AabahranContraints of the Mind
The Savant Collection · by Academician Elesa Anah
Oft is said that discipline and order are the surest roads to self realization. Even a quick glance at the political landscape of today's society will provide a basis for this statement. The Tribunal cabal collects their power through a strict enforcement of law and code. The Warmaster cabal subjects its members to rigid physical exercise and punishment in an effort to perfect their bodies. The Syndicate perform based off the idealized yet predictable business model: do what the person with gold is willing to pay for. With such models available for study, the argument for an ascetic approach to power acquisition is a solid one. However, I believe a stronger argument can be made against such an approach.
To begin, one must look to the birth off a mortal mind. The creation of the fetal body is outside the scope of this article, yet the creation of the fetal mind is a wonderous thing. A portion of the very fabric of magic is pinched off, and imbued in the newborn body, creating the seed from which the soul grows and expands. Initially, this seed has no restrictions placed on it, no constraints with which to fight. It is at this time when the mind grows the fastest, hungering for more knowledge and more power. It isn't until the mind matures that the walls become erected and the mind's growth slows substantially. Society creeps in, telling the mind what it may and may not do, what it can and cannot have, what is right and what is wrong. The mind accepts these rules, and doors begin to close, it becomes structured and rigid. Once this state has been reached, the mind can rarely, if ever, achieve its true potential.
Thus to attain true self realization, and subsequently peak power, the mind must remain free of constraints. What one wants, one gets. What one desires, one pursues. One does not do good or evil, one simply does. The argument presented here, while counter to the power pursuits of other entities, is the most logical discourse available; this should be strongly considered by Aabahran's intellectual elite, if they wish to remain thus. The uninformed may view this lifestyle as a selfish or greedy one, but once all angles are considered, it is the surest road to self realization.
-Lorikar Varhal