Erikson believed life consisted of 8 developmental stages. We can successfully learn to navigate each stage and attain the virtue associated with the stage or we can continue to struggle there. The last stage is integrity versus despair. Those who navigate this successfully look back on their life and are in accordance with how they spent their life/no regrets. Those who struggle look back on life full of sadness and regrets about what they did or did not do. If you were visited by the ghost of future, would you feel fulfilled, or would this ghost give you a warning about your past and current life choices?
Here are the stages in list form:
Stage 1: Trust vs. Mistrust (Birth to 18 months)
Virtue: Hope
Focus: Developing a sense that the world is a safe and predictable place based on caregiver reliability.
Stage 2: Autonomy vs. Shame and Doubt (18 months to 3 years)
Virtue: Will
Focus: Gaining a sense of personal control over physical skills and independence.
Stage 3: Initiative vs. Guilt (3 to 5 years)
Virtue: Purpose
Focus: Asserting control and power over the environment through planning and social interaction.
Stage 4: Industry vs. Inferiority (5 to 12 years)
Virtue: Competence
Focus: Coping with new social and academic demands to develop a sense of pride in accomplishments.
Stage 5: Identity vs. Role Confusion (12 to 18 years)
Virtue: Fidelity
Focus: Developing a personal identity and a sense of self in the context of social roles.
Stage 6: Intimacy vs. Isolation (18 to 40 years)
Virtue: Love
Focus: Forming intimate, loving relationships with other people.
Stage 7: Generativity vs. Stagnation (40 to 65 years)
Virtue: Care
Focus: Creating or nurturing things that will outlast the individual, often through parenting or contributing to society.
Stage 8: Integrity vs. Despair (65 years to death)
Virtue: Wisdom
Focus: Reflecting on life and feeling a sense of fulfillment and acceptance
© 2026 – SoulSequel
10 responses to “Have you lived the life you wanted, so far?”
Erik Erikson’s coddlemania has made a couple of really dependant, weak, duplicitous generations if you ask me.
@LuftBalloonEyeGouge if you ask me, the issue is childhood trauma and many never successfully navigating the first stage.
@Scarlett2
Navigating the first stage isn’t really possible for the infant.
Caregiver reliability suffers because parenting becomes secondary to other things like hustle culture, because generations have been raised by self motivational speakers to go after a success path of life, instead of a practical one.
Caregiver reliability suffers from diversions like 5 hobbies taking time from child rearing.
Have I lived the life I planned? I have not. The reason for this is that I never, ever planned my life. My life has unfolded around me. The only thing I can think of that even comes close to a “life plan” is that time in the late ’70’s when I thought “I wonder if I’ll still be alive when the year 2000 hits”. I was mildly surprised when I made that milestone.
Now, am I satisfied with the life I’ve lived? Absolutely! My life, up to this point, has had it all. Joy? Check. Despair? Check. Hard times? Check. Euphoria? Check. Satisfaction as well as disappointment? Check and check. Loneliness as well as companionship? You bet. Crippling disaster as well as incredible success? Absolutely. Fear and security. Confusion and clarity. Embarrassment and self confidence. Life has it all. Life is pretty cool. Planning it doesn’t insure avoidance of pitfalls or guarantee satisfaction. This is how I’ve lived MY life. Others might do it differently.
So anyway, I can look back on my life and see the good and bad choices I’ve made. I can see the things I regret doing or saying as well as the things I’m proud of doing and saying. I mean, I’m aware of these things but I don’t dwell on them. “Life is like a box of chocolates…”
@rainmaker Love all of this. I never considered it as an unfolding. That is nice imagery. I guess I decided about a decade ago that I better jump on this life thing. Prior to that I feel I was on autopilot.
I never planned my life. Even growing up, I didn’t know what I wanted to go to school for so I didn’t go.
My job was fulfilling. Exhausting in every way but it was definitely fulfilling. I had plans and goals for my career. I achieved all of them. It involved a lot of struggling and dramatic events but I got there.
My family life has evolved and I have been given the chance to not HAVE to work anymore unless I want to. I’ve given myself a decent 3 years to recover from working, allow myself to reset the switch and give myself time to breathe before focusing on the next chapter
So now I do things that I want to do when I want to do them (except appointments, life revolves around those now). But even still, I have no plans to make any plans (except traveling) anytime soon.
I never got to be Roy Rogers or the Green Hornet, which was my childhood dream. I don’t really plan my life. I have lived life with many stages. I was a new wife and spent my days trying to be the best wife, cook, mother, and keep a clean house. But in spite of being everything to that man, he fell in love with another woman, a nude dancer/cocktail waitress. So, I was single and lived the life of a single mother. I worked as a nude dancer/ topless cocktail waitress. I had a glamorous life. Then an executive married me and I was a trophy wife I lived in heels, fake fingernails, and going to the beauty parlor. I was a soccer-mom, and had housekeepers and gardeners to hire and keep the house in perfect condition. I even owned and ran my own business. I was everything I could be for that man. At 33, I was told that I was too old and my husband left me for a 22 year old. I decided to never wear fake fingernails, ever again. I found myself working in a factory. I worked my way to management. I tried being married to an alcoholic who abused me and beat me. Yeah, well that was a hellish life!!! I got out of that and I was single again. I decided to marry the love of my life. He was a man I had loved since childhood. He was funny and had spent 50 years of my life making me laugh. Marriage to him was one solid comedy act. I had a housecleaning agency and enjoyed being a uniformed maid. I went to law school and worked in my spare time interviewing serial killers on Death Row. I took care of my husband when he got sick and held down a job while caretaking, until he died. I look back on my life and figure that I have done a bit of everything. Then I was single again. I got to know myself better. Then settled down with a man who fits me like a glove. What do I want to be??? I’ve been a little of each phase in my life. Now, with my partner, I’m just being me and enjoying the perks of being retired.
I think we all just try to do the best we can without having to check off boxes. If you can be happy during your life, if you receive love from those who you love, and if you try to be nice, your life will be good.
I think that I would like to see how many push-ups I can do. So far, I can only do 7 push-ups. Out of a box of 12 push-ups, I have to put 5 of them back in the freezer for later.
I don’t honestly believe that anyone can really plan their life out and expect it to happen exactly as they have envisioned, at least not with any definitive accuracy. Plans have a nasty habit of changing due to all kinds of unforeseen circumstances.
For the most part though, my life has been as good as could be expected, within the confines of the circumstances and experiences that have shaped my relative reality. I’ve served in the military, been to war, traveled to exotic and exciting places, met people from diverse cultures, loved multiple women over the years, suffered loss, married and had children, and have been employed in many different occupations. I have known scarcity and abundance of resource, and I have done all of this with the knowledge and understanding that life is temporary. I have vanquished all of my demons, and I am at peace with whatever time I have remaining in this temporary existence only by the grace of my creator.