Yet another defense of Snape's Occlumency lessons (long)

[nrenka]

No: HPFGUIDX 120104


--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "dungrollin" 
<spotthedungbeetle at h...> wrote:

> Dungrollin:
>
> Because we can't know what Occlumency or Legilimency is like, we
> try to find parallels in the real world – and frankly, there
> aren't any.  Nobody knows what it is like to have one's mind 
> attacked in this way.  What we do know is that in the Potterverse 
> it has parallels with resisting the Imperius curse, and that takes 
> *willpower*, not relaxation, or meditation.  On the very first 
> attempt at resisting Snape's attack, Harry threw it off, because he 
> was stubbornly refusing to let Snape see his memory of Cho under 
> the mistletoe.

Not to toot my own horn, but I posted some thoughts about 
parallelisms and mechanisms (yes, with real life parallels) back in 
some notes at 116339, 116353, 117539, and various and sundry places.

The essence of the argument is that resistance takes relaxation--of 
this particular kind, which is decidedly NOT limpness and rolling 
over, but a state where everything is working together but is not 
tense.  Tense muscles are weaker than relaxed ones (as you learn 
quickly when punching things), and tense minds have more trouble 
doing complex tasks (like the state you need to be in to play a 
complex piano fugue--you aren't thinking about each note; do that, 
and you trip and fall.)  The full-power actualization of willpower 
takes this kind of relaxed state.  It's actually much harder to 
*resist* when you are tight and nervous.  It's also hard to learn how 
to functionally resist when you're getting whacked hard from the get-
go.

I am away from my books, but I always read Harry's resistance to the 
Imperius curse as a kind of successful 'centering' operation.  He 
hears the inner voice of resistance, and reaches a state wherein he 
and that voice are unified in purpose--and he breaks the curse.  Both 
that kind of resistance and Occlumency seem to involve a kind of 
getting together with yourself, getting everything in line so that 
nothing sticks out, being balanced and not distracted by strong 
emotions or things like that.  Stubbornness and a desire for things 
not to be seen helps, but Harry would have had to really get himself 
together to do that consistently--and consistency is what he does not 
evince.

(There's an argument folded in there about teaching methods for 
*roughly analogous* disciplines, but if we're playing the strict 'no 
parallelisms' game, you are free to ignore those.  I don't recommend 
it as a general methodological principle, as it then proceeds to 
destroy most arguments made at any time.)

Now if ya'll will excuse me, I'm going to get back to my case of the 
stomach flu.

-Nora is perfectly willing to admit that these arguments could not 
apply, but they make some elegant sense with things that are pretty 
widly true, especially if you have experienced the strange mind/body 
relationships pursued in some martial arts