Talk:Walk-in (concept)

Dissociative Identity Disorder vs. walk-ins
"Those people usually stress that it is important to make a distinction between people who suffer DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder) and themselves. Again, unlike classical, Sybil-like blackout DID, the host person is conscious of and able to communicate and cooperate with the others. They often prefer terms such as people or selves to "personality", which they consider misleading since it implies that each is not a separate being." Where did this come from? Which people stress that it's important to make a distinction? My distinctions are 1) I have not officially diagnosed. 2) I don't have the classical blackout (but that doesn't mean I don't have DID, and it doesn't mean it never happens.  One inherant quality of blackouts is that you don't know!) 3) we get along  4) we're not looking to integrate. If someone has a resource for this distinction, let me know. Otherwise, I'd like to edit the page. Crisses 02:47, 8 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Well, fellows, in that case, why don't you edit it? This is Wikipedia, after all -- you can feel free.


 * My sources for that information, among other things, included the Missing Manual. Also LJ-multiplicity and the writings of Amorpha, and even Positively Plural. You're certainly right that I should have named my sources. --Bluejay Young 04:06, 9 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I think the best way to handle it is to narrow the phrasing down. To say 'usually stress' it's an implication that the belief is held by the majority.  To say "Some people stress..." lightens the phrasing somewhat, and makes it less of a generalization while still representing a belief that diverges from the other topics expressed. I can make edits to reflect that change.  Another thing I'm wondering is if this is a misinterpretation of something I contributed to the Missing Manual :) because then I could go nudge what I wrote. The Crisses 04:50, 9 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I doubt it. I wrote most of this article as it currently stands and I usually don't source the Missing Manual but rather personal email correspondence and people's websites. I really should cite some sources on these things. The things I said about groups handling things okay and cooperating are very much like what appears on the Missing Manual under "getting along inside". But I'd have to go back and read it to get an exact quote -- maybe I should do that? Or at least cite "getting along inside" in a link. --Bluejay Young 02:31, 11 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Just a quick note here for future reference: Graphictruth.com has a "wetware" area that currently covers autistic spectrum issues and mulitiplicity. Is "wetware" a standard term used within wikipedia? firewheel


 * This note should probably have gone in my user talk section unless you're going to talk about walk-ins in your wetware section: However! here you go -- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wetware :) It's got its own article, so all you'd have to do if you wanted to use the term is enclose it in the double brackets; wetware -- that's it! Good to see ya! Bluejay Young 04:48, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

walk ins
When you state that a soul may choose to be a walk in rather than choose the more tedious process of birth, what would be the difference in the processes? Why would birth be more tedious? Also, once a walk in enters the body, can it change it's mind? For example if it realizes it will be unable to accomplish it's plan in the particular body it chose, can it leave again? If so, then what would happen to the body? Would it probably have to choose death or could another soul or possibly the original soul decide to enter this particular body? Lauri Woods


 * Yo Lauri, I can only speculate at this point but will have to look up what people believe on this issue. As far as birth being more tedious, I've seen that in a couple of places and apparently this is a view held by the kind of people within the New Age religion who are squicked by the idea of anything as physical and earthy as sex, pregnancy, and the birth process. This anti-sex attitude is not held by all New Agers of course. I think they also believe incarnating through the pregnancy-birth process may prevent them (as in the Veil of Maya) from accessing information from the "higher plane" which they would need in order to do their job. In the cases where I've read of a walk-in soul leaving, the original soul is sometimes reported as coming back all right, having felt like it was "on vacation" sort of; other times you hear about a succession of other souls coming in and managing the body's life until its appointed time of death. I can honestly say I've never read about a walk-in soul having to leave the body to death, without another soul to take up where she left off, either because she couldn't complete her plan or for any other reason. Your best source is probably the books by Ruth Montgomery. Thanks for the questions! I will see if there is some way I can work them in. --Bluejay Young 21:58, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

This will have to be taken at word value but basically any discarnate entity wishing to perform in a "walk in" onto this level due to universal laws is basically in that vessle for the timespan of its experience within our currently running dimensional frequency. On top of this for most beings the reasons for the return must be learned within the framework of the reality entered (usually by synchronicities). As an advantage to walk-ins they are usually gifted with heightened spiritual awareness. This is something that is known to the entity at the immediate time of the walk-in but is usually lost as a thoughtform, moreso dependant on the specific deimensional frequency the dicarnate entity is wishing to move in from. The higher the dimensional level the more "amnesic" barriers are placed on the entities infinite being. This is basically because dropping dimensional levels is not a recommended past time for light beings and if full knowledge of the previous existence was known it would be akin to jumping out of a cold bath into a vat of burning oil. My two cents on things from a being who "dropped in" for a while. Peace

--- I think, "Meet Joe Black" is a good movie about walk-in. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.152.172.4 (talk) 13:59, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Copyright Problem
The page linked from the copyright infirngement notice explicitely credits this Wikipedia.–Jerome K. 14:10, 11 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I don't understand what's happened here. I wrote most of the original article, and I can assure you I wrote it out of my own head. This can be proved by the page history. The other users who have worked on this can vouch for their own authenticity. It appears that (like a lot of websites, apparently) Crystalinks has instead copied from wikipedia, not the other way around. But at the bottom, they do reference Wikipedia as the source, through a link, like Jerome says. If there is any problem, please contact me through my talk page and let's resolve this. --Bluejay Young 19:12, 11 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I have reverted this. The cited page is a copy from Wikipedia, rather than the other way around.  Sources do need still need to be cited for some of the claims made in text, with bibliographic references added if possible.  It would improve this a great deal if it were possible to track down whoever it was that coined the term "walk-in" for this phenomenon, since IIRC Ruth Montgomery does not  describe it in those terms exactly. - Smerdis of Tlön 14:59, 13 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Thank you. Montgomery calls it walk-ins in Strangers Among Us. --Bluejay Young 22:59, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

NPOV tag
The biggest problem is the article's tendency to treat this hypothetical phenomena as real. Given that the existence of the "soul" has yet to be proven, this leads to some problems with neutrality and sources. Pairadox 09:55, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

While we don't "have proof" of the existence of a soul, there are some highly similar phrases that people agree on existing (if not the why or how): Consciousness, the mind. Some issues with it: [From a Christian Perspective, but with reasoning] —Preceding unsigned comment added by DragonSlaveII (talk • contribs) 02:32, 6 March 2008 (UTC)


 * I think that any time you're describing a belief system, it can be more or less assumed that the whole thing is speculative. I did use the words 'subjective experience', perhaps not prominently enough, but I do give Wikipedia readers credit for a modicum of intelligence. I'm willing to work with anyone who wants to improve the article, but I'm resistant to the idea that Wikipedia should not include articles on religious, spiritual, or metaphysical concepts/experience.


 * What would really make this article, and what I have been looking for for some time, is a quote from a medical professional about reports of walk-in experience and what they think it is. I know a couple of doctors were interviewed for the Unsolved Mysteries segment. One of them said that the experience is so common to patients coming out of anesthesia that doctors almost expect to hear the patient say "I'm not who you think I am". They apparently attribute it to a certain kind of dream state. But I need a source like a book or medical journal I can put in the references. --Bluejay Young 18:16, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

This is about tag cleanup. As all of the tags are more than a year old, there is no current discussion relating to them, and there is a great deal of editing done since the tags were placed, they will be removed. This is not a judgement of content. If there is cause to re-tag, then that of course may be done, with the necessary posting of a discussion as to why, and what improvements could be made. This is only an effort to clean out old tags, and permit them to be updated with current issues if warranted. Besides, not re-writing background in every article is WP policy....Jjdon (talk) 21:53, 28 April 2008 (UTC)


 * I would say that this article still needs a thorough rework. It does not represent, in my view, a neutral point of view and does not treat the subject with the needed critical stance. Shandolad (talk) 18:19, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Saint Tirumular
The only reason I put in about St. Tirumular at all (which would be back a couple of years ago now!) was that I was sent a message by a Hindu Wikipedia user advising me that the Saint's story represented a kind of walk-in. I take the point that it is regarded by devout Hindus as being unrelated because they believe the God Siva directs these things to happen under very special circumstances only -- the way Catholics think about visitations from the Blessed Mother.

If St. Tirumular's story is not related to walk-ins in the usual sense, maybe that whole section should be removed. I will do so, and put it here. People can decide if/how they want to work it in. I am sorry if anyone was offended. --Bluejay Young (talk) 06:20, 23 June 2008 (UTC)

Here it is:

History
The idea that walk-ins first appear in Hindu sacred literature is a misunderstanding of Hindu concepts. In Hindu belief, each person is composed of several bodies including the physical, astral, mental, refined, and so on. The Atman or eternal soul is a complicated concept viewed as the 'self'. To some it is regarded as an essence that is not a body, and therefore not transferable, to other Hindus it is composed of many levels and can be affected in many ways. According to this belief system there is no mention of a "walk-in" and it is a concept foreign to Hinduism. The popular new age concept of “walk-ins” would not be recognizable by any Hindu and at most would loosely compare with the Hindu concept of spirit possession.

The story of the missionary Saint Tirumular is sometimes regarded as a story of a "walk-in", but traditional Hindus regard it as an insult to Siva to equate it as such and also to the Saint. Legend has it that he voluntarily left his body in order to reanimate a young cowherd who had just died. He did this so he could comfort the sacred cows that were wandering around lost and upset. The Rishi used his siddhis or yogic power to accomplish this after receiving a miraculous boon from Lord Siva himself, allowing the Rishi to accomplish this task and comfort the cows. The subtle bodies, the atman, the soul, the consciousness and all other aspects of the dead man were long gone; only the physical shell existed at this point, assisted by divine intervention. Tirumular's own body, which he carefully hid in a hollow log, was subsequently taken up to heaven by the god Siva, leaving him to spend the remainder of his life on earth in the body of the cowherd. The reason for this, which the Rishi eventually gleaned through meditation after not being able to find his own body, was that Lord Siva had sent him on a mission to stay where he was and to record the wisdom of the Upanishads and Saiva Agamas in the local language, Tamil. Assisted by divine intervention, he was able to access the dead man's knowledge, including his ability to speak Tamil and went onto establish the Saivite path.

Hindus view possession by a divinity to be a fortuitous and blessed event which has nothing to do with the new age concept of "walk-in". Hindus also believe they can enter "altered states of consciousness" through meditative practices for spirit contact and voluntary possession, but would not expect someone not trained to do so for risk of mental disturbances and other problems. From the Hindu doctrinal standpoint, possession cannot occur without permission of some sort; they feel this negates the very concept of "walk-in".

Dissociative Fugue
Why has nobody mentioned this yet? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fugue_state Psychologists have observed people actually adopting a whole new personality, complete with memories. This isn't the same thing as DID; dissociative fugue involves ONE new personality with amnesia for the old. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Chaoticidealism (talk • contribs) 19:19, 20 April 2009 (UTC)


 * You mean like Ansel Bourne? That is considered dissociative identity disorder. One other person is all that is needed. Michael Kenny's The Passion of Ansel Bourne talks about this in detail. And I had (probably too much) information on cooperative walk-ins / soul merging as being similar to a cooperative multiple group, and it was removed. I think they were right to remove it because it was getting off the track. --Bluejay Young (talk) 13:37, 9 June 2010 (UTC)

Alias
I removed this:


 * In the TV series "Alias" the main character featured by Jennifer Garner introduces herself as a "walk-in" to the CIA as she wants to become a double agent working for the benefit of the CIA (season 1, episode 1, "Truth be told", near the end at 59:35).

The everyday sense of the word "walk-in", someone who shows up unsolicited for a tryout, has nothing to do with the new-age idea. --173.228.85.123 (talk) 01:12, 16 August 2014 (UTC)

Common usage
The term "walk-in" usually means entering or showing up without an appointment, or a closet that's big enough to walk into. According to wiktionary, it can also mean to enter illegally without breaking in, a room that's entered without an intervening passage, or a movie theater that isn't a drive-in.

The usage given on this page seems like an unusual one. Shouldn't this page be called something like "Walk-in (parapsychology)"? — Preceding unsigned comment added by CoStar (talk • contribs) 00:22, 26 September 2015 (UTC)
 * I would suggest the name change would be more appropriate as "Walk-in (New Age)" since the concept is primarily associated with the New Age movement. LiPollis (talk) 06:08, 29 May 2016 (UTC)