One of the most important things to consider before delving into the contents themselves is addressing the matter of, "Can I accept that it both does and doesn't work?" By that I mean there are not universal standards that apply and there is ample debate on and about a number of qualities of what makes up otherkin or theriotypes or anything in that sphere. There are some general universals, just not many. The real difficulty comes from sitting down to sift apart that which is from that which is not, which is more or less a self-exercise alone. Reading can help to understand it but one is going to find a lot of contradictory content on the surface, say the disparity of psychological versus spiritual, as there are many who are one or the other and argue it from those angles.
It is going to take introspection and thinking about oneself and what they
really are and what that
really means. One does not choose their type as a result - coping-links adopt a type, that is what makes them distinct - and there is an important difference between
identifying as and
being something. Because in one case, one is adopting an identity but holding it as a choice when it isn't and the other is embracing what is. As result, there is no "fit". Either one is something or not, this may be many somethings or a few, although more often than not it is just one thing and in a number of cases, it is not what one might desire for themselves. So making this distinction is important in each capacity, as otherwise the entire endeavor is flawed and is a game if merely convincing the self of what the true self is. To use an example, many people, those normal and mundane, convince themselves they are "good" and that it is the world against them rather to any observer one realizes their goodness is false piety in the agnostic sense; they are as bad and as guilty as any other person, no universal saint are they. But they pursue and live this obsession to themselves and it makes their lives very difficult, the reality that they do bad things and they must reconcile them. In a way, the experience of one's types are similar if they are invented, manufactured rather than organic.
Memories are a rarity, it should be noted. The majority of otherkin and company do not experience memories of other lives and believing in that in the first place requires a system and framework that permits concepts as reincarnation or various elements of quantum theory, which is to say these are exclusive, just that not all subscribe to them and those who do are not always those who experience memories. It is also very difficult to separate memory from fantasy, so much so that this in itself is a strong argument against the community as a whole. It takes not only practice but the execution of understanding and the use of approach to memory to discern what is a flight of fancy or what truly is recalled. This nebulousness typically takes a strong understanding of psychology and a certain type of personality to analyze critically and effectively, but even that finds challenge and debate. Thus memories are not only not assured to exist, they are not assured to be true.
Awakenings happen in many different ways but almost all of them function in a form that is a realization of the self, or a persona in the case where the individual has coerced themselves into believing this is them; a persona being a "mask" one adopts to act out something, see what many shamans and indigenous people do in spiritual communion and revelation to understand these things, but know it is not limited to. An awakening is exactly as described, it is as if one moment one was totally unconscious and unaware of themselves as they are, rather than they were, and the next there is a sense of disparity - that something has changed profoundly. Now the mind is excellent at convincing the body of anything, the phrase "Mind over body." is scarily true, but there is something special to an actual awakening to the self that is both fulfilling and frightening. This is part of the transformation process, and I mean this in the sense of actualization and individuation not anything else, and it represents a sum of an individual rather than them being many parts or playing out only certain parts. All the agreeable and disagreeable things, as analytical psychology would phrase it, are combined together into one continuous mosaic. It is everything that individual is made up of and no one thing rules the other. They are, in mind, complete. But we must recognize this is not the case in the majority of kintypes or theriotypes and so on; many are still incomplete, thus they are in the process of this described existence.
What does that mean however for an awakening experience? Rather than being the sum of the journey, it is generally the start, because each individual has their own process. Some begin very early, often prepubescent childhood, others only later in life, and some "rediscover" it. I myself knew from very early on, from the earliest recognition of the
I that I was what I am and I lived that for a while in childhood where that is all acceptable. Pretending to be a "tiger" or a big cat at any instance, trying to act like one, learning about them, mirroring behavior, doing those things which humans regularly do not do in demeanor, all of that is generally acceptable, but in a few years of course children are forced to lose their fantasy and conform. For better or worse this is needed for the greater population, those normal persons, but for someone who is not quite one of those things this becomes an exercise in self-denial and repression. Which was my case, I was forced to hide it deep away despite that being my experience from the first day I realized I existed. I did everything in my power to be normal and mimic everyone else, to play a game of being a person, but it never worked; humans are designed to be highly scrutinizing for anything that is off in the social realm, so faking it only gets one so far. I had to rediscover myself, which I had buried under so much emotion and anger, a great amount of denial and years of being told to be normal. It only resurfaced because I went to find myself when I had nothing left; there was no more in the bottom of the out other than me, who had been waiting there all along, watching and lurking. I was content to wait myself out of course until this event. When there was nothing else for me to use in a time of immense trial and extreme strain - physical, emotional, spiritual, and psychological - and out of desperation I would explore myself. Now, one can imagine all the good that comes with being a great cat but there are also terrible consequences for this and in order to be whole, I had to put all these things together and accept what is the sum. That of course is my experience but it is almost verbatim what was and is described in many historic texts about the nature of becoming whole and many early works of psychology; there is a basis here which is transcendent. Thus it is why we need to understand just how deep an awakening really need go and why so much effort is put into it in other practices, namely traditional religions and spirituality. Even if one discounts all of their experiences to being plainly those in the theatre of mind, it is the same type of process of discovery and journeying within.
I do hope this proves helpful,
@Kentin, it is a long and difficult process, but I hope this kind of knowledge gives a better idea of what has to be done to do it successfully.
