The One that Pulled Himself Out of Perdition

Two brothers (Sam and Dean) follow their father's footsteps as “hunters,” outlaw cowboys that kill monsters such as vampires, werewolves and demons. Their father, John Winchester raised Sam and Dean to be hunters after his wife Mary was murdered by the demon Azazel when the boys were little. 22 years later, the brothers set out on a journey to fight evil along the way, to find their recently-missing father; when they finally do he reveals he knows what demon killed their mother and has found a way to track and kill it. Meanwhile, Sam develops frightening abilities such as seeing visions of people dying before it actually happens. These visions are somehow connected to the demon that murdered his mother and its mysterious plans that seem to be all about Sam. When their father dies striking a deal with that very same demon, the brothers determine to finish his crusade. But disturbing revelations about Sam's part in the demon's apocalyptic plan are presented when John's dying last words to Dean are revealed. Dean is supposed to kill Sam before Hell’s plan is fulfilled. Sam is to become a vessel for Lucifer after he is broken out of his cage in Hell. This will start the Apocalypse.

To ensure the master plan of the Apocalypse happens, Heaven also plays a role. They bet all they have on the power of their champion, the Archangel Michael. After they win, Paradise will return to Earth. For such end, they are willing to sacrifice billions of lives in the war of Armageddon. Castiel is deployed form the supernal realms to ensure that Sam becomes Lucifer’s vessel, and Dean becomes Michael’s. He is tasked with bringing the will of Heaven to fruition without question. However, by observing both the good and bad in humanity, Cass changes and becomes the most valuable allied of the brothers in their mission to stop the Apocalypse and defy heaven.  

Castiel waged a second civil war in Heaven to prevent the Archangel Raphael from restarting the Apocalypse. To win this war of attrition, Castiel teamed up Crowley, King of Hell, to take abundant souls from Purgatory. Castiel absorbed billions of souls, including the primordial beasts, Leviathans, from Purgatory. The power was so great that Castiel effortlessly killed the Archangel Raphael. However, the evil souls had warped Castiel's mind, causing him to proclaim himself as the new God and proceeded to wipe out all of Raphael's followers, while killing innocent disbelievers on Earth. After the war, Cass rejoined the Winchesters and became a hunter himself. 

Castiel is honorable, resolute, innocent and above all loyal. He literally died several times for love of his friends and will stop at nothing to fulfill justice. This Blogg dives into his personality and motivation. 

 Week Six: Motivation 

Self-efficacy

Self-efficacy is the belief one has about the ability and probability of one achieving a desired outcome. Self-efficacy beliefs are directly related to motivation to perform difficult or novel tasks. Importantly, self-efficacy is relevant to specific dimensions. For example, if one has high self-efficacy for taking Math courses, one may not have high self-efficacy for taking Humanities courses. The main sources of self-efficacy in descending hierarchy of strength are history of mastery (when individuals were able to master similar tasks in the past), vicarious experiences through similar models (directly related to Bandura’s modeling theory in which one observes action and internalizes it as personal learning), verbal persuasion for external regulation (positive and negative reinforcements), and physiological states (arousal or depression). Finally, it is noteworthy that self-efficacy is ephemeral, it is a fickle trinket that is hard to find and easy to lose.

 

Team Free Will and the Self-efficacy Guardian Angel

 

Castiel was one of the great Host of Heaven. He was one of the angels in charge of protecting and guiding humanity, the replacement garrison after the fallen Watchers. Castiel fought countless battles against the demons and won. As Ruby, a high-level demon servant to Lilith herself, shakingly cries: “We only heard stories of a being like this. We never seen one. When it bleeds, the ground shakes. When it speaks, the heavens tremble. When it comes, I will be running.” Castiel’s incursion of Hell blazes through the deepest layers of perdition to raise Dean back to life. At the biggening of Castiel’s arch, he has very high self-efficacy. There is no doubt in his mind that he will fulfill his mission, just like he has done since time immemorial. Because of such prolific past instances of mastery, Cass has high expectancies for his future performances, building monuments to his resolve and motivation. He is the implacable instrument of Heaven’s wrath.

But in the deepest recesses of his mind, Cass is like no other angel. Whereas his brethren in arms are resolute and instrumental, Cass is sensitive and intellectually autonomous. He listens to his heart as well as his orders. He has always had his questions about the intent and the methods of Heaven. He is the only angel that even suspected the highest secret of the Archangels: that God left a long time ago. Heaven is arbitrary and the Devine Order is merely angelic politics. Cass always knew this, but his self-efficacy was always firmly grounded in obedience. He lacked the motivation to break free from its shackles because he never experienced anything outside of blind submission.

Until he met Dean. Dean’s autonomous volition and purity of heart showed Cass another way. Through modeling (another source of self-efficacy), Cass caught a glimpse of what it is to be human: defiance and anthropogeny. He flirted with the possibility of being like Dean and making his own choices based on his intrinsic motivation rather than external regulation. His self-efficacy changes from very high when based on his past, to much lower when based on his potential of being like his model, Dean. Modeling becomes the nexus of all the permutations of Castiel.

This proves to be a serious issue. Because Castiel’s new self-efficacy and motivations are based on the example of Dean, when Dean breaks down, Cass loses his mind. After much pressure, Dean decides to give in to the plans of heaven. Dean agrees to relinquish the innermost fiber of his essence as he agrees to become processed by the Archangel Michael. This event would start the Apocalypse –and cause the death of billions in the process. This is the very thing that Castiel fell from Heaven to avoid. Castiel beats Dean senseless as punishment. “I disobeyed because of YOU!” “I fell because of YOU!” “How dare you be so weak? Are the angels right about men? Was I wrong?”

Cass lost self-efficacy because he lost his model. His motivation was gone, and he became confused. Ultimately, his confusion and alienation from Dean causes him to spiral and do the unthinkable. He follows the path of Satan and decides to become the new God. The angels whisper that they were right about his ostracism. They whisper that Falling is indeed condemnation. They see that freedom is folly and that it is not better to rule in Hell than to serve blindly in heaven. However, Cass recovers his motivation through words of encouragement from none other than Dean. He experiences verbal persuasion, another source of self-efficacy, when Dean confesses his friendship and appreciation for the angel. Cass has broken the seal of purgatory to absorb the souls therein onto himself. This has granted him immeasurable power. However, he has also absorbed the primordial monsters Leviathan. They poison and corrupt Cass from within, eventually causing his death (at least one of them). Because of the Herculean task ahead of him, Cass does not believe he can solve this issue. He never had Leviathan inside of him before. The ritual to extract them is dangerous and he will lose his power. Dean encourages Cass to follow his heart and do the right thing in difficult situations. He encourages the angel to look back as his past instances of mastery and realize that his heart is always right, and then they will get through things together. Cass recovers his motivation and is able to defeat the Leviathan in Purgatory.

Dean successfully breaks Cass out of his learned helplessness caused by the self-fulfilling prophecies that he placed upon himself. Deep down, Cass believed that he was alone again. He believed that he could not trust Dean (because of his idea to give in to Heaven’s demands earlier) and that he could not find a connection with mankind again. Cass placed himself in the cage of learned helplessness, in the cage of loneliness. Dean’s true friendship breaks him free and reframes his mind into a growth mindset. In this paradigm, one believes that challenges are merely opportunities to grow due to high self-efficacy. Drawing power from their friendship, Cass is able to believe in humanity and in himself again. This makes him realize that the Leviathan crisis was nothing but another opportunity to grow in his campaign against the heavenly despots and the tyranny of fate.

Sisyphus pushes the boulder again. According to Snyder (1991) hope is a positive mental state based on the determination of achieving a goal. Castiel never lost hope because he never lost track of his goal. Either as the pawn of heaven, as a member of Team Free Will, or as the new God/Satan, Cass has always had one goal in mind: love and protect mankind. He has always been resolute in building intimacy with his friends and understanding the human condition. He has always been pushing the boulder of agency and justice across the peak of destiny to protect those he loves, to protect Dean.  

 

 

 

 

 

                                                         

Week 5: Expectancy Value Theory 

                                                                Of Man and Angel

 

Value in Expectancy-Value Theory can be seen as the importance one places in an ideal or activity. This is ultimately rooted in the psychology of the individual and the attributions that make up one’s imagination. For example, one who is religious may place more value in the effigies of faith and less value on action and reason; such a person would be more motivated to learn Philosophy than to learn Chemistry. Interestingly, as withing, so without. Values can be of an intrinsic bend, or an extrinsic one. Values also determine instrumentality. Instrumentality is the perspective of wheel and metal, with no patience for things that grow (to quote Tolkien on Saruman’s mind). One goal (wheel) only exists to serve another. Intrinsic motivation, in contrast, is the appreciation of the nature of things. Instead of direct phenomenology, one sees things as ends in themselves. Intrinsic motivation is patience and love for the beauty of life (to quote Tolkien on the mind of Gandalf).

           

          Situated Expectancy Value Theory is beautifully shown in the arch of Castiel. Castiel’s

 values determine his expectancies for his environment and his relationships with others,

 especially with Dean and the angels. Most notably, Castiel excels in attainment values, which

 are used to validate his ever-changing identity. His utility values are almost meaningless, as

 he considers the inherent nonconsequential value of things, rather than any utilitarian

 attributions. Finally cost is meaningless to him, as he is willing to literally die (multiple times,

 actually) for his values.

Castiel’s values changed over time. At first, his only value was obedience. As Dean accuses him, he was just a simple tool to his higher angelic commanders. He deliberately kidnaps Dean, against the angel’s own judgment and motivation. He is silent at Uriel’s abhorrent idea of destroying a whole city as “divine judgment.” He is a simple pawn in heaven’s plans for the Apocalypse. This is because he considers obedience to be his most important attainment value. His idea of himself as an angel is directly connected with his obedience to the divine hierarchy. As he puts it: “You [Dean] ask me to disobey? Lucifer disobeyed!  And he Fell, Dean!! If I disobey, there is no difference between Satan and me.” However, after witnessing the good in humanity, mostly through Dean’s character, Castiel changes his motivations.

After living with the brothers, Cass betrays Heaven and joins “Team Free Will.” He sees intrinsic value, beauty, in the growing imperfect humans. As he confesses to Dean: “You are the most tormented human I have ever seen. But all you do is love. All you do is sacrifice for those you love.” After literally falling (pun intended) for the humans, he changes his identity from a paw to authority, to the angelic champion of free will. Now, his goals are motivated by the fulfillment and confirmation of his new identity. Now, all he does is fight Heaven and its Archangels.

            Cass is also a prime example of instrumentality. Every step he takes is for the ultimate overarching goal of helping Sam and Dean in their mission. Even when making mistakes, such as taking souls from Purgatory to assert his hegemony over Hell, he acts to fulfill the goal of protecting the brothers and validating human dignity. Never once does Cass think of himself or any other reason for his actions. Notably, Castiel’s endogenous instrumentality is seen when he makes a deal with the Nothing. For the life of his son Jack, the Empty will take his soul to the Void in the moment in which he is the happiest. This relates to endogenous instrumentality because this ultimate sacrifice is determined by his ultimate singular goal, his intrinsic motivation of love, Dean.

Moreover, goals can be either performance or mastery oriented. Mastery goals focus on the process of learning to achieve maximum competence. This is most significant for motivation because mastery goals view errors as part of the learning process, not as impediments and reasons to be discouraged. Castiel uses this strategy. His mastery goal is to understand humanity and master an intimacy with it. Every challenge that Cass faces is utterly meaningless before the resolve of his love. He is killed several times, but God brings him back to life to fulfill his mission. Every time he is resurrected, he is more powerful. Every time he is resurrected, he learns more about humanity and its struggles; always becomes less angel and more man.