Psychology final: a look at me and my personality development over the last 5 years

With a five year time line, I'm staring at my Junior year in high school. Over those few five years I have seen myself grow more than I thought I ever would or could. If you had asked me five years ago where I thought I would be as a person, I probably couldn't have even imagined being who I am today. I used to be a people pleaser, a person who dropped everything I wanted to do to make others happy and a person known to hide behind her writing journals. From that I have become a stronger, more confident and outgoing female. Though, I didn't have much of a choice in the outgoing part of that.
After high school, I moved away from my small hometown in Oregon that I had been in for eighteen years, and decided that my destination was Las Vegas, Nevada. I decided on this location because of college. I was a dance major at University of Nevada, Las Vegas. With being miles upon miles away from anyone I knew, I didn't have much of an option of becoming more outgoing: either be a hermit or get to know people. The latter of the two sounded more fun. By the time I left Las Vegas, I had more friends then I knew.

I ended up leaving UNLV five months after starting due to an injury, this is where I learned how strong of a person I am. With being a dance major, an injury takes you out of the running so I had to quit college and move back to Oregon. Before my injury, though, I had to deal with very harsh teachers. They were constantly tearing me down and telling me that I couldn't dance, then after my injury I heard that they thought I probably did it on purpose. It was really heart breaking and tore me apart emotionally. Once I got back to Oregon and got back on my feet, I started dancing again and ended up landing a few dance positions in shows and even some dance jobs for teaching. This not only built up my confidence, but made me realize how strong I really am because I didn't give up on what I wanted to do, and I didn't let others of higher authority keep me down.

I feel like a lot of things helped develop my personality. Where I grew up is a very sheltered place. Usually if you grow up here, you don't leave because it just becomes this comfort zone. This culture that I grew up in, is a very racist and judgmental culture, and I know that altered my personality because I saw how much these assumptions hurt others. I didn't want to do that. So I opened my heart and my mind, I try to take each person for who they are rather than judge them by skin, age, sex or sexual orientation.

My family showed me right from wrong, plus coping skills. With my family, religion is very much tied. My godmother is a huge part of my life since she is also my grandmother. She has helped me learn right from wrong according to the Bible, but I had a hard learning and growing experience when I told her that I wasn't going to be baptized Catholic like her. I think experiences, whether mine or ones I've witnessed, have been what affected my personality development the most.

Though I have a lot of negative moments in my life that have probably altered my trust in people or made me skeptical at times, I can't say that I would change any of them. Even the negative “episodes of life”, make me who I am and I'm proud of who I am. I am stronger than I thought I ever could be, more confident than I have ever been and happier with myself than I think a lot of people my age are with themselves. I've lost loved ones, lost friends, been in a major car accident that altered me a lot, moved multiple times and seen love destroyed, but all of it has added and mixed together to make me, me. I wouldn't want to change that for anything, and I have no want to change any of it either.

Motivations and motivation theories

The theories of motivation are instinct, incentive, drive, arousal and humanistic. Each theory is based on different personalities. A person can be driven by their motivation or even lack there of. For me, I am driven by my humanistic motivation the most. This motivation is also seen as Maslow's hierarchy of needs. This means that my motivation lays in basic needs to the need to fulfill my personal potential. Knowing that I did my best or better, is enough to drive and motivate me to do whatever it is I need to do.

Other than humanistic motivation, I think the other one I agree with most is the theory brought by Henry Murray. His theory also deals with human needs, but more in response to other things like past experiences and interaction. Being driven by individual needs is a very common motivation. Motivation to drive careful to avoid harm, and motivation to find a significant other for affection and sex. I think that most people see them as life goals and expectations rather than motivations. It has become common that people feel the need to get married, because “everyone is doing it”, but really its an instinct and, in a sense, a way of survival.

Out of the motivations, I can't seem to bring myself to fully believe in the intimacy motivation. Though I know people want and almost crave warmth and love, I wouldn't see how this would motivate people in any way other than to jump into a relationship. The want for a relationship can motivate people to do certain things like clean themselves up so they look more presentable and attractive to the opposite sex, but I do not think that intimacy is a drive for people do actually better their lives.
Though different theories can affect different people in different ways and each motivation can deal with certain aspect of life, but I think I stand strongly next to the motivations that deal with life, rather than just aspects of life. 

I know this isn't really about life, but I've been feeling unmotivated lately, and last week's class work was on motivation. So writing this really helped me realize what I need to focus on.