Rory MacDonald - Individuation

This video was made by me (M. Schütt) as a tribute to UFC Welterweight fighter Rory MacDonald. More of a psychological exploration than an actual highlight this video seeks to combine the facets of MacDonald's character with some major points of Jungian Psychology, namely the Persona, the Shadow and the process of Individuation.

Part 1 - Persona/Guardian Angel:
Every person has a built in facade - a persona (litterally a mask). Through the persona we codify ourselves in a form which we hope will prove acceptable to others.
The tendency is to build acceptable traits into the persona and to keep unacceptable traits hidden or repressed. These socially undesirable aspects of the maturing personality are usually relegated to the personal unconscious, where they coalesce to form another complex, or part personality, that Jung called the shadow.

Guardian Angel refers to the sport of MMA which pulled MacDonald through some hard times, gave his life direction and ultimately meaning. The religious aspect of this phenomenon is present throughout the video.

Part 2 - The Shadow/Inner Demons:
Jung felt 'shadow' to be an appropriate term for this disowned subpersonality for there is inevitably
something 'shady' about it, hidden away as it is in the dark lumber-room of the Freudian unconscious.
Unwanted though it is, it persists as a powerful dynamic that we take with us wherever we go as a dark companion which dogs our steps - just like a shadow in fact.

Although acting as a guiding light, MMA has managed to unleash the inner demons of MacDonald's character, personified in the Shadow-character he assumes before, during and after fighting. This is the other, violent side of him that he has not been able to suppress.

Individuation:
Usually called 'self-realization' or 'self-actualization', Jung called it "an expression of that biological process - simple or complicated as the ease may be - by which every living thing becomes what it was destined to become from the beginning"
It is a creative act of Self-completion. How does this extraordinary fusion occur? The answer is that it occurs in our sleep and that the process is immeasurably assisted if we record our dreams, reflect on them, and work on them.

All opposites are intrinsically irreconcilable: but conflict between any pair of opposites generates tension which motivates the psyche to seek a third possibility that transcends them both. If one can learn to bear the tension that oppositions invariably bring, then the problem is raised to a higher plane: good is reconciled with evil, love with hate, doubt with certainty, and a new synthesis will follow between conscious and unconscious, persona and shadow, ego and Self. Such reconciliations are attained neither rationally nor intellectually, but symbolically, through the transcendent function of symbols. The symbolism of the cross needs little amplification: it indicates the cardinal points of the mandala and is the Christian symbol of wholeness, representing the reconciliation of opposites through suffering, the memorial of Christ's individuation and atonement with God.

Through his opposite personalities, then, MacDonald achieves Individuation, i.e. completion of the Self, at the end represented through the Christian symbols and the mandalas. It is is a dream come true, so to speak.

Hopefully, you all enjoy it

Видео Rory MacDonald - Individuation канала Mifojei