Goal Complexes and Control Beliefs

In this post, I discuss why Kiritsugu participated in the Holy Grail War from two perspectives: goal complexes and control beliefs. 

Kiritsgu's goal orientation in the Holy Grail War was not related to mastery. He did not care about being better at fighting or improving his skills as an assassin/mercenary. Rather, he clearly held a performance-oriented goal in that he wanted to defeat the other six mages participating in the war (i.e., outperforming others). He also had an approach tendency in that he proactively wanted to defeat the other mages and was not motivated by the fear of losing against them (although he was highly self-efficacious that he probably did not imagine himself being defeated by the others). 

Performance-approach goals lead to mixed outcomes, but in the case of Kiritsugu, he was able to behave effectively and achieve his goal of defeating the other six mages and obtaining the Holy Grail. This success was likely due to the fact that he had autonomous reasons to outperform others. His pursuit of the Holy Grail was highly self-determined; he was not controlled by any kind of external rewards but was autonomous and motivated solely by his dream to achieve world peace. Because of such high autonomy, his performance-approach goal orientation effectively motivated him to behave in an efficiently goal-directed manner. 

I now turn to Kiritsugu's control beliefs. First of all, Kiritsugu lived in a world that was uncontrollable to him. There was nothing he could do to prevent war; although he attempted numerous times to change the world by going to war zones and killing mages, his behaviors were futile, and wars remained everywhere. In such a low-control environment, it is better to use secondary control beliefs (i.e., change one's self) to adapt to the world and maintain one's mental health. However, Kiritsugu refused to do so, and instead, he always adopted primary control strategies (i.e., change the environment). He could not accept the world in its current state, and despite his constant mental suffering, he could not give up his dream to make the world a better place. He probably knew that if he used secondary control strategies and adapted to the uncontrollable environment, he would be less stressed and mentally stable. However, his only interest was world peace, and his mental health was unimportant to him, which is why he kept sacrificing himself to go to war zones. 

In such a situation, the Holy Grail was probably the one and only means that could change the environment for Kiritsugu. It was irresistible for someone who resorted to primary control strategies all his life, and he probably could not stop himself from wanting it. This is another reason why he decided to participate in the Holy Grail War.

To me, Kiritsugu's utter lack of attention to himself is what made me like him so much. He is a cold-hearted and mentally ill person, but all of those mental problems are because of his desire to achieve world peace and to make others happy. In last week's post, I wrote that Kiritsugu was unable to make his dream come true, but this week, I wrote that he actually obtained the Holy Grail. I hope I have a chance in the future posts to explain why his dream was not achieved even though he had the Holy Grail.