A personality and a personal course of life: from theory to methodology

Confrontation in social science of two fundamental conceptions of study concerned with an individual and a society - traditional realism (E. Durkheim) and nominalism (M. Weber) - is of conventional nature, since a person concurrently exists in two spaces: individual and social. Personal development proceeds by virtue of the social, i.e. existing in the society and created by it: system of morals, values, norms, and traditions. Primary socialization agents are the next of kin who have a great influence on the formation of the personality. Their appraisals, processed by a person, transform into the personal self-appraisal. But no less important is the fact that the person is also an independent creator of oneself thanks to the existing development vector. The individual component in the personal development appears in the form of social actions that have a purpose and are supposed to be considered, which means compliance with the inner, psychic levels of the personality. Furthermore, it should be mentioned the role and importance of natural instincts and aspiration for self-development and self-perfection, which a person has as early as right after one’s birth. In accordance with the foregoing, the author defines a personal course of life as a way depending on the social (socialization, external conditions of life), the inner (inherited - what is given by nature, and innate - the inner pursuit of self-development and self-improvement) and the experience-based (self-conception that varies according to the experience) components.