fourth of July. Nice day to return. Fourth of July. We've, of course, got a plus episode coming out on Tuesday, but it is our mid-season break coming up. So, yeah, we'll be back. I think it's on the first or the second for plus. But, yeah, another episode's coming up on Tuesday. But our big show coming up, I finally got not this in the mail.

But I got Alvin Schwartz's book in the mail. An Unlikely Prophet, a Metaphysical Memoir by the Legendary Writer of Superman and Batman. Yeah, so Schwartz, he's one of these golden age writers. They call them the comic book golden age writers. So the guys that were writing the stories like Batman, Superman, some of the early Marvel stuff in the 1950s, 1940s. Oh, the real original. The golden age. Yeah, yeah.

Before it became garbage, right? So he's considered one of these golden age writers and he passed away, I think it was a few years ago now, but he was 98 when he passed away. He was born in like 1916 and he wrote this memoir. This is a memoir before he died.

And it's all about how Superman became more than just a fictional character. Oh, is this following on from, because you obviously brought up Fourth Wall Phantoms there by Joshua Cutcham, but is it like this idea of a topic entity forming from the imagination of a writer? Yeah, you're right. Joshua Cutcham mentioned this book specifically in Fourth Wall Phantoms. It's the idea that there's this

kind of soft line between fiction and reality when it comes to these literary creations. And he was one of the authors mentioned. Schwartz spoke about this idea of Superman, the character, eventually controlling the stories written about him in these comic books in the 40s and 50s. And other Superman contributors who took over that character were

commented on a similar thing. It was like there were certain stories that you could write about Superman, but if you tried to venture outside of this created world, Superman wouldn't let you.

It's like he would start to influence the creators themselves. It's almost like the character of Superman started to decide what stories he wanted to be in. This is crazy. This ties in with something that happened. So I happened to be talking to an acquaintance. I wouldn't say a friend, but just an acquaintance of mine. And she was telling me about it. She's like, ugh.

Well, she must be psychic from the story that I'm going to tell you, but she was telling me about how she's been trying to improve her writing. And so she goes to these writer's courses and this kind of stuff, and they do little camps. So it's like a new age kind of camp. And so they'll go out and they'll be in a teepee or not a teepee. What's the word? A yurt. The good old yurt, right? And she's like, but I don't go to them anymore. And I said, why don't you go to them anymore? She's like, oh, I had a really bad encounter. And here I am thinking, you know, she's taken ayahuasca or mushrooms, you know, did something happen?

She's like, no, no, no, no. I've been focusing really, really hard on my psychic practice one night. What did she do? She's like, I woke up in the yurt and she swore that there was like this glowing being with this basket under its arms with all these blocks in it. And the being was going about. And because they were in this room that was, because it was a yurt, right? So it had all these kind of like cots around and people were sleeping. And she's like, apparently this being was like taking the block out and was going up to people's heads and was like-

But...

inserting ideas into their heads. And she was more pissed off because she's like, it didn't come to me. And I was like, well, you were awake. And then she's like, no, I won't go back. I won't have anything to do with it. She'd already received her block. Well, she never wrote anything after that. Oh, right. So it's like, yeah, but it literally was like putting ideas into people's heads. And I've heard a bunch of stories like that over the years. Remember the one where it was a similar story where someone woke up and there was some entity in their room and it was, there was like some mystical tape recorder. Yeah.

No, I don't remember this. They said it was an alien encounter. And they had this giant tape recorder and it was like firing information into their brain. Yeah. Sending all these ideas into their brain. And that's the thing. It's like these beings seemingly do influence humans. Like they're the ones, these entities themselves kind of take on their own mind. So it's not necessarily, it's a thought form. I wonder if it's like in a lot of these cases that,

These entities just exist somewhere, but they step into the form that is created. They're an intelligent entity, right? But they can't manifest in this reality until they take on, I guess, the structure that's created by the writer. And that's why they have independence. Well, Schwartz never really understood...

what the Superman creation was. He had an inkling that it was influencing the stories and influencing the way the character was being written. But it wasn't until this strange Tibetan guy showed up out of nowhere. It's always some Tibetan llama showing up. Yeah, at his house in New York, just like on a bicycle, knocked at the door one day. You mean Blavatsky style? Yeah, full Blavatsky style. This weird Tibetan guy knocked on his door and it's this strange encounter he had with this mysterious individual who

that ultimately led to his understanding that, well, the creation of my fictional Superman was more than just something on the page. It had become something more. So I wonder if it's attached to him, though, because you're talking about the Golden Age and, like, the stories for a lot of that stuff, they're not the same anymore. Like, they've been, I don't want to say corrupted, but they've certainly kind of lost their...

Well, it's a different age as well. Like the 40s and 50s was an age of hope and aspiration and the future was bright. And now that's completely reversed. Now we're in the black pill phase. Everything's, you know, post-apocalyptic disaster and everything's got to be gritty and dark. Yeah. You know, back then there was a vision of the future that was aspirational and now that's kind of gone. But I guess that's why it was the golden age. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you could have gritty and dark. I'm just wondering if it's like he, by him passing away,

Did the form that was somehow connected to him then also... That's what we'll explore. Okay. Because other people have come into his creation and encountered his creation. What have you got coming up? Oh, we're going to be heading into some strange reports actually out of this great Russian researcher. His name is... I've just lost it because I told you my story. It's Mikhail...

Mikhail Gerstein. So Mikhail Gerstein was connected to essentially like a Soviet anomalous research group. And I found him through Paul Stonehill, who I'll link to him in the show notes, does great videos and this kind of stuff. But I jumped into the research of Mikhail and,

Is this some kind of Soviet X-Files? Yeah, pretty much. Like it's along those lines. And you know, with Paul and Philip Mantle, you know, they've covered a lot of this stuff, a lot of UFO activity. Paul covers more of the, uh, like he covers UFOs, but he goes into, uh, anomalous, you know, time slips and that kind of stuff as well. But with Mikhail, like he was looking into some of the strange reports of, uh,

underwater encounters. And just like we have in the West where it's like recently USOs are like the new black. It's like they're back in vogue again because of what's going on with Grush and the other whistleblowers talking about the Tic Tac UFO kind of stuff.

The reality is that USOs have been with us for a long time. People like Ivan Sanderson with the publication of Invisible Residents show us that. It's like, yeah, mariners, sailors have been encountering strange craft that have been in and out of the water for as long as we've been at sea. Same thing was happening in the Soviet Union. But of course, the Soviet Union, because everything was hidden behind an iron curtain, none of this information got out. But you have researchers like Mikhail who are pulling out this information and a lot of strange details are

come from the hydronauts. So the hydronauts are essentially submarine sailors or submariners. And they've had a lot of strange experiences with phenomena that is just honestly almost beyond belief. Is that what they call them? The hydronauts? Hydronauts. That's kind of cool. Yeah. Like the cosmonauts in space. Hydronauts. What do they call the Air Force guys?

Aeronauts? I don't know. Well, yeah, Aeronauts. I guess it'd be Aeronauts. Yeah. Yeah. I guess that'd be Aeronauts. But no, the Hydronauts. And the Hydronauts, their jobs were so difficult and so strenuous that when you obviously went into the military, you would get time served, right? Even though I don't know if it was conscription, but I'm imagining it probably would be, right? But the amount of time you got for every one year you did as a Hydronaut, it accounted for two years as any other profession in

inside the military. Oh, really? Because that's how rough it was. And of course, these guys were at the cutting edge of a lot of weird stuff going on, particularly around the North Atlantic, also up into the Arctic. And then, of course, you've got these reports coming out of the lakes, large freshwater lakes like Lake Baikal as well. That's really where you want to encounter some kind of anomalous activity when you're trapped inside a metal tube. Oh, I know.

underneath the ocean. My gosh. No way to defend yourself. Like I won't include this one, but there are a couple of reports there, strange things like apparently submarines colliding with strange large objects, right? That didn't show up on sonar. And I know like we're talking here, the 70s, the 80s. So like sonar technology is not, you know, the way that it is today. But even so, like they're established mariners, right? They should be able to avoid these sorts of things. But this stuff would travel so rapidly, but it would be invisible to sonar.

So they didn't understand, it's like, why is this stuff invisible to sonar? Other people would report that they would have craft that were invisible to radar, but they would be able to visibly see them, right? So people would report seeing these things when they surfaced. They'd be trailing along behind submarines. But there was this one report of where a submarine suffered this catastrophic damage. No one knew where it came from.

The submarine surfaced, and at the very front was what appeared to be a large, humongous stone ball. What? It was just like a huge stone ball. How? It was rammed into the front of the submarine. The submarine was all caved in at the front. It's this huge, and it looked like it was stone. And essentially, as they came to the conning tower and were looking out, trying to ascertain what this thing is, it just kind of, bloop.

I just fell straight off. But then it was intelligently controlled. Like there was something behind it because it didn't fall down. It fell away.

So there's plenty of those sorts of reports of people having these sorts of encounters with this stuff. So we'll get into that in our plus extension later on, but let's jump into this stuff. Yeah, that sounds fun. An unlikely prophet, Alvin Schwartz. So as I said, he passed away at the age of 94 back in 2011. But this story he tells starts in 1994 and he's at his house in Westchester, New York.

And he gets this strange telephone call. Out of nowhere, someone on the other line, are you the Superman rider?

And he's like, another one of these comics fans. Yeah, this is the downside of being considered one of the golden age comic book writers. You get all these people reaching out to you nowadays because comics and that whole world is back in vogue. He's like, yes, I am. He's like, and you wrote Batman? You wrote Batman 2? He's like, yep, Batman 2. But he said there was something about the person's voice on the other end of the phone line. There's something he couldn't place. He realized it was an accent he'd never heard before. It's this really strange accent.

It had this Oxonian English to it, but totally Oriental as well. Like this weird mix of the two. So you mean educated and high frow? Like an educated, yeah, like Asian accent. And his voice said, I have a great need to see you. I don't know if that's possible right now. I'm at home, he said. I don't know if you can see me. It's a question of great necessity. Do not put me off, Mr. Schwartz, when you are the only one who can understand my situation.

And he said from time to time he comes across these real nuts that call him. Of course he would. People asking about, you know, issue 47 of so-and-so Batman comic. Looking for plot holes when there's no need to. But he said in an odd way this caller didn't sound like a nutcase. It was something convincing in his speech. So instead of putting him off, he, you know, he said, well, what do you need to know? Understand what? He said, recently you gave a lecture on Superman at the University of Connecticut, yes? And he said, yeah, that was about five years ago.

And subsequently, a lecture was printed in a learned journal called Children's Literature. And he's like, yep, that's true. Came out about three years ago. And he explains that it's a bit of a backstory to this paper that he wrote where his son was working in publishing and he was doing children's publishing. And so he took this summer course at this university where one of the guys giving the course was a professor from Connecticut.

And this is Schwartz's son mentions to the professor, oh, by the way, my dad, he wrote Superman and Batman for years. And the professor was like, I've got to speak to him. I've got to get him in. And so Schwartz said he was invited to the University of Connecticut to give a talk to this professor's students about this period of history with the literature, the comic book literature. And it went really well. Everyone loved it. The professor loved it. So they actually asked him to write a paper about

And so he agreed. He wrote this paper. The paper was entitled The Real Secret of Superman's Identity. And the theme was that Superman had acquired a kind of reality that controlled his writers and editors without them realizing it.

And he wrote about this in the paper. He said, for 16 years, I suffered a peculiar kind of occupational thralldom, but I wasn't entirely aware of it. And he talks about how in Western mythology and fairy folk tales, you've got all these stories of different creatures like trolls and elves, having vampires, having some control, like mental control over people. Especially vampires.

And he said, in the same sense, we were taken over by a similar being, but it was the being, our fictional creation. He said, we either tend to reduce it to mere psychology or deny that it's happening altogether in terms of, you know, in the West, that's how we look at it. But he said, in my case, as well as that of all my coworkers, we chose the path of denial. It simply never would have occurred to us that we were, to put it bluntly, being directed.

He said, I was not to understand until long afterwards that it wasn't I or any of the other writers or the editors who directed Superman's destinies. Superman directed his own destinies. All of us were merely his pawns. So again, this paper that he wrote, in his mind, this was kind of a metaphor of sorts. It was an interesting idea, nothing more than that. The professor loved it. But this caller...

He read the paper and that's why he tracked down Mr. Schwartz. Oh, I understand. Yep. And he says on the phone, Mr. Schwartz, you must have meant it. It's the basis of your whole lecture. You must not back away from so keen an insight, even though there may be pressures.

And Schwartz was like, what pressures? What pressures? It was just like a fanciful way to describe my experience of writing Superman. Well, not only that, many people, many writers describe it as being like, you know, people describe it like the beast. Like your writing gets away. Like it kind of takes itself and you're caught up amongst the, the, um,

What's it called? The wash. And that's how it kind of runs away by itself. So it's not that abstract for him to describe it that fashion, I would have thought. It's probably more common now for writers to describe this where these fictional characters take on a life of their own and they almost dictate how the stories end up about them. But he tries to dismiss this guy on the phone and the caller gets very adamant. Don't dismiss me. I need your help. I'm in a similar state, you see.

And Schwartz is like, what similar state? What are you talking about? He says, I'm like Superman. Now he tries to brush him off. He's like, this is nuts. The guy says, look, I'm not crazy, sir. Like the Superman you describe in your lecture, I am an idea become real. And you are the only one I've encountered in years who seems capable of grasping such a possibility. Please don't tell me that this is the monk from Alexander David Neal that escaped. No, it's a totally different story.

And he's like, well, yeah, this is all very interesting and I'd like to discuss it further, but I kind of need to go and do something else now. But write me a letter and I'm sure I'll read it. Okay, adios. And he hangs up, says goodbye. Leaves the phone off the hook. Well, he thinks that's got to be the end of it. Another wacko has called me. Okay, I'll add that to the list. Two days later, he's sitting at that same home in Westchester, New York, you know, just sitting in his evening chair, reading the paper or something.

And he says, getting to my house is virtually impossible without a car. It's just in the middle of nowhere. It's a long, long winding driveway and there's nowhere close. Like you've got to drive there. And he says, at least that's what I thought. Because he looks up from his afternoon tea and he sees this strange, tall looking man riding a bicycle up his driveway.

And he's wearing this long brown robe kind of covering his face. He's like, who is this guy? He's wearing some kind of weird poncho. And it was so long he could barely pedal this bike. And he's like, what the hell's going on? It must be someone local. Like it must be one of my neighbors or something. And so this guy rides to his front door and he goes to answer. And he says, I find myself looking into the flat, narrow face of a man nearly seven feet tall.

who looked distinctly oriental. Couldn't quite place his background. And he's like, can I help you? In many ways. I am Mr. Thongden, he says. Now, even though he hadn't given his name on the phone, he knew this was the guy from the phone. He immediately places the accent and he says to him, I had no idea you were from around here. What are you, a couple of houses down? I had no idea you were a local.

And he says, I don't remember having seen you before. And the guy's like, you have not, but we have spoken. He's like, yes, yes. I remember the phone call, but you never said you were a local. And he looks at the bike and he's like, well, yes, I am within bicycle range, 37 miles. So this guy had ridden 37 miles. That's like 60 Ks or something. From New York City to get to this guy, to get to Schwartz's house.

He says it was necessary. I came from New York. And he's like, oh my God, you must be exhausted. He invites him in, says, let me get you a drink. He invites him in, takes the guy's cloak. And it's almost like this guy doesn't really follow or understand anything.

the general niceties and pleasantries. The men in black scenario of like, they just don't know how the subtle nuances of human interaction. Yeah, it's not that extreme, but he's not really polite. He just kind of walks straight in and plonks himself on Schwartz's reading chair where he was just sitting. Oh, please take a seat. And he says, oh, you said your name was Thong? And he's like, Thongden, the only one in the phone book. Thongden is an unusual name, Asian? And he's like, yes, but borrowed.

You mean it's not really your name? I am basically nameless, but not without progenitors. We have much to talk about, Mr. Schwartz. So this guy's come with an agenda. And he says, look, I gather your coming here has something to do with Superman. Your version of him specifically, he said, as I already explained. And he said, as this strange guy was talking to him, he would always glance over his left shoulder.

and look at something behind Schwartz. It was really strange, this odd thing he had. Was he looking at something specific in the house? Was it a different location? Yeah, just always looking over his shoulder. It was really strange. So he offers him tea and he asks for it with butter in the Tibetan style. And he says, yes, I'm here for Superman, but your version of him specifically says,

Because I'm thinking of him. So you made him real, your own words. That's what you said in your lecture. Now, he's like, I don't understand what's going on. What are you talking about? He says, Mr. Schwartz, as with Superman, you can say in one sense that he is from the planet Krypton, but the Superman you describe as controlling you, he is not from Krypton. Again, that puzzling glance over the left shoulder.

Schwartz is like, I see. Actually, I didn't create Superman. Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster did. He says, no, no.

They created the cartoon character. You created your personal living Superman. Is that why he continues to look over his shoulder? Is there a Superman form hovering over him? Yeah, you get a sense that Superman's in the room with him right now. Schwartz can't see it. Of course not. He's got no idea. So Schwartz sits down and he's staring at this guy thinking, where is this going? What is this kook on about? He says, look, there's something I'm missing about this whole conversation. You've got to start from the start.

He says, you didn't really fully create Superman, but you came close and then you went on a long detour. But I am the one to put you back again on your path. And he starts waving his finger at Schwartz. He says, as for myself, as you can see, I have been completely and thoroughly created. Schwartz is like, what are you talking about? I don't understand. What do you mean created? What are you getting at?

He says simply that I'm real. You can touch me. You can have me as your guest. I'm here drinking tea with you at the table. And how that came to be is one of the things I'm here to discuss with you. And for the first time, Schwartz said he started to have the premonition of where this was leading. He said, I didn't yet understand it, but I knew somehow that this guy wasn't crazy. And I was on the verge of discovering something astounding.

He's like, well, please, Mr. Thongden, elaborate, discuss it. Tell me what you're talking about. How are you different from anyone else? He says, look, it's not easy to explain. In Tibet, before the Chinese invasion, there would be no problem understanding. But here in the West, such things are not known, let alone believed in. Yet there are many like me and have been many in the past who have lived amongst you. He's like, tell me.

Do you know what a tulpa is? Fongdon says. A what? And he spells it out for him. A tulpa. T-U-L-P-A. Of course, something we've covered many, many times on the show before, this idea of a thought form, a thought creation. He says a living human created by pure thought.

So Schwartz starts to get this tingling feeling up his spine, like his hair standing on end. He starts to get the distinct feeling that this guy Thongden in his living room drinking tea isn't exactly human. I mean, already he looks off, he sounds off. He's nearly seven feet tall, which is pretty big for a Tibetan. Tibetans aren't seven feet tall. And he starts to give this philosophical conversation about the concept of tulpas and

And there's an interesting detail where he says, many of them have come before and lived among you. And so Schwartz is naturally like, who? Anyone we would know. And he proceeds to talk about Alexander Hamilton. Hamilton? Yeah. So Hamilton, the first secretary of state, you know, one of the founders of the United States, I guess you could say, might have become president if he wasn't killed in a duel.

Um, Fongden says we're told he was of uncertain parentage, an orphan who went on to achieve great things, but there were never any parents, Mr. Schwartz. This is what Fongden's telling him. He simply turned up as an adult, whole and complete. The early personal history was mostly tagged on afterwards. It was created, but I mentioned only one instance. There are others.

Isn't that a weird idea? That is weird. But surely that's not the case. Some of these famous people in history weren't humans. They were created tulpas for a purpose. Well, the thing is also to be so instrumental in world history as well.

That's odd. That's like we're going from talking about entities and planting ideas to actual formed entities interfering in human affairs or directing human affairs. Well, we always talk about this idea of a hidden force that guides humanity. What if one of their methods is to just create a tulpa? Like we're going to create this tulpa. Send him in there. Because it's logical because it's so simple. Like if that's something that it's capable of doing, that is very simple. Well, Schwartz is like, again, why are you coming to me?

He says, you already know that. Because I suggested Superman was a kind of tulpa in my paper, it was just a metaphor.

He says, because you had the vision to consider such a thing. And I need someone like that. Is this a guy like some kind of weird Rick and Morty me six? Like, is it like he's like every moment of him existing is pain and he's like trying to finish his mission so he can leave? Not quite, but you're almost on the right track. He says, there aren't many people like you, you know, you're a rare one. And yes, we have a special affinity for each other. Schwartz is like, what do you mean? What are you talking about?

He says, you have a need for me and I have a need for you, but you are not aware yet of your own need, which has to do, I may as well tell you, with working out your unique experience with Superman. You have to bring him back to life, but you cannot until you understand fully who and what he is to you. My need is much simpler. I need you to think about me.

Well, Schwartz is like, what again? What are you talking about? Think about you. Why? What for? He says at the right time, as for my need, I refer to you again to Alexander Hamilton. Remember, he's died in a duel.

Thongden said because he was a tulpa, he knew he was fading away and the jewel provided him with a simple way out. Come on, this is absurd. It's not like he'd be walking down the street and then just fade into nothingness like Back to the Future. It needed to be like a real kind of exit.

I mean, especially in those times, wouldn't it just been as simple for him to walk into the wilderness and just dematerialize? I guess so. Yeah, it's probably an easy way. Like why do it so theatrically and, you know, make a big deal out of it? Well, Fongden says, I'm not ready to take a way out. He says, your need is too strong, you see. So if I'm to show you the way, you must keep me going. And Schwartz says, well, just by thinking about you. By this stage, the guy stood up. He's grabbed his hood.

And he's ready to head out the door. He says, you won't be able to avoid it now. He grabs his bicycle and he says, I shall be around sooner than you think. But for now, you need your time to get your mind adjusted to this. You need to better understand the presence that sits over your shoulder. And again, he looks over Schwartz's left shoulder. What presence? He says, Superman, I'm talking about. He gets on his bicycle and rides away. Well, if his goal was also to get him to think about him,

After such an encounter, you probably would persistently think about something like that for a while. And again, that's always been the concept with tulpas is that they need energy, thought energy, the focus and the thought energy to sustain themselves. It's their food. It's what gives them existence. Well, I don't think that tulpas are actually that different to other supernatural beings like the hat man or the shadow person, because with many of those

encounters and those reports. It's like the energy, the fear is being harvested from the victim. So a torpor could use the same mechanism, but it's a different kind of energy. It's not fear. It's just, it's thought attention. So he watches this guy leave and he doesn't vanish or anything. He just literally gets on the bicycle and rides away.

And he closes the door and he's just thinking, what the hell was that? That was absolutely bonkers. That was insane. But he can't stop thinking about it. There's something about the guy that was so uncanny, so strange. The accent, the height. His whole physiognomy was strange as well. Long fingers. The John Keel long fingers. Ruddy complexion.

So he really does have these men in black characteristics. Yeah. And as he sits down back in the chair, he looks at the cup the guy was drinking from and he just can't stop thinking about it. And as he's pondering the visit from this strange guy, all these memories from his past start wafting up into his thinking. And he's thinking, why am I thinking about this? Why did I forget about this? And-

He realizes these events that are suddenly reoccurring to him, they all started to happen after he started to write about comics and specifically started to write for Superman. So he tells a series of these early experiences. One of them was in 1940. He's living in Greenwich Village in New York.

with his wife, totally broke. They had no money. He didn't have a job. You know, food was getting low and he was really desperate for work. And he tells this story of how he ran into a friend who was in the writing business and his friend got him a gig writing for comics and it was considered like a, you know, like a low level job, not very prestigious, but he was desperate. So he started writing for these comic book companies and they loved it. They loved his work.

Uh, he, he got into, they got him onto Batman. He said the editors loved it. And he, on his third Batman script, they just started throwing all these scripts at him and it became his vocation. He wrote Tomahawk, The Flash, uh, Wonder Woman, Aquaman, all those early ones he wrote for. And then one day they were so impressed with his work, these editors at DC, they said, why don't you write for Superman? We want you to do Superman. Yeah.

And he had so much work on, he kind of sat down and he thought, do I want to write for Superman? Like he's kind of dull. Like he's got all the powers. He can do everything. Can I actually make Superman interesting? And he describes sitting at his favorite local deli in New York and just like thinking about it, like serious, intense meditation on what is Superman.

You're doing it for hours. Did he introduce kryptonite or is that previous to him? I'm not sure, actually. That's a good question. But it's considered like the classical, all the good things we know about Superman. A lot of it comes from Schwartz. But he started to ponder Superman and what specifically occurred to him was this dichotomy between Superman's powers and Clark Kent.

And he starts to, and he elaborates a lot on this in the book, that this is something that is universal. It's something inherent in all of us. We all have the Clark Kent side. We are all, in a sense, normal, ordinary people. But at the same time, we all have a Superman side. We all have a spark of the divine. We're all capable of incredible things where our potential is much more than we understand as human beings.

And he starts thinking that Superman is a real incredible archetype for this universal truth. And he thinks, if I focus on that, I can make Superman really interesting. You're saying like we're all capable of extraordinary things given the circumstances. Yes. And specifically supernormal things, strange supernormal things that we would never consider possible. We are actually capable of those things.

While still being boring normie Clark Hentz. And so he agrees. He agrees to start taking on this Superman gig. And he realizes that, you know, since he made that decision and earlier when he started writing on comics, he's

all this strange stuff started happening. And so one of the examples was he knew Jackson Pollock. Oh, the painter. Yeah, the painter back in the early days. Oh, the Blue Poles guy. Before he was, you know, getting tons of money for these crazy paintings, he was starting to enter the art scene and starting to get a bit more popular. And Schwartz said he and his wife were good friends with Jackson Pollock and his wife. And they would have the, you know, like double dates and they would have dinner parties together.

And he tells this story about how they were over at Pollock's house one night and it was just the two couples. And there was something in the air, like they had a couple of glasses of wine, but they're all super alert. And the discussion was all about philosophy. And I think it was Schwartz's wife had brought up this question, which is really what Joshua Cutchin explores in his book, Fourth Wall Phantoms. What's the relationship between the creator and the created art?

And how does the creator allow that inspiration to come through? Specifically, they were talking about painting. How do you get out of the way and let what's under the canvas emerge rather than painting it yourself? How do you let it come through? It's so funny because that in itself, it's just like, that's what you would hear from like a pretentious gallery owner of like, oh, the artist allowed the canvas to speak for him. But in some ways, it's like there is an element of that. It's like they kind of, it's not,

mediumship or channeling, but it is kind of, yeah, removing your...

your control and giving up to the skill. Well, apparently Pollock was a man of few words and he was listening to them all give their philosophical ideas on this. And he just stood up and said, it's easy. You just let it happen. Come here, I'll show you. And they said they had rarely seen him work. It was something he never really got to see. But this night, they all followed him into his studio and he had one of those huge canvases laid out with like

a couple of squiggles on it already, like a couple of circles, weird circles. Did you see that bucket of paint and throw it on it? Well, Schwartz, like no one said anything. Schwartz said they watched and he cracked open some brown house paint or something. And Schwartz watched as he just started to like drifted over the canvas. And he said he saw something that he couldn't explain. He said the paint didn't just drop down like you would expect normal physics to allow it to drop down.

He said it was like something was wrong with the physics of the paint. And before it hit the canvas, it was doing strange things. Like it was levitating up and then dropping back down and coming down in these weird spirals and then reversing. And he said Pollock was just going back and forth with his hand, with his bucket of paint. But he said something strange.

supernatural was happening with the paint going onto the canvas. He said he'd never seen it before and they were all like mesmerized. And he said to Pollock, he's like, what is happening? I've never seen this happen before. And Pollock was like, no one ever does. No one ever sees it. But this is how I do it. Now, the interesting thing about Pollock's paintings, they've come up on previous shows. Remember we... Well, the golden ratio is somewhere in there, isn't it? Was it the golden ratio? Not the golden ratio. I can't remember...

Wow, it's connected to the golden ratio. Yeah, there's some type of harmonic. It's the Mandelbrot like fractal mathematics. That's it, fractals, yeah. And we covered this with Mandelbrot's work, the guy that created the whole fractal calculation, those fractal art pieces that came from Mandelbrot. And-

It was said that that fractal mathematical relationship, it's in nature, obviously, as well. So when you look at a forest scene, for example, it does certain things to you, lowers your blood pressure, makes you feel great. You feel energized. That's why you love looking at nature. It's good for you.

Apparently, they've done studies on this. You get the same effect from looking at Pollock's paintings. I'm sorry. I mean, I hear this, but it just looks like a psychotics nightmare to me. I agree with you. It's absolutely hideous. It's absolutely hideous. But there is a strange mathematical relationship in his paintings. They are not random.

It is the same relationship that you see in nature from a fractal mathematical perspective. And obviously no one could figure out how he does it. Maybe this story from Schwartz is a clue. And the implication is that there was something else directing the paint. Now, Schwartz came away thinking maybe the circles that he already had on the canvas were like some kind of

Like vortex or something that we're creating some kind of gravity swirl, like Stonehenge. Like he has all these crazy ideas. And Pollock was just like, that's just how it happens. I just do it. So he tells this story. It's really weird, this Jackson Pollock story. And then a few months later, his wife Marjorie, she was an artist as well.

And he said one day she was in her studio painting in their apartment and he had taken a break from writing, which he often did just to watch her paint. And so he goes in, he's watching her and she's painting something mundane. She's painting like a bowl of fruit or something. And he said,

It got to a point where it's like she was stuck and she didn't know what to do. And he watched her and she started to do something strange. She started to do all these weird movements with her hands, like this strange dance for like a good 30 seconds or something. And then she just kind of went and just like dabbed something on the canvas with this splotch. It totally ruined the bowl of fruit. Didn't make sense. He didn't say anything. He just kept watching. And after a while, again, she starts doing this weird movement.

and then splotch. And she does this over and over again. It looked like a weird ritual dance. And he said he watched her for almost an hour doing this. And eventually he walks over and he starts to see what's emerging over the top of her bowl of fruit. And she's painting Ganesh. Now he says he was aware of Ganesh and the whole pantheon of gods.

But he's like, Marjorie doesn't know about any of that stuff. But is it possible that such a symbol has appeared in, you know, I guess not so much maybe in 1940s in the US, but you have to wonder, has it somehow seeped into her memory? Yeah. I mean, they live in New York. Surely it's pretty diverse even in the 1940s. I don't know if it would have been, but perhaps. Maybe she's seen Ganesh before, but he says no. She's not familiar with it. And she's

She continued and more of these figures started to emerge on the canvas. Eventually there were fine details that looked like they were coming from, you know, like a fine reproduction, this style of art. This is the actual painting? Yeah. No, this isn't. Sorry, this is not the actual painting. This is just an example. Right. But these heavenly beings start to emerge in her painting from this soft blue light. And there's like Shiva in there, Mara, Gautama Buddha, like all these Eastern deities. Yeah.

And it's almost like she snaps out of a trance and she's like, oh, she looks at what she's painted and she's like, where did these come from? Who painted these? And she recalled what Jackson had said, Jackson Pollock, because she was at that dinner party and she says, I just kind of did it. It just happened. She said, but I don't like it.

She says, I don't know where this is coming from. And she starts waving her arms at it. She's like, take it away. Take it away. I don't want to see it. That's not how I want to paint. There's nothing of me in this painting.

Because it wasn't her. And she's like, she's all flustered. She doesn't know where it's come from. And she says, forget it. Just to forget it. I need to do some shopping. We need groceries. I'm going to go shopping, make a grocery list and forget about this. I'm going to throw it in the bin when I get back. So she gets an envelope and she starts writing down the stuff they need for groceries. And Schwartz is like, this is so weird. Like what's going on with my wife?

He watches as everything seems normal again. She's writing down the grocery list. Then the pencil starts being strange. It starts jumping around on the page. So the energy remained like into an instrument that she was holding? Well, she's like jotting down something strange. Like again, like she was controlled when she was doing the painting and she hands it to him. And there's this weird message on the script and it says, fish and fowl, you are no longer meat eaters. As in... Too bad? They have to be vegetarians now.

He says, I knew it was the pencil and not Marjorie writing. She was as startled as I was. Clearly what was going on wasn't the same as my theories with Pollock's gravitational fields or anything like that. He said there was a presence we didn't know about.

The force surely came from Marjorie, but it was one she didn't recognize and wasn't ready to acknowledge. And suddenly his wife turns pale. She's like, oh, Alvin, I'm getting a message. I'm getting a message. He's like, what? Can you hear a voice? She says, no, I'm getting a message. I can't take it. She says, I'm meant to take a bath, sit quietly before the canvas, then paint, and I'm not supposed to tell you anything about it.

He's like, what's telling you this? She says, I don't know. It's just this thing is telling me. It's not a voice. It's just a thing. Forgive my ignorance on this, but are Hindus vegetarians? Yeah.

Okay. So she's drawing Hindu imagery and now an entity is telling her that she has to be a vegetarian. Is it some Hindu entity that's now guiding her? Yeah, we would think that. They have no idea what's going on. They've got no idea. She says, some part of me is dipping into some other part I never knew about. That's all I can say. And so she goes and takes a bath. She follows the instructions. She sits in front of the canvas for a while and she starts working again. She starts painting again.

And something entirely new starts to come forth. This is over the painting of the Hindu deities. She says, I feel I shouldn't tell you this, but it's not something that belongs to me, this force. It's more as if I belong to it. And as soon as she says this, she's like, I can't breathe. She's like, I can't breathe. And she's having a full-on panic attack. She's holding her throat. She's

begging for help starts changing color schwarzer's like what the hell's going on he grabs her they run to the car and he drives down to the the local doctor's office which thankfully is close the whole time she's thankfully is closed close oh close yeah not closed yeah close and he says to her i've heard about this is before this is when you do yoga and the kundalini goes wrong and he's just blabbing

Anyway, they make it to the doctor's office. The doctor is with another emergency and can't see them. And the secretary's like, look, do you want me to call an ambulance or can you hang on and wait? She's like, oh, wait. And so they sit in this doctor's office. Now, Schwartz doesn't understand why he did this. He doesn't know where the inspiration came from. He doesn't know how he knew this.

And it's similar to a story I told on the last Plus show with biting the fingers. You might remember if you're a Plus listener. He says to his wife quickly, I don't know why, but do this. And he crosses his hands like this and says, grab my hands. She does the same thing, crosses her hands.

They hold each other's hands and he says he feels this weird buzzing energy flow into his arms, come into his body, into his chest and then disappear. And she's like, how did you do that? What did you do? I feel better. It's gone. It's gone. And she's fine. And they quickly realize that the doctor's going to think they're crazy. So they had a panic attack. They flee the doctor's office. They literally flee.

And so this is just another one of these memories that he realizes, I totally forgotten about that. It's like he had blocked it out of his existence. Or to be blocked for him. Until Fongden had showed up, this weird seven foot tall tulpa, until this guy had showed up, he'd forgotten about this. Same with the Jackson Pollock story. Now, he said, I worked in comics for 19 years. And during that time, I produced 20,000 comic pages. Wow.

He said, I maintained what I can only call a special relationship with Superman. Although I had no idea in those days how deep that relationship went. Now, he describes how his relationship with Superman ended because in 1958, DC got a new editor for Superman. And this editor just like had his own idea of what Superman should be.

And one day he called Schwartz into his office and he says, look, I've got this story. You've got to do it. You have to do this story where Superman figures out a way to give Lois Lane his powers temporarily. Like, huh? Huh? What a great story. Superman cracks the glass ceiling. Yeah. And Schwartz is like, that's the shittest idea I've ever heard in my life. I'm not doing that.

He's like, you got to do it. I'm the editor. Right, yeah. Schwartz quits on the spot. Because it's almost like the relationship he's built up with Superman. It's like going along doing a certain thing and you want to make a fundamental change to that. So it's like, no, I get it. Well, he says in hindsight...

He had done those kinds of dumb requests for Batman, for Aquaman, for all these other characters, and it had never really bothered him. It's like, yeah, I get my paycheck and I'll write the story or whatever. But for Superman, it was like the universe was like the whole existence was being challenged by this stupid idea. And he just quit on the spot. And it's not until Fongden comes back and questions him about it

He's like, yeah, why did I get so upset about it? Why did I just drop everything and quit my career? Like he just dropped everything and left. Because the entity didn't want that. Yeah. So he's starting to work out this connection and the importance of this Superman character. Later in 1965, he says he's long out of the comic books business. And this is another one of these stories he had kind of forgotten about.

He was on vacation in Hawaii and he was lounging by the pool one day

And one of these hotel employees came up to him and it was a strange looking guy. He was, you know, in his fifties and he'd seen him around doing hotel maintenance. You know, he had like the hotel cap on and everything. Like the white smock. Yeah. And he starts talking to Schwartz and this guy introduces himself. He says, his name's Harry. And he says, you know, you and I, we have something in common. And Schwartz is like, oh, what would that be? He says, I'm not sure.

But I'm a kahuna, you see, and I can just feel it. And a kahuna is a Hawaiian shaman. Yeah. So I don't know if this guy's a part-time hotel worker, part-time shaman all the way around. Often with the kahunas, it's really fascinating. It's like it's something that you go about doing your day job, but then later on you go and perform your duties. It's a really fascinating concept. So you can do it after hours. Of course. It's not a full-time gig. No. Okay. There's a part-time shaman.

And he's like, well, what do you do? He says to Schwartz, what do you do? And Schwartz says, well, I'm a writer. He's like, what do you write? He says, well, I used to write Superman and Batman. He's like, Superman. That's it. Superman. I know Superman. He says, I know your Superman. What? Schwartz is like, what are you talking about? He starts to tell him, he starts to tell him this story, right? And Schwartz thinks he's a nutter.

But this guy's dead serious and kind of saying to Schwartz, you need to open your mind. And we have this connection. You don't understand it yet, but you will later in your life.

And he says, I know you're Superman. He says, I was in my spirit body as a kahuna, as a shaman. I was in my spirit body and my ancestors called for my assistance. And he claims that his great, great, great grandfather called him in his spirit body form and said, the islands of Hawaii are going to be destroyed by volcanic activity. We have to do something to stop it.

And so this kahuna, this Hawaiian shaman, Harry, is like, well, what do we do? What possible force can stop volcanoes? He's like, I know, something like Superman. And the ancestors are like, what is this Superman? Can he truly help us? And Harry, this shaman, is like, leave it with me. He claims that he contacted Valkyrie.

Tulpa Superman. How? He says he wrote a letter to the Daily Wire. Is it the Daily Planet? Yeah, the Daily Planet. Like in another dimension because the Daily Planet exists in another Tulpic dimension. He writes a letter, care of the Daily Planet for Superman's help. He claims Superman showed up like Tulpa Superman and he had to explain to him, look, there's this issue with the volcanoes and you need to fix it somehow. Right.

Long story short, he claims Tulpa Superman went back in time and altered the volcanoes somehow and literally saved Hawaii. Like Hawaii would not be there if this shaman hadn't been able to contact Tulpa Superman. And so he tells Schwartz, he's like, that's your Superman. You saved Hawaii. Thank you, my friend.

Now, obviously, Schwartz is like... It must be surreal for him. Oh, right. Crazy person. Can you get me another mojito? Like, this conversation's done. But this guy basically walked away from him and said, you're eventually going to realize that what I told you is true. He just walks away. It's utterly insane. Completely bizarre. But again, it's something that he had forced out of his memory, something that he just tried to forget about. It was so odd.

Um, and all these suppressed memories start showing up after Fongden, this Tibetan starts showing up. He'd forgotten about Jackson Pollock. He'd forgotten about his wife's weird Hindu paintings. He'd forgotten about this Superman guy. And he said, I recalled this Hasidic tale. It's an old Hasidic tale from a Hebrew philosopher named Martin Buber. It's about a rabbi who used to get up every early, every morning and wash his dishes. And he would do this every single day, his entire life.

And he would do this even if the dishes had been washed the night before. And one day, one of the rabbi's students asked him, Rabbi, why do you wash the dishes every morning? And he says, well, I wash the dishes every morning because dust gathers on them every night.

And so I guess the message of the story is things have to be maintained. Like your memories of things have to be maintained. Otherwise they're lost. You know, you can't just leave these things be. You've got to... Apart from the fact that science now tells us that every time you remember something, you slightly alter it. Yeah, that's true. But he mentions this story because it comes up later when he goes to New York to visit his editor because he's, you know, still a writer. And he has this meeting with his editor. And when he leaves, he's like...

Maybe I should look up this Thongden guy. He said he was the only name in the phone book. So he goes to the phone book. He looks him up. There is indeed a D Thongden at West 89th Street. So he's like, off he goes. He finds the place and he says, it's weird. It's just this place on 89th. And there's two, he says they could be sumos. They're like fat Asian guys sitting on the front step. He says they, I don't know if they were Japanese, but they just, they look huge. Like big burly Asian guys. He's like, maybe they're Tibetan.

He starts walking up the stairs expecting these guys to part, to let him go and knock on the door or press the bell. And they don't part. They just kind of stare at him like, piss off. And he's like, what is this? And he says to them, oh, I'm here to see Mr. Thongden. Does he live here? He lives here, right?

And they go, oh, Mr. Thongden, you're Mr. Schwartz. And they go, oh, I have this really thick accent. So wait, he's got sumo bodyguards? Yeah. And they're like, he says to them, you were expecting me? And he says, oh, yes, I was expecting you. Door open. Just go in. Just go in. And he's like, are you guys his neighbors? And they sort of look at each other as if that's the funniest joke ever. And they just start laughing and go, yeah, something like that. Go in.

So he walks in and there's only one apartment in there. And he walks in this entryway and there's these French doors with glass panes on it. And he walks up to these doors. There's no bell or anything, but he can't see through the window. He says there's this weird like cloak blocking the window. So we can't see anything. So he knocks on the door and no one answers. So eventually he gives the door a bit of a push and it opens and he walks into this room and

But he can't see anything because what he thought was curtains is this strange gray, blue, impenetrable mist. It's like a portal or something. There's like a void in this apartment, this weird gray, blue opacity. He can't see anything, he says. And he finds himself staring at nothing.

And there's silence, like the Oz effect. And eventually he is this tinkling sound like water dripping and some kind of hand crank, like someone, you know, those old school taps where you had to crank. There's someone pushing one of those and he's heard them in his travels before. And eventually this mist starts to go and dissipate in this weird way, like ectoplasm parting.

And there's this little Jewish guy washing dishes with this old hand crank in this little kitchen. He's like, what is going on? This Jewish guy's whistling some tune that he finds faintly familiar. It almost sounds like, though, that this –

fog or mist is like an ectoplasm. Remember we've recently been talking about, even though it's not ectoplasm plasma, but it's like, um, the, the form of the universe, right? It's like, he's walked in there and because he was thinking about that old, you know, Jewish folklore, it's like, it's tapped into his mind. And then like, like some weird holodeck created this scene before him. He nailed it because he realizes this is the guy from the Hasidic story washing his dishes. What, what is going on? What am I seeing? Yeah.

Um, and eventually he hears this voice like, and out of this weird darkness steps, this beautiful woman, she's like six foot two wearing this amazing dress, just beautiful white woman. And, uh, she says, follow me, Mr. Schwartz. And he turns around and the rabbi is gone. It's just a kitchen table, a bunch of chairs. It's like, what the hell's going on? He follows this woman. She leads him into this parlor.

And it's like this old parlor library thing, you know, beautiful furniture. And Fongden is just sitting there in this tailored business suit looking like a rich Eurasian businessman like Mr. Schwartz. We have been expecting you. The woman disappears. You mean as she walks out of the room? Yeah, she walks out of the room. And he's like, good to see you. Please sit down. But don't look so astonished. What you see here is what there is. It better not be striking a white cat. Well, yeah.

What he proceeds to tell Schwartz is that yet what he saw was a mental hologram. And, uh, he had pulled it out of these thought forms that had existed around Schwartz. And of course, cause he had been thinking about that Hasidic story a couple of days earlier. Yeah. It was in his mind. Fongden claimed he had pulled it out and created it for him. And, uh,

He says, like, was the rabbi that I was thinking about a tulpa as well? And he's like, no, no, no. It takes nine months to create a tulpa and gives him this whole backstory of

And so why such a specific time? Like the same, it's odd. That's the same length as a human. He says roughly, it's the same time to create a human being to create a full on Tulpa. It takes about nine months. Um, and he then goes on to explain that, uh, you know, you need your sustenance in terms of, you know, food, you eat sandwiches, whatever. He says the Tulpas, we need focus. We need thought. We need attention. We need you to think about us.

He says, if there's no one to think about me, I lose substance. I fade away. And he says, that's why you're here. Well, that's the thing. Did he pick Schwartz out because he seemingly has unwittingly strong ability to create topic forms? Well, this is where we start to understand why Thongden, yeah, sought him out. And he tells this backstory. He asks him, have you ever heard of Everett Nelson?

And Schwartz says, well, the name's kind of familiar. Is he some kind of scholar or something? And he says, yes, in a way, he was a student of W.Y. Evans Wentz, the scholar who first- Oh, the Faye guy, isn't he? Maybe. He's known for translating the Tibetan Book of the Dead. He was the first guy to do it. This is him on the screen here next to the llama. Well, I think Evan Wentz was also with the Faye folk and- Probably. Probably.

Because Everett Nelson that followed him was writing about fairies.

Yeah, it must be. Maybe I've got myself. No, it is. Yeah, yeah. The fairy faith in Celtic countries. Yeah, yeah. So they were these philosophers and they looked at mystical religions and, you know, faith folklore and Gnosticism and all these kind of mystical things. And that's him on the right there. That's Evan Wentz. I wouldn't have thought it was. Yeah. Thanks for clarifying. And so Nelson, who was much harder to find a picture of him, but that's him there. Yeah.

This was Wentz's student and he followed in his footsteps. So he did research on, you know, faith folk and mystery religions. And if you search for him, you'll find his papers on philosophy. Much harder to find, but... Are they theosophists? No, he's not a theosophist. He was a skilled linguist and...

Thongden says he was a bit of a Rinpoche himself. And Schwartz is like, what does that mean? He says, well, it's kind of like a priest, you know, a little bit different. And he says, listen, I brought up Nelson's name because he was the man who created me. In other words, he thought me up.

Nelson, on the screen here, created Fongden. And what happened to him? Well... Because normally, like with Alexandra David-Neal, which is like one of the most well-known stories, she had to dissolve it because it got out of control. Well, Schwartz is about to walk out. He's like, okay, this is nuts. This is crazy. I don't know if I can entertain this anymore. And he's like, hear me out, hear me out. This is the important part. He leans forward and he says, I lost Mr. Nelson. I lost him a week ago. Did he kill him? No.

Why is everything some Netflix murder mystery with you? Because they're tulpers. The fact that Alexandra David-Neal had to work so hard to get rid of hers, I feel like with these entities, it's like you create them with the greatest of intentions, right? But then they run away and they want to survive. And so then they become dangerous. There is no box on the table with his severed head in it. I'm not saying that.

No. He just drained him of all psychic energy. Well, Schwartz hears this and suddenly he realizes where he recalled the name. He had read it in an obituary about a week ago. Nelson had died in his Oxford home of old age and he was a scholar. He had a two-column obituary in the newspaper. And the article mentioned that Everett Nelson was considered something of a sage by those who knew him. And so, you know, Schwartz is like, well, this must have been...

like a father to Thongden. So he's like, I'm sorry for your loss. Yeah, he must have been like a father to you. And Thongden says, he wasn't only that. You see, I suffered more than grief. I suffered a deprivation of my essential sustenance. He's like, how do you mean? When Dr. Nelson stopped thinking of me, I stopped existing. Well, he started to dissipate, he says. So his thinking about him was like food for Thongden.

In some sense, he says our minds were joined. That is, I was a part of his mind, but that essential sustaining energy came from him. Without him, I knew that I would soon also cease to exist. I don't know, though. Old age. I still reckon he ended up in some psychic suitcase somewhere. But this is why Thorndon is seeking out Schwartz. Well, in all seriousness, right, if this is true, he must have, like,

How would the physics of this work? Like how long, like clearly he's psychically starving. So how is he sustaining himself? Well, here's why I love this book because we've always heard these stories. You know, we've heard the famous Alexandra David Neal story of her traveling to Tibet and creating a tulpa, it getting out of control and her having to dissipate it. We've heard countless stories of Dr. Kirby Surprise and his tulpa creations.

There's various modern stories of Tulpa creators talking about their entities that get loose and things that thought forms that they've conjured. Well, that's the thing. I mean, you're kind of suggesting before that, oh, no, it's not some horrible like, but every story we've covered for the most part about Tulpa is they go on a murderous rampage. Yeah, you're right. It usually ends badly. But-

But here is the first story where you get to hear the Tulpa creation perspective from the Tulpa themselves. But also I think it, not only that, it depends on the kind of Tulpa you've created.

Think about it, right? All human beings are different. Human beings are capable of a wide spectrum of kindness and evil. Well, Fongden reveals to him, he says, a lot of the guardian angel stories that people experience, they're from thought creations. I believe that. They're from tulpas. Well, I think with the third man effect, especially the stories of people that drown in rivers and then all of a sudden a hand reaches down and pulls them from the river. I think that the fear of death

and what they're going through, the emotional trauma of it is so strong that it spontaneously generates a tulpa. And that's why when they're pulled out and they're rescued by this mysterious third man, there's no one else around. It's like because it's only enough energy to sustain it for just that moment in time to rescue the person. Yeah, that's an interesting idea. Yeah, he says there's an interesting conversation that follows. So what follows is

Thongden reveals his entire inception because he's got memories going back to this guy Nelson when he first went to India and he tells the story of how he met up with the llamas in the Himalayas and how he was trained and Thongden recalls his entire incubation and creation.

But there's this really interesting discussion that is kind of included with this where Thongden points out that, yeah, people create angels, people create all sorts of things. Well, it's no different to a homunculus when you think about it. He says people create aliens. He says a lot of the alien encounters are from people's creations. They are thought forms. A lot of them are tulpa. Not all of them, but a lot of them are tulpas.

So it's really fascinating, but I wanted to tell, start to tell you some of the story of Fongden's creation and this, this guy, Nelson, who he arrives in the Himalayas in the 1940s, specifically to Gangtok, which is right on the base of the Himalayas. There it is on the screen there, like beautiful mountainous area. And a lot of, a lot of the Tibetan refugees live there today. Yeah.

And so he arrives at this hotel and he's been invited to meet this Lama there, Lama Samten, who works for the Dalai Lama. And this Lama wants to meet Nelson because he's been reading his publications about his research into fairies and Gnostic Christianity. Right.

And Nelson goes to meet him and expresses his desire to learn more about Tibetan mysticism since it's still being practiced. And before he just researched like, you know, dead religions. But there's something about this Westerner and this Lama is like, he senses something about this guy and asks him, look, I understand why you're here to gain some of the knowledge about our practices, but

but there must be something personal about your arrival. Why have you come so far in this period of time to meet us? And he admits, Nelson admits, he says, well, you're quite right. I've been having these dreams. And he describes these reoccurring dreams he's been having for years and years and years where he'll wake up and there'll be a monk standing at the foot of his bed

like wearing some kind of robe that he doesn't recognize. And he's just an Asian monk. And he's standing at the foot of his bed, staring at him. And then he'll like fall back to sleep and then wake up again. And it's this weird reoccurring dream that keeps on happening. He said, I kept on trying to forget it until he said one day he was in the British museum and there was a British mountain climber who spent time in the Himalayas and who had sketched something and

And this sketch is in the British Museum and it's a sketch of a monk and it was the same monk from his dreams. And he's like, what is going on? And he said written underneath it was Tanka from a Tibetan meditation scroll. And so when Nelson saw that, it mentioned Tibetan scroll. He's like, this weird monk from my dreams. It's connected with Tibet. I've got to go to Tibet. So that's why he went there. Now, Tanka just means... So almost he was...

Not orchestrated, but it kind of was. Like it was set up by that being. Well, the implication is that Nelson is maybe a reincarnated llama and has some past life connection to Tibet. And this emerges throughout the story, but I won't get bogged down in too much detail.

Um, so that's why he came to Tibet. He knew he had to come to Tibet. So this llama writes a letter of recommendation for him and says, you must take this to the temple in the mountains, give it to the head llama. He'll know what to do. And so this is a huge 10 day trek. And it's a bit of an adventure story where he's like getting lost in the mountains. He finds some hidden Valley. There's like some shaman summoning demons. This is crazy 10 day trek, but eventually he makes it to this temple.

And he hands this llama the letter from Semtal. And this llama reads it and he's like, okay. He gives him a personal instructor and he says, here's your quarters. And he basically lets him live at this monastery at the top of the mountain. And so Nelson, after a few days, his instructor teaches him these exercises. They're basically focus and meditation exercises.

And after he masters these, it takes him a few weeks to get better at them. The head llama comes to him and in a long kind of back and forth philosophical explanation, he basically explains to him through a translator that you have so many thought forms built up from your time as being a Westerner, essentially. You have all these ideas of what you are, who you are,

He says you need to break through them to understand who you really are. And so what the llama wants him to do is understand how these thought forms are created and how they're destroyed. And the llama says your goal is to create a tulpa and then destroy it. Then you'll understand the nature of thought and what holds you back.

So it's the idea of like breaking down the ego and all these things we think are our true selves, but are just notions built up postnatally. But it's also a training exercise. Yeah, it's this training exercise, but it takes months. He has to do it for months. And so he gives him the scroll and he says, when you're ready to start, open the scroll. And so that night he opens the scroll and

And it's that monk he's been dreaming about on the scroll. And so he meditates on this scroll for six months nonstop. And this is where Fongden is telling the story to Schwartz. And Fongden's like, after like three months, there were these moments where he would be separated from Nelson.

And at first it would be like he would have conscious knowledge of looking at Nelson doing the meditation. Then he'd be back in his consciousness as one. And so these separations, they started off as lasting like a minute and then two minutes and then five minutes. And over time, these separations were getting longer. And he said, each time we would separate, I would feel stronger.

And so, but it's, it's strange that he describes it being like a child, because when you think of it, that's your children as well. But when you first have your children, they're completely and utterly dependent upon you. And as they grow and as they get older, they start to march off by themselves. And then by the time they're adults, it's like they're independent. Yeah.

And eventually they are independent. What I'm saying is like there's a similarity in what he's describing here. Well, it eventually gets to this point where something clicks in Nelson's consciousness and Thongden can remember all this because he was the same consciousness until there was this split. And when this split happened, Nelson's sorry, Thongden said he felt it. It was like a snap.

And suddenly he had agency and he could move around and he found himself in the temple grounds, like in the main temple at the monastery grounds. And he said he, Nelson's consciousness at the same time was like, holy crap, something just happened and knew immediately that he had to go to the temple. And so Nelson gets up from his meditation. He walks out to the main temple. There's no one else in there. And he looks and at the top of the, like the

where the main llama sits at the top of the hall in the main chair is this monk that he's been focusing on. It's like seven or eight months now he's been doing it. He's sitting there in the chair, but he's semi-transparent.

He's like, so he hasn't fully manifested. Yeah. He's like half there and it looks like he's asleep. Now Nelson freaks out. He's like, holy crap. I did it. There's a Tulpa. He runs down to his instructor. He's like, you've got to come with me. You've got to come with me. You've got to see this. You've got to see this. He says, okay, do you see him there sitting on the chair? Am I hallucinating? And all the llama cares about, all the monk cares about is, oh dude, calm down.

He's like, you're so attached to this. Yeah, I can see him. He's not fully complete, but yeah. And he says to Nelson, he says, it's time you started to destroy him. You need to dissipate him. You've done it. The experiment's done. You need to finish this. And he's like, no, I can't do it. This changes everything. It's like, this is going to revolutionize Western thinking. Like this is going to change the world. And the monk just walks away so disappointed.

He failed because he's like, you've so attached this. This is the wrong path. But Nelson can't let it go. Now, for some reason, the main llama lets him keep doing this. And it takes another couple of months. And this is now from the perspective of Thongden. He said one day he felt that separation again and he never snapped back. And he claims he looked down at his hands and he's like,

they're solid. He could see the flesh and he looks down and he's wearing a robe and he can feel his legs and he gets up and he moves around. He's a solid creation. He has now formed, he's material, he's independent, he's fully sentient. And at this point, Nelson walks in and finds him just sitting in his chambers and he's like, it's you, we did it. And it's weird because he really is like a newborn. Like he's a, he can't talk.

And he's just like smiling and pointing like a baby. And Nelson's like, it's you. And it's amazing. Like we have to experiment. Let me get you something. Can you talk? And he's just like nodding. And he points to an empty cup. And he's like, oh, you want a cup of tea? Let me pour you a cup of tea. And he drinks the tea. And Nelson's convinced he has to show this to the main llama.

And he says to Thongden, the now fully formed Tulpa, he says, all right, stay here. I know you can talk. I know you'll be able to do it. So when I come back with the llama, I want you to talk. Okay. You're going to talk. And Thongden just like nods at him very seriously. So he can understand. Yeah, he can understand. And so Thongden,

He, he leave a few minutes later, he leaves to try and find the main Lama. And there's this huge commotion coming out of the main temple. Like all the monks are rushing in and he can hear yelling and screaming and shouting. And he's like, what's going on? So he goes to the main temple and he's like, says to one of the monks, what is happening? And they're saying, well, you should know, have a look at the front of the hall. So he looks up, his tulpa has now got the main Lama's scepter.

And he's waving it around, walking back and forth saying, I am the wisdom. I am the light. I am all knowledge. All must follow me. I proclaim my wisdom. He's like taken over, right? See though, see what happens with them? Yeah. And all the monks are yelling at Nelson, like you've got to destroy him, throw him into the fire. Like you've got to cast him out. You've got to destroy him. And he's like, no, he runs to the front.

He says, Thongden, I command you to get down. Return to your quarters immediately. Thongden looks at him, throws the scepter at him and just bolts. He runs through this rear entrance of the temple and all the monks are like, you've got to destroy him, like destroy him with your mind.

Nelson starts running after him. It's like a Jason Bourne chase scene. They running through the streets of this monastery. And the last thing he sees is Thongden leaping onto the back of a horse, stealing it and riding off into the Himalayas. See, it would have been better for some weird Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon style fight before he escaped, but that works. That's okay. There's a little bit of that. So he jumps on a horse and he takes off after him. And the pursuit...

lasts a whole day and night until he eventually catches up with him. And I'll reveal to you what happens after the break. It's going to be a two-parter, this story, because it is long. But that's a wrap for the opening of The Unlikely Prophet. I'll link to the book in the show notes. It's a brilliant one from Alvin Schwartz, a metaphysical memoir by the legendary writer of Superman and Batman.

Where it goes is crazy because at this point, he doesn't even understand that Superman is also around influencing his thinking. Not back then. Yeah, okay, all right. Currently in New York. So that'll be coming up a little bit in our Plus extension and as well as next Tuesday. So a friendly reminder for you, our free listeners, this is the last episode of Season 33.

And we'll be back for season 34, the final season we'll be hosting of Mysterious Universe. We're going to dissolve this tulpa. Not the end of the show. There will be replacement hosts, more news coming in season 34, but we'll be back on the 4th of July. And of course, we'll be back for Plus next week.

That's a wrap for this free edition of the show. If you want to sign up for Plus and get access to all that good stuff, all these extra conclusions to stories, mysteriousuniverse.org forward slash plus. Sign up today. Help support your favorite show. You get access to the big extensions we do on these shows every single Friday. And of course, Plus members get access every

to our exclusive shows that come out every Tuesday as well. Mysteriousuniverse.org forward slash plus. Check it out. Help support your favorite show. That's a wrap for this free edition of MU. Thanks for listening. Thanks for watching. If you're on Plus, stick around for the Tulpa updates after the break. For everyone else, we'll catch you on July the 4th. See you then. Welcome back to your Plus extension.