this is my submission for @journeythroughjourneytothewest's "jttw general" tag! (You can find info about it here). lemme know if I submitted this wrong and i'll fix it
I went on the most absurd research rabbit hole because of this footnote
"The Monkey of the Mind" is obviously referring to the state of "restlessness and indecision", and if I interpreted that part correctly, the word 'yima' translates into something like, "idea horse". (Wikipedia page) I wonder who that reminds me of
I searched up "idea horse Buddhism" and it gave me results talking about a 'wind horse'. According to Buddha Weekly, the Wind Horse "[symbolizes] the winds of life force of our bodies" and is an allegory for the human soul in Tibetan Buddhism
I did some extra digging and I believe Tibetan Buddhism is a actually a separate form of Mahayana Buddhism (which, according to @superkat500, is actually the type of Buddhism that Journey to the West is advocating for! She talks more about it in this Quick Notes)
I didn't register that "the Hose of the Will" was a typo so when I searched it up (adding 'Buddhism' to the search) it showed me some articles talking about free will in Buddhism. I found the preview for this article where it says, "... he [Buddha] rejects the ultimate or absolute freedom of the Will, but not the minimal power of free will." While I didn't do any more research to support this idea, I think this quote might've explained why Ao Lie didn't participate as much in Journey to the West despite being the allegory for Human Will
Other sources that might be of interest:
 The wind horse is an allegory for the human soul in the shamanistic tradition of East Asia and Central Asia. In Tibetan Buddhism, it w
Tibetan Buddhism, branch of Vajrayana (Tantric, or Esoteric) Buddhism that evolved from the 7th century ce in Tibet. It is based mainly on t
Below the cut are the notes I took (it repeats the same stuff) as well as doodle refs:
