What makes you Otherkin?

From my own understanding, an Otherkin is a person who believes their soul, or some part of their identity isn't human. Not all Otherkin experience their "inhumanness" in the same way, and so there are many different, even contradicting ideas about it.

How do you, personally, experience yourself in a non-human sense?

Gee, ask a harder question next time. That's about like asking, 'how do you experience yourself in a human sense?' Or a male/female sense etc.

I don't know 100% that I'm not just a human with interesting ideas. My body certainly is human. The tendencies for mental shape shifting could be a natural human trait. Born in a different time and place maybe they'd just call us shamans, or witches, or whatever. But maybe those shamans would also have stories of having the spirit of an animal or other creature inside of them.

Most people have a certain default mindset. They're always talking to themselves about things. They care about certain things. They see the world in a certain way. I know about this because they're always expecting me to see it that way too. Sometimes I do, but I'm not as happy then. I don't feel like 'myself' when I do.

My 'nonhuman' mindset is quieter, more focused, and more aware. I start to move differently. I will bob my head around when I'm looking at things like a bird does. I'll even mentally ruffle and resettle my nonexistent feathers. I'm more in the 'now' and not thinking about later. I'll start to feel phantom talons on my toes and on my fingers, and phantom wings on my back which I'll stretch sometimes. I also become more sensitive to emotions and energies. I've also found that it's a good mind state for studying for tests and focusing when I've stayed up too late at night. There's more to it than that, but it's a good start on the subject.

This is a tough question to answer, but that's mostly because I don't really have much basis for comparison. I don't know how to be anything but what I am and how I am.

I consider my kin-ness an internal belief sort of a thing. I base my belief in it off of personal experiences, memories of what I believe are past lives and sensations that I believe are phantom limbs. I do not consider my mindset non-human really in any way. I find the idea of a single human mindset to be rather silly, every single person is different and seeing as I'm a human being with a human brain and human biochemistry effecting every little part of how I function in this lifetime, I'd feel entirely silly trying to claim a non-human mindset.

I actually think this is the best, most important question posed on any Otherkin board ever. XD I will try to answer.

1. I have a subtle/phantom body that is painfully incongruous with my physical body. AFAIK, I don't have a neurological condition that would cause this.
2. I am unbelievably perceptive, moreso than anyone I have ever encountered. I am almost able to read minds because I read physical cues so adeptly. There is no grimace, muttering, tone of voice, flash of eye, increase of perspiration (yes, I can smell how people are feeling XD), quickening of pulse, or choice of phrase that goes unnoticed. It is very difficult for others to conceal their feelings or intentions from me. I don't know for certain how to test the validity of this without confirmation bias, but I pretty much believe that I am so capable in this area because something about my senses is non-human. I quiz tons of people, trying to figure out if they have an ability remotely close to mine but if the absence of such evidence can be taken as evidence of absence, I am feeling doubtful. XD My eyesight is poor but I still note and remember everything I see with almost perfect clarity and my hearing is so sensitive that I wear headphones or earplugs everywhere I go. Everyone around me frequently remarks on my exceptional sense of smell, as well.
Also, my doctor has confirmed for me that I am synesthetic, causing some intense overlap between these senses. I hear semi-musical sounds that correspond to motion, color, energy and sometimes, though rarely, tastes, smells and textures.
3. I can see my subtle body, or think I can, and it does not look even remotely human.
4. I think that I need blood/energy to survive and be healthy, in addition to regular food and liquids.

After that, it gets considerably more vague and considerably less reliable or interesting.

5. I feel intensely interested in and connected to the stars and outer space.
6. I feel like other people just don't understand me or how/why I think the way I do.
7. I have some mental shifts into a less verbal and more scent-oriented state of mind.
8. I have some odd compulsions, mostly to either touch or avoid touching things, but also to hide, or become invisible (though not out of fear or discomfort, but out of curiosity), to be early for everything (so as to watch everyone else approach), and occasionally to get as high off the ground as possible, though I am afraid of heights. XD

There are other, less noticeable things, too, but I don't want to go on for eternity. XD

Quote:AFAIK, I don't have a neurological condition that would cause this.

You mean you don't have a noted neurological disorder that would cause this. Anyone can have a neurological condition, but if it's not a problem-causing one (as defined by society at least) then it's going to go by unnoticed except by you.

As for the OP, I actually do experience myself in a human sense, but at the same time as being a fox. While I do believe in the spiritual and souls, and thus the possibility that a past life existence as a fox left an imprint on my soul, I also believe that it manifests itself through my mindset. That, psychologically, I have a mixture of what I know to be the "minds" of humans and foxes. Now I could be way off base, of course, since this is only drawn from what I've observed and interpreted.

In regards to shifting and phantom limbs, I actually look at what I canNOT completely shift into as a hint, and that is the arctic fox. I already feel both human and fox integrated in "form", mentally, but whenever I cameo-shift into another organism, they feel seperate. I take on the "form" and observe the "mind" of the organism that I shift into, but it feels like a costume. It doesn't feel real in the sense that it's a part of my identity, a part of who and what I am.

As far as perception goes, I don't know of any difference between me and fellow humans. In fact, my perceptions are probably worse, because I'm deaf and completely dependent on electronic devices to hear with. My sense of smell stinks too, Isometimes even have a hard time smelling the nasty things in the bathroom until I'm right next to it. my only good working senses are my eyes and my sense of touch. I need my eyes, couldn't survive without them. I'd like to think that I'm more spiritually perceptive than some that I know, but I know it's most likely not true <!-- s:lol: --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_lol.gif" alt=":lol:" title="Laughing" /><!-- s:lol: -->

I think the only real way I can explain how I feel I'm otherkin is my awareness. Which is hard to explain really, it's one of those things that I struggle with words for and feel the need to grab you and put you in my shoes instead (which is impossible to do anways) so I can show you. There's this feeling of awareness, that this is what I am and this is a part of my indentity. Not an awareness that "I'm different" or "I'm special" in the sense that everyone else is fake, but rather an awareness of simply "this is what makes me..ME". It's just something that was always there, something that I took for granted and never actually THOUGHT about it or analyzed it until now.

Kinda like language, your native language. It's just there all your life, you grew up with it and learned it at an early age. Did you analyze your language and thought about it in deep, critical ways of thinking during your childhood? Probably not, not until you went into secondary school at least. You don't really think of your language's reason for existance, it's innate purpose and the extreme complexities in the earlier years, it's just something that's there in your life.

And my apoligies if this has confused the shit out of you <!-- s --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_razz.gif" alt=":P" title="Razz" /><!-- s --> Unfortunatley I'm not as graceful with words as others here tend to be.

Corvinas Wrote:How do you, personally, experience yourself in a non-human sense?

When I do energy work, it is apparent to me that my personal energy (chi, or whatever you want to call it) is composed of "shadow energy". I have phantom body parts which I am aware of at all times (in other words, even when I'm not doing energy work). I feel considerably more comfortable when I am having any kind of out-of-body experience, and when I out-of-body travel to non-physical realms that have a high percentage of shadow energy in them, I feel a strong sensation of "rightness" and recognition.

I call myself a shadow because my feelings of comfort and recognition are much stronger in those "shadow realms" than anywhere on Earth (though I love Earth), and because my energy seems to me to be rather different from that of most other humans, but close to identical to that of non-physical shadows I have encountered.

I am also a multiple. My "other half", that is the entity who I share headspace with, is also a shadow. For many years I self-identified as being him (whereas now I identify as being linked to him) and I considered myself non-human because of that. Now, I do not consider his non-human-ness to have any bearing on my own - it just so happens that neither of us is entirely human.

very nice question *ahem*

I feel inhuman when I do some energy work
And constantly for about 7 weeks now, phantom limbs (wings and a tail and since a week or 2 claws)
Then there is the feeling to be stronger and smarter than any human from time to time

Hrothland Wrote:Then there is the feeling to be stronger and smarter than any human from time to time

everyone has that once in a while. <!-- s --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_razz.gif" alt=":P" title="Razz" /><!-- s -->

Quote:How do you, personally, experience yourself in a non-human sense?

Oookay. Simple and complex to reply, all at once. I have a "Different Overview" since my Awakening, back in 03. That means that the Awakening unlocked my senses of reality and beyond, thus I have (re)gained the ability to see the more then the physical senses usually reveal to the conscious "I". It is similar to the "Third Eye" but I can see more then only one "layer" of reality since 03. However, this part is only one of some more. Also I have a rather complete memory of my true nature, how often I incarnated and what happenes between those rare incarnations.

I am totally non-human when I leave my physical body or doing energy works, embedded into a shamanic session. During CRV-Sessions Viewers report that I am either an Angel, or a Fiery Dragon - depends on educational background and religious believings of them. My true being sometimes leaks into reality when phantom wings, phantom tails, claws, or something like this intermingle with my human body-map. Sometimes those phantom limbs interact with the physical reality, everytime this happens, some strange things take place. Frequently the Light-barrier of Elevators or automatic-doors are irritated, but sometimes the interaction are more physical.

My true nature explaines many incidents that happened and are (of course) still happening to me and to those who are nearby. So I am frequently being seen by others during my Out-Off-Body Explorations, which are a common part of my life since 1991, when I began to shamanize. Those encounters are seldom controlled by me, but the last two were planned and induced in order to get an artisan a clear impression of my gestalt. Usually it is otherwise: The more I try to control it, the less the effects or reportings - with some remarkable exceptions, like during my Condordance or in special situations, when I decide this spontaneously.

Corvinas Wrote:From my own understanding, an Otherkin is a person who believes their soul, or some part of their identity isn't human. Not all Otherkin experience their "inhumanness" in the same way, and so there are many different, even contradicting ideas about it.

How do you, personally, experience yourself in a non-human sense?

Before I reply I'd like to ask a question of my own. Are you starting to think you might be kin? Well on to myself.

As far back as I can remember I've always felt that there was something else to me. At first it was just a sense that the sex of my body was wrong and I should be a girl. As I grew older that sense just deepened but I realized that I didn't quite identify with humans completely. At one point I thought I was a super hero (pure fantasy) and then a werewolf (maybe a fantasy, not sure). About seven years ago I had a memory surface of a little fight with a big, dark, shapeless entity which I thought was a dream until I met someone a year later who remembered the same thing only he was the entity I fought. About three years ago I started to sense bat-like wings and a tail after talking with an old friend from school. About this same time I had a dream in which I was a girl but not completely human and two others who I thought were my sister and mother (they weren't my physical family as I don't have a sister).

I guess in short it's just KNOWING that I wasn't quite human.