- Erikson introduced the concept of identity as:
The wholeness to be achieved at this stage I have called a sense of inner identity. The young person, in order to experience wholeness, must feel a progressive continuity between that which he has come to be during the long years of childhood and that which he promises to become in the anticipated future; between that which he conceives himself to be and that which he perceives others to see in him and to expect of him.”
- Having a realized sense of identity can be seen as a state of continuity.
- If identity development is facilitating a conversation between the past, present, and future, the goal of development is to find that space of self-continuity where there’s a connection between your past, present, and future selves.