Planet: Malachor V
Objective: Exploration/None
In Proximity: [member="Judah Lesan Jr."]
Post: 8/38
That was part of what was wrong with the Jedi sometimes: that sense that they always had to act, which ultimately meant that a proactive Jedi was the only appropriate pathway. And how many times has that meant that we act pre-emptively, and make the wrong call? How many times have we jumped into battle against an enemy we need not have fought? How many times have we acted when we should have reacted, or not acted at all? It was a dangerous line of thought, but a common sentiment among many of the younger Jedi - and one that Judah appeared to share.
Perhaps it was the inner darkness they had spoken of that was pushing him that way: the Sith were the same in that respect, always driving forward, never stopping to take a moment and reflect on whether they should act as they were, or if there was an alternative. And such drags them down that darker path, for the Force will always respond to us, even if not in the ways we expect. She'd learned that early on in her training, her own experiences driving her to that inescapable conclusion: the Force reflected what it saw in the beings that constituted it. And so the Jedi train to maintain objective serenity, such that the Force will reflect that in turn.
Malachor was the sort of place that had left a darker imprint because the beings that had resided here had carried that darkness within in their hearts, and their actions here had left an essence upon the planet that simply felt wrong: an amalgamation of anger, rage, hatred, anxiety, fear, jealousy and base impulse, lacking the control and inner calm that were a Jedi's mindset. And so it persists, even when no Sith have set foot here in a long time.
"Have you ever learned our Healing techniques?", she asked, bringing her thoughts back to the present moment with a view to answering Judah's question. "There are many different ways, but our deepest technique requires that we empty our bodies of our sense of self: push away ego, push away desire and thought other than the simple intent we have to aid our patient." That part had taken her an age to learn, because it was a sense of empty selflessness that the mind found to be unnatural, but that was how it worked. "When we empty ourselves of self, we create a conduit for the energy of the Force to flow, and it uses us to channel that healing energy into our patient, to accelerate their natural healing."
Some Jedi believed it was a process that could be achieved in a matter of moments, but that was one of the worst misconceptions that Tey had bumped into during her own training. True Healing could take hours - her longest session had been a fourteen-hour stint to help an Anomid afflicted by the Brainrot Plague, trying to purge the virus before it systematically destroyed their nervous system. And that was one heck of a close call. She'd needed to sleep for nearly a day afterwards as a consequence of it, too.
"As I understand it, the ability to project a purging energy and cleanse the darkness works on much the same principle," the Healer observed softly, watching the Padawan carefully. He'd spoken of his father once again, and that was an interesting psychological marker. There are issues there, Teynara mused inwardly. "We all carry the light within us: it is a reflection of our calmer, compassionate, rational selves. Even the darkest of the Sith can't shed it completely, but they bury it so far as to believe it gone."
Not true of all the Sith, though: she knew that from experience. Some of them carried as much light as they did darkness, but left it untouched for the most part: something they could draw upon if they wished to, but these were beings of strong moral courage that nonetheless gave themselves over to the coldly pragmatic Sith as a means of pushing forward an agenda that did not involve the protective methodology of the Jedi. For them, it is natural that the strong should hold power over the weak. That so many used that for oppressive purposes didn't mean they all did.
"Only the Masters know how to fully use the technique you're talking about, though," the blonde remarked, knowing well enough that it was beyond her own abilities. "That's all I've been able to surmise of it, though. Perhaps one day you'll be strong enough to use it yourself?" Teynara frowned slightly at the thought, her gaze dropping for a moment as she reflected on that. "But remember that the darkness must exist alongside the light. To eliminate it entirely is as much an abomination as to see the light gone. As it is within you, so it must be within the Force."
