#especially bc i never liked the perspective that one thing belonged to only one deity

[izzyovercoffee]

hey, love your meta and translations. I was wondering if you had any thoughts on a specific Mando'a word for "helpless?" (Laandur and di'kutla have different connotations to me) context: best fren gave me "you are not helpless" as an affirmation bc anxiety paralysis, and approaching things from a Mando mindset often helps me. thanks

Before I say anything else, I just wanted to say that I am truly, truly honored that my post about mental illness had such a positive impact; and I’m thankful that you and others have found it helpful.

Since receiving this ask, I’ve been giving this question a lot, a lot, of thought … and to be honest, I’m not entirely sure how to answer this—though I definitely am going to try. With respect to where this question comes from, I’m trying to come up with a few alternatives … because, I’m actually of the opinion that the word “helpless” may not actually be in the mandalorian vocabulary. 

Gently paging @kaasknot and @cassiansfuzzyjacket (and, really, anyone and everyone else who’d like to chime in for this particular topic) for input, though—because I can definitely be wrong, and more insight is always better, especially with sensitive subjects that can have many, many different perspectives and many approaches.

The way I’m looking at this, “helpless” in mando’a, at the very least, would not hold the same context or connotation that you would be using it for, ie. an affirmation of some kind. More likely, helpless would take the connotation of “exposed” or “cannot fend for one’s self,” which is wholly different from anxiety paralysis. 

That said though, there is a word that is close but not the same, and carries different layers of meaning to it that changes the phrase, or pulls it away from what would otherwise be negative within mando’a. 

solus — /sō·lo͞os/ — vulnerable, alone, each, one, individual, united, as one

It also has a verb component to it: unite, which I’m roughly guessing it to be akin to soluur or soluusar, but these are very rough and one can feasibly assume conjugation would still be solus or solu if absolutely needed.

Much in the same way that Mandalorians can and are contradictory in the very same breath—venerating gods who were once people, the ka’ra, for example—so can they be in words.

Solus, as a word, means both alone and united, one who feels solus would be simultaneously vulnerable, isolated, and yet are very much a thread woven into the fabric of a larger identity and community, fully alone and never truly alone. 

Nu solus, ni solus — [I am] not vulnerable, I [am] united — the state of being both painfully vulnerable and entirely invulnerable; of being both incomplete, and whole

So that’s one possibility you might want to try, and see if it fits or if it helps. Unison, being united, being part of something bigger — that’s the biggest draw to mandalorians, I think. The sense of community and belonging, that’s something that mandalorians absolutely embody when it comes to other mandalorians — aside from, of course, real serious ideological disputes, but that’s probably a given.

Another possibility is one I touched on in a previous post I did regarding the word k’atini. I don’t want to repeat everything in there, but ultimately the way it’s represented in the mando’a dictionary is, really, mistranslated.

K’atini — get through it, I can and will survive this

In your case, I feel that k’atini still applies, though it’s not exactly what you were looking for.

K’atini is what you say when your world is ending and you keep going. K’atini is what you say when you get your ass whooped and you stand back up. “It’s only pain [ and pain won’t stop me ]” ….

K’atini comes from atiniir, which means to endure, to put up with, to take it (like a beating). The K’ addition comes from the imperative prefix, ke’, k’ — it’s what you tack on before a word to indicate an order or a command.

When things are overwhelming, when the world is crushing you, even the barest minimum act of enduring, of surviving is an act of rebellion. Paralysis, or not, you will survive it.

…but now, now … I thought of a punny one, and I apologize in advance.

It’s gonna go under a cut for two reasons though. First reason is because I’m not entirely sure if it actually works and might choose to remove it in the future or put it in its own post, and the second because I don’t want this post to be too long on the dash.

Anyway, here is the pun:

Naast cuy Naas ures te — The Destroyer is Nothing without the title. ( Lit. [The] Destroyer is nothing without [the] ‘the’ / [The] Destroyer is “Nothing” lacking [the] “t” )

For the record, the word for the is te, literally pronounced “tay,” which is how I assume you pronounce the letter ‘t’ in mando’a, and coincidentally … if you were to add the letter t to naas, it would give you naast. 

Eh? Eh?? 

I’m laughing at my own horrible pun I’m sorry.

Also, before it’s brought up, I personally haven’t found anything that says the specific mando’a pronunciations of their letters has to match Arubesh, which is on an entirely different pronunciation system for the Basic alphabet. I maintain that the easiest way to pronounce letters in the mando’a alphabet is to keep them as close as possible, phonetically, to actual words, and both the ‘tay’ and ‘ee’ sounds are very, very common in mando’a. But anyway, I digress.

The intent is to link nothing with destroyer, to link the state of nothing, or the inability of not being able to do or act and therefore be frozen in a state of inbetween, is one very short phonetic leap to Destroyer, of whom is both a Creation Deity as well as an instigator of and a force for Change and survival. 

Or, another way of looking at it, think of it in a low moment, when you’re feeling down and out and like you don’t matter, or you have no worth, or you are nothing beyond your illness or your anxiety. It changes the meaning of “nothing,” and so instead of “I am not nothing” which while positive isn’t always enough, we can take that horrible feeling and laugh at it. “Error is a ‘t’ short of Terror.” Nothing is a t short of Destroyer. 

It’s funny because language is funny, and it’s funny because we hold ourselves to higher standards than is sometimes fair, or that we expect more of ourselves than we can possibly give, or demand of ourselves that which is unattainable—and it’s not because we’re too weak, or too helpless, or too incapable, but because it’s not something one can feasibly ask from one’s self, just as one cannot ask a fire to provide us water or make it rain. 

edit: but, it’s funny because in language, we can ask nothing to become something, we can make nothing into Destroyer, with one small t, and I, personally, think that’s funny.

This is, of course, not as serious as the previous two — it’s more tongue-in-cheek than anything, but I figured I might as well add it in case you do happen to find it useful. B’)

Anywho, hopefully these are acceptable? Or, at least, offer self-motivating inspiration, and aren’t too difficult to pronounce.