Does anyone feel like they have two personalities?

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yes, this is an nt thing as well, but it's more exterme with us.
before i knew what i had, and didnt understand why i liked to pace back and forth and flip my fingers, i was horribly, terribly ashamed of my aspie traits. i'd do that outside my house in places like an empty hall at work or in the bathroom, i'd also flip a handkerchief in the air and watch it. sometimes i'd had a nagging fear someone might have seen me do it and i'd be very tense and unable to stop thinking about it. if i ever got caught i'd die from embarrassment.
every time i spend too much time with people, like in a yearly school trip when i was a kid, i'd fight so hard not to stare into space, not to lose sight of the conversation, not to embarrass myself by doing or saying the wrong thing, not stare at blinking objects for too long or become hypnotised by moving treetops, etc. and control my hyperactivity, hid my ocd, pretend not to be bothered by the noise and crowds.
i feel like a robot and have since early childhood, when i was forced to pretened to be that other person, the other person i don't know and have no idea how to be. it's an exhausting, frustrating and depressing experience. that's why i've always hated being stuck in those situations. it's torture.
my parents used to say i'm afraid of being independent and away from home, but i have no problem being independent, as long as i'm alone and not surrounded by people.

Sigh. Yes, big time yes. Every night I come home exhausted.

Actually, I think its an ASD trait when we OVERDO it, like giving personas names, or relying on them any time in public situations. Which I do, except with my closest friends..
And often our personas have been copied from TV, books, or things we saw others do (mimicry). I know its this way for me. Of course, I can only speak for ME (or maybe a persona or two! LOL) on this.

Sincerely,
Matthew

Another thing... for me, even if I'm trying not to put up a front, as soon as I'm around other people, I get terrified and I immediately start putting on the show, before I can stop it. It just takes over. That is, until I get to know someone well enough.

you have no true self. the concept of some sort of core personality is illogical anthropocentric BS with as much scientific validity as astrology and cosmo personality quizzes. unless you are christian or something there is no reason to believe in this stuff

A lot NTs have multiple personas and switch amongst them easily depending on the people around them. It takes a huge amount of work for an autistic person to maintain just one NT-ish persona in public. I don't do this anymore. I'm not good enough at faking a persona, and it is so exhausting and makes me burn out, and I don't want to be accepted based on a fake persona anyway.

I have two layers. There's the outer shell, which interacts with the world, and there's an inner core which is "me". I've got so used to using the shell that I think the core has been slowly merging into it for years now. There's not much "me" left. I have largely become my persona, which is so successful that people are astonished to find this happy, friendly guy can have some rather dark thoughts.

The core isn't frozen just yet, anyway. In times of stress or exhaustion the shell tends to collapse. There's also the freaky way that the shell can go through heightened emotional states - fear, hysterical laughter, anger, pretty much everything - and I'll suddenly find myself dispassionately watching. I feel like the emotions are being faked, that I'm just acting them, but at the same time I *can* feel them. I become two people for a moment. It's a rather unpleasant sensation and doesn't usually last long (fortunately).

But really, I have a number of shells. I switch them sometimes depending on circumstances. Me socially is very different to me at work. There's also a rather nasty me that was born from a period of several months living with an alcoholic. It was how I survived. I hope I never need that one again.

Oh really? And what are we? Computers running outdated software?
I have a self, a central "I" that considers everything coming & going from my mind to the outside world. The only time I do not recognize it is during shut-downs.

Sincerely,
Matthew

I'm going to do an experiment on myself at work, for a week. Instead of trying to be the leader thinking I have to be the fastest and get the most done out of various people on the litter crew, I'm going to bring my true personality to work that you all know me for. I'll imagine that each row is a drum solo and be a lot gentler on the plants in the grass beds, instead of poking for cans and bottles. The sweet Mickish personality that WP and my unprofessional Offline world know me for.

Experimentation is fun.

Am I supposed to invent a persona or something then?

My personality changes according to the person I'm interacting with.
If I know that person then I already have in my répertoire a personality ( opinions, likes, hobbies, tastes, way of speaking..) that they know and are used to or like or both.
If I don't know that person (and it's really a random person I'll propably never meet again) then I quickly (and for the most part unconsciously) make up one, mimicking their way of speaking and posture, using what they say to somehow relate to them, even making things up.
I know this may seem an hypocrite behaviour, but it's really not conscious, to me it's a natural coping mechanism
Does anyone relate to this?