Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s five stages of grief. Sigmund Freud’s five stages of psychosexual development. Lawrence Kohlberg’s six stages of moral development. The urge to compress the complexities of life into neat, tidy stages is irresistible…and has very little to do with reality.
Those stage theories reflected a time when most people marched through life predictably: marrying at an early age; then having children when young; then work, work, work; then maybe a midlife crisis; then retirement; then death. Those ‘passages’ theories evaporated with changing social and economic conditions that blew the predictability of our lives to hell.
Debunking Psychological Stages
Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s five stages of grief. Sigmund Freud’s five stages of psychosexual development. Lawrence Kohlberg’s six stages of moral development. The urge to compress the complexities of life into neat, tidy stages is irresistible…and has very little to do with reality.