The Nobel Novelist [Doris Lessing] Spoke of Having Different “Levels”: Is this Common in Multiple Personality?

In yesterday's post, the mystery novelist told of having “several different people, or ‘I’s’ taking part.” In the same interview, she said that it can be “very frightening to write a story…soaked in emotions that you don’t recognize as your own,” emotions which come from a “different level.” Are “different levels” typical of multiple personality? They are. Let me explain.

Whenever I have initially discovered that a person has multiple personality, I usually meet and interview a handful of identities. But, eventually, I will find that this initial group of identities is not the person’s only group of identities. It is only one level, layer, group, realm, etc.

The members of this initial group or level of identities are more or less aware of each other. Most of them don’t have memory gaps when other members of their group are out. However, you find that the person still has some memory gaps, emotions, or behaviors that cannot be accounted for by any of these known identities. Also, when you ask this group of identities if there are any other identities outside of their group, they may tell you that there are rumors of others, or that they have noticed unaccounted for emotions, etc. In short, you will eventually find that there are other levels, layers, groups, or realms of identities.

So, when the Nobel novelist talks of emotions, etc., coming from “different levels,” she is describing a common situation in multiple personality.