How do you go about finding the right career path? It’s definitely not as straightforward as the board game “Careers,” where you can readily achieve goals of fame, happiness, and money.
It’s challenging because we generally seek work that is enjoyable, a good fit for our interests and aptitude, and also a way to earn a living. We may initially be driven by something we love to do, but this is not necessarily the most practical road to take. Knowing yourself is the first step. If you’re lucky enough to have a particular talent, this can streamline the decision-making process. If you’re faced with more than one desired career choice, however, you may get caught up weighing the pros and cons. The balancing act of left-brain or right-brain dominance is not always clear cut. Having both strong analytical and creative sides that we wish to cultivate requires a considerable amount of contemplation and self-reflection. Is it possible to find a happy medium? Can we satisfy both the head and the heart?
At first glance, art and science appear to be separate disciplines. Closer examination reveals a significant connection between the two. Both art and science attempt to make sense of the world. In fact, science and art are quite similar, since the goals and motivations are essentially equivalent. The methods used to communicate and describe this vision may differ, but the need for order and predictability are shared between the two (Featherstone, 2016).
Both art and science require persistence, imagination, and creativity based on a set of theoretical principles. The language of art employs various elements that evoke analysis and critical thinking. Experimentation is necessary for both art and science in order to delve into innovation and discovery. Psychology utilizes the scientific method to study the relationship between mental processes and human behavior. The mind itself cannot be observed without an empirical foundation, but art is fundamentally a visual creation for the eye. Art and science are intertwined in their exploration of the human condition and connections to human emotion.
The relationship between art and science has always intrigued me because of my interest and passion in both fields. The trajectory of my career in healthcare ranged from health education to clinical research. This vocation fed my scientific curiosity and eagerness to help others in a meaningful way. Throughout this occupation, however, a preoccupation with the arts remained, particularly dance. I was left with a nagging feeling of unfulfilled professional goals. Eventually, I earned a Ph.D. in psychology, with a specialization in health psychology. In order to blend the performing arts with a scientific perspective, my dissertation research focused on disordered eating attitudes and behaviors in college dance majors. I’m currently developing a wellness coaching practice with an emphasis on working with the dance population.
Reconciling the competition between art and science can be a complex process that takes time to unravel. To gain additional perspective on the issue of overlapping and/or dual career choices, I spoke with Dr. Lucy Kaplansky. She has had a successful career as both a singer/songwriter and a clinical psychologist.
Alice Schluger: What initially inspired you to choose a career in music?
Lucy Kaplansky: I’ve loved singing and playing music since I was a little girl. My dad, a mathematician, was a terrific piano player and there was a lot of music in the house. I always loved to sing and I started messing around on piano, then guitar, around age 10, accompanying myself as I sang my favorite pop songs. So, I think I always knew I wanted to sing as a career. Then I started to perform at my high school, and people thought I had real talent. It was probably then that I thought maybe I could actually do this and have some success.
A.S.: Which factors led to your decision to transition to a career in clinical psychology at that point in your life?
L.K.: I moved to New York City to sing in the folk music scene when I was 18 and by age 21, I was already experiencing some real success, including a stellar review in the New York Times. It’s a long story, but suffice it to say that just when I was getting real affirmation I panicked. Turns out I was too neurotically conflicted to let myself pursue what I really wanted, and I told myself I didn’t actually want it. I was in therapy at the time and I thought being a therapist would be interesting. So, I quit music and went back to school, eventually getting a doctorate in clinical psychology. It took me many years, and a change to a different therapist, to figure out that I had been lying to myself, and at that point, I was already a psychologist. I realized I had to return to music, which was the scariest decision I’ve ever made. But I’ve never looked back.
A.S. How has your interest in both the arts and sciences influenced your work in terms of creativity, knowledge, style, and implementation?
L.K. I think I have very different parts of my brain that work together in interesting ways. I’m very much a linear, logical thinker (math is in my blood after all) but I also have some innate musical talent, and some kind of ability to write songs, which I don’t experience in any way as a linear process. Somehow these very different sides work together to form me, an artist who can produce art and also perform on stage and engage audiences. I don’t really understand much more about it than that. I can say that being a psychotherapist, for the time that I did it, was not something that felt natural or comfortable for me, it was too murky and amorphous a process. I probably would have been much more comfortable being a neuropsychologist, for instance, something more based in science, as I saw it. I will add that I was telling a friend, who is a talented painter, how excruciatingly hard writing songs is for me, much harder than other types of linear tasks, which feel like they come naturally to me (like taking care of the family accounting for instance), and he said maybe it’s good that it’s so hard for me, maybe that’s part of why I’m good at it. So, there’s that.
Also, I think that in training to be a psychologist, and in my own experience in psychoanalysis, I became far more insightful and wise about people and their motivations, which has informed every aspect of how I look at the world, which in turn has affected my writing.
A.S. What advice would you give to others about choosing a career path in either or both of these disciplines?
L.K. When someone wants to try to be a singer/songwriter professionally and asks me for advice, I usually say you need to find out if you’re really good at it. The truth is that you WILL find out because you’ll get unmistakable feedback from audiences and venue promoters if you’re really good. That’s just the way it works. You’ll know. So, unless you’re getting clear signs that you’ve got real talent, you might not want to pursue it. There are too many extremely talented people out there struggling to get anywhere, it would just be too hard to compete.
I don’t have much advice for people who want to be psychologists/psychotherapists, because I really didn’t work in the field for very long, so I don’t have a great sense of how to be a success at it. But, it seems pretty clear that you have to love sitting in a room with someone who’s suffering, and you have to feel comfortable with a lot of murkiness and ambiguity and figuring it out as you go. I just wasn’t comfortable with that.
A.S. Research indicates that music is not merely a luxury, but also a necessity. We need to provide our brains with a higher level of thinking. What are your thoughts about this statement as it relates to your dual careers in music and psychology?
L.K. I really believe that’s true. I’m not familiar with the research, but speaking from my own experience listening to music or going to shows, there’s no question that music engages us in a way that’s fundamentally different than most other experiences. It FEELS different. It moves us in ways other experiences can’t. It makes us feel alive in a whole different way.
Lucy Kaplansky moved from Chicago to New York City at age 18 where she pursued a singing career in the folk music scene. In 1983, she enrolled in Yeshiva University where she obtained a doctorate in clinical psychology. She declined a record company offer at that time and established a private clinical psychology practice in addition to working as a staff psychologist at New York Hospital. By the 1990s, Lucy was drawn back to her music career and subsequently gave up her psychology practice. She has since released 10 critically acclaimed CDs on Red House Records and has twice been awarded best Pop Album of the year by the Association for Independent Music.
Lucy’s comments remind us that music and science use logic and mathematical formulas for exploration and inspiration. Her final thoughts about passion and engagement are colorful threads that weave together as we choose a career path. It’s all about the exciting journey of soul-searching and self-discovery. Sometimes we have to venture out of our comfort zones to find our way home. Whether you’re an artist or scientist at the core, or a combination of the two, fulfillment in our hearts and minds is necessary to attain the ultimate success.
In the words of Ludwig van Beethoven, "only art and science make us suspect the existence of life to a higher level, and maybe also instill hope thereof."
References
Featherstone, D. (2016, March 16). Why art and science are more related than you think. Forbes Magazine. Retrieved from: https://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2016/03/16/why-art-and-science-are-m…
