Self-Assessment: Biopsychosocial-Spiritual Evolution

Introduction

We as people go about life through what we believe, and we build upon our beliefs with our surroundings. As we grow up, our experiences shape who we are. Life helps us develop strengths and get through our challenges day by day.

Body

Biological

From the biological perspective, we look at the sections of biology that affect our health. We examine the needs of living, such as physical and mental health. Basic needs include food, shelter, and all things that we need to be healthy. Growing up, I suffered from obesity up until the age of fifteen. I am nineteen years old at the moment, and my journey through feeling comfortable in my own skin and my health has been a wonderful journey. Growing up, everyone I knew called me fat; my family and friends all pointed out my body size and how big I was. By the age of fifteen, I started my fitness journey and started to care more about my health and what went on in my body.

I stopped eating unhealthy, and within two years, I lost 50 pounds. I felt really good about myself, and being successful in losing weight made me realize how motivated I can be as long as I push myself. It is my strength. Once I became healthier, I got comments from the same people, only this time they were compliments. I have relatives who are diagnosed with cholesterol, diabetes, and heart problems. Most of my family members tend to be on the overweight side of the BMI scale, and I made a decision to care more about my health. Though I did get through my weight loss and hit my goal, the comments made by the people I love will forever be in my head. This journey is so beautiful from my perspective because I made all the negative into something positive, and I did it by myself.

Psychological

From the psychological perspective, we’re looking at the past events of the person, attitudes, thoughts, mental abilities, who they are, and any medication they have previously taken. This will help us see the perspective of their mental health, and this can differ with the events in your life or over time. This perspective is mental. Events that can affect your state of mind can be traumatic, or they can be accomplishments that lead to positive thoughts.

As I was younger, I have always been seen as a very energetic and happy child. I identified myself the same way. I loved to laugh and be happy in general. I know that life is not always happy, but I have always tried to make the best out of any situation. Around the time I gained a lot of weight, I did feel like I was unhappy, which really hurt my state of mind. I would identify as an overweight person, and since I was so uncomfortable, I let my weight define me. I was not acknowledging all that I was. I let people’s comments and my own feelings get the best of me. I was always upset, and eventually, it started taking a bad role in my life.

Then, around my older teenage years, I realized I made the decision to feel this way, and my appearance could be fixed by a simple diet and exercise, so that is what I did. I lost the weight, and I felt so much better about myself. I started to identify myself as strong and accomplished. This was all because I chose to make a change for the positive and a better state of mind. In my experience, it was very traumatic for my family and friends to call me fat and ugly, so I chose to change myself just to prove to myself how strong I really am. I turned a traumatic experience into an accomplishment, and that is something I am proud of.

The one thing I am not proud of is what I did about a year ago. I became obsessed with being what society calls beautiful and being skinny. I received compliments left and right about how good I looked and how beautiful I was. I let everything get to my head, and I allowed myself to stop eating and keep exercising. I dropped to an unhealthy weight, but I was receiving so many great comments about how good I looked, and that made me develop an eating disorder. I thought what I was doing was normal because of the feedback I received from my family and friends. I started getting attention for my beauty, and I let that get to my head. I became obsessed with my looks, and now I know that that is not good. I am slowly recovering from my eating disorder. I struggle with my body image, and that has not changed; I am just learning to love myself as everyone is, but I know that the mindset of being beautiful comes from more than just being a low weight. It comes from happiness and self-love, regardless of body image.

Socio-cultural

In socio-cultural, this is when you regard the friends, family members, environment and surroundings, the social environment, political point of view around them, and even the economic environment. The use of a genogram is used to provide a family systemic overview of relationships, and it can also help examine the issue rationally that contributes to the problem at hand.

My social environment is great; I feel like I can make friends in any setting. I have my work friends, my school friends, and my friends who are practically family. One pattern that I have noticed with all of them is that I talk to everyone, but I stay close to only one person. I would say I am more of a one-best-friend person, meaning I do not like to be close to many people. Everyone that I see on a regular basis always comments on my personality, saying how I am always smiling or laughing.

To my family, I am seen as a person who is strong and responsible. I go to school and work all the time. I just want to set a good example for my younger brothers because I am the second oldest child out of six. As for my parents, they have full trust in me. Regardless of the situation, they believe I will make a rational decision that is best for my circumstances. All in all, my social environment is very supportive and very healthy. I know I am not alone, and that is something that I am very thankful for.

Economically and politically, my environment is controversial. Economically, I was raised by two hard-working parents who support six children and are field workers. I was raised to be humble and earn what I have today. For these reasons, ever since I was a senior in high school, I started working, and slowly, by the age of 18, I stopped asking my parents for money. In regards to my political environment, most of my environment claims to be democrats, but I consider myself a conservative because I was raised very traditional, and I strongly believe in the catholic religion. All my surroundings and socio-cultural environment are very healthy. There are always bad sides to people, but luckily, I have experienced mostly all the good in what I am surrounded by.

Spiritual

In the spiritual assessment, we consider who we are as ourselves and a sense of why we are in this world for our purpose, and our religion and personal values. As I mentioned earlier, I was raised and still am catholic. I believe in prayer and in God. I believe that everything that is happening is meant to happen, and I can go through it all so long as I keep believing in God and never stop praying. God makes me stronger every day, and because of him, I am who I am: a strong woman who will never stop fighting for what she wants in life.

Theory of social learning to your developmental history

Erving Goffman’s theory explains how we go through life with standards. He explains how we create a persona that we would like to become based on what others think is right. I believe this theory relates to me in ways that make me who I am today. I would say this because I did act based on who was around me. For example, around my parents, I am the responsible one, but around my friends, I am more carefree. I changed based on what is acceptable and what I want others to see me as.

I want my parents to trust me and be proud of me; therefore, I act upon their wishes and know that I have to act according to what is acceptable to them. On the other hand, while I spend time with my friends, I know that I can have more fun and have a good time because it is a carefree area, and I want my friends to see me as a person they have a good time with. Be respectful with adults and have fun around kids. In both scenarios, I act as if I want the people around me to see me, which is what I learned as I grew up.

Theory of personality development

Sigmund Freud’s theory tells parents have a great impact on how children develop as they grow older. They do influence our lives as we do what we see is right and what is accepted. For example, at the age of three, if I danced and people laughed, I would keep doing it because I would think it would be funny. There, I developed a sense of humor. We are raised by our parents to be a certain way that is right in their eyes, and they take action for forgiveness. Every year, I feel as if I gain more sense of self-worth, which will eventually lead me to look and feel better because I am more secure in who I am and my personality.Developmental milestone or psychological task (Erikson psychosocial s tages)

Infancy (age 0-1)

Infancy is the stage we are said to be a point where we learn to trust. At this age, we start developing an attachment to the person who is raising us, and we can trust them or decide not to. As a child, I was taken care of by my mother, as my father worked. Then, at night, I was cared for by my dad. I feel like I trusted them as my parents, and they both loved me the same.

Toddler (age 1-2)

In the toddler stage, we are said to develop a sense of choice and doubt. This can also be known as the autonomy stage, which allows us to have the capacity to make decisions independently, to serve as one’s own source of emotional strength, and to manage one’s life tasks without depending on others for assistance. An important developmental task of adolescence. In this stage of my life, I learned to walk and talk, but I also learned to make choices. I would make funny faces at foods I disliked and ask for more of the foods I liked. I learned to talk and make choices for myself.

Preschool (age 3-5)

Initiative and guilt are found in the preschool stage of life. I successfully went through this stage as I gained the power and opportunity to act or take charge before others do. I went to preschool and started kindergarten at this age. I learned what school was, took action, and took care of my responsibilities. Also, I learned great. I learned what getting in trouble was and what being held accountable for my actions felt like.

School (age 5-12)

Inferiority and industry are what is learned at the age of five through twelve. At this age, I remember feeling low, like I was at a lower-status place, with school and at home. At this age, I believed I knew what was good for me, but growing up, I saw that I was wrong. I also learned to do hard work as I was starting to feel like studying could help me with my classes and tests. In this stage of life, we want to know what’s best, but we really do not.

Adolescent (age 12-18)

This stage is where I hit my milestone. Here, we learn identity and go through role confusion, which is exactly what I went through. I always cared for school and bettering myself with a brighter future. Though I am confident of my abilities, I still wanted to be looked at as beautiful, and this is where my eating disorder started. I wanted to just be thin and eat anything, but that was not possible. In this stage, I learned about who I am today and my desires.

Conclusion

A really big external influencer would be my best friend, Arcelia. She always believed in me and always would let me know my worth. I know I can be beautiful and smart with reminders, my best friend tells me often. It is a good influence when you are being complemented while improving, and it is being noticed.

References

1. “Mindset: The New Psychology of Success” by Carol S. Dweck
2. “StrengthsFinder 2.0” by Tom Rath
3. “The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People: Powerful Lessons in Personal Change” by Stephen R. Covey