heart is expansive, mind is contractive
reposting this as its own post rather than a reblog response to someone cause i think it should be its own post.
A lot of people say that heart is about who you are while mind is about what you do. And while Heart as the immutable self and Mind as the possible choices someone makes works great in theory...it doesn't so much in practice. Let’s look at the heart and mind players in base homestuck, for instance.
(this is hells of long by the way. sorry.)
There are three Mind players in Homestuck: Terezi (Seer), Latula (Knight), and Redglare (Knight).
And let’s look at what they do. Terezi seeks to understand the law. She talks about how Paradox Space has a sense of justice. When she kills Vriska, she does it not because she wants to, but because the wider system of the alpha timeline demanded it. When John was doing his retcon shit, he had no idea what he was doing, so Terezi systemized it and gave him a list of tasks to do.
We don’t see much of Latula. However, we know a couple things from her. She tells us that the karma cycle revolving around the Serkets and the Pyropes was an expression of Mind. And we know that she is a Knight—one who fights their aspect just as much as they fight through their aspect. Latula tries to present herself as this over-the-top rad gamer girl. Keep in mind that Latula can’t smell, and Beforus would ordinarily slate her for culling because of that. She doesn’t want to be coddled, so she tries as hard as she can to show self-sufficiency and identity. She fights against this system that would tamp down her individuality and autonomy.
Finaly, there’s Redglare, who is just an alternate universe Latula. Redglare is a Knight. She fights THROUGH Mind—she’s a legislacerator. The law is her weapon. But, again, as a Knight, she also struggles with imposed order and wider systems—she’s part of the cult of the Sufferer.
And then there’s the five Heart players. Dirk, Nepeta, Meulin, Bro, and the Disciple.
Dirk, as a Prince, one who destroys Heart, behaves much like a Mind player. I mean, he literally has an AI copy of himself. He hates himself, and while he loves his friends, he still tamps down their individuality—Jane remarks about how he regularly tells her to be more like Jake, and Jake mentions the opposite. He’s great at planning, being logical, etc. etc.. there’s also the irony, something he uses to not show sincerity (heart).
Bro is Dirk, so Bro is also a Prince. Again, the irony, the comparisons to being like a robot and a puppet master. He destroys Dave’s sincerity and ability to be vulnerable. Interestingly, he also has a whole thing with masculinity, with this toxic ideal of being big and tough and never showing emotion and constantly doing badass stunts. Dirk has this too, but it’s less pronounced (until obv. he becomes part of LE). He’s kind of the opposite of Latula in this way, because Porrim points out that part of Latula’s over-the-top-ness stems from a desire to stick it to misogynists, while Bro is the misogynist in question. Misogyny and toxic masculinity are (part of) Mind—they’re relentless systemization that reduces people to stereotypes.
Nepeta, the Rogue! Rogues steal for others—she, in theory, steals Heart and redistributes it. Now. Doesn’t that sound…like shipping? When you steal someone’s heart, that means they’re falling for you, but Nepeta wants to redistribute Heart. She doesn’t have much success in her own romantic endeavors—Equius, as much as I hate to say it, doesn’t stand up for her when it really matters, and Karkat is wholly uninterested in her---but she has a lot of interest in the relationships of others. She also just portrays some general Heart characteristics—she lives alone in a cave pretty much completely disconnected from society.
Meulin…doesn't have much going for her tbh. she's a dancestor. you know how it is. she likes shipping. she's being kind of mind controlled by kurloz? i have kind of a pet theory that mages and seers are more susceptible to manipulation than other peeps because their classes are about taking info in, but that's not really relevant right now. she's a deaf nepeta that smokes catnip like weed and that's really all there is to say on the matter.
the Disciple is a mage, since she's meulin. She was the closest follower of the Sufferer's teachings. She understood the rebellion against the system, and her love with the Sufferer transcended quadrants. (The sufferer was still a Blood player, though, because the rebellion was based on visions of the past.)
Anyways. Based on all that, my conclusion is largely that Heart is about the self, and Mind is about the non-self. Frankly the fundamental way I understand the two is that Heart is crackships and Mind is responses saying that you shouldn't ship that because it's not canon. Mind is the law, systems, logic, and Heart is individuality, desire, random idiosyncrasies that are hard to reconcile with larger systems.
People say Mind is the what-if, but like...look at Nepeta. Look at her shipping wall in her cave. There's all sorts of random shit on there. And you say Heart is about what the character is locked onto and can't unbecome, but look at Dirk (prince). He was the first to ascend to his ultimate self, the first to subsume to this wider "Dirk".
idk. do you get what i'm saying? am i making any sense?
