More on my theory

Last post I wrote about a theory I have concerning my decision to pursue a career in science. I have decided that there's more to the story.

After rediscovering my interest in reading fiction, I have been devouring novels, as of late. I just finished reading "A Reliable Wife" by Robert Goolrick. It is a wonderful read, but what really struck me was the way in which his words appeal so strongly to the senses. He manages to describe people and landscapes and, yes, even food, with utter sensuality. That got me thinking.

Given that starvation numbs the senses, of course I lost an interest in reading when I had anorexia! Even the most eloquent writing could not appeal to my senses and coax me out of my anorexic stupor. I remember thinking, what would motivate people to read novels? Also, I could not, for the life of me, understand how reading could have been one of my greatest joys. That is because the words fell on dead ears...and eyes and nose, etc.

Now that I am fully fed and the healthiest I have been in years, I get it. I understand the appeal of great fiction, and I understand why I could not enjoy it when I was anorexic. I understand that science was attractive to me because it required me using the part of my brain that was still functioning. Reading seemed pointless and inane; science had a point and made sense to me. I only had to focus on data and facts, and I could be perfectly numb doing it. Reading and writing required me to be alive.

A theory

I have been working on a theory in these last few days involving my decision to major in biology and my interest in science. Here it goes.

In high school, I was fully involved in music, so I thought about majoring in music in college. Looking back through some old journals written during that time, I mention in almost every entry how much I want to be a professional musician. I was also interested in all things writing and language...I thought about majoring in English, Linguistics, or even Latin. Then I became anorexic. I stopped playing music, I stopped reading, I stopped writing. In my senior year, I chose to major in biology.

I was always a curious child. I loved the outdoors, and I loved understanding how things worked. But I never liked math or science in school. It involved a kind of thinking that did not come naturally to me. What I really loved was using the creative side of my brain. Almost daily from the age of five, I would write a "book." Then I would proudly give them to my mother. They are full of pictures and endearingly misspelled words, and they read from the back to the front (for some reason, I always stapled on the right side and started writing at the back). I was serious about writing, though. When I got a little older, I would always include an "about the author" section, detailing the other books I had written. I kept track; I thought I was a real author.

So, even from a young age, everyone thought I would do something liberal arts-y. So did I. But anorexia changed everything. And, here, I think, is why:

When I was starving, I hated the sound of music. It made me feel sick to me stomach. And I could not concentrate on reading. It felt like trying to do these things took an overwhelming amount of physical and mental energy that I just did not have. Math and science, however, suddenly got easier. In my last year of high school, I took both calculus and statistics, and I breezed through them. The year before that, I had taken AP Biology, and I did well enough that I exempted 8 hours of college biology. I won't say that any kind of thinking was easy at this time, but analytical thinking was a hell of a lot easier than creative thinking. I had discovered a new part of my brain that had previously felt dormant, while the creative part of brain decided to go into hibernation.

After having my dreams of grad school in science dashed, I have had more than enough time to consider what went wrong. And here is my new revelation: while I respect science and what it has to offer, I don't really like it! Yes, I said it. Thank goodness I didn't go get my PhD in neuroscience. Lately, I have started reading avidly again, and I am writing more. The result? I feel happier! I think that I am rediscovering me.

My theory is that analytical thinking takes less cognitive energy than creative thinking because analytical thinking is more focused, while creative thinking requires more leaps of abstraction. It just seems that when I am feeling especially creative, my mind leaps around a lot. When I am doing science or math, however, I feel like my mind is more restrained while it follows a sequence of methodical steps. Now that I am eating better than ever, I feel more creative, and I don't want to work in a lab--I want to read and write!

Just in case I have ruffled anyone's feathers, I want to say that I do not think science does not require creativity. I just think the day-to-day affair of science is pretty cut-and-dried. Anyway, this is just a loosely-defined theory of mine.