All the words that I use in ways that most people don’t use them, because in some ways I kind of sort of made them up, but ultimately aren’t all words made up? Anyway, I don’t want to stop using them.

Airbenders primarily avoid conflict. They jump out of its way or they try to deflect it. They tend to not bring up things that are bothering them. They likely subscribe to “forgive and forget.” They don’t hold grudges or let things get them down for long. See “earthbending,” “firebending,” and “waterbending” for the other conflict styles.

Contention is conflict done badly. It’s picking a fight, abusing authority, being manipulative, a spirit of discontent, a need for control—whatever it is that causes you to treat someone else as less human than you. Contention can happen in the absence of conflict—it can be a refusal to do conflict at all, a refusal to allow yourself to be known or to engage in productive, relationship-building disagreements.

A necessary result of two people being honest and vulnerable with each other. Conflict is having and working through (and within) disagreements). It is the price of really knowing each other. Conflict is different than, but often confused with, contention.

The ability to make something happen, to determine the outcome. Absolute control does not actually exist, even for God, because it violates the eternal principle of agency. Control is a zero sum game—the more that one person has, the less that another has. Control is different, but often confused with, power.

Earthbending is standing your ground. It’s planting your feet. It’s recognizing where you’re at. Earthbending is hard to describe without earth-related metaphors. In earthbending, you listen and communicate carefully. You say what you mean, and you try to understand what other people mean (even if they’re not saying it directly). Earthbending is seeking to see yourself and others clearly.

Firebending is usually in attack mode. Even firebending’s defensive maneuvers are kind of offensive. Firebending is intended to alarm or to hurt or defend (or all three at once). It can also be used to burn things down—to stop a relationship, a conversation, an idea—and it is almost always characterized by strong feelings, like fear, conviction, or pain.

My definition of hope comes from Joseph Spencer. He says that “in hope, the past event that calls for faith is recognized to contain . . . a promise, an indication that things can be different” (For Zion: A Mormon Theology of Hope). That is, faith is recognizing God’s work in the past. Hope is believing that He will work those same wonders in the future, through us.

Hunger is need or want. It’s what we feel when we experience our dependence on the world around us. Although this is usually an uncomfortable feeling, hunger is a gift. In Letters to a Young Mormon, Adam Miller says "Hunger marks your openness to the world, your dependence on it…. This open vulnerability to people and food and air is not a curse but a gift” (73).

Idolatry is trying to find something that can only be a gift from God (salvation, healing, faith, forgiveness) in something that isn’t God.

In Interfamily Systems Therapy (IFS), we try to identify feelings or urges as “parts” (or “peeps,” as my mom says) with names, personalities, ages, purposes, and desires that may conflict with each other. (Think Inside Out.) As a rule, no matter what a part’s job is or how destructive their work is becoming, they’re there to help. My anger is there to protect me. My sadness lets me know what I value. My tired tells me to rest. But they’re all a part, and it’s my job as the Self to be the whole. I’m the grownup, and I have to help them realize when their job is done or redirect their energy when they’re being hurtful.

Kindness is doing what is best for someone, even if doing that won’t make people like you more. It is different than, but often mistaken for, niceness.

There’s a Hawaiian word I’ve never found a good replacement for in English—kuleana. It means stewardship, honor, responsibility, area of influence. The word is commonly used in terms of “kuleana land,” land given to Hawaiians by the king in the 1800s are still inherited by their descendants.

Leveling up is seeing and experiencing the world more clearly than you did before. I sometimes talk about it in terms of entering a new reality. This process is usually uncomfortable (sometimes painful), but it generally allows us to know ourselves and God better.

Nice is what we do and say to make the people around us like us. It’s politeness and sweetness. It is a Venn diagram with kindness—they overlap, but are not always the same thing.

“People speaking” is a term that comes from Shannon Hale’s The Goose Girl. People speakers are people with unusual influence over the people around them. This influence is usually derived from some combination of personal beauty, excellent communication skills, and flat out charisma. A people speaker invites those around them to think and feel the same way they do.

Power is the exercising of agency. It is less like control and more like love in that instead of being a zero sum game, power is something that, when used properly can magnify itself. Power often means the relinquishing of a desire for control.

Waterbending has to do with redirecting energy, social and interpersonal. I usually associate water bending with a term from a different fantasy series: people speaking. (This term is from The Goose Girl by Shannon Hale, which is straight up one of the most satisfying books I’ve ever read.) People speaking is having influence over how other people see the world.