Art or Science?
So I'm officially graduated as a Master of Arts in Counseling Psychology. You can tell from the picture to our left...look how happy I am! The most tangible changes to my life (apart from no longer attending MHGS) are 1) the job search, which sucks, and 2) Getting to add the "MA" after my signature at my internship. Being sometimes slightly full of myself, I really enjoy getting to through my "title" to the end of my name. A couple of us at the internship are Masters of Arts, and there are a few who are Masters of Science. So I got to thinking a bit about the idea of counseling as a science vs. counseling as an art.
Obviously, walking out the doors of Mars Hill, I'm going to think of myself much more as an artist in regards to my approach to counseling. Funny thing is, for most of my life I'm much more comfortable in the realm of science. I started college studying chemistry, and still enjoy calculating/planning/organization. Trying to create is infinitely more difficult for me, and within my intern experience I find myself falling back onto the structure and organization of the program, rather than attempting to enter into the creativity that Mars Hill so desperately tried to infuse into me.
I've been reading Care of the Soul (Thomas Moore) lately, and while I have a hard time getting behind all of what he says (that for another place and time) I have been impressed by his hopeful view of the daily struggles we all want to get healed in therapy. Moore seems to believe that depression (think feeling down more than clinical depression), envy, etc. all have a place and value in life and help us to live more soulfully and fully. I like this a lot, but dang I struggle to get there. I fall easily into the medical model that Moore discusses: assess, diagnose, and medicate (through therapy or actual medication). Moore shows a way that really gets artistic (read: makes Jamie uncomfortable) with the emotions and thoughts of the patient. It makes me wish I had a few more years of practicum to have peers (rather than paying clients) to practice this on.
As I am trying to enter this profession (if someone would give me a friggin' job), I hope I can be more of an artist rather than a scientist. In my own therapy, I know that I've appreciated someone approaching me creatively rather than trying to calculate and systematize my mind and emotions. When I try to be creative, I often throw away what I'm working on about 15 minutes in...can't do that with human lives. So maybe I'm gonna have to just try and ride it out. Yikes!
Listening: The Cool Kids, Iron & Wine shows in Seattle, Coldplay's LeftRightLeftRightLeft
Reading: Care of the Soul (Moore), Two Towers (Tolkien), finished How Fiction Works (Wood)
