One Power: Encyclopedia II - One Power - Differences between Male and Female Channelers

One Power - Differences between Male and Female Channelers

When using the One Power one weaves flows of different elements: Earth, Spirit, Water, Air, and Fire. Men are generally stronger with Fire and Earth, while women are generally stronger with Air and Water; significant strength in Spirit is distributed equally, and relatively rare in either. Male channelers, in general, are capable of holding more of the Power than female ones, while women generally are more dextrous in the weaving of the Power. Also, male channelers cannot link to form a "Circle" of multiple channelers working together without a woman's aid; only women can initiate a Circle.

Female channelers can tell when other women are touching the Source - a white glowing aura appears around their body, only visible to those trained to touch the One Power. There is no way for a woman to tell when a man is channeling that has been discovered as yet. Men feel women holding the Source as a tingling on their skin, like goosebumps; they can also sense when another man is holding the Power (though they cannot see it). Finally, male and female channelers experience the Power differently: a woman would describe it as a gentle force requiring patience, acceptance, guidance, and relaxation (which they term Embracing), while a man frequently describes it as a rough torrent requiring strict control and exertion of force (which has been described as Seizing). This essential difference in the "feeling" of the Power means that a woman cannot teach a man to channel, and vice-versa (and it has been tried many, many times). In fact, many weaves which work for one sex do not work the same way for the other, and may in fact be dangerous for the wrong sex to use. As an example, a woman may set things burning with a weave of Fire, but must use Air or Water to put it out, while a man is able to use another weave of Fire to absorb the heat and displace it harmlessly, an act which would seriously harm a woman who attempted it.

Channelers must always be careful, as the One Power is dangerous. Besides providing an addictive stimulating quality, channelers who draw too much of the Power into themselves can kill themselves or render themselves brain-dead. If they are lucky--relatively speaking--they will only burn the ability out of themselves, leaving themselves unable to channel ever again. Channelers can also be permanently denied the Source by another party. In modern Aes Sedai parlance, this is called "stilling" when done to women, "gentling" when done to men, but archaically it was called "severing" for either gender. Regardless of the circumstances, those who lose the ability permanently also tend to lose the will to live. Very recently, an Aes Sedai named Nynaeve al'Meara, and some Asha'man, have discovered how to heal severing, but the process only works completely when used on the opposite gender.

All men and women with the spark come to a point of crisis in which they are in severe danger of dying without training, as the One Power is dangerous. Many women who die of mysterious circumstances in their late teenaged years are actually wilders who have failed to cope with their abilities. The women who survive invariably develop mental blocks that prevent channeling in the absence of certain conditions; two known blocks required severe anger or thoughts about men before their sufferers could allow themselves to channel. Serious and sometimes drastic counseling is often required to overcome blocking.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Differences between Male and Female Channelers", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki