What does it mean to be a psychologist?
Thinking about consciousness and its consequences and looking for a calisthenics exercise for my mind in this transition season where little occupation abounds and where my studies have not yet begun, I have questioned myself about my profession. This year I will count 25 years since I graduated as a Psychologist and would like to share, as far as I can, what it means for me today to walk this path and study mental processes.
Of course, the passage of all this time has served to clarify things but also to confuse them. I believe that this is one of the consequences of my profession: I tend to think as holistically as possible: adopt the perspective of the other, reason from what is happening in my environment and that generally, causes me great confusion and not a few headaches. In certain circumstances, what is gratifying and exalting to one individual is the opposite to other, in fact, with the passage of time it may be that for the same individual what was previously precious, may lose its tinsel and become banal or even repulsive. As Borges said, if you give me enough time, I'm sure will contradict myself.
The thing is that studying The Mind like that, with CAPITAL LETTERS, does not exist. We study as many minds (small or large, but all unique) as we can. We are discovering that that which makes them wonderful contains a little bit of uniqueness and another of generality, a little bit of common agreement and another of unreachable separation, a little bit of significant self and another of common diffusion in the mass.
I believe that the work of the psychologist should always begin with a brutal candor and assertiveness in recognizing that we know very little, almost nothing, about the deep labyrinths of the psyche.
One tries, of course, to look for those common characteristics that become fragments of the smoking mirror of Tezcatlipoca, in which another part of the being is glimpsed. Then perhaps I can feel that I already know who I am and what I want and, some days later, the wind changes, someone arrives or someone leaves, one wins or loses and what was a fearsome invading army becomes just a reflection and surprises me thinking: "How did that nonsense keep me so distressed? Perspective; every pain and joy was relevant at the time.
That is another difficulty of the trade, as one studies the mind in the present and analyzes the picture taken, the relentless time goes on and this luminary of the individual's psyche and topology continues to transform and mutate so that if one delays too long in the analysis, a new picture may already be needed and one may have to start all over again. According to Ortega y Gasset, man is himself and his circumstance. Perhaps one will have to be satisfied with pointing out trajectories and patterns. Just as when observing a primitive and hallucinatory dance, to identify a single step could be little less than impossible, if we look with openness at the set of movements it could reveal its eloquent cadence and filter us a better idea of the dancers and their essence.
And all this without mentioning the changes that all human contact provokes in myself. It is impossible to link and not change. It is impossible to accompany without linking... and it would be terrible to do so.
That makes me think of another conflict: it is impossible not to influence. There are no impartial observers, we are all on the stage. Just like the electrons of quantum physics, the therapist, the coach, the counselor generates a gravitational breath in his client about which the latter reacts, empathizes, and behaves according to his fantasies and beliefs about the therapist. Our mass and its gravity always affect the decisions and perceptions of others. Hopefully we will find a way to make it better.
Then things get even more complicated if we think about the intrinsic connection that unites us all, which makes us correlate and react according to the one as a person and in his moment but, at the same time and with great energy, also with respect to what the group in which we are located wants and desires, activates or deactivates in us. Never is more true the rogerian maxim that tells us that "I am not but in the other". I am in the other and for the other and the other is in me and for me; everything is connected with everything.
And all this without even having spoken of the spirit and its currents of influence…
Maybe I haven't answered the question of what it means to be a psychologist, but I hope I have at least put some of its complexities on the table. I'm from a generation that understood the phenomenon of psychology from the social sciences. I know there are other angles, but this is the one I know.
Does being a psychologist make me happier or unhappier? I don't know. Deep down there is a vocation and an intrigue, a constant and attractive curiosity that drives me to ask and want to understand. In the end, I am a man that looks through the lock of time, wants to open the door; an observer that wants to understand, not to be an arbiter or judge, but to enter the field and join, to enter the circle and dance with the tribe.
The psychologist is perhaps that dolphin that swims on the surface of the ocean, romps, breathes with himself and with others, and then descends to the abysses of the unconscious sea in search of the pearl of wisdom to help him understand. Perhaps this is the closest thing, the psychologist is the one who wants to understand.
Finally, I would like to share what happened to me many years ago. During my last years of high school, a bad counselor, after playing with tests and interviews, told me in a dismissive way that the only reason I wanted to dedicate myself to this science was to try to understand myself. Today, more than 30 years later, I can say with total frankness that yes: I want to be a psychologist to understand myself a little better. To recognize the links that unite me with my fellows, to explore the edges and their consequences, to put at the service of my travel companions what I can know and, hopefully, to find a question worth answering.
This is for me the path of the psychologist: that of a diver who joins the other and comes down to explore together with him, as far as the line allows, the unconscious seas, their tides and wrecks, their waves and treasures. We are rescuing small fragments with which we conform this beautiful mosaic that is life itself.
With love,
Francisco Monterrubio