Someone pointed out to me yesterday that I am in the eighth stage of Erikson’s Psychosocial Stages of Development. This was news to me as I hadn’t heard of it before. I didn’t think you could get better than the Bristol Stool Scale in terms of medical scales. I’m not actually sure that you can. I wasn’t, from considerations of good taste, going to add a link to the stool scale (it’s not about making furniture, just in case you were wondering) but when I found this my resolve crumbled. Julia came racing through to see if I was in pain, but I was just trying to contain my laughter. Whoever posted it has less good taste than I have, and probably a looser connection to sanity too.
Anyway, back to the serious stuff. I am now in Erikson’s 8th stage of development, which is the last stage. That is a worry even before I start looking into it. It’s subtitled Integrity v Despair.
This is not a lot of use in understanding it, and reading more about it, one commentator opined that to do well in stage 8 you needed to have started preparing in middle age. The whole point, of course, is that I am currently regretting a wasted life and and my inability to go back and change it. Telling me that to feel better about my current life I should have done some things differently twenty years ago is both obvious and useless. I haven’t read Erikson’s original work as I don’t do well with academic papers, so it’s possible that he was more insightful.
Anyway, the outcome is that I can’t change things, and am not on my own with these feelings. Or, to put it another way, there’s no point worrying. As I already knew this, I just wasted a couple of hours reading internet articles.
However, put on a scale that runs from the Kardashians to the Meaning of Life,I feel I could have done worse. Two hours on psychology, an hour and a half on poetry (improving my tanka skills), with diversions into the Ukraine, bowels and baking have not been a complete waste, and I still have plans for the future, even if that future does feature an abrupt conclusion when I reach the end of stage 8 and fall off.
Flowers – detail
Photos are from April 2020. Not sure why now, probably some that were sent to Julia for Mother’s Day.
“Success in this stage will lead to the virtue of wisdom. Wisdom enables a person to look back on their life with a sense of closure and completeness, and also accept death without fear.” May you find wisdom along your journey, Quercus. Remember, “wherever you go there you are”. 🙂
🙂 Part of that wisdom is in accepting what you cannot change.
That’s one link that I wish that I had not followed.
Looking back can only bring pain for most, as hardly any of us have done as well as we could have done. I can remember my mother saying that she thought that she hadn’t been a great success at bringing up her five children We rushed to reassure her that she was wrong, but with the benefit of hindsight, I am not so sure now that she didn’t have a point.
To be fair, the other four seem quite nice. 🙂
It’s comforting to know I am not alone, but sad to think of so many people feeling bad about something we cannot change.
I agree.
Love this post today…anytime you can use a scale where the Kardashians are in it…
They are a very useful indicator . . .
Erickson’s work was actually more insightful – but I’ve forgotten most of it now.
I had a feeling that might be the case – very little survives dumbing down one an internet commentator gets to work on it. 🙂 I am, of course, in that nujmber.
If my were alive now she would probably comment on the relevance of these “Stages” devices. I remember hearing my parents discussing one or the other of us I had four siblings. her comment was “Don’t worry Dear. He’s just going through a stage”. The general feeling is that the concept of ‘going through’ implies and inevitable coming out the other end. I’m not referring to furniture making either.
🙂