GeekxGirls posted on Kylo Ren’s lightsaber battles, and they have similar thoughts to what I’ve been gassing on about. From “Kylo vs Finn and Rey – You’re Missing the Damn Point!”, regarding his injury from Chewbacca’s bowcaster:
So…after being shown the pure unadulterated hell that spews forth from this hand-held death cannon in a deluge of destruction and demise, we can all agree that being shot with this thing tops a long list of things you don’t want to happen to you.
Well, it happens to Kylo Ren.
And, what does he do? Well, he doesn’t get thrown through the air like every other fucking thing that gets hit by this murder machine. In fact, he just kind of takes a knee for a minute. He doesn’t get instantly wrecked while careening through the air hoping for the sweet release of death. He gets up, and proceeds to walk it the fuck off.
But, he doesn’t just quit there. He doesn’t just walk off what everything else in the universe instantly dies from. He goes out to find a couple bitches, and tear them apart.
Abrams, et al, went out of his way to show a few times, prior to the Han Solo death scene, how powerful the bowcaster is. Ren probably had mitigated the bowcaster’s effect somewhat using Force Deflection, though imperfectly. After being injured, there are other Force powers he could’ve used.
Ren is impulsive and young, for sure, but, as the last sentence in GeekxGirls’ post says, there’s probably more to him than some may accredit him.