Psychology

Back in my early years, we used to live with both of my parents in one major town in our country. I am the eldest child in a family of four with one brother and two sisters. My father was working in the social services while my mother was a teacher. We were therefore well financially in the family and my siblings and I would get anything we wished from our parents. I only need to request from my parents and it would be granted. This shaped me into a very careless and lazy person.

This condition went on from my childhood to the time that I was in high school. I grew up believing that money is always there and the problem is how to spend and not where to get money. I would be given some money by my parents while going to school and I would spend all of it even before I get back home. The most surprising thing is that my parents never questioned me on my spending of the money.

By the time I was getting out of high school, I was worse as I would not think of anything productive but to just stay and use my parents money. I was too careless and too irresponsible to an extent that my father would not introduce me into his life of business. Everything changed one morning when we were told that there will be a hurricane and therefore we have to vacate our houses. By then my father had retired and was working in a business which he had opened.  When the hurricane came, it swept practically everything that my father had. It was unfortunate that my father had used all his savings that he had to expand the business and therefore he did not have money by the time of the hurricane. My father was so devastated because he had invested all the money into the business which was now in ruins.

Just like Piaget describes in discontinuity model, life happens to have some stages which happen to be qualitative in nature. I can term this as my point of discontinuity in my life because from that time, money became scare at our place because my mothers business would not support the family. I would no longer get what I wanted as the little money that was there would be used to support the family and cater for the family expenses. Initially I was very frustrated and would not understand why my father was not giving me the money that I wanted. After some time, I realized that the truth is that I have always been too lazy and it is time that I should wake up and work.  I searched for a job as I too wanted to support my family where I would. I got the job and would save the little money that I would get and give it to my father. Over time, I became responsible and I am thankful to this incident as it helped to change me into a responsible person.

After some time, my father was compensated by the insurance company and because I was already responsible, he requested me to assist him in the business. I gladly accepted the offer and worked with him until the time I joined the university. Were it not for this single incident that changed our family for some time, perhaps I would have grown up to be a reckless and irresponsible person. This discontinuity in the lavish lifestyle that I was earlier used to is the one that helped me to become a responsible person that I am today.