As I learned in class this year, psychology is the broad study of people’s behaviour and their mental processes. Growing up, I took various philosophy classes in school and learned to tie the concepts of philosophy and psychology to one another. To me, psychology was the explanation, while philosophy was the guide.
In philosophy class, I learned about how the word’s etymology stems from the Greek “philo” and “sophia,” translating to “love of wisdom.” Wisdom seemed to be the key to traversing the ups and downs of adolescence as I entered it. I longed for the guide of philosophy almost as deeply as I wished how to perfectly explain all the processes that resulted in my behaviours, however unfavourable or inexplicable they could be around the tumultuous ages of 11, 12, or 13.
I always felt drawn to concepts of what society denotes as “self-help” in today’s world: A largely commercialized mode of self-application of psychological principles. I’d check out self-help books from my school’s middle- and high-school library as a fourth and fifth grader to try and rationalize the world around me and grip onto some sense of normalcy. But the issue was always that I couldn’t quite figure out what the “right” answers were: What I needed to say, feel, or do in each situation that guaranteed the most preferable outcome, that would help the most people, or that would lead to most social or emotional success.
I always felt that I needed to do good, make the right decisions in such a way that would somehow affirm my own inner success of character or growth. In a strange way, while boasting in a naive fashion to my elementary school friends about how cool it was to stand out, there was nothing I wanted more than to feel like I fit and belonged. This was my psychology.
The belonging that I desired consisted of expectations that delved far deeper than what music, books, and films aimed towards my age demographic suggested, and this is why I could never recognize how deeply insecure I really was. For years, I’d tell people about how I had no insecurity before adolescence took a hold of me. But I can see now, with the help of psychology, how untrue this was. I was always this way.
My seventh-grade teacher often explained philosophy, in its most basic form, to be a quest for truth. The truth is that my mind has always been in a battle between worry over what psychology might teach me about myself and who philosophy should teach me to be. The truth is, I always wanted to be my own psychologist, my own greatest philosopher, and the leader of my own quest, and hold all the truth I needed within myself. Perhaps it is too idealistic to assume so; but then again, it may be my own failures that push me to concede. I can’t argue for the justice or righteousness of this inner conflict, but just that it is a part of my psyche.
My mind has always been in a battle between worry over what psychology might teach me about myself and who philosophy should teach me to be
This year, an impactful classroom moment took place in a discussion of cognitive dissonance. It took me days to realize that I think I’ve been in a state of cognitive dissonance for my entire life.
A highly aroused state caused by the conflict between what feels they ought to feel, do, say, or even be; this is the best psychological term to describe all that I’ve written about in the last few paragraphs, and what’s helped me arrive to the realizations I’ve described thus far. But I wonder if it’s possible for cognitive dissonance to be more than just a transitory psychological state, but rather a permanent state of one’s psychology.
I hope not, but the truth that psychology presents doesn’t care about what potential truths my philosophies have to offer. It seems, in fact, that the cold truth of psychology, perhaps best exemplified through Freud’s sometimes questionable conclusions, presents truth without philosophy entirely.
This is why I don’t know if I agree with psychology.
This may sound like a funny statement, given that psychology is a study and not a proposition. But I believe it is a proposition, a proposition that we study, dissect, and attempt to explain over and over and over again. Yet this constant study has one fundamental flaw: It lacks empathy.
My year as a high school psychology student has shown me that psychology proposes that what I think doesn’t matter as much as why I think it. In my heart, I am a lover of wisdom, and because of this, I believe that psychology cannot hold any real answers without philosophy.
If I depended solely on psychology, it would be futile in accomplishing holistic self-understanding. If I depended solely on philosophy, I’d get lost in a maze of “should” and “could” hypotheticals. And what I’ve learned is that I’d rather take cognitive dissonance than death by such a limitation. Because if there’s anything that a “one-or-the-other” mentality lacks, it’s truth.
Deya Nurani is a high school student based in the US.
