Want to be a psychologist? Seek the unknown and get lost!
Posted January 18, 2016
By Melissa Stiksma
As a psychology student and relentless traveler, I believe in the impact of your environment and the benefit of changing it often. It just isn’t September until I’m on a bustling campus surrounded by freshmen with backpacks full of books. Recently starting in the clinical program of George Mason University, I identify with that freshmen naiveté. Moving from Florida to D.C. as a brash 23 year old has been an exhilarating but overwhelming change. Blazers replace floral flip flops. My change in environment makes me wonder: do the people make the place or does the place make the person? Will your university change you? Or did you choose your school because you knew you’d fit in? I argue that the answer lies in an interaction. And the more you interact with the world – the more you can start to understand it.
Wanderlust, a longing to explore, has given me more than a good story about meeting Lorde at a rock music festival in Japan. My incessant thirst for novel contexts, people, and adventure has influenced me as a human being and as a researcher; the two intrinsically intertwined. Traveling gives me previously unfathomable perspective in a field that necessitates reflection. For future psychologists of the world, I advise this: seek a world larger than your own. Get comfortable with being uncomfortable and expose yourself….just not literally. That’s illegal.
Take, for example, my time in Peru. Traveling alone with a backpack and no itinerary for three weeks affects you; and I found that where ever you are, that’s where you’re supposed to be. Although I sought solitude, I found comfort in easy friends from the ubiquitous microcosm of hostels. Humans are social creatures with social needs – even the lonest of wolves and the blackest of sheep have a desire to belong. Moving throughout Peru, I celebrated Mother’s Day in an orphanage, rode an oversized pony led by a 13 year old up a remote mountain, sand-boarded desert dunes, white-water rafted for $20, climbed Machu Picchu mountain, and zip-lined near Tarantula Lodge (which lived up to its name). Although I cannot list these on a CV, they undoubtedly contribute to who I am as a person and thus as a scientist. I gave into a higher power and allowed fear to succumb me – akin to running analyses after lengthy data collection. As a graduate student I feel reckless but as a traveler, relatively cautious. Put yourself in varying contexts so you can see the world with different lenses bringing a much fuller perspective to your life and work.
But you don’t have to go to Peru or Japan to do this! Stop using the broke college student excuse. Now is the time to explore and be okay with getting lost. Buy a cheap bus ticket to see a small town’s quirky claim to fame (e.g., Captain Kirk’s future birthplace in Riverside, IA). Decide to drive only turning left for two hours, find the best local grub, and ask someone what they’re passionate about. Volunteer (to teach English) overseas and you often only have to pay for your flight. There are loads of books and blogs about how to travel on a budget (like this, this , and this), the trick is caring enough to actually do it. Even easier, you can gain perspective just by switching up your routine or becoming a tourist in your own town:
- Use Yelp to try a new food/dish once a week (instead of the usual at Panera Bread)
- Sunday farmer’s market (instead of a grocery store)
- Talk to people (instead of headphones)
- Go for a walk between classes (instead of Facebook)
- Study at a local coffee shop (instead of Dunkin Donuts)
- Drive home using a different route (or get lost unfailingly like I do)
- Throw your books in a bag and read at a dog park (instead of that same corner of the library)
- Book a night in a hostel and swap stories with a traveler (instead of Netflix at home alone)
- Visit a museum or common tourist attraction (instead of Netflix at home alone)
- Ask for directions to the best bagel shop (instead of Netflix at home alone…don’t lie to me)
People tend to stick with what they know (or acclimate like an ink drop in water). As explorers of the human mind we need to become more aggressive in our pursuit of the unknown. I fear a world of Starbucks armchair psychologists, ‘authorities’ of human behavior, making generalizations about a world they have yet to experience. So I repeat my advice to future psychologists: get lost and explore with no hypotheses. Become an anthropologist immersed in unfamiliar surroundings. Albeit fleeting and biased, a blurry snapshot from a different vantage might present meaningful connections about the beautiful world we live in.
So travel far and wide. In books and theories, music and time, and through people and their stories. Because at the end of the day, we are only a collection of our stories and the people we tell them to. Go forth into the real world, find your plot-twist, and tell me about it when you get home.
Bio
Melissa Stiksma is a doctoral student in the clinical program at George Mason University. Her research interests focus on the intersection of positive and clinical psychology, especially as it relates to social anxiety. Through her career Melissa hopes to make a positive impact in people's lives via psychological research and real-world application. To learn more about Melissa visit http://melissastiksma.weebly.com/
