ā ļø Spoiler Alert: The post contains spoilers about The Stormlight Archives and Will Wight’s Cradle
Recently it has come to my attention that it’s been a short while since my last “book” blog. Now this “recently” was a year ago and it’s been two years since I posted anything even remotely related to books but I digress. Within my rights as the owner of this website, I have been posting whatever I feel like. Within your rights as the readers of this website, it has been brought to my attention that “WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU THIS IS NOT WHY WE READ THIS BLOG?!”. Now me being such a benevolent creator decided to give the people what they want, not because I was scared you would stop reading, but solely because I was feeling generous. That’s it. Don’t get the wrong idea, I’m not fond of y’all or anything.
It’s been a month or two since I read a book so while thinking on what to write about I ended up on revisiting my favorite memories from many of the books that I have read. Which is a lot. You need to understand that all I did since 4th grade was read, I read anything I could get my hands on. In 7th, things got out of hand. I read during class, with a book at my lap when the teacher blabbered on about quadratics or what not. I read on the bus to and from school. I read when I got home and I kept reading until I was forced to sleep. I might be one of the very few people to have had the horror of having books taken from me and a football thrust upon me by my parents. Now their reasons for doing this might have to do with social isolation and dropping grades but to this day I am pretty sure they are just jealous of my relationship with Rick Riordan. The guy pretty much raised me.
While most of these paper adventures were set in fictional worlds, I did have an occasional stint in the non-fiction world. I won’t deny that I was a victim of reading about productivity to feel productive. I don’t want to get into my stance against self-help literature because I know you guys probably don’t care that much. (It’s controversial I’ll tell you that much š¤«). The largest point I have is that that motivation doesn’t stick. Eventually you stop using the Atomic Habits framework. You stop manifesting like the Alchemist told you to. You realize a Venn diagram could sum up the entirety of Ikigai. (no offense to any of these authors, I’m a dumb 20 year old. You do you).
No, those books didn’t stay with me. Neither did their lessons nor their quotes. At the end of the day motivation fades and most quotes are just advice – easy to agree with and easy to forget. What did stay with me and became a part of me, however, were a couple of lines from some of the fiction I read. You see, even though fictional worlds didn’t really have any “reality” behind it. It was 300-400 pages, sometimes even multiple books of character growth and conflict. Those authors got me invested into the plots that they had painstakingly built. It helped me internalize the journeys of the main characters, journeys that very few authors could summarize into personal mantras. And these mantras aren’t very different from the real world. If you look at some of the most dedicated members of society, you can’t pinpoint their motivations to a couple lines, instead they relate to very personal concepts. Soldiers have their creeds. Religions have their prayers. Athletes have their routines. Similarly, characters have their oaths and revelations. I realized that the best mantras aren’t advice or instruction. They’re identities.
Kaladin’s First Ideal
Life before Death. Strength before Weakness. Journey before Destination
The first ideal of the Knights Radiant. A unifying law between all the different orders. This wasn’t just a statement that Brandon Sanderson put in the story. It was a revelation we saw Kaladin arrive at throughout his journey in the first book. Nine words perfectly killing the whole argument that we had been made to believe throughout the entire book – that the Knights Radiant were evil traitors.
Throughout the Stormlight Archives, we see these words shape wars, conflicts, and the lives of millions across centuries. I was thinking of delving deeper into these words but then I realized, instead of me explaining it – who better than Sanderson himself? Here’s him writing as Teft, who explains to an injured Kaladin, the true meaning behind the first ideal.
Life before death,ā Teft said, wagging a finger at Kaladin. āThe Radiant seeks to defend life, always. He never kills unnecessarily, and never risks his own life for frivolous reasons. Living is harder than dying. The Radiantās duty is to live.
āStrength before weakness. All men are weak at some time in their lives. The Radiant protects those who are weak, and uses his strength for others. Strength does not make one capable of rule; it makes one capable of service.ā
Teft picked up spheres, putting them in his pouch. He held the last one for a second, then tucked it away too. āJourney before destination. There are always several ways to achieve a goal. Failure is preferable to winning through unjust means. Protecting ten innocents is not worth killing one. In the end, all men die. How you lived will be far more important to the Almighty than what you accomplished.
Lindon’s Lord Revelations
I have been talking about cradle for a long time on this blog. The story has officially ended now with the final book, in a much better way than a 16-year old me would have expected. It made me a realize the series was never about whether Lindon could save Sacred Valley. It was about who he became while trying. Having been a victim of analysis-paralysis for a long time, something Cradle taught me was over time the goal is always going to change, your initial goal when you start out doesn’t really matter. It is just going to decide the direction for your very first step. I used to make the mistake of placing a lot of importance on that first step. I still do it now. But as I grow older I realize how little the first step truly mattered. And this isn’t just me, you the reader, if you look at yourself just 5 years ago, where you were, what your goals were, even who you were. You’ll realize how different your expectations for your future self were.
Back onto Lindon’s journey though. His personal mantra was revealed to me by his Lord Revelations. Three small statements. The first – your Underlord revelation talked about how you see yourself.
I follow my Path,” Lindon said, “so I won’t be worthless anymore.
The second – your Overlord revelation, showed how others see you.
Iā¦advance,” Lindon said. He moved forward, onto the next challenge, no matter what stood in his way.
The third, and arguably the only one you had real control over, your Archlord revelation, requires that you meditate on the future. What do you want to move towards?
He could see his entire journey like a line that pushed forward in the future. I practice the sacred arts so that I won’t be worthless anymore. “I am not content with this world,” Lindon said. I advance. “I want more. I want…everything. And now he felt the third advancement in him. He almost said the words: I will never stop. But the Archlord revelation was all about his future, and this one wasn’t to his liking. So he changed it. “We,” Lindon said, “will never stop.
The biggest learning of them all
What stayed with me in the end is that our personal mantras aren’t something a book will give us. It isn’t a quote lying around on Pinterest. It’s the result of true introspection, something that we forget to do while chasing out temporary goals and ever-fleeing motivations. Because at the end of the day your journeys, the one you traveled, the one you are traveling, and the one you want to travel, all have one thing in common – they are yours.
Maybe what we need to figure ourselves out isn’t books. Maybe it was about setting aside the books and stepping out into the world. And the most horrific realization of all – maybe my parents were right š±
Well that was it for my ramblings. Hopefully you took something away from this post. If not, take this – stop asking me to write about books. That’s it. That’s the entire point I was making throughout this post. Alright love you bye.
