November 27, 2019

2019.11.27
Huh. So for a while now I've been thinking about different forms of expressing the balance between our rational selves and our emotional selves - the conscious and the subconscious, the Id and the Ego, the Elephant and the Rider...

Following a link about Boba Fett in this Quora "What is something that almost nobody knows about Star Wars?" Rui Sonofel had an answer on The Force had a bit that made me realize I've been living with a pop-culture example for decades:
A Jedi channels the Force through sheer willpower alone. They distance themselves from their emotions and from that part of the Force.

A Sith channels the Force through their emotions. Their emotions is like the lightning rod they use to channel the Force. They don't deny themselves any desire or restraint themselves from anything.
The "sheer willpower alone" part is what's really grabbing me. I've heard a model of one person's depression that said it wasn't the emotional side overruning the rational side with sadness (which I had assumed), it was more that the emotional side was just conked out, and that was the side that had been providing the critical motive energy.

Huh. I want to revisit some of the arcs in the original trilogy and the prequels and maybe even the new ones and see if this idea has any useful expressions there, or if it's just a bolt on from the "expanded universe".
The world's a fucking garbage fire, we're just two hobos warming our hands.