Mastering the Elements: A Christian View on Bending Styles in Avatar

in the world of Avatar to last air bender bending is more than just martial arts Styles but an extension of who the vendor is in this miniseries I'll be breaking out each element from Avatar going over what makes it special some prominent Benders of each element and how the characteristics of these Benders can be appli to our [Music] lives the first I'm going to talk about some characteristics of water the first of which is adaptability so you see water is an element which is able to e and flow and constantly change with his environment being able to take on the form of whatever it's in and honestly I think that's an incredible skill to have no matter who you are because let's be honest life is unpredictable you mean you could be working at your dream job one day and lose it the next and especially if you're in in the it field right Tech is constantly changing and it's really hard to be able to keep up the next prominent characteristic is versatility or resource resourcefulness whatever you want to call it basically water is able to to change how it is and be able to react to whatever situation and when it comes to water benders a skilled one can keep up with an keep up an overwhelming offense and a solid defense all at the same time and it's this versatility that makes them a very deadly force to be reckoned with now water is also known as a symbol of emotion or basically just being empathetic and and for those of you who don't know what that means basically you're able to connect to people and have what they call emotional intelligence it basically just means you know how people feel and you can connect to them and that's a huge characteristic that a lot of water benders tend to show and another kind of key point about this whole idea of water is that it's not it's never stagnant and you shouldn't be you shouldn't become fixed in your emotions or your morals and now the last really big characteristic of water is the aspect is is the duality which it can be go from being calm and soothing which is represented by the healing factor of water bending or just a raging Storm which is like the dark potential and the moral flexibility basically doing things that you probably shouldn't be doing and it's a lot like you know blood bending you know the Dark Art of water bending now the best characters that represent these aspects of water bending is none none other than qara and Saka of the Southern water tribe now as for guara she tends to go with the flow and is really able to simp EMP with others even her enemies and honestly that leaves her open to all types of manipulation but the other side of guara is that she's iron willed in her morals and her beliefs she if she thinks something's right or and better yet if something's wrong and that it needs to be right it she's going to stand her ground no matter what anybody else tries to talk her out of it and she does not give up on whatever she believes in now throughout the show qara has been shown to be a very quick thinker uh for instance when her and Toff were imprisoned and again during her figh against aula during the final Agony Kai and both of these instances show how qara was able to adapt to the situation she was in while also showcasing the versatility of the water that she bends now when it comes to her personality even more so Katara wore many hats I mean she was the teammate the team healer a sister the group mom etc etc and and honestly having to juggle these many types of hats or guess masks you put on takes takes the ability to kind of go with the flow and be and be able to change on the fly now let's talk about her brother Saka now despite not being a bender himself Saka still shows us some of the strengths of of water the first and probably the most prominent for him is resourcefulness aaka is always coming up with plans on the Fly and he's able to use any tool any tool for his favor and honestly that leads to his adaptability to any situation that he find himself in and the point that ties both of these traits together is the fact that Saka is a huge problem solver I mean think about it he was the brains of Team Avatar and he was their natural leader whether you know they knew it or not they looked to Saka for a lot of these things and that's because he's able to continue on no matter what setbacks are ahead of them so let me know if you're enjoying this video so far be sure to to drop a like and comment below what's your favorite element now for me what I learned from water bending is that life doesn't always go as planned but I can do my best to taking this stde and adjust as needed so back when I was you know younger as a as a small child we tended tended to move a lot and know my dad wasn't in the military but better opportunities came up and you know he took them right who wouldn't but that kind of forced me to get used to adapting to different situations and different surr surroundings now I still do get kind of nervous and awkward at first anytime I meet someone new or do try something new but I've learn to lower the time it takes to start to feel comfortable again I'm no longer just the scared little child anymore right I mean after all water doesn't let anything stop it now as for versatility what I've learned is that there can be some overlap in your skills and experiences if you know where to look uh for example uh when I wrestled in high school some of those Tech techniques transferred over to when I played football and and as for technology I learned so much about computers that it actually transferred over to my non-te business right just the whole idea of problem solving and being able to troot issues that come up and when it comes to emotions I may honestly be the most emotional guy that you've ever met and I I know it's not cool you know this guy just a big teddy bear or whatnot but it's the truth and honestly trusting the wrong people in my youth left me left me hurt I mean honestly I used to cry after every wrestling match that I lost in high school because I was just I was trash at it honestly like I was terrible but I learned to deal with my emotions in a healthy way now and not let them overflow or just to bottle them up now as for you here are some steps you can take to be more like a wer b or at least how to think like one first is get uncomfortable I mean you can't adapt if nothing changes right so we have to get used to being uncomfortable I know it sucks but trust me it's going to work uh next so you got to go with the flow and honestly just see what happens cuz you never know next is learning to improve your skills pick something to improve and just see how it helps in other areas I imagine yourself stranded on an island how would you use your skills and surroundings to to your own advantage and trust me I think you'd be surprised to see how often these things kind of cross over and lastly is to never limit yourself strive to do something you've never thought you'd be able to do and and for me it was honestly starting this YouTube channel and even learning a foreign language and honestly it's it's it's a journey because I'm still struggling with both but I'm glad I started because now I feel like I'm more well-rounded as a person and hopefully it's going to it's going to show through on these videos and it can inspire you guys to to try different things yourself so the first characteristic I want to go over is actually endurance and for for earthbenders it's important for them to be able to endure the enemy's attack and wait for the right opportunity to strike and kind of you think about the element as a whole you know Earth or stone or Rock whatever you want to go with they tend to last a really really long time I mean over years and years and years and that is the the the main point of Earth in Earth Benders and accompani with that is the aspect of patience because think about it if you're standing there or sitting there or whatever taking abuse over and over and over again and you're waiting for the right moment patient is a really key virtue and in that it's not just about sitting back and letting life happen but it's also more about taking advantage of the opportunities when they arise without any hesitation now there's no better earthbender to best showcase this mentality than the blind banded herself Toof Bayon and when it comes to this whole idea Toff is honestly one of my favorite characters cuz I just love her attitude about everything but when you start breaking down the layers behind her you really start to see how she best represents the the element of Earth and about endurance so Toff is as we all know she's BL blind right she's been blind since birth and that's something that she has to endure her whole life it's not really something that she can change or realistically do anything about I mean this isn't Naruto where we can just pop out people's eyes and switch them so in her blindness actually comes with another type of thing she had to endure which was her weak appearance cuz again Toff is a 12-year-old little girl and if you see her on the street you might not think twice about oh she's not gonna do anything to me she's not that dangerous and when it comes to her parents that was actually taken to a whole another level they thought she was just this precious porcelain doll that that at any moment could be broken and that's not really something that she agreed with at all honestly and she she went along with the idea that she was just this little princess uh just to make her parents happy but in reality she was just this tough as Nails little girl who can honestly just beat beat your brains in without without without any hesitation and through through watching to as that's the main example I've come to realize that it's not just about enduring hardships per se but also enduring what other people may say or think about you when you know that's not that's not the truth and so when it comes to the idea of patience and waiting and then striking again tough has everyone else beat because she she actually vented the idea of the whole seismic sex thing so so Toof uses the ability earthbending to see everything and it's through that particular ability she's able to really Master the art of sitting and waiting she waits for her opponents to make a mistake or to make their move first and then she counters viciously and this is an aspect that she actually used to to teach a when he was trying to learn Earth bending and it was a concept that he actually struggled with he didn't he couldn't grasp the whole idea of charging in head first and and waiting for your opponent to strike before striking back A's idea as an as an airbender was to evade and just duck and Dodge and get out of the way but when it comes to Earth and and the enduring factor is you have to sit in The Fray and you can't you just can't run away from it it's sad I know and me personally the patience is something that I had to learn andow with throughout the years because at first I used to be just I want it now I want it now I want it now and just really going getting after it but as I've gotten older and as I've experienced what I what I have in my short life here it's that what they say is true patience is a virtue and often time it it can be overlooked now let's see how we can apply these ideas of endurance and patience to our own lives and I'm going to start off with the idea of endurance so like I said before it's it's not just about the hardships in life but also what people may say or think about you now honestly all of that is stuff that we have to endure on a day-to-day basis some more than others but we're all we all have to endure it just the same and I'm talking about you know maybe it's it's sickness death loss of a job loss of a relationship or maybe people think that that you're a pushover that you're easy to to to lie to or or to give over on all these different things or maybe that you're dumb and it's it's it's hard it's hard going through that day in and day out really trying to figure out why God why me why am I the one who has to go through this why am I the one who who is who is your strongest Soldier and honestly at times it feels like it can be unfair or that you won't make it through at the end of the day and honestly I used to feel like that too so James 1:12 it says blessed is the one who endures trials because when he has stood stood the test he will receive the crown of life that God has promised to to those who love him so basically what that verse what that verse means to me is really just to find purpose in the pain the pain that we all have to go through because we're all here on Earth we're all living our Our Lives dealing with our own problems and it can be easy to get lost in that and to not realize what what we're fighting for and why we're doing it that's why it's important to endure these these trials and to really look forward to what's on the other side because you're going to get stronger so just like when you're going to the gym for the for the very first time all you New Year's resolutioners trying to lift weights and get strong and it feels hard at first that's cuz it is and you're going to wake up sore and hating life right after it and it's important to to not stay there though you can't give up on it just because something is hurting or it starting to get hard a little bit we have to be able to push through these fears push through these anxieties and get to the other side because you're going to get stronger and you're going to get [Music] better so the main characteristic of the element of fire is passion and when I think of passion I'd like to think you know powerful determined all these different things and that's true you think about somebody's passions I you can often think about you know their Hobbies you know whether it's Sports video games uh acting uh making YouTube videos wink wink hit hint or anything like that and people we do these things because we're passionate about it they bring some type of joy to us but if you're not too careful those passions can often become dangerous and borderline obsessive and kind of like fire these are the type of things we have to learn how to control and and direct so the best the character I think best describes or best fits this description of fire and his his passions and dangers is none other than Prince Zuko himself because for the vast majority of the series he was very very obsessive with the idea of capturing a who he believed would be the key to getting back his honor and for the vast majority of the series Zuko was this angry bullheaded person who was relentless at pursuing his goals now I can understand being you know determined and really getting after what you're passionate about so think about it how low are you willing to go for your passions for your desires in Zuko's case he was willing to betray Uncle iro someone who's been with him the entire time he was banished for for years now just for the shot at reclaiming his honor that he never really lost if you think about it cuz in Zuko's case honor is something that can't be lost or taken away or even given back to you because of something that you have to do for yourself and at this at this moment in time he didn't understand that he was just so determined to reclaim his honor no matter what and again if you see an avatar if you know Zuko you've seen all the memes about his honor and though funny it still holds truth to it so just think about it think about your own passions think about your own desires think about the times that you were willing to do things that you really shouldn't be doing or you never thought you would in the first place but you decided that this was worth it and then ask yourself after you did that thing was it really worth it because often times once that passion dies out or once you realize it's not what it all what all it was meant to be or what all that you thought it was it was going to be then then what then we're just sitting there wondering where does it all go wrong now all of these things changed ruko when he actually changed sides and he decided to join a and team Avatar and when he did that he all of a sudden lost his passion he lost his goal because he went from trying to capture the Avatar to actually helping and training him and because of this Sudden Change he actually lost his ability to fire band and often times I feel like that can happen to us when we when we find out that our passions the things that we're working so hard for don't pan out we're often just uh we're left sitting there wondering okay what do I do now where do I go is there even a point to continuing on this journey and we find ourselves like Zuko we lost the fire in his case literally and in order to reclaim it he had to find the the true source of fire and and of course if you watch the show you know that's from from the dragons but in our case it's more so about finding you know not a new source but the source because again the Lord Lord gives us these desires he gives us these passions and he puts these dreams in us and sometimes we go off off hard left and we when it doesn't work out we wondering again why God why didn't this work because he says hey this isn't for you add something else for you instead when you do the things that I've called you to do then everything else is going to work out and when we come to this new source or in our case the source it's important to have the the determination and The Willpower to see things through because that's the whole idea behind passion in the first place and nail them into the fire is to stop at nothing to accomplish your goals so now let's take a step back and look at how these characteristics of fire can be applied to our own lives and of course I'm start off with the idea of passion again now it's important to have some sort of passion in your life you know whether it's just some type of hobby Again Sports video games trading cards collecting cars whatever it is to you because without it honestly life is just boring cuz I don't know about you but I don't want to go to work every day and then just go to sleep just to go back to work again I don't I don't want to do that I don't enjoy that type of life and hopefully you don't either but again the whole IDE about passion and fire and all this stuff is to pursue it with with intensity but under control because if you if you're too too far gone even if it's something good it it'll eventually turn into something bad because uh one thing my dad used to always tell me is that like he he wants me to to get my nose out of the dirt so I can look up and see what's around me cuz I had a bad habit and honestly it's still it's still kind of there but as I've matured I've gotten better with it but once I find something that I'm really interested in whether it's some type of Technology whether it's an anime or video game or even working out I'm going all the way in 100% And I'm just forgetting about everything else and that's not good either so it's it's a fine balance that we have to find but I I know you can do it because if I'm able to do it then anyone can cuz this is what this verse in the Bible say says about passions and what you're doing in Colossians 3: 23 whatever you do do it from the heart as something done for the Lord and not for people so basically what that verse is meaning to me is you know whatever it is do it 100% but do it for the Lord right because that's that's why we're all here that's the reason why we're on this Earth is to do the things that he has commanded us for and ultimately do the thing that he put us on the earth for cuz I'm truly believe each and every one of us has a purpose here and whether you found it or you think you found it or you're not really sure whatever it is that you do do it 100% and the last thing I want you to remember is to believe in yourself and do whatever you think that you want to do and just don't let it consume you because otherwise you're going to miss you're going to miss all the other things that life has to offer the first characteristic of air bending or the element of air is is freedom and basically means that you're not really Bound by these worldly desires and so just think about the the air acolytes or even the air Nomads from A's time they were pretty pretty spiritual and they weren't really Bound by the worldly governments and ways of thinking and they were actually pretty mischievous and really creative I mean we've seen a with his air scooter and the different type of you know jokes and pranks he plays on people and it's pretty it's pretty funny if you ask me so another aspect of air is really the ability to think about or how to get around any type of situation uh just think about a when he was anytime he fought Zuko or anytime he had to fight anybody he would never really attack he was always being evasive trying to get out of the way and that's because Airbenders truly respect all forms of life and they view violence as the last resort literally and killing even L lower than that so it's always about trying to get out of situations versus charging at of head on and that's pretty much the main reason why a even struggled with uh learning Earth bending and honestly you think about air is always trying to follow the path of least resistance air is always freely flowing and going around each and every obstacle and that mentality is shown both in Airbenders uh bending style as well as how they think about things and of course we can talk about air bending without talking about the last air bner himself AAR now a lot of the stuff we learn about air Nomad and their culture is actually through a and through him we kind of see how he truly embodies the teachings of the air Nomad culture I mean he's funloving adventurous a little mischievous and he was always W to avoid a fight like I said earlier a never really wanted to fight even when it came to the whole world being at stake and honestly that's not a fault to a to a alone and this mentality was true for the majority of Airbenders in A's time and this attitude is actually what caused a to have such a hard time with earthbending because you have to face your problems head on as an earthbender and that's just something he wasn't prepared to do Ang stands true to his air Nomad culture in that all life is sacred so much so that he was about to lose the fight with the fire lord which would sent everyone into another you know fiery Wasteland which is nuts to me but hey if you're enjoying the video so far be sure to drop a like and comment below what you've gotten out of it so far as for me the element of air is probably the one I'm least compatible with which is I don't know kind of sad I guess I don't know um but it's not completely it's just only in some ways because for me I've never been one to really view myself as yes a free bird without any care in the world um I I used to be a pretty bad Warrior that would just dread the future and just be stuck in the past all the time um talking about worrying about you know bills and you know how I'm going to eat this week and what what I need to do for these videos all these different things but I know that's something that God has actually helped me with uh over the last couple of years and he actually did this through the Bible I know shocker and but this this one message this one passage really uh sticks out to me and it's Galatians 5:1 and it says for Freedom Christ set us free stand firm then and don't submit again to a yoke of slavery and what that verse meant to me is that I was already free I just had to realize it and that's something easier said than done because again it's your own mind it's easily to fall it's easy to fall into that trap and to think that you're bound by something that that you don't need to be so whether you're free or not it's all in what you believe in your heart you can choose to be a victim or choose to be a victim and be bound by all these doubts anxieties dreading etc etc or you can be like an air bander and accept the freedom that's already given to you and as for me I strive to be be more like these air banders with their ideas of Freedom love compassion and honestly just the whole belief that no one is lesser than somebody else cuz in my opinion we all deserve the same level of respect no matter who you are so what about you do you have what it takes to have a free mind like an airbender can you commit yourself to not being bound by all those useless thoughts and accept what has been given to you if so then type I'm free in the comments below and after you're done be sure to check out my entire bending series from a Christian Viewpoint you can click on the card above or the link in the description below and remember stay awesome stay blessed and on your [Music] story

Channel: The Liberated Otaku

Views: 474

Keywords: airbending, avatar, aang, avatar aang, being free, god set me free, airbending in real life, real life waterbending, waterbending irl, katara, avatar: the last airbender, waterbending, anime, christian, spiritual, versatility, adaptable, firebending, firebending real life, avatar the last airbender, zuko, christian inspiration, zuko firebending, avatar firebending, anime motivation, anime motivational, christian motivation, earthbending, avatar aang earthbending, toph earthbending

Id: FN9mKsvp3a0

Length: 26min 22sec (1582 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 24 2024