[OB] Fourth Windrunner Ideal

[IntentAwesome]

I still think, thanks to the epigraph:

Quote

"My spren claims that recording this will be good for me, so here I go. Everyone says I will swear the Fourth Ideal soon, and in so doing, earn my armor. I simply don't think that I can. Am I not supposed to want to help people?"

 that it is something a little more utilitarian than simply allowing others to protect him or protect themselves. 

My new thought is "I will let go of/leave behind those I cannot save."

Like in the highstorm scene early in the book, Kaladin is forced to leave behind many, since he could only save a small number. But he was angry over the ones he had to leave behind. In the Shadesmar scene, it would have meant leaving Adolin behind.

[Blackredfalcon]

Admitedlly, I haven't read all 6 pages of this thread - there are some kewl ideas here, though., so I apologize if someone else has thought of this as well.

I'll throw my two cents in - I'm pretty sure that it will ahve something to do with everything that Brandon showed us about the Ideals that were spoken in Oathbreaker - primarily:

Dalinar forgiving himself and Teft learning to live with himself, seems to be the central theme here (forgiveness) - and Kalidin has extraordinary problems doing that, sure, but there was more to it than that, I believe -esp. when he knew that he could/would receive a 'burst of power' by saying it. It didn't seem like enough of a painful barrier.

I think it may be somewhere along the lines of :

"I will let my failures and the ones that I have failed give me strength."

Seems to be something that Dalinar managed when he took his own pain from Odium, and Kaldin just cannot do that yet.

[Wreith]

All the theories along the lines of forgiving his own failure or saving who you can don't fit with the (alleged/likely) Windrunner's questioning of the fourth oath in the epigraph. "Am I not supposed to want to help people" implies being presented with a case where the choice that needs to be made is to voluntarily refrain from helping anyone.

I suspect the fourth oath is something along the lines of "I will not let the situation in front of me distract from my sworn mission"

When he starts to leave the parshmen, rather than reporting, he goes back to help get people to safety. no real consequences here.
He almost goes to help the men on the wall when he first arrives in Kholinar. Adolin's intervention is likely all that stopped him.
And if he had focused on the mission instead of allowing himself to be conflicted, he could have saved Elhokar.
In Shademar, getting to Dalinar would likely have meant leaving Adolin behind.

Seems to me that there was a lot of that kind of 'when do I help' theme in Oathbringer
like Shallan's similar issue where 'helping' people caused them more harm than good.

 

[Hsien99]

All orders have a primary and secondary attribute with the Wind Runners it’s protecting and leading. It’s not just about saying it but living by it accepting it into your essence. I will kill those I love for the greater good, I will set down my burden lead men to die into battle and be a beacon of hope to those that have none. I will sacrifice those I love for the greater good, I will honor the dead protect the living and kill those I hate if they deserve it. Protect those that I can kill those who deserve it and give me wisdom to know which ones.

 

[eimeard]

"I will protect the living, and forget the dead." 

Kaladin's guilt over those he failed to protect is what broke him enough to become Radiant. It's what drives him. And he loves so many of the people he's lost. To reach the Fourth Ideal, he has to let go of them completely, to better protect those who are left. 

[VivaFariy]

A lot of people have said something close to what I was thinking. 

• "I cannot save everyone, but I will save those I can".
• "I will not let those I can't save prevent me from saving those I can" was what I was thinking
• "I will let learn to let go of those whom I cannot or could not save."

Those are all around what I was thinking. Something about growing callouses, like his father always told him to, but Kaladin was never able to. He knows, and has known for a long time, that he needs to learn to move past those he can't save and not let that hold him back, but has always had an incredibly difficult time doing so. It's the one thing he's still unable to accept and swear.

[IronBars]

Late to this topic as well.

Windrunner 4th ideal in my opinion is going to be choosing what honour is, in OB kaladin questions whose defintion of honour decides if he is fullfilling his vows or not, and comments on how abstract it is, and how easily brought into the question what the honourable route is, 

So i think the 4th ideal will be a defining of it and thats why kaladin couldnt speak the ideal because he wants to protect everyone and cant distinguish between the different shades of honour so to speak, 

When the royal guard and the parshnen he had been friendly with clashed in kholinar kaladin was rendered useless by this conundrum or moral quadary which led to Elhokars death.

so makes senss to me if the the ideal is a defintion of the path to take in those situations, as to the wording of said ideal im not really sure how that would go maybe something like:

"i will protect those most in need regardless of my personal feelings" 

pretty similiar to the 3rd idea though, so maybe something more along the lines of:

"I will sacrifice those i love for the greater good"

Bit morbid but....

Edited February 18, 2018 by IronBars

[Stark]

I always figured it would be something more difficult, based on the sapphire recording we saw, and the difficulty Shallan has been having reconciling her fourth ideal.  Something like:

"I will trust those I wish to protect to make their own choices and stand on their own, even if it means I lose them."

 

It has to be something about letting go of the protective urge.  If he spends all of his time protecting people and keeping them under his wing, they will never have a chance to grow and reach their potential.  Protecting them so they can learn to protect themselves is one thing, and necessary.  But once they have learned to protect themselves, trusting them to be able to do it is that much harder.  You must stop protecting them and allow them to be responsible for themselves, else you are smothering their potential, which is far worse.  But someone, like Kaladin, who defines himself by protecting everyone, would have a terrible time with this concept.  

Let them stand on their own and protect themselves.  Some will stumble, and those you can save.  Some will fall, and those you grieve.  But the others will stand and be Radiant.  But they can't stand if you are constantly swooping in to protect.

 

I will protect those who cannot protect themselves.

I will protect even those I hate, so long as it is right.

I will trust those who can protect themselves to make their own choices.

[(^_^)]

First of all, knowing words is barely the begining, one also has to both mean them, and understand them. People can force themselves to say something and mean it, but that does them no good if they do not truly understand them.

Secondly, there are two major bits of data about 4th ideal in OB - that words themselves (not necessarily ther meaning) say something about not protecting, and that Dalinar, alive at that time, played somehow into that ideal, possibly as ones he failed. Both of those make it unlikely to deal with guilt , or those one could not save (at least, not directly). So it could be some version of "I will protect only those I can" or "I will accept I can't save everyone", as that could be interpreted as "it's ok to fail" or "it's ok to give up". Kaladin could not say and mean this, because he knew he had to get to Dalinar, but could not. Swearing that Ideal right there would be equivalent to saying "ok, fine, I can't save him so let's do something else".

On the other hand, it's possible that what Kaladin will swear will be something entirely different than what he could not say here. Words have to be accepted by spren, and that is subjective of each spren, so as long as it is something worthy and he really means it, it *could* be entirely different ideal.

 

 

To explore other possibilities, I would say that something about "letting go of burdens" is most 'likely unlikely' candidate, because it would also require understanding more about their Order, their power.

Unrelated-or-maybe-not, Shallan, Lightweaver, has access to surges of Light and Transformation, but for her, Transformation appears to be less about Soulcasting and more about changing people, showing them what they can be (trough her drawings), expanding her power beyond 'just' Surges, just as Dalinar is all about bonds, uniting people, uniting realms, sharing knowledge, not just sticking soldiers to the floor.

In similar vein, Windrunners are not only about flying around with surge of Gravity, but also Adhesion, essentially binding things, bonds. So one of ideals might exploit this, either by "let others share my burden", or something crazy like "I will not protect everyone" (and trust others to protect them (and on top of that, possibly, accept failures)). Kaladin does not seem to use Adhesion except rare cases, so it's likely that for Order, that surge is more about bond than actual aplication.

At least until possiblity of 5th Ideal being "Don't kill to protect", as someone mentioned it in here. Because with Adhesion, it might be possible to immobilize enemy, removing him from fight without killing.  This would require significant Stormlight efficiency to make it possible to immobilize all enemies he would otherwise have to kill for long enough, and some way to overcome limitation of using it on Invested enemies, but at least in theory Ahdesion makes it possible for Windrunners to not kill.

[Jenet]

I have been pondering this question now for many months. I now think it will be someting like:

"I will forgive myself for not being able to protect everyone."

We have seen that forgiveness is a very important factor in this book, and if we look at all the episodes that Kaladin is remembering over and over again, pestering his mind and feeding his depression, every one of them is about him failing to save other people. At the same time, this ideal is so difficult for him to swear that he has to see Adolin and Dalinar almost die and the whole war lost (as far as he could judge then) if he did not swear it, and he still could not do it.

If you are the kind of person that Kaladin is, haunted by depression, quick to take the blame and always over-thinking everything honorable, you find it very hard to forgive yourself for your failures. You haven't got it in you. We can see that in the haunted look in his face, the" brightlord brooding-eyes", and the way he always punishes himself.

Forgiveness is a very powerful thing. It has the power to set you free in a way you can never imagine before you manage to do it. But it is extremely hard to turn your mind arount to do it, if you are in the middle of a deep depression.

[scifan]

I expect that Kaladin's 4th ideal will relate to this quote from Lirin -  "You have to learn when to care, son. ... And when to let go. You'll see. I had similar problems when I was younger. You'll grow calluses."  

Which echo's a number of other people's comments above.

[cubelith]

Many of these ideas seem to be pretty similar to the reversed First Ideal (which I described here). I think some likely answers are those revolving around command (or protecting important people, like Dalinar), or about finding a third way/being smart instead af blindly fighting to protect

[Vissy]

Inb4 it's just going to be a repeat of 2nd and 3rd Oaths, except for Leading. "I will give purpose to those who cannot find it for themselves." "I will lead even those I hate, as long as it is right." Admittedly the latter doesn't really make sense, but the first one kind of does!

Edited April 27, 2018 by Vissy

[galendo]

On 4/26/2018 at 11:34 PM, Vissy said:

"I will lead even those I hate, as long as it is right."

Are you leading them off a cliff?

More seriously, though: I expect the next Oaths will be different than you've proposed.  I don't think that Kaladin would have struggled with the Fourth Ideal if it were just about helping other people.

[Vissy]

4 hours ago, galendo said:

Are you leading them off a cliff?

More seriously, though: I expect the next Oaths will be different than you've proposed.  I don't think that Kaladin would have struggled with the Fourth Ideal if it were just about helping other people.

Hmm... maybe... now what gave you that idea, this road definitely doesn't end in a cliff 

Yeah. I expect they'll be the kind of Oaths that let him include more people into his "us" group, or erode the "us - them" divide in him completely. 

Edited April 30, 2018 by Vissy

[Solant]

Quote

My spren claims that recording this will be good for me, so here I go. Everyone says I will swear the Fourth Ideal soon, and in so doing, earn my armor. I simply don’t think that I can. Am I not supposed to want to help people?

I feel like this either implies the fourth ideal deals with not wanting to help someone, or wanting to not help someone (the difference is subtle, I know, but it is different.)

I personally like the idea that it was foreshadowed in the Kaladin flashbacks in the first book with his father, multiple times, as stated by other posters above.

Quote

Roshone,” Lirin said, leaning down. “A surgeon must know when someone is beyond their ability to help. I’m sorry, Roshone. I would save him if I could, I promise you. But I cannot.”

I suspect it will be along the lines of, "I vow to let go of those I cannot save, to protect those I can." Then he will light up like a Christmas tree and kick the crem out of everyone.

[Stark]

It has to be something about knowing when to let go, either to preserve himself, or to allow others to stand on their own without him as a safety net.

[scifan]

The challenge with where Kaladin is at now is that he has to be able to make a choice when he's faced with two groups he knows and doesn't differentiate a true "enemy"... he currently doesn't have any true allegiance to any one group...

I'm uncertain if he'd have been able to fight if he were "protecting" his mother and father... 

[nightbobicus]

sorry in advance for the fault i am not english storming language

I will protect those who cannot protect themselves.

I will protect even those I hate, so long as it is right.

i will protect myself before other

the windrunner is an order that protect people before themself kaladin prove it so much time when on the chasm taking all the arrow for save the bridgemen , almost death protecting king elhokahr he go into the army for protecting tien he stay when the slave got taken and don't run ,he give the shardblade to he's friend. he always trying to save people just so much time putting his life first above other .

this oath is diametrically opposed to khaladin .he's not the almighty ,he can't protect other if he don't protect himself

they are 5 ideal but the 4 give the armor why not the 5 probably because the 4 oath protect the wearer of the oath

 

or maybe it's i will forget the dead for the living

 

 

 

 

Edited May 8, 2018 by nightbobicus

[Goldeneyes_Kholin]

I will not protect those I cannot save.

[Bigmikey357]

It's probably why Shallan doesn't have plate yet. She's at her 4th truth. She's said the Words but she hasn't quite taken them to heart. An Oath/Truth not fully internalized won't grant you full powers. 

 

[KalaDANG]

Maybe it's more along the lines of, "I will focus on protecting those who can be saved, and accept and live with the sacrifices of those who fall."

Or a variation like this

"I will not let the deaths of those who cannot be saved keep me from saving those who can."

Or maybe it would exclude restating anything about protecting those who can't protect themselves and would instead be like this.

"I will live with and accept the sacrifices and deaths of those I fail to save."

I would have to agree that it feels like it would be partly about accepting the deaths of all the people that he has failed. When he's trying to swear the ideal, and he thinks of all the people he's failed, they're all people who he has failed to protect, and he can't let it go. Part of me feels like when he says, "'I can't lose him, but...oh, Alimighty...I can't save him.'" that he isn't talking about Dalinar like I originally thought, but I think he might be talking about Tien. Most of Kaladin's inner torment and depression stems from the fact that Kaladin couldn't save Tien. So I'm thinking that part of this ideal that he's having problems with is letting go of those who have died because of his failures. His only connection to Tien is his drive to make sure that there aren't any more who die like he did. It's demonstrated clearly in WoK when he spends so much time and money sheltering the young inexperienced conscripted teens in his squad. But if he accepts that he can't save everyone, and that he should focus on saving those who can be saved, he'd lose that connection. I'm not saying that he'd get all hardened and callused like Liren wants him to be, but he would have to learn to deal with the pain of losing those he can't save. Kaladin has spent the entire series thus far dwelling more on those he has failed to save than rejoicing in those he could. He never feels like it's enough. He needs to learn to not let past failures keep him from future success.

[goody153]

On 11/15/2017 at 7:13 PM, Mr Horrible said:

My guess would be: "I cannot save everyone, but I will save those I can".

I think this is the one. Also reminds me of the lesson from Mistborn 

Spoiler

Vin reminding Kelsier they're not invincible

which kinda points out that you can't do everything yourself. Ironically Kaladin says this to Elhokar "focus on the living" when he was hesitant to leave Aesudan while holding his child.

 

On 11/16/2017 at 5:08 PM, Ramza1890 said:

"I can lash if I want to, I can leave your friends behind. Because your friends don't lash and if they don't lash then their no friends of mine."

- Windrunners 4th Ideal

Nevermind this is the real cannon 4th ideal lol

Edited June 12, 2018 by goody153

[Vissy]

Kaladin the budget maker.

"I cannot save all of the money, but I will save every last bit of it that I can."

[vikorr]

I think the fourth ideal will be along the lines of “I will honour the living and the dead”. I base this on a number of parts:

1.       The 4^th ideal is a progression of ‘the type of person the spren want their KR to be’, protecting people without honouring their lives, and deaths, will be shown to be a hollow thing.

2.       Both our Windrunners, Teft and Kaladin, seem to have an issue with honouring the dead.

3.       Kaladin has previously had problems honouring the living

4.       Kaladin just prior to attracting windspren to save captured humans from a highstorm, had been talking with syl about right & wrong, honour, and perception…then getting parshmen to protect humans, and getting people to help each other out of danger.

5.       Kaladin, in attracting the windspren aboard Honors Path, was finally thinking about what it means to honour the living.

6.       Kaladin attracts windspren near Thaylenah in Shadesmar. This time, he know the words, but cannot say them, thinking of all the dead. So we know that the 4^th ideal must relate to his perspective of the dead.

7.       Kaladin, then thinks of Dalinar, and the oath he must say, thinking ‘could he really mean them?” In this section we’ll see how the 4^th ideal also relates to the living

 

1. BS said that the ideals were about the type of person the spren wanted them to be. The 2^nd & 3^rd oaths were about protecting…but:

-          You cannot protect everyone

-          You cannot force your protection on such a person who does not want your protection .

-          You must honour others right to make their own choices

-          You must honour even their choice to put themselves in danger (eg the Squires, who themselves swear to protect)

-          If they die, you must honour their choices, their sacrifices, and their lives

The fourth ideal must progress the type of person honourspren wish their KR to be, and swearing to protect seems hollow without honouring the lives (values, decisions, journeys, camaraderies) and deaths (willing sacrifices, and other deaths) of those you swear to protect. It is almost akin to saying 'your life and death is about me, not you'. Should they die, then you must honour their lives and deaths. It's why we have funeral services.

 

2. Both our Windrunners (Teft and Kaladin) seems to have an issue with honouring their dead. For both Teft and Kaladin, if you think about it, it has always been about their failures, their pain. We see that Kaladin, despite his very good intentions, has never:

- paid honour to his friends or brother’s deaths

- paid honour to their journey (that lead to their deaths), nor the improvement in their lives, nor the camaraderie, nor the meaning when they died doing their best / what they thought was right etc

- celebrated the good things in their lives.

Teft too, hasn’t done such for his family.

 

3. Kal has a problem with honouring the living, but he is getting better at it. A year back, in his conversation with Tarah, she says “"Oh, Kal," she whispered, then squeezed his arm. "Maybe someday you'll learn how to be there for the living, not just for the dead.". For him getting better at honouring the living, see the next sections.

4.       In the scene were Kaladin saves people from a highstorm by parting the winds with windspren.

Kaladin attracts windspren prior to this scene, and he had been talking with syl about right and wrong, honour, and perception.

He then has a conversation with a parshman about honour / them protecting humans, “Do Better,” he said to her”These people are your charge now. You’ve seized the city, taken what you want. If you wish to claim any kind of moral superiority, treat your captives better than they did you.”

He was talking to people about helping each other reach shelter, then letting them move on as he went to save others.

He eventually attracted a hundred windspren, though from the description, this may actually be a windrunner ability, as at the end of it we get this sequence “Kaladin sighed and released the winds, and the spren behind him scattered”. In later scenes, as he nears the 4^th Ideal, he doesn’t exercise any control over the windspren.

 

5.       In this section, we’ll see how, as Kaladin almost reaches the 4^th ideal, he is thinking about honouring the living, and helping them. He is also thinking that the 2^nd ideal must have limitations on it.

Kaladin argues with Notom about honouring the living.

-          He talks about what honour there is in keeping Syl locked up

-          He talks about what honour there is in Notom killing him

-          He talks about helping Dalinar (rather than protecting, in this particular passage)

Kaladin goes on to think of the 2^nd Ideal “The Second Ideal made more direct sense. I will protect those who cannot protect themselves. Straightforward, yes…but overwhelming. The world was a place of suffering. Was he really supposed to try to prevent it all?”

Kaladin then thinks of the 3^rd ideal, but with no resolution “Who decided what was “right”? Which side was he supposed to protect?

“The Fourth Ideal was unknown to him, but the closer he drew to it, the more frightened he became. What would it demand of him?”

Windspren then start crystallising around him.

“Syl. What is the Fourth Ideal?”

You know you have to figure that out on your own, silly…you’re close.

Here, Syl alludes that the 4^th ideal is closely related to what he has been thinking about, as he’s just about reached it. His directly previous conversation had 2 references to honouring the living, another to helping the living, and almost admitting even if indirectly, that he wasn’t personally meant to “protect them all”.

Kaladin and Notom move on to talking about the Bondsmith, and Kaladins need to protect the Bondsmith. He does this with great consideration for Notom.

 

6.       In this section – we see that Kaladin now knows the 4^th ideal, but can’t bring himself to say it.

He had a single slim hope. Each Ideal he’d spoken had resulted in an outpouring of power and strength. He licked his lips and tried whispering it “I…I will…”

He thought of the friends he’d lost (lists names)

Say it, storm you!

“I…”

(more names of the dead)

A windspren appeared near him, like a line of light. Then another.

The words, say the words !

But Kaladin is not yet ready to let go of 'his responsibility for those deaths'. His saying the 4th ideal must involve in some way, him changing his perception regarding his responsibility to the dead / his view of the lives of the dead (which is currently only 'I failed them').

7.       This section is a continuation of 6, but focused on the living:

Kaladin thought, finally, of Dalinar. Could Kaladin do it? Could he really say these words? Could he really mean them?

“I …can’t” Kaladin finally whispered, tears streaming down his cheeks. “I can’t lose him, but …oh, Almight…I can’t save him.”

He couldn’t say those Words.

He wasn’t strong enough.

Here, if Kaladin means what he says when he swears to honour the living and the dead:

- he must let Dalinar fight the battles that Dalinar chooses to fight – which is honouring the living. The realisation that he must let other people choose to put themselves in harms way is why Kaladin says “I can’t save him” (he still believed that saying the ideal would grant him access to power that may help him get home, then the thoughts that followed “He had a single slim hope.”)

- he must let Dalinar do this, despite the danger. Kaladin’s fear of losing people (in his view ‘letting them die’) leads him to say “I can’t lose him”, for if he lost Dalinar, it would mean honouring the dead, and he’s not ready to do that / absolve himself of such a death.

So Kaladin, though he is getting there, isn’t quite ready to give up on trying to protect everyone, or to absolve himself of all those deaths that he couldn’t prevent. Hence the lines ‘He couldn’t say those words. He wasn’t strong enough”

As the KR who left the gemstone said “Am I not meant to want to help people?”

------------------------

Sanderson has given us a lot of clues, from how progression works, to Kaladins character (in detail), especially Kaladins fears (which relate directly to why he can’t say the 4^th ideal), to what Kaladin is thinking each time he attracted windspren, to what Kaladin was thinking as approached the fourth ideal, to what Kaladin was thinking when he knew the 4th ideal but couldn't say it.

I think there's enough consistency among the clues to say that the 4^th ideal will be something close to “I will honour the living and the dead”

Edited June 15, 2018 by vikorr