Why not Psychology?

It's not one of the most common of the family of "what exactly is the point of your education, anyway?" questions I get asked with obnoxious frequency, but it is the one I've probably had the most difficult answering. It's taken some pointed readings, some difficult self-examination, my desire to get back to writing in this blog, and a job search that has done nothing but question my educational journey (past, present & future) to get me to finally suss out the answer to it.

Not to say I haven't had answers to that question, they've just never been really on point. My freshman year of high school I used to tell my psychology teacher that I "didn't believe in psychology", which was admittedly bullshit (I mostly just didn't want to do the level of work she required for the class); in recent years I've tried to explain to people that my connection to depression and mental health is both intra- and interpersonal; that I didn't ever want to approach the topic from a "clinical" standpoint. But that always felt a little like an excuse for me, though in hindsight one I'm glad I had. See, today my answer is a bit of a synthesis of these two originally insincere ideas; I don't believe in the need for psychology.

Since this is the part of article where I backpedal from my outrageous and extreme position so as to not give the impression that I am some kind of outrageous extremist, I'll clarify that I believe, today, there is a need for therapists and counselors and neuroscientists and the like. I often encourage people I know that there's nothing to fear from these resources; that they can in fact help people, and I still believe that. But here's the thing: why do we need these resources?

My problem is that pills and even therapy are little more than the treatment of symptoms. Yes, therapy can, in some ways, get to the root of the external causes of depression and anxiety disorders; and yes, sometimes these external causes don't even exist, and that depression and anxiety are genuinely biochemical diseases that require nothing more than biochemical treatment. I do still genuinely believe these things. But modern psychology, in what I can only assume is a desire to appear more like a "hard science", is very quickly shifting to explaining things like depression and anxiety as nothing but a biochemical disease, to the point where external influences are being phased out. And I'm not naive enough not to realize how much the pharmaceutical companies are helping guide this transition.

But this isn't a scathing attack on pharmaceutical companies, or even on the institution of psychology, as if there even were some building or group of people one could direct such attacks. I certainly know plenty of people with or pursuing psychology degrees, and I have nothing against them personally or their field of study. This is about why I, Alex, advocate and activist for mental health, am not diving head first into my apparent following as a psychologist. After all, don't I want to help people? Well, I've come to a kind of realization; something I feel like I always knew but never had the guts to come right out and say it. I don't need a degree to be qualified to help people. Also, and here's the real epiphany, neither do you.

I need to preface this next part with a bit of a disclaimer. Therapists are by and large great people, and if you need help, if you really need to talk someone, you could do a lot worse than seeing a counselor. They will help you, and even if they don't, there's always plenty of others out there, and they're usually more than willing to make referrals. Most significantly, I've yet to meet a therapist who didn't genuinely care about people. Oh, I've heard horror stories to the contrary, but I've never seen it myself.

I'm not even saying that there's not any need for therapists. My point is that there shouldn't be; in a perfect world there ought not be therapists. This is not a perfect world where things like depression, grief, anxiety and like don't exist. This is a perfect world where general mental health knowledge is as widespread as general health knowledge; a world where empathy and connection are valued more than independence is. We live in a society that doesn't understand empathy; hell, I consider myself to be pretty empathic, and I doubt I understand it all that well. People simply have trouble fathoming one another. We get so wrapped up in "just being ourselves" that it seems preposterous when the world asks us to consider what it is to be somebody else for a moment. So we can't connect. We can't understand. Combine that lack of understanding with a general ignorance regarding mental health, and you create an atmosphere where it's neither helpful nor even generally safe to talk to others about depression or anxiety. Family members and friends don't know how to act, how to respond, how to help. Usually you're lucky if the things they try simply don't help at all; oftentimes the things that come naturally when trying to help end up doing far more harm than good. In such a world, there's an obvious need for therapists. Who else can you talk to and actually get help from?

But we cannot let ourselves be content with such a world. For starters, who has several hundred dollars to drop every month for an hour a week? And why is one hour per week the only "dosage" of talk medication we allow ourselves? If people just knew how to listen to one another; knew the basic symptoms of depression and anxiety; know what to avoid; know what to ask; then we could be in therapy, for free, any damn time we wanted. And these things aren't especially hard. You just have to be willing to learn them. And you don't need to college degree. Hell, you don't even need a course. I could probably go over the key pointers in a post shorter than this one, and while you wouldn't be nearly as a "qualified" as a registered therapist afterward (I would never claim to be myself), you could be there for someone you love in ways a $100-200 hour-long weekly session with a relative stranger never could be. That's not nothing.

I had a conversation recently with a person. This individual described themselves as not being qualified to understand or assist with someone's mental health status, and their actions did nothing to make me believe they were selling themselves short. They also said that I too was equally unqualified, and while I understand where that sentiment is coming from (again, I would never claim to be as qualified as someone with an actual degree), I have to soundly reject that notion. For starters, I wouldn't have made the obvious mistakes this individual made. It's a sad world where you need a college degree and post-graduate certification to be considered "qualified" enough to listen to a person's problems and give them encouragement and advice. We're not talking about rocket science here, we're talking about people. Yes, you could make the argument that people are generally more complex than rocket science, but on this point we have a bit of a leg up. You see, we're people too.

This has been kind of a stream of consciousness post and for that I apologize. But my point is this: it's on all of us to make this world a better place for the people we care about living with depression, anxiety, or any other mental health disorder. And you certainly don't need a degree for it.