My past, present, and future

My Past, Present, and Future Robert Tucker PSY 202 Adult Development and Life Assessment Megan McLaughlin 3 November 2012 I. What was my family like growing up? A. Military family B. Oldest of nine children C. Parents’ divorce and mother’s absence II. Things that I remember about my childhood? A. Going bowling as a family B. Making good friends C. Changing schools a lot due to moving around D. Playing baseball in Japan III. Jobs that I have had? A. Cook at Burger King B. Working at the Post Office IV. My personal, professional goals and academic goals? A. Being a role model to my children B. Making the promotion list on the 1st look C. Making Deans list while earning my college degree My Past, Present, and Future I am thirty seven years old and I never thought I would have to write a paper about my childhood and my adulthood. I will present a brief description on how I moved around the world when I was young due to being a military child. How I graduated from a school that was overseas. The very first job that I had once I graduated from High School and before I joined the United States Army was working at Burger King as a food service member. I will present this paper on the theories that I learned during this class on Adulthood theories. I grew up in a military family. My dad was in the United States Air Force for 20 years. I was born in England. After being there for a three years my father was stationed in Florida. While in Florida, I remember playing soccer as a child. The team I played for ended up and playing at the city championship game. I was only seven years old then. When I turned eight my father was again sent to Japan. While in Japan, I played baseball for two different teams. The one team I played for was for little league only when we played fellow American teams. The other team I played for we traveled all over Japan playing Japanese children. It was a lot of fun playing against other cultures and learning about them and their sportsmanship. The first time I played against them, I never saw a curve ball thrown before. Not only did I have to learn how to play baseball, but I also learned good sportsmanship. I was playing baseball seven days a week during my summer months. Also in Japan my family was involved in the bowling league that was on the military base. I had the opportunity to meet some professional bowlers when I was thirteen. The reason why I got to meet them was during the winter season we had a tournament in which I won. After our time in Japan, my father was stationed in England once again. While in England, I attended Junior High and also High School. When I was sixteen my parents got divorce. I took a lot on my shoulders during this time frame, because my father was working a lot of hours and I also had a job in the summer time. The money I was making was going to my dad for bills. When I turned seventeen my dad got re-married while he was stationed in England. My step mom had five kids of her own. During my childhood I went to many schools. I ended up going to four different high schools during my high school life. The jobs I have had as a teenager was very crucial for me. I first started off working at the post office during high school. I was working there five days a week. It was one of the classes that I had to take. It was only two hours a day but it showed the importance of being dedicated to your job and the responsibility that you have to have when working in a demanding job. After High School graduation, I than got a job working at Burger King. While Working at Burger King, I had many jobs inside the corporation. I had to learn on how to work as a team member and also work on customer service. I also had to learn on how to control my emotions. While working in a customer service job, the one thing that we don’t realize no matter how mad the customer gets you, you have to be the strong one and be professional. I was offered a leadership position while I was working at Burger King. I decided that Burger King was not for me. I was only nineteen and I was on my way to being a manager in the corporation before I reached the age of twenty one. One thing that some people don’t realize about growing up as a child is very difficult because you are moving every three to four years. According to Long “ Children whose parents have careers in the military must experience separations, moves, and new beginnings regularly. ” (As cited in Growing up military.  Psychology Today,  20, 30-32, Long P, 1986.) I joined the United States Army in March of 2004. This was the first time that I was away from home. While in the Army I have been moved everywhere you can imagine. I have been stationed in Korea twice, Germany, Ft. Hood, Texas, Ft. Campbell, Ky., and Ft. Lee, Va. As a young child I learned on how to cope with moving to different places. So when it was time for to move on to different places, I knew on how to do things and how to show my family on how to do things before we move. My personal goal in life is to be role model to my children. I want my children to look at me as an inspiring person. I want them to be better than me. Not only am I fathering to them, but I want them to come to me whenever they have a problem. Since going to college, my children have looked at me and asked me why I waited so long to go back to school. I told them that I didn’t plan of going to school after high school and the only thing I wanted to do was have fun with my life. Once I sat down and thought about things, I decided to go to college and continue my education. I have realized that you can have fun with life and go to college at the same time. My professional goal for my job is to get promoted to the next rank on the first look. Getting promoted in the Army is always a competition with other soldiers within the Army. I believe that I am on the right path to get promoted on the first look. I have had almost every job title that I can have for my next rank. I have also worked outside of my career field and do other jobs. Now my job is considered a special assignment. Having a special assignment is an incentive to have to get promoted to the next rank. My education goal for me to is finish my degree plan and make the Dean’s list. I want to accomplish this because nobody in my family has done it. Another reason behind me finishing my degree plan is that out of the kids in my family, I will be the only one to finish college. My brothers and sisters have dropped out of college. The reason behind the Dean’s list is that during high school, I just cared about passing the class. The only thing I wanted to do is play sports and hang out with my friends. If I accomplish this goal, my children would look at me and say if dad can make the Dean’s list then I also know that I can make the honor roll in school and do just as well as my father did. In conclusion, I have analyzed my past, present, and future. If you look at my past, present, and future you can see how my past reflects on my present and how my present reflects on my future. The knowledge that I have learned about myself will help me to continue my education. I have also learned a lot about myself from looking back on my past, assessing my present and I now know what to do and what I want for myself in the future. Writing this paper has taught me that even though I am thirty-seven years college was/is and always has been an option for me. Traveling as I did when I was younger allowed me to open up to new things and adjust to new surroundings and lifestyles. Working at Burger King before joining the military allowed me to realize that if I didn’t set myself up for success then I would fail and failure is not an option for me. Being in college has taught me many new things and I am now ready to pass those well taught and successfully learned lessons on to my own children. I now look forward to my future and I no longer dwell on my past. In my eyes I have become a successful man and I am very proud of the man, husband and father that I have become. Reference Long, P. (1986, Growing up military, Psychology Today, 20, 30-32. Retrieved from http://search. proquest. com/docview/214479801? accountid= 32521 Witt, G. A., & Mossler, R. A. (2010). Adult Development and Life Assessment. Retrieved from https://content. ashford. edu/AUPSY202. 10. 1