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In an age of science and reason, psychology is seen as a default answer to emotional problems. Much like a medical doctor is a natural source of answers to our physical ills, a doctor of the mind seems like a natural solution to problems that aren’t purely physical. But for Christians, does psychology hold the answers we need for what’s bothering us?
My history with psychology
I’ve dealt with depression and suicide since I was about 10 years old. It wasn’t until after I was married that I finally sought modern science to help me deal with something I thought was completely normal. My experience brought me to 3 different experiences:
- A doctor who gave me antidepressants
- A psychologist who tried to teach me coping mechanisms and self-acceptance
- A Christian psychologist who tried to meld modern psychology with God’s word
Although the 3 took vastly different approaches to helping me, their overall goals weren’t terribly different. They asked how I felt, what I experienced, and how I’d like to feel. They were able to assign me a list of disorders based on my responses, then gave whatever treatment they felt was best. These disorders included:
- Dythymia (non-stop depression) due to my brain not making enough of a chemical
- Severe depression
- Borderline Personality Disorder (self-harm, suicidal tendencies, “emptiness”)
- Avoidant Personality Disorder (antisocial due to a feeling of ineptitude and fear of rejection)
I don’t admit all of that as a means of being unique or saying “look how broken I am!” but to show that I’m no stranger to how deeply personal it can be to finally have answers for everything that was “wrong” with me. It’s honestly difficult to write out all of this because there’s a certain stigma to those who are seen as broken. However, this will become very relevant in the next article, and I trust my readers to know that my own story with psychology doesn’t end here.
In college, I ended up taking several psychology classes, purely out of interest and a desire to understand myself and counsel people. I learned all the major practices, including studying things like Freud that are hardly touched today. I even found myself looking to pursue psychotherapy as a profession.
Psychologists are often demonized by people who are either religious, conservative, or come from a background of “manliness” where emotional weakness and needing help are frowned upon. Likewise, this can be a very sensitive topic for other Christians who also have a history with psychology. Perhaps there are some reading this who remember how much worse off they were before finally visiting a psychologist and may have difficulty seeing problems with something that genuinely helped them.
Before we continue, I’d like to encourage that we set aside both kinds of thinking for a moment. It’s important that we, as God’s people, have an objective understanding of both how psychology works and where it may fall short. In the end, our goal is to honor God in what we believe, even if we arrive at very different conclusions at the end of these articles. So let’s look at the goal of psychology, then in the next article we can more closely discuss whether psychology offers what we truly need.
What do psychologists do?
Psychology is a surprisingly broad spectrum with a variety of specialties and approaches. Yet when we think about psychology, we often mix it with psychotherapy, which is the “how to” of putting psychology into practical use in a patient’s life. So as we talk about psychology, it will be in the context of how our understanding of human thought and behavior can help us better understand a person’s emotional or behavioral issues.
Thus, psychologists are primarily in the business of helping people. Whether it’s because of their own history with psychology, or just an innate desire to help others, there are few psychologists who begin such a journey with bad intentions. Psychologists see people who are suffering, yet approach things from both a medical standpoint (especially psychiatrists, who can prescribe mediation) along with an emotional, perhaps even spiritual, approach.
However, the very foundation of psychology is rooted in the natural world. They look at a variety of factors including:
- upbringing
- environment
- how we think about ourselves and others
- How we respond to situations
- Certain biological problems (with the aid and patient-supervision of a doctor or psychiatrist)
And a host of other things that can all affect how we perceive and react to the world. Even though these emotions can’t be objectively studied, psychology is founded on the idea that we are purely natural beings, and thus even our emotions are little more than a chemical response.
So as psychologists spend years with a patient, their overall goal is to find ways to outwit their natural selves, teaching them things like self-affirmation and coping mechanisms. The end goal may not always be to make them better, but at the very least to equip them to live with the hand they were dealt in life.
This is done primarily through analysis. The psychologist will ask a barrage of clarifying questions, seeking to get to the root of the patient and what it is they’re dealing with. They’ll use their training to come to a diagnosis, labeling the patient’s problem from the DSM-5, a ridiculously large book filled with everything psychologists have learned since the days of Freud.
Once a patient knows what’s wrong with them, usually in the form of a disorder, the psychologist can really get to work. Over time, a patient can start learning how to accept themselves, understand their triggers, and start living life the way they’d like to, free from the burden of their disorder. Symptoms may come and go, and for that reason a patient may never be completely done with a psychologist, but instead can become more independent.
Coming up next
We’ve taken a look at both my history with psychology and what the science and practitioners of it seek to do. Stay tuned for my next article where we’ll look at what we need as Christians, and whether psychology can give it to us.
