My name is Rochelle. I am 17 years old. I have decided that I would like to share some of my writings openly. I began writing one day, intending to keep a daily journal. To make a long story short, the daily journal did not work out. It's hard for someone who lives with so many other people inside one mind to get daily time. We all clamor for our own special time, and there are just not enough hours in the day. Then, of course, there are all the additional daily tasks that need to be done, such as schoolwork, housework, etc. So I've settled for sharing bits and pieces once in a while via my space here on this site. Those are what you'll find below.
Most of what I write about regards faith. My faith is vital to my survival. You're welcome to read regardless of your own faith, of course. I never think it's necessary to insist that anyone follow the same pattern that I have, although I hope that they will. I have put this here as a disclaimer because I don't intend to use spoilers or anything when discussing my faith. I've spent so many years being silent about literally everything that I feel and hold for this system that I'm now just going to lay it all out. There are plenty of other things I get into discussing as well, but they don't require such notice as far as I know, and many of them tie back into my faith.
My name is Rochelle. I am on a journey. There are many others on this journey with me. Most are female, but a few are male. The goal of the journey is to find the common thread that makes us all parts of the same mind. Maybe we can find that this is truly one soul and that being one mind is not so frightening as it seems.
Let me explain a bit of what I am talking about. When I speak of "we", I am referring to the group of images existing in one mind: the mind of a person who has a legal name. We are images of who she once was; we are images of who others have told her she was, is, and could be; we are images of who she once thought herself to be; we are images of who she thinks she is; we are images of who she thinks she can be; we are images of who she fears becoming; we are images of who she fears she is; we are images of who she perceives she is required to be; and we are images of who she wishes she could be but perceives she never could be. Most people do not know that we exist. In fact, for many years she herself did not realize what we were or how our presence in her mind dictated her behavior. We were merely a fantasy world, created (she thought) for her amusement. But she thrives on our existence. We provide the means for her to understand herself and the world she lives in.
The one problem with this is that she has lost herself and now looks to us for the answer to the question of who she is. None of us can answer it alone. For all of us would answer emphatically, "You are who I am--and you are who they are." Just as a community of individuals takes on a personality, her perceptions of herself represented in us take on a personality--and that personality is who she is. How we as portions of her mind react to one another and the needs of the whole organization can change her personality.
Some of us represent her past. Some of us once represented her past and are now trying to move forward and to learn to exist in the present moment and to use the things that shaped who we are to help in shaping who she will be in the future. Some of us represent her hopes and dreams, and they give the rest of us the strength to keep traveling on the journey. A few are still very much filled with doubt and are unsure whether they wish to walk this journey with the rest of us. I suppose that all people have these feelings, but all people do not store their perceptions of self in images of people, each with his own name. For people who do not do this, I'm sure there is some method of processing the thoughts and feelings other than having a continual dialogue going with the self. For our host, this dialogue is very normal. In fact, often there are many of these dialogues going on at one time.
I couldn't tell you when the dialogues began. All children have imaginary playmates. All children talk to themselves. But most children grow out of it. When do they grow out of it? Our host never grew out of it. She just kept right on doing it. Oh, she may have learned not to do it out loud, but it went right on in her head. There was always someone to accompany her, always someone to talk to her, always someone to hold her hand, etc. No matter where she went, she was never alone. Sometimes the other person was older, stronger, wiser. Other times the person was younger, weaker, someone who needed something she could give. Eventually this internal reality became so developed that she was no longer a part of any of it. She just watched from the sidelines.
What caused this? Could it be that for a time the internal reality functioned as a representation of what she hoped could someday be actual reality but that there came a point in time when she gave up hoping and the internal reality became the representation of what she perceived would always be? Could it be that this cycle between representation of hopes and giving up has repeated itself over the years and now is a source of internal conflict between us all?
Aloneness seems to be a central issue in her life and in the events in this internal reality. No, aloneness is not the correct term. Loneliness is more correct--loneliness and aloneness during times of pain; fear of being left unattended during a time of intensive need or stress; fear of being neglected or left to fend for oneself without appropriate skills or resources, fear of being unwanted and left alone with no source of comfort or change in environment. There are two or three in this world of her mind who are very young--under three years of age. One is an infant. They crave being held and sometimes pass these cravings on to others of us. But the cravings are never satisfied. Why? How far back in life does this fear go, and what caused it?
We have seen pictures and heard sounds, as if watching a movie. We have often felt as if we were trapped in a space where movement was limited by some kind of structures or restraints which would not allow us to reach out and alert others to being unhappy. There is no escaping the confines of this structure except through the intervention of some person from outside--and the intervention comes only at its own will and never in response to a cry. Are these memories? If so, are they significant in the development of fears that she would carry with her into the rest of her life until set free by God?
Being set free by God is another concept that I'd like to write about. But I have written quite a bit here for today and am tiring. Perhaps I shall continue this train of thought in the morning--or in the event that we are awakened from sleep again as has been happening for several nights now. I hope that this beginning does not turn out like many others that have been tried from within this mind. We so need to communicate with each other--and possibly with someone who knows us. I don't know how difficult it would be for someone to understand the concept of a community of self representations in one head. It is something termed dysfunctional, crazy, mentally ill--something to be fixed. But for us, it is just normal thought processing. Perhaps one day she will not need it, but for today...
In hope,
Rochelle Nichols
Freedom in Christ is a very strange topic to me! I've heard it said once that people change when they've learned enough to want to or when they've hurt enough to have to. Admitting that we often prefer staying in our discomfort is painful. For many of us, it brings feelings of condemnation. How dare we desire to be free if we don't want to accept the freedom or let go of the chains? But to change, to walk into the unfamiliar territory where we completely trust God, is frightening. It requires giving up our control of life and facing our fears of rejection. Much of our pain is based on the host's perception that she is never good enough. To admit that we still trust so little means admitting that once again our host is not good enough. She has not lived up to the standard she thought she had achieved or could achieve. In fact, this constant effort to change, to become "good enough" is much of the reason why there are so many of us inside this mind.
But something about this seems incorrect to me. Jesus Christ does not condemn. He would not heal a person and then remind them sternly how little they had been without him. Even in reminding people of who they had been before, he always emphasizes the fact that now they are set free. All that matters now is his love.
Some of us in here fear that being set free means giving up things we want or, worse, things we need--and things we happen to think are very basic to the experience of happiness. And isn't happiness our right? We do live in America. Why should we lay aside our hopes and dreams for some abstract being who apparently cares so little about our own lives and so much about His own agenda? Yet there are others of us who see this question written down and are completely appalled that it has come forth from any part of this mind. How could we doubt His love for us? How can we not see how He has been faithful to us through all of these years? How dare we question whether He cares about the details of this personal life?
Yet this mind has been hurt quite a bit, and those hurts are apparently the fuel for the fires set about by the doubters. We've tried quieting them, going on as if the doubts did not exist. This got us nowhere except further into the feelings of bitterness and hopelessness. All we can do now is confess the doubts and ask, "Help me with my unbelief," knowing that He is merciful and did not refuse anyone who came to Him with an open heart.
Being set free by this kind of God doesn't mean bitterly sacrificing my needs. It means willingly sacrificing them because God knows what I need and would never leave me foresaken, even if He did allow me to be tested. The hurts of the past would cease to be signs that He had refused to show His love for me and would become opportunities for Him to fill up my emptiness with His love and to transform me by His grace before the eyes of a world that expects me to be as bitter as the next person. What keeps me from accepting this freedom? What kind of failure am I afraid of that leads me to believe it is just easier to remain in the confines of the current spiritual state?
How odd that I would be the one to write about being set free. In the internal reality I am a severely disabled teenager, unable to walk or speak and with limited use of my hands. My disabilities represent something. Exactly what that something is is rather questionable. Perhaps it is a feeling of being almost totally dependent on others. Perhaps it is a feeling of being unable to reach out and take hold of anything we want. But even more important than this is the fact that until recently, the others have seen me as someone who was completely accepting of these limitations. I always smiled, never cried, welcomed contact from all in this world who reached out to me. I observed all things, but though I may have longed for friendship with a given individual in my heart, I never revealed it in any way. I just waited and was content with what I had.
Perhaps this, too, was a representation of something: a representation of the contentment our host longed for, that contentment being the only thing which could make the pain of such feelings of isolation as she endured tolerable. If she could welcome interaction from all people with joy, then she would never be disappointed by the quality of the interactions. If she never showed her longing for friendship with a given individual, she could never be disappointed when she did not receive what she hoped for.
But only I and a handful of others in this mind have achieved this kind of freedom. A certain few--and particularly a certain one--of the others in this reality with me look upon my ability to do this with much envy. But the truth is that my heart greatly desires fellowship with other hearts. I have not so much learned to be happy in my aloneness as I have learned to be patient in my suffering. When I finally began to show myself to them on a consistent basis, they felt pain and interpreted it as my pain. Perhaps it was my pain. However, it is pain that I cannot feel. Perhaps I am used to it. Or perhaps I am more free than I thought I was. Perhaps within the limitations of my disabilities a piece of this soul is free, and I am a piece of her will which has submitted itself to experiencing that freedom. Perhaps in time more of these pieces will do the same.
So what is my life like in here? To tell the truth, it is much better now that I have a place and time to pour out the things I have been holding in my soul. I love to read and to think. I would probably be good at prayer and meditation, and perhaps I already do these things without realizing what I am doing. I enjoy the smallest things in life. Every person I meet is a potential friend. That is what my life is like. You know the appeals to meditate on God's Word day and night and to pray without ceasing? That is what I do. It is not boring. It is what gives me strength. It is the only thing that allows me to enjoy a life so devoid of activities.
Of course, people are not designed to live a life so devoid of activities. So I think and pray, and I save everything up in my mind. There are others who are doing this as well. And this is the place and time, here at the end of the day, when we write all of these things down. I have been the one to start. As time goes by, I may introduce you to others so that they may also write as their portion of the mind becomes transformed. There is a special place where we come to write this journal. It is in a park. There is a cclearing where we build a fire, and around the fire are logs that we can sit on. Some prefer sitting on the ground if and when they come. I sit in my chair. We use this site for other things as well, but for those of us who use it at night it is a very special place. There is often singing and praying. Usually someone will read for all of us out of the Bible.
To the east of the campfire site, there is a river. I have never been there, but I know that some go there to think and to pray. There is a small cabin near the river where they go on retreats at times. I will not write any more about the cabin for now, as the owners are not ready to be introduced yet.
Freedom in Christ requires giving up something, letting go of "the sinful nature," some kind of spiritual rebirth. Spiritual rebirth is a concept that I've been considering for some time now, even longer than I've been considering freedom in Christ. As I have said in the previous days, there are apparently needs that this body has which are tied to things that happened or didn't happen in infancy or early childhood. There is a need to be held, but I think that a more basic need underlies the need to be held. It is a need for stability, security, acceptance, and approval. If I am reading and interpreting correctly, this is nothing new. Life has been unstable and attachments insecure since the beginning of man's existence. Being merely man wasn't good enough. He had to be like God. And finally, unconditional love wasn't enough. There was always an attempt to make himself good enough, to make up for that rift between himself and God.
I am having much difficulty in writing tonight. Part of it is that I cannot quite put into words what I am trying to say. Today has been a bit too noisy, and I have not had enough time to listen. I am also struggling with the presence of others tonight and the necessity of taking medication to ease symptoms of asthma. On previous nights I have been alone when I have written. Tonight I am not alone, and I think I am not meant to be alone. With me is Cara. At the moment she is the only one I can see. My ability to move on is slowed by her struggle. Perhaps if I give her the book and let her write, she will be able to make a step further, and we can begin to move on.
Cara shares her story via her own page. Cara is someone whom I admire greatly, though I doubt she would recognize herself as someone worthy of anyone's respect or admiration. She is a very deep thinker. She searches ever for self-understanding, for the truth, for an understanding of God. I am only at liberty to share my own writings here, but I hope you will visit her page.