Written by: Nabeeha Nafey
If you’re anything like me, then you too must find yourself ever-oscillating between the distinct worlds of STEM and then the eclectic one of imagination. The former is full of gears in machines that turn that help us automate, theories rooted in science that make modern medicine possible, and numbers that are necessary for us to crunch to propel innovation — and our lives — further. Very necessary, indeed! Though, the latter presents us with something just as needed: art, emotion, culture, and expression. The creative sphere allows us to not only create, but consume the smaller details embedded into the world around us. An intake of such content, by proxy, makes us far more thoughtful about our surroundings and introspective about our own lives.
However, there is a reality I must acknowledge. The humanities are far from unimportant. Yet in practice, STEM is more visibly rewarded and celebrated. This isn’t a bad thing; but it’s definitely a reason why so many of us are inclined to pick careers that ride this wave of security and prospect, despite a piece of our hearts always belonging to the world of expression and composition.
One thing I’m reckoning a lot with in college is how I’d like to keep myself immersed in the world of stories, literature, and media in the midst of being a Bachelors of Science candidate. It is beyond easy to get swamped with homework, exams, extracurriculars, and jobs. However, the biggest thing I’ve learned so far in my freshman year is that it’s important to consume intentionally.
Art is a dopamine dealer. When we consume it, we trigger the activation of our brain’s reward system – this is why when you finish a great show or book, you feel all the satisfaction and giddiness you do. It’s for this reason that art is such an integral part of therapies which improve our moods and reduce stress! We thrive on content that makes us happy. But here’s the issue with that: dopamine release is a feedback loop that can very easily overstimulate us. Given the amount of media that algorithms push onto us, we begin to consume compulsively. When we prioritize consuming as much as we can as fast as we can, we redirect our brains to reward immediate gratification.
The bigger problem is how accessible fast-paced media is when there aren’t enough hours in the day. When you’re busy spending long hours studying for difficult exams on chemical kinetics or grinding through discrete math problems sets for your degree, it’s much easier to open up an app and scroll than to sit down with a book. Neither are we able to spend all that much time thinking about what we’ve consumed. And this isn’t even limited to STEM majors — absolutely anyone with a busy life could be plagued by it.
Combined, these issues push us into the trap of cognitive fatigue. When we’re constantly and mindlessly consuming, we don’t have the brainpower to be creative ourselves. A writer can fall into writer’s block because of this. A painter might stop painting. Even if creativity only lives in the way we think, we risk losing that too. And intentional consumption doesn’t just preserve creativity — it helps us improve our own work in STEM!
My advice: instead of consuming what’s pushed onto your timeline, focus on small things with meaning. Listen to a new album with no skips as you take notes. Find a podcast up your alley and listen to it on the walk to class. Dedicate half an hour each evening to write to your heart’s desire. Don’t be afraid to set restrictions on your apps if you think you need to (I know I certainly do). And learn to recognize when you’ve consumed too much and take breaks; I find that boredom is where the best ideas end up coming from.
The more intentionally you consume, the more you train your brain to fall back in love with details. And detail is vital to STEM. The ability to notice patterns, sit with complexity, and think beyond what’s obvious is what separates memorization from mastery. That way, art lives implicitly in every waking moment of your day. It’s not really about needing to consume more; you just need to consume better! That’s part of why I’m choosing to pursue a minor in English — it’s one of the many ways I’m trying to merge my own journey being pre-health with the expressiveness of the humanities.
After feeding our minds carefully, it’s easier to see how much of STEM is rooted in creativity. Writing code is like developing a story you’d like to tell. Trying and failing at lab experiments is troubleshooting until you find the right ending. Designing blueprints for critical machinery requires the same imagination an artist needs.
My point is this — you don’t have to choose one or the other. They don’t exist in binary. We should be able to hold both the creative existence and the universe of STEM in both hands. Our world, and the people building it, need both. It needs analysts who understand human emotion. Doctors who dissect their novels. Engineers who have a flair for beauty. How else can we live in a world that’s not black and white, but instead full of color?
And whatever you do, make sure it’s for yourself. You’re not trying to prove anything to anybody by showing that you can do both. There’s no pressure on you to write something that’ll win the Newbery Prize, or come up with a plot as intricate as the one in your favorite epic series. When we approach our pursuits with the mindset that whatever we produce must be perfect, it strips out the joy from the journey that is the creative process. Anything you build is always something that comes from nothing, and that in itself is a testament to the fact that it’s worth it to stay engaged with everything.
So in a society that rewards output, protect your interior world too! Gears may turn the world forward, but it’s our imaginations that really give it direction.
Featured Image Caption: The “left-brained” vs. “right-brained” argument is actually a neurological hoax – our brains are hardwired to be logical and creative!