Personal Landscape Project

Essay
Olivia Cozzetto
HSP:301

Who Am I?
To answer the question who am I?, I must look at the influences and factors from my
family, loved ones and different systems (small and large) that have had major influences in my
microsystem and other layers in the ecological theory. Identifying my values, reactions patterns
and how I react in diverse context as well as pointing out different bifurcation points and the
butterfly effect in my life, I can start to understand how different factors and events effect
myself which in return helps me answer the question of, who am I? As a future human services
professional, the reflection required for this project will help me to recognize how different
influences affect my decision making skills and how I react in certain situations.
Through the process of reflection, I found the interconnectedness of my life. Things
dont just happen in my life like I thought they did, but are determined by multiple elements
affecting my lifes path which I have an active part in. Through the examination of my life using
the required fields which we covered throughout class readings, discussions and lectures, I have
come to better terms to understanding who I am and how past experiences have influenced
that.
Systems and Interconnectedness

A system that has influenced who I am is my high schools organized clubs. Throughout
the four years in my high school, I was involved in almost every club my school offered. Later in
my junior and senior year, I took on more responsibility by gaining positions in the clubs. I was
involved in a wide variety of clubs and held a number of different positions. For example, I was

the president of the humanitarian club my junior and senior year, vice president of the drama
club, founder of the environmental club, president of Science Olympiad, and the senior class
Activities Coordinator. I participated in clubs for a number of different reasons, I had friends
who also participated in the same clubs and I found an interest for the activities and experience
the clubs presented. Another factor that played a part in the amount of clubs I was involved in
was the absence of my high school boyfriend, Justin. We had been dating for two years prior his
graduation from my high school. In my senior year, he started his college education at Western
Washington University. As I reflect back to my decision to participate in so many clubs, I think it
had to do with the fact that I was missing my boyfriend and tried to hide my fears of a long
distance relationship by creating a busy schedule filled with clubs.
As I reflect back on all the club activities I was involved with I cant help but think why I
chose to take so much responsibility being an officer in so many clubs. I remember struggling to
keep up with my AP classes and homework plus working an after school job and finding time for
my family, boyfriend and friends. The need to seem successful in everything I was doing was
the main motivator for pushing myself in high school. I wanted to seem like I had everything
under control but when really I was struggling to stay on top of my life. I identify this as a
weakness of mine.
My high school provided me with the opportunity to be an involved student which
directly impacted my identity. My identity in high school was the girl who literally did
everything. I mean this in two ways-I participated in a lot of different school and club activities.
I was in drama for three years yet held a position in ASB. In a way, I had lots of different

identities in my high school from being a drama geek to AP student to hippie tree hugger. The
second way was the fact that I always was the one who ended up doing everything for
everyone else. If someone couldnt make the sashes for homecoming court, I would stay up late
making them; if someone couldnt organize the upcoming club meeting, I would do it. People
relied on me to always be there to finish what they started. I became the mother of the
school and took care of everything. I believe this really affected my growth as a person and
influenced my larger system.
Having other students rely on me in my high school made me develop the idea that I
couldnt make mistakes since I was under the pressure to meet the exceptions of other
students. I always tried my hardest to keep mistakes minimal. Since I was always the one having
to do things in the end, I stopped asking people for help. With my ability to run many different
clubs, I began to think that I didnt need others and if other people did try to help, they
wouldnt do it right or do it as good as me. Once again, I realize that everyone needs help once
in a while and that its important to be able to ask for help. I struggled with asking for help with
clubs in high school because I felt I could handle it all on my own. In my senior year of high
school, I was so stressed because of the pressure I was feeling to maintain a good GPA and yet
run and organize so many different clubs and activities by myself. In the future as a human
services professional, I could see how my need to control and to be the one doing the planning
could hurt me in the professional work place.
Although I felt pressured being responsible for so many things, I also felt very
accomplished for all I was achieving. I was able to find qualities about myself that I wouldnt
have found without being active in my schools clubs. Through the humanitarian club, I found I

had a passion for helping others and the skills for organizing events and activities, through my
time doing Science Olympiad I became more comfortable interacting with students I wouldnt
have normally mingled with, and through the environmental club I was able to understand
other individuals points of views even if I didnt agree with them. I believe I was able to
development my skills that I will someday use as a human service professional through
managing the clubs at my school.
These skills from high school helped point me the direction of going to college, which
was something not expected in my family. I felt better prepared by having multiple extracurriculum on my resume when applying to colleges. By using Bronfenbrenners ecological
theory to identity different influences for higher education, my family in my microsystem didnt
expect me to go to college although my macrosystem was filled with my community and school
which valued and held beliefs in higher education. The overarching values and attitude from my
community influenced me more than my family at the microsystem. The influences and
experiences from high school impacted my decision to apply to colleges. A smaller system such
as organized clubs at my high school gave me the skills and experience of working with people
and planning events that influenced me to apply to colleges which shows the
interconnectedness between personal smaller systems and larger systems.
My smaller system helped me understand strengths as a leader in my school clubs and
give me verification that college could be possible for me. The idea that I was able to handle AP
classes and lead clubs all while working a job made me believe in myself which impacted my
application to Western Washington University. My smaller system also impacted my decision to
go into the human services major like the wide variety of clubs I was involved with in high

school; I came to college with a wide variety of interest in different study of fields. I entered
WWU believing I was going in the environmental science major but quickly found out sciences
and labs werent for me, I then went into being interested in education, then communication,
and then finally settled into human services. The majority of the reason for picking human
services is because I felt I had the most experience in the major because of volunteering and
helping others through the clubs in my high school.
My involvement in high school with the clubs impacted my decision to go to college and
choose human services as my major. This shows how my smaller system of high school affected
my larger system at WWU.

Values, Reaction Pattern and Strengths and Limitations in a Diverse Context

My values in life have come from family, friends and personal experiences that I have
been through. I value strong, loving and open relationships with my family and friends as well
as new people I meet. I value meeting new acquaintances and creating new friendships. These
values come from my experience of having a loving and caring family and friend circle while
growing up. I always felt loved from my family as well as my mothers friends and as I grew up
from my friends as well. I value being a hard worker and putting 100% into your work. This
value comes from my first job. My first job was working for my boyfriends fathers local
business in my community; I was given the job because a position was open and because I was
dating the owners son. I probably worked harder than I needed too to prove to others and
myself that I wasnt just given the job at the request of my boyfriend but because I am a hard

worker. I also value experiencing new experiences in my life. Within my twenty something
years of living, I have had a handful of new experiences such as traveling, meeting new people
and eating new food. I want to seek new experiences throughout my life because I value the
knowledge and awareness that comes with new experiences. My values arrive from my past
experience and are influenced by my family and friends. My values contribute to who I am.
One reaction pattern that Ive been recognizing through personal interactions and my
history of club involvement is my need to control others. This reaction pattern goes back to my
involvement with clubs in my high school; since I ended up having to do things for others I
developed the need to just do things for others when it isnt needed or necessary. For example,
if friends are over at my apartment, I will wait on them by hand and foot. The need to control
others and situations creates a lot of stress and anxiety for me. I can get very worked up over
very small details that matter to no one but me. I feel the need to control situations because
then I feel better about how the situation will turn out knowing that I can control some aspects
of it. I know this is a very bad quality to have as a human services professional especially
because you sometimes have no control over situations with a clients and even control over the
clients actions. My reaction pattern to control people and situations is something I identify as a
quality I need to work on before becoming a human services professional.
My limitations and strengths in a diverse context were brought to my attention in class
while working on the Diversity Interaction Inventory worksheet. The worksheet was a way to
gage your experience of interacting and knowing people of different races, gender, social class
and religious affiliation. I did poorly on some aspects of the worksheet. Growing up in a small
town, I was limited in the number of interactions with people of different races or social class.

My high school probably had around ten students that did not identity as white. Now as a
student at WWU which is much bigger than my community, I have had the chance to interact
with people of different ethnicity and races much more frequently. The system of my high
school restricted my interaction with different races but now through WWU I have broadened
my interactions. A limitation in a diverse context is my lack of experiences interacting with
different races. With my limitation, I might not act as comfortable or as engaged with people
who identify as other races because of my limited amount of interaction and knowledge.
I scored fairly well in the sexual orientation and religious aspect of the worksheet; since
grown up with a childhood friend who identifies as a gay male and living a very religious
community. A strength of mine in a diverse context is my lack of religion. Growing up in a
nonreligious household but in a very religious community, I did not practice any religion and
there for have not been influenced by only one religion unlike many people are. When
interacting with people who are very religious, I interact in a way of interest and curiosity of
their religion instead of opposing their beliefs or only agreeing with them. With my lack of
knowledge about religion, Ive been able to carry on great conversations with people about
their beliefs without holding any biases of my own. My limitations and strength in diverse
settings are very impacted with my upbringing and hometown community.

Ecological Systems Theory

My parents divorce has significantly impacted my whole being. Growing up, I thought it
was normal to spend the majority of the time with your mother and visit your father on the
weekends. Using Bronfenbrenners Ecological theory that we discussed in class, I will reflect on

my parents divorce and how that has influenced my ecological systems. From the required
reading by Bronfenbrenner (1994), the ecological system theory is a combination of different
interconnected layers; the smallest layer is the microsystem and has the most direct contact in
the individuals every day environment. The next layer is the mesosystem which includes
interactions taking place in the microsystem, then the circle expands to the exosystem which
involves less direct contact with the individual yet impacts the individual through the
connection of two or more factors then this leads to the macrosystem that shows the overall
values, social norms, and customs of the culture (Bronfenbrenner, 1994). The overlapping layer
is the chronosystem, which looks at the timing of events in the individuals life and the impact it
has.
When viewing the event of my parents divorce in my ecological system, I am going to
start with the boarder layers first to show how the impact affected me at a personal level at the
microsystem. The timing of my parents divorce I feel had the most impact to my development
and the structure of my family. From the Brofenbenners Ecological Theory article (1994), the
chronosystem includes any major changes in an individuals environment which then
environment affects the individual. My parents divorce when I was four years old is a major
life changing event that changed my environment drastically. The timing of the divorce is major
factor to consider when looking at my ecological system. Since I was four years old when my
father left my family, I didnt fully understand what was happening. I was experiencing a new
family structure which included a very unstable family; my mother was pregnant with her
fourth child and she was trying to handle three kids from ages ten to four. Being four years old,
I didnt understand why my father couldnt live with us nor could I grasp the complications a

divorce would present in my family and my life. My older sister was ten years old when my
parents divorced; her experience is much different than mine because of the timing of the
divorce and her age when it happened. She remembers my father cheating on my mother, and
my mother begging my father not to leave her while she was pregnant with three children to
raise; because of my age I do not remember this. Since my sister was older when the divorce
happened, her relationship with my father is very different than mine and she struggles to trust
male figures which shows how Bronfenbrenners ecological theory at the chronosystem
involving my parents divorce and the timing it happened had a different effect for myself and
my sister.
My parents divorce also influenced my exosystem. The exosystem is filled with indirect
influences that affect the life of the individual. Both sides of my family are catholic and while I
dont practice the religion, my grandparents on both sides are very big believers. My fathers
family is from Italy and brought the value of family, pride and religion with them when they
moved to the states. After my father cheated on my mother, my fathers side of the family
stopped all communication with my mother and father as well as my brother and sisters.
Because of my Grandfathers microsystem which had Italian roots of religion and family, my
Grandpa was furious with my father who cheated on my mother and wanted a divorce. My
parents divorce caused my extended and immediate family to break apart. My childhood went
from spending every Sunday and holiday at my Grandmas to being disregarded as out of the
family. My mother and my siblings lost our extended family with my parents divorce which
caused lacking support systems in my life and a family crisis. Growing up, my extended family
never contacted myself or my family; I literally grew up not knowing who half my family was.

This made me unaware of my family history and made me question the importance of extended
family. In my exosystem, there is a lacking linkage between my immediate family and extended
family because of my parents divorce.
At the personal layer of the microsystem, my family is still at the center of it. My
parents decision to divorce affects me every day. I still do not have a healthy relationship with
my fathers side of the family. My parents divorce at the microsystem level affected my role in
the family. My mother was very strong during the process of the divorce but struggled to keep
up with four growing kids and since I was still young and spent most of my time at home, I
became my mothers helper for caring for my younger sister. I starting feeding, changing, and
watching over my sister while at a young age. My younger sister and I have a very strong
relationship now days because of my influence in her life. I development mothering skills to
help my mother care for my sister and when my sister grew up she began to imitate everything
I did. She looked up to me and I took care of her. I feel Ive grown up being the mother to my
sister, especially when we visited my father on weekends. My father had no desire to care for
my baby sister so I took up the responsibility for caring for her. I developed into a more caring
person from the experience of caring for my sister because of my parents divorce.
Overall my ecological system is much different from some who didnt have a divorce in
their family and even differs from my older sister because of the timing of the divorce. My
ecological system reflects how my parents divorce affected my relationship with my extended
family and my role in the family. My role changed from being the youngest to having to take
care of my younger sister which then caused me to develop into a caring yet sometimes

overbearing mother type of figure which builds into my controlling reaction pattern Ive
mentioned.
Chaos Theory
The chaos theory as discussed in class lecture is a complex dynamic system used to
understand patterns, changes and connections. The article, Butterflies and Bifurcations: Can
Chaos Theory Contribute to Our Understanding of Family System? examined how the chaos
theory can help understand events that seem random and unpredictable. From the article, all
events, even if they seem totally random, have some form of structure and influence from the
environment. Two controlling forces in the chaos theory are bifurcations points and the
butterfly effect. Bifurcation points can be viewed as the decision to choose a path when the
road splits into two. The butterfly effect is smaller, indirect forces that can make big changes in
life. By using the chaos theory, I can understand different changes in my life and examine how
interconnected small events and life decisions are.
I identified the decision to care for my grandma Elaine as a bifurcation point in my life.
My grandma Elaine is my fathers mother, while growing up I did not have a very good
relationship with because of my parents divorce which I mentioned when reflecting on the
ecological theory. The bifurcation point happened when I choose to be a part of my grandmas
life again. It wasnt so much of her decision to let me in her life again but because of her old age
I took the opportunity to start to get to know a lady I never knew while growing up. The
opportunity came up when my Aunt called me to see if I would be interested in caring for my
grandma a few days a week during the summer of my freshmen and sophomore year of college.

I could have said no, yet I didnt because I understood my family needed my help and because I
wanted to build a relationship with my grandma.
I started taking care of my grandma four days a week in the summer. To the rest of my
immediate family my grandma was seen as a scary and mean old lady, but after having the
chance to get to know her I have developed a pleasant relationship with her. By caring for my
grandma, I also found out that I enjoyed that type of work. I realized I had the patience and the
ability to care of elders.
As I reflect, the decision to start caring for my grandma shows what type of person I am.
My aunt also asked both my sisters to help out with my Grandma, yet both of my sisters
declined the offer. From my experience of caring for my younger sister, I was already
accustomed to taking care of people. I knew I could have said no but I felt I had an obligation to
my family to pitch in for caring for my grandma.
The bifurcation point of caring for my grandma directed me in the path of human
services. I felt good about myself when caring for my grandma. I seemed to the right skills and
ability to help elders which focused me I entered the human services major with the knowledge
and experience of caretaking which pushes my interest in the field towards elder care.
The butterfly effect is like the ripple effect. It starts out with just one small occurrence
but keeps making more and more ripples until the change is comprehensive and brought to
attention. The butterfly effect in my life is my brothers influence in my higher education. My
brother, who is four years older than me impacted my life when he dropped out of college. His

influence didnt make me choose a path like a bifurcation point, but influenced me in smaller
ways.
My big brother was my hero. He is funny, very smart and loving. While growing up, my
brother made many mistakes involving drugs and alcohol abuse. His mistakes distressed my
family and mother. I often found my brother on drugs after coming home very late and I would
confront his choices. My relationship with my brother at this point in my life was very bad, I was
too young to see that my brother was severely hurting and depressed but only saw him as a
drug user. At the time he left for Evergreen University, he was struggling with depression and
suicide. This is the beginning influence of my butterfly effect.
My brothers depression caused him to drop out of college after two months. The
change, people and environment of the college had been too much for my brother. My mother
reacted very poorly in the situation. She denied the fact that my brother was struggling and
needed help but blamed his depression on his transition to college. This impacted my
perception of college-as a fourteen year old witnessing my brother leave for college relatively
okay and coming back two months later as a different person; I thought his college experience
had changed him for the worst. Ive come to terms to understanding the pain and pressures my
brother was feeling that caused his depression and that it wasnt because of his education at
college.
My brother was the first person in my life and my family to attend college. Both my
parents never went and they never talked about college as a future for me. My brother is
probably one of the most intelligence people I know. I compared myself scholarly and mentally

to my brother. He was much better at school than I am and he still couldnt get through college.
For a while I thought because my brother couldnt make it through college, there would be no
way for me to either.
This idea changed when I started getting into clubs. As Ive mentioned before, the
organized clubs at my high school gave me experience and confidence to believe I could make it
in college. My idea of college changed when I started researching and talking to my teachers in
my junior and senior year. From thinking college changed my brother to understanding all the
opportunities I could receive by going; I started applying to different colleges.
As I reflect on the influence from my brother, he caused a ripple in my life that started
me to think about colleges, even if the first thoughts were negative he effected my decision to
attend WWU.
Authentic Self
To address the question how to become authentic in my personal life and my
professional career, I first must answer how I see myself. I see myself able to communicate with
most people but the degree of authenticity changes depending on my relationship with them. I
can talk endless hours with close friends and be my true self but I might feel uncomfortable
talking to newly met individuals/strangers and not be my true self. I see the correlation
between the type of relationship I have with people and how authentic I act. I wish I could be
authentic in each conversation I have but often I hold back comments, questions and my true
self because I am afraid to be judged or seen in a bad light. I feel I struggle with being my
authentic self in a lot of situations, for example I act much different when interacting with my

boyfriends family even though Ive know them for years. Along with the fear of being judged, I
feel I dont have enough confidence to present my true self in every situation. For one, it takes
a lot of energy to be my authentic self and I feel I still am developing my true self every day.
Through reflection of my authentic self, I feel I need to work on my confidence in situations
where I might not feel the most comfortable interacting with people and I need to break the
fear of being judged.
Being authentic and your true self is important in the human services field. I hope to
present myself in the field as an understanding and open person to come talk to. Since I
understand how it feels to be judged by others, I hope to present myself in unjudging manner. I
hope to make clients feel welcome and free to talk about anything with me. I hope to present
myself in an unbiased way. I will probably hear a lot of things that will shock and mystify me
from my clients, but I think its important to withhold any bias feelings from my clients and to
focus on them not myself.
My authenticity still needs work to be able to portray my true self in every situation.
Through reflection and experiencing new experiences and realizing my limitations in a diverse
context which I discussed earlier, I will hopefully be able to practice being more authentic in my
personal and professional life.
Impact of elements to becoming a Human Services Professional
Through the course of this project, I was able to identify how interconnected my
experiences are. Nothing just happens without different forces and impacts from past
experiences, family and friends. For example, my participation in clubs influenced a lot of

different aspects in my life and before this project I hadnt realized the huge influence of them.
As a human services professional, its important to know your values, reaction pattern and how
you will react in diverse contexts so you can control yourself in difficult situations. By
understanding how the chaos theory works, you can understand your impact in other peoples
lives and help clients make the best of bifurcation points. The ecological system helps
understand that in order to help clients you cant just look at the microsystem but need to look
at the whole ecological system and take in count for different factors. By understanding how
much influence my parents divorce had on my development as well as my family role, I can
better understand myself. By reflecting how the chaos theory has impacted my life, I can see all
the small factors that I think dont matter, but actually have some type of influence. Through
realizing that I am not always a representation of my authentic self, I am more conscious of my
actions and how I will interact with clients.
Through the reflection of my past experiences and family influence, I have a better
sense and understanding of how to answer the question, who am I?

Sources
Bronfenbrenner, U. (1994) Ecological models of human development. In International
Encclopedia of Education, Vol.3,2nd. Ed. Oxford:Elsevier. Reprinted in: Gauvian, M. &
Cole, M.(Eds), Readings on the development of children, 2nd ED. (1993, pp.37-43). NY.
Freeman.
Ward, Margaret. (1995). Butterflies and Bifurcations: Can Chaos Theory Contribute to Our
Understanding of FamilySystems?. Journal of Marriage and Family, Vol. 57, No. 3, pp.
629-638. http://www.jstor.org/stable/353918