[OB] Being Broken isn't a requirement to radiance

[MonsterMetroid]

I haven't see a discussion on this WoB yet,

source: https://wob.coppermind.net/events/175-oathbringer-houston-signing/#e8418

Quote

Questioner [PENDING REVIEW]

How was Shallan able to bond with Pattern before she was broken?

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

She was open to him even before she went through a lot of that turmoil

Questioner [PENDING REVIEW]

I thought everybody had to be broken in order to...

Brandon Sanderson [PENDING REVIEW]

Well, that's their philosophy in-world. But I'm not going to say whether it's correct or wrong... I will imply that there are other means as well.

Typical cagey Brandon.

I think this means that while being broken is the most common way it isn't the only way.

What do you guys think?

Edited December 6, 2017 by Ookla the Metroid
sources are important

[What's a Seawolf?]

Adolin Radiants via reviving Maya confirmed.

[MonsterMetroid]

2 minutes ago, What's a Seawolf? said:

Adolin Radiants via reviving Maya confirmed.

Oh thats an interesting point... man what kind of craziness would that be if Shallan revived Pattern as a child and that's how she became a lightweaver... I dont know how she would have found a shardblade and kept it secret but that would be super interesting.

[kari-no-sugata]

As far as I know, it’s the cracks in the soul that’s a requirement for a Nahel bond and how you get them does not matter too much. Then there’s attracting a spren on top of that.

[Necessary Eagle]

Well, on Scadrial you can theoretically Snap from extreme joy. Perhaps there's something similar with Nahal bonds.

[Knight Oblivion]

It makes sense. Lots of things besides what we'd call "broken" can crack a spiritweb. 

[Wandering Investor]

There seems to be a theme of Radiants remember voicing from when they were young, with both Shallan and Szeth being examples. Perhaps a child's soul is more open? 

Having an open soul is the requirement for the spren to enter, its just that cracks seem to be the most common way.

[Blacksmithki]

1 minute ago, Wandering Investor said:

There seems to be a theme of Radiants remember voicing from when they were young, with both Shallan and Szeth being examples. Perhaps a child's soul is more open? 

Having an open soul is the requirement for the spren to enter, its just that cracks seem to be the most common way.

Hmm, a child's soul being like an incomplete web or something?

[Wandering Investor]

Not incomplete, just open to external... stuff? Like the child might be able to invite the spren in, if that makes sense. I'm not really sure how the cracks in a soul work, so it is just an idea.

[Stark]

22 minutes ago, Blacksmithki said:

Hmm, a child's soul being like an incomplete web or something?

Not incomplete, just still forming.  Much like how children have a greater degree of facility when learning new languages and concepts than adults do, or heal differently, they may be more subsceptible to change or new ideas.  A young mind full of imagination, who has not yet had years of people telling them what is really real, and what is childish fancy to be left behind may be more readily available to adapt their imaginary spren friend into their concept of themselves.

 

And if that just so turns out to be real, then so be it.

 

But an adult, who is certain of their reality and identity, I can see why that may need to be fractured so something else can seep in.  In this case, I see the difference being the same as the difference between shaped clay and pottery.  There is a transition from one to the other.  If you want to add more to the pottery after it has been fired in the kiln, you need to break it to add more, or paint over it.  However, the shaped clay can be molded and remolded right up to the moment it goes to the kiln.  So you can add glues, and dyes and other things before it is locked in one form.

 

The transition to adulthood, life's kiln, where you leave your youth behind.  I think it is after that point that you may need to be broken to allow a spren in.

[MonsterMetroid]

1 hour ago, Stark said:

Not incomplete, just still forming.  Much like how children have a greater degree of facility when learning new languages and concepts than adults do, or heal differently, they may be more subsceptible to change or new ideas.  A young mind full of imagination, who has not yet had years of people telling them what is really real, and what is childish fancy to be left behind may be more readily available to adapt their imaginary spren friend into their concept of themselves.

 

And if that just so turns out to be real, then so be it.

 

But an adult, who is certain of their reality and identity, I can see why that may need to be fractured so something else can seep in.  In this case, I see the difference being the same as the difference between shaped clay and pottery.  There is a transition from one to the other.  If you want to add more to the pottery after it has been fired in the kiln, you need to break it to add more, or paint over it.  However, the shaped clay can be molded and remolded right up to the moment it goes to the kiln.  So you can add glues, and dyes and other things before it is locked in one form.

 

The transition to adulthood, life's kiln, where you leave your youth behind.  I think it is after that point that you may need to be broken to allow a spren in.

I actually really like this theory, children are oh so accepting of everything they see around them if a spren appeared and talked to young shallan I have no doubt she would trust it and open up to it.

[Govir]

2 hours ago, Ookla the Metroid said:

I think this means that while being broken is the most common way it isn't the only way.

I seem to remember reading a WoB that talked about how it's not a *broken* soul that allows the various magic systems, but an *expanded* soul. An easy way to get an expanded soul is to first break it. (And now, I'm thinking this was actually an annotation. Are those in the Arcanum?)

[Hiad]

3 hours ago, Stark said:

Not incomplete, just still forming.  Much like how children have a greater degree of facility when learning new languages and concepts than adults do, or heal differently, they may be more subsceptible to change or new ideas.  A young mind full of imagination, who has not yet had years of people telling them what is really real, and what is childish fancy to be left behind may be more readily available to adapt their imaginary spren friend into their concept of themselves.

 

And if that just so turns out to be real, then so be it.

 

But an adult, who is certain of their reality and identity, I can see why that may need to be fractured so something else can seep in.  In this case, I see the difference being the same as the difference between shaped clay and pottery.  There is a transition from one to the other.  If you want to add more to the pottery after it has been fired in the kiln, you need to break it to add more, or paint over it.  However, the shaped clay can be molded and remolded right up to the moment it goes to the kiln.  So you can add glues, and dyes and other things before it is locked in one form.

 

The transition to adulthood, life's kiln, where you leave your youth behind.  I think it is after that point that you may need to be broken to allow a spren in.

I too agree with this idea that children are more open or as Roger Waters once wrote:

"When I was a child I caught a fleeting glimpse

Out of the corner of my eye

I turned to look but it was gone

I cannot put my finger on it now

The child is grown

The dream is gone"

[Foxx]

I really like the concept of a child naturally being more open to a spren bond than an adult, and thus not requiring "brokenness." It also fits with psychology, as children are far more impressionable than adults and events that happen to them while they are going through developmental phases have a far larger impact on them than those events would after the child was grown. 

4 hours ago, Ookla the Metroid said:

Oh thats an interesting point... man what kind of craziness would that be if Shallan revived Pattern as a child and that's how she became a lightweaver... I dont know how she would have found a shardblade and kept it secret but that would be super interesting.

Wasn't Shallan's shardeblade (Pattern) locked away by her farther? Can a Radiant's sprenblade be locked away like that? Maybe that's an indication that Shallan did, in fact, revive Pattern from a former blade? They were not fully bonded at the time and thus her father was able to lock Pattern away?

[IndigoAjah]

4 hours ago, Blacksmithki said:

Hmm, a child's soul being like an incomplete web or something?

Like Daemons in Phillip Pullman's "His Dark Materials"? Only, you know, with a different theological viewpoint... 

[Starla]

I've always suspected that Shallan attracted Pattern because she had an overactive imagination as a child. I could see cryptics being attracted to imaginative children who are not firmly rooted in reality and try to manifest their imagination through some creative talent, like drawing or sculpting or pretending/acting. There are also theories that Tien was a proto-lightweaver, and he also fits the archetype of the dreamy creative child with his love of patterns in stone and horse carvings.

@Foxx I don't believe Pattern was actually locked in the safe box. He probably disappeared as soon as the box was closed and went back to a dismissed state. Shallan assumed the sword was still in the box because she blocked out the fact that she had summoned him, and never tried to do it again (until WOR). I think the light she saw around the box was her imagination.

 

[IndigoAjah]

39 minutes ago, Foxx said:

I really like the concept of a child naturally being more open to a spren bond than an adult, and thus not requiring "brokenness." It also fits with psychology, as children are far more impressionable than adults and events that happen to them while they are going through developmental phases have a far larger impact on them than those events would after the child was grown. 

Wasn't Shallan's shardeblade (Pattern) locked away by her farther? Can a Radiant's sprenblade be locked away like that? Maybe that's an indication that Shallan did, in fact, revive Pattern from a former blade? They were not fully bonded at the time and thus her father was able to lock Pattern away?

I'm fairly sure that it's acknowledged in WoR that Pattern was only locked away in so far as Shallan believed he was and then he was by trauma (ie Shallan herself locked him away). H=She could have hypothetically summoned him wherever her father put him, physically locking him away was pointless and an act of panic and misunderstanding

[IndigoAjah]

Also, and I've never asked myself this before, how much did Shallan's father know about where the Shardblade came from and what Shallan was? 

[Foxx]

2 minutes ago, Starla said:

 I don't believe Pattern was actually locked in the safe box. He probably disappeared as soon as the box was closed and went back to a dismissed state. Shallan assumed the sword was still in the box because she blocked out the fact that she had summoned him, and never tried to do it again (until WOR). I think the light she saw around the box was her imagination.

 

1 minute ago, IndigoAjah said:

I'm fairly sure that it's acknowledged in WoR that Pattern was only locked away in so far as Shallan believed he was and then he was by trauma (ie Shallan herself locked him away). H=She could have hypothetically summoned him wherever her father put him, physically locking him away was pointless and an act of panic and misunderstanding

Now that y'all mention that, I'm starting to remember that being explained. NVM, then, disregard my theorizing. 

[Smokeform]

Pattern says in WOR that Shallan attracted him because instead of breaking like most people she cracked. Sorry I don’t have the exact quote. This implies that she had some very serious trauma in her early childhood but she mostly held together, probably through lies. 

[ThurgreatMarshall]

7 hours ago, What's a Seawolf? said:

Adolin Radiants via reviving Maya confirmed.

Burning Tanavastium confirmed.

[Subvisual Haze]

It's actually really odd that even after acknowledging the death of her mother, Shallan's earlier childhood is still a blank slate to readers.  Besides her remembering seeing a production of The Girl Who Stood Up and having a talent for drawing her past is just...empty.  

There does seem to be timey-wimey shenanigans going on with spiritual connections breaking the linear causality of time though.  Sylphrena sought out Kaladin because she knew that someday he would need her?  Pattern bonded Shallan because of the way she protected herself with lies...after they had already bonded?  Magic destiny or something.

I think Odium even implied glimpsing into the spiritual realm is necessary to see the future.  This makes sense if the spiritual realm likely connections that haven't actually happened yet in our timeline?

[Wandering Investor]

Another way to explain the radiant children idea is that its easier for them to form Connection, since they tend to be more open to things than adults. Similarly, radiant squires don't have to be broken, they have to connect to a Radiant and then get their own radiance. Broken souls have cracks which can let things in, which is how adults can gain their radiancy without another Radiant present.

[Smokeform]

2 hours ago, Subvisual Haze said:

There does seem to be timey-wimey shenanigans going on with spiritual connections breaking the linear causality of time though.  Sylphrena sought out Kaladin because she knew that someday he would need her?  Pattern bonded Shallan because of the way she protected herself with lies...after they had already bonded?  Magic destiny or something.

I thought Seeing the future was something of Odium so I assumed that Syl was looking because she knew that somebody with a cracked spirit web would be trying to protect people and would need her not specifically Kaladin. Someone will always be trying to protect others so she will always be needed by someone. With Shallan I assumed that she was already holding her sanity together with lies before Pattern came around. I mean, Shallan’s mother was willing to kill her own daughter something was obviously vary wrong. The fact that Shallan still doesn’t remember those years doesn’t bode well. 

[aemetha]

17 minutes ago, Smokeform said:

I thought Seeing the future was something of Odium

Seeing the future is not of Honor, whose doctrine was followed by the Alethi, hence the taboo on it. Odium is better at it than Honor, but Honor also remarks that Cultivation is much better than he is at it. Seeing the future therefore doesn't belong to Odium, he just happens to be quite good at it and Honor quite awful at it.