How Did I Go Through My Adolescence?

After taking this course, I have noticed that our mental statuses are affecting our daily life. The topic that impressed me the most is ‘How did I go through my adolescence?’ and I want to have a reflection on this topic.

According to Erik Erikson’s theory on ‘Stages of psychosocial development’, he stated that there are 8 stages of psychosocial development that characterize development of life. He believed that there are special problems or crisis to be confronted at each stage. The individual can move on to another stage only if the crisis is resolved. I am now 19 years old and at the stage of adolescence. The psychosocial crisis that I have to confront is identity vs. role confusion. The favourable outcome will be an integrated image of oneself as a unique person, which means understanding your own set of personality.

In my past life experience, I have the role confusion too. As I have a twin sister, people always compare me with my sister no matter in school or at home. We studied at the same primary school and many schoolmates cannot identify us. Sometimes I felt like I am the shadow of my sister. What I remember at that time is an incident that happened during the rehearsal of the graduation ceremony. At first, my sister was given the chance to present the honor to the lecturer at the ceremony. However, she was ill one week before the ceremony. Some of the teachers are afraid that she might not be able to present the honor and they found me to be the back-up. Finally, my sister got well soon but I was quite unhappy at that time. No one knows my feeling that I am always the one to be the back-up and people only remember my sister first.

After the graduation, my sister and I studied at different secondary school and I found out that I was quite introvert and started to cover up my own feeling. I seldom share my opinions with my classmates. They always want to understand me more but I act like ‘I am not care about it’. Actually I want to develop the...