Meditations Upon Harmony - The Ways

The Five Ways of Harmony

Respect One’s Place Among the Whole

There are smaller and greater Ones in the great sweep of consciousness that forms the Dream. Every “One” is a whole being, complete and unique. Within each One are necessary structures - organs, allies, cities - that contribute to that uniqueness. By understanding one’s place in a greater One, one can perform those tasks to the best of their abilities. A healer should be supported in healing. A leader has a duty to lead. A warrior should be guided towards defense and protection, rather than personal glory. Some Ones are larger than others, with demands that have led to the formation of the many kiths.

Take Only As One Needs

The Dream is finite - not in structure or matter, but in its narrative. When something is taken, the sense of it being taken resonates and impacts so many other stories. Absences are felt in cold and hunger. As such, when something is taken? It should bring warmth and fullness wherever it may go, lest lack become the norm. The Dream is covered in scars - it is the wisdom of the long-lived to tread carefully. But what is need? Fasting, asceticism, and much debate have gone into answering this question. Many seek to provide for their families, while others question the wisdom of expanding populations. Need is an open question, one that lies at the heart between the often-tense relationship between Kin and Kind.

Cultivate the Barren

If all taking comes at a cost, then it becomes the duty of the living to live a life of constant repair. It takes active choices to keep the Dream alive and thriving. Seeds must be planted. Herds must be watched over. Children must be educated, or their ignorance leads to new wounds in the land. The great business of a growing society ought to be the cultivation of the world in the ways that a solitary soul could not. This Way justifies the existence of elven communities, the city of Mithrallir, and the projects they undertake to alter the Old Wilds. The area of the Wilds has grown by at least a third in the last millennia, making more space for their sustainable way of life. This is the argument that could lead to empire, and one that the daev have taken to heart as their purpose in existence. But where does it end?

Recognize the Wise

Elves live for a very long time, as do many of their cousin peoples. Time alone does not cultivate wisdom, but it does create many more opportunities to do so. By heeding lessons already learned, one can save the Dream the cost of that education. There’s value in learning a lesson alone, but there is also always a price. By deferring to those who came before, one can focus one’s energies on going ever further ahead. The kiths and the Elderkind rely on this respect for elders as the basis of their authority. Parents or sometimes the heads of communal child-rearing groups instill this respect at an early age. Critics of this Way are perhaps more common than any other, from humans who feel slighted and denied the status of ‘elder’ in many cases or even from many wood elves who savor the experience of lonely lessons learned.

Leave As Much As You Take

This Way is the unifier of all others. By limiting what one takes, cultivating new growth, and sensing one’s place in the greater whole, one finds a gap in the world. In finding this gap, one seeks to fill it. This is where action, education, and the passing on of knowledge come alive. This is where seeds and seekings come into play, not as mere quests, but as a moral imperative to justify one’s own existence. Life itself takes life to succeed and thrive. Life, then, can be measured in what is given in return for living. Nature is a constant cycle of taking and surrender of light, water, and flesh. This, too, is the fate of Kin and Kind. This final philosophy serves as both motivator and limiter. Trying to leave more than has been taken from the world may not be possible, and the attempt may drain the Dream as quickly as you seek to grow it. This is the common criticism of human ambition, even as whispers of elvish empire rise to counter it. The true limit of what one can give to the world is an open challenge to all leaders, even the lonely Gardener.

Lesser Ways

Beyond the core five Ways of Elvenkind, there are other Ways that have arisen over time as kiths emerged. These are not viewed as sacred so much as practical, though many would argue for or against their inclusion in the divine philosophical canon. These are Ways that are lived more than considered.

The Way of Station

Once upon a time, ambition was the soul of the daev. It was their purpose, their obsession, and their downfall. Generation fed upon generation. Sisters put the whip and the dagger to their sisters, brothers, and kin’s backs. Above or perhaps beneath it all laughed a divine shadow, a demon in its truest form. Station was the salvation of the daev, just as it liberates all of the Kind. It is the daev who introduced the kiths - warriors, wise ones, and workers. It took many centuries to cool the fires of ambition in their blood, just as it took many centuries to demonstrate the values of kith to their wilder cousins. In time, a recognition of one’s place came to be seen as liberation rather than oppression - by taking on a singular role, one can devote one’s entire soul to that work. Kiths can be changed, but they rarely need to be. Station is the temper to ambition, a channel to direct one’s inner drives. Station is salvation itself.

The Way of Consequence

Other Ways establish that life costs life in all of its transactions. It is only natural that people born into a world of many dangers, passions, and rivals would come to study the meaning of this cost. Foremost among the wood elves, this study of consequence - of the price of each action one undertakes - has become the center of martial doctrine. Nowhere beyond war and medicine are the costs of life more clear. By understanding that one day’s victory means not just the defeat of another, but the birth of the next battle ahead, one comes to cultivate patience and care in violence. It will always return to you. While this philosophy makes elvish warriors prone to defense and fortification, there are those who argue that consequence is to be understood, not avoided. Those with the will and humility to bear the price of war can be just as aggressive as any human, and often with an extra sense of righteous justice.

The Way of Art

Everyone sees the Dream from a different vantage, a vantage that can never be expressed in fullness. It is this impossibility that drives conflict, but also pushes us towards each other. We strive to know, to love, and to understand one another. We seek to know the laws and rules of what is often complex or even lawless. It is the very limit of our vantage that makes every discovery a wonder and a joy. This is the Way of Art, developed by the high elves - to strive to do the impossible and complete one’s knowledge of even a single topic or thing. Even the long-lived understand the inherent tragedy in the art, and are driven to share their knowledge to those who are ready to receive it. In return, the younger are expected to invest energy and time into the discoveries that only a master can unravel. Through this exchange, they all grow closer to the truth. Perhaps, once observation, experience, and the place of self are perfectly aligned? The impossible will come to pass.