psychology development applied to autobiography

I became the person I am today because of my past, and all the influences that have shaped me, molded me, and impacted my personality and sense of self. Of course, my genetic history is also tied into who I am, impacting my physiological development, which in turn shapes how others see me and respond to me. In my case, I was adopted and have no knowledge of my birth parents. Occasionally I have considered finding out who they were but have yet to take that step; perhaps one day I will. Without knowing my biological parents, I do not know my genetic history as well as I could. I also do not know the conditions that impacted my mother during my prenatal development. As soon as I was adopted, my parents embraced me and held me as if I was one of their own. They adopted one other child, my sister, who is two years younger than me. We had a happy childhood, not without its ups and downs but certainly less stressful than the childhoods some of my friends had. My parents are still married after all these years, and are role models for a successful relationship. I have yet to find the person I want to spend the rest of my life with and am actually unsure if marriage and parenthood are in the cards for me.
Early childhood development is a critical stage, even if we do not even have strong memories of the period from infancy to preschool. Freud claimed that between the ages of one and three we go through the oral stage: evident in the ways babies suck things incessantly: their pacifiers, fingers, or any object that happens to be in front of them. According to Freud, infants whose needs are not adequately met at this stage, for whatever reason, may develop oral fixations later in life (McLeod, 2017). Examples of oral fixations might include smoking, nail biting or overeating. For example, if the child was scolded or yelled at any time they sucked on something, they might not have had their oral needs met, internalizing those needs rather than fulfilling them in a natural progression. I do not have any oral fixations that I am aware of, and so I can assume that the first few years of my life were spent pleasurably sucking on things before I had developed the ability to speak.
Piaget proposed that during the first few years of life we were not necessarily orally orientated, but simply object oriented. This stage of development Piaget called the sensorimotor stage (“Piaget Stages of Development,” n.d.). Babies do experiment with what is directly in front of them, and are not cognizant of anything that is not within their immediate zone. Erikson proposed a different approach, focusing more on social interactions and how they impact our psychological development, our beliefs, attitudes, and sense of self. The first few years of life are characterized by the development of trust, or mistrust as the case may be depending on environmental cues and how the child interprets those cues. Appropriate responses from caregivers during these early years will engender a sense of trust of others that may last a lifetime. A mother who was responsive to my crying, for instance, leads me to believe that when I need something, I will receive whatever it is I need in due time. While I may not know exactly what I went through for the first two years of my life, based on my ability to trust others and my lack of oral fixations, I would say that I progressed through this stage easily. My communications skills have always been strong and I have never struggled with issues like trust.
However, I can be a little controlling and tight with money sometimes. I thought this was due to the way my parents raised me, to always keep my room clean and to be frugal in all matters. Yet Freud might have suggested the possibility of an anal fixation. During the anal stage of psychosexual development, the child is being potty trained. Potty training that is stressful can lead to anal fixations, according to Freud, and anal fixations can manifest as being overly neat, overly punctual, and overly controlling. I have learned to use these tendencies in my favor: keeping a clean house and being on time for my appointments are, I believe, positive qualities. Yet I have been told to loosen up and lighten up, and that might be because I can be a little too fixated on control. Erikson suggested that this same stage in psychosocial terms would have been when I learned to develop a sense of personal autonomy: testing my boundaries, asserting myself, becoming independent. There might have indeed been some issues at this stage of my early childhood, given that I do tend to be overly cautious in my affairs and afraid to take risks. If my parents tended towards being overprotective, which they did, then it would certainly explain why I tend to take fewer risks than some of my friends. The inability to take risks freely parallels the need I have to control everything. I want to know the outcome before taking action, which sometimes paralyzes me. I am afraid to do the wrong thing, but I also know that life is about learning from our mistakes. Erikson also would have pointed to the importance of the next stage in psychosocial development: Initiative versus guilt, in which the child should be encouraged to take initiative and even to make mistakes rather than having the parent continually redirect that innate curiosity.
I am single, and comfortable living on my own. I have had roommates for much of my life but currently am living alone. I do not view being alone as problematic and am quite comfortable with not being in a committed relationship now because I am focused on developing my career. I understand relationships do take a lot of work, and one day do hope to be in a committed relationship with someone who is strong and independent. When I consider my sexuality and psychosexual development, I do believe that Freud’s theories have some merit. The concept of the Oedipus complex seems strange to people but it does make sense in the way that young boys do sometimes develop a sense of competition with their fathers. By the time I reached adolescence, I was a little sullen and brooding and would act in ways that modeled my father but also expressed my own budding sense of masculine identity. I knew I was heterosexual when I hit puberty, based on my sudden and intense sexual fantasies and a period of phallic fixation all boys do go through. Right before I hit puberty, around the age of 12, I started to show a predilection for sports and this was when my competitive streak started to shine. Erikson would have noted that this was the “industry versus inferiority” phase where I developed self-efficacy through practice and skills development (McLeod, 2018). I still play sports, but mainly as a hobby and to stay in shape.
Currently in graduate school, I have a strong sense of purpose and direction in life. I believe that as I grow older the concept of self-actualization will become more salient for me. Abraham Maslow proposed that we have a hierarchy of needs. We need to meet the basic needs first, before we can adequately address the higher level needs that are important for feeling fulfilled in life. Erikson also showed how during early adulthood, we are learning more about how to form emotional bonds with others, willing to be vulnerable with other people and to love freely. I have several close friendships that I believe fill this need for love and intimacy. Experimenting with non-monogamy, being with more than one partner in an open relationship, has afforded me the ability to be vulnerable and intimate, honest, and respectful of others without needing to pigeonhole relationships into the binaries our society is too prone to imposing. I do not believe so much in gender binaries, binaries of sexual orientation, or binaries in terms of monogamy or nothing. As I contemplate my role in the world as I get older, I know that I need to have intimate relationships with many people who can inspire me and help me to grow. Most theorists operated within a more conventional framework, but successful completion of the intimacy stage in Erikson’s theory results in “happy relationships and a sense of commitment, safety, and care within a relationship,” (McLeod, 2018, p. 1).
The challenges I face now are financial in nature, as I struggle to pay off student loan debt while still pursuing my graduate degree and embarking on a new career. I do not know yet what I will do with my degree, and am considering working abroad for the first few years. I need to feel a sense of generativity, as Erikson put it: a feeling like I am contributing something to the world rather than just taking up space within it. As a result, I have decided to pursue a career in human rights law and social justice advocacy. It is an exciting field, a necessary one, but alas not necessarily one that pays well.
However, I decided long ago that it was more important for me to feel a sense of purpose and feel self-actualized than it was to simply accumulate money. I can have all the money in the world, but if I am unhappy then that money means little. When Maslow proposed his hierarchy of needs, he showed how even the esteem that comes from being a famous person in one’s field, an expert, or a respected member of the community might not be enough to provide true self-actualization. True self-actualization means something different for each person and of course might mean something different for me ten years down the road. For now, I feel that I am on the path towards self-actualization by laying the foundation for a career in social justice. I hope to make a difference in the lives of others.
My future plans revolve around my career. It is likely my uncertainty of the future that causes me to focus less on finding an intimate partner and more on my career. My friendships are strong; I feel confident and hopeful for the future. I am happy and stable, with no mental health issues and a strong bill of physical health. Grateful for all I have, I can see that an upbringing filled with love and support was instrumental in shaping who I am today.





References

McLeod, S. (2017). Psychosexual stages. Simply Psychology. https://www.simplypsychology.org/psychosexual.html
McLeod, S. (2018). Erik Erikson’s stages of psychosocial development. Simply Psychology. https://www.simplypsychology.org/Erik-Erikson.html
“Piaget Stages of Development,” (n.d.). WebMD. https://www.webmd.com/children/piaget-stages-of-development#1