Discover psychology to be better people

July 19, 2018

About two thousand people came in the afternoon of Wednesday, July 11th to the Pabellón Cuba to participate in the presentation (and sale) of the book "Discovering Psychology". It is a first edition in printed text of the first season of "Doing and Thinking Psychology", a television program that with very wide and positive reception was broadcast through the Universidad para Todos space, on the Educational Channel, about three years ago.

The Salón de Mayo turned out to be too small to accommodate the immense group of Cuban men and women who not only wanted to buy the book (and about 1,200 succeeded), but also wanted to participate in the panel that some of the book's authors organized for its presentation, and which very kindly the Provincial Center of the Book of Havana -with Dulce and Ramón leading the way- welcomed with enthusiasm.

No matter how much the forecasts suggested broad participation, the numbers of interested parties and sales far exceeded even the most optimistic expectations. Dozens of interested people were unable to access the presentation and sales area; hundreds of people were unable to buy the book because it sold out. And it is quite possible that they will not be able to buy it for now, since the volume of published copies is much lower than the recognizable demand.

Why did so many people gather to buy a book and participate in a close encounter with the authors?

To answer this question, let us lay out some important elements.

As already mentioned, the book is a written version of some of the programs from the first season of Doing and Thinking Psychology, a television series by Universidad para Todos, which achieved a large television audience. Already in some of the programs I had promised to do everything possible to publish the book. I had the complicity of GECYT (a Knowledge Management and Technology Company of CITMA) and its Editorial Academia.

Editorial Academia, directed by professor Néstor del Prado (whom many know for his writings published on Cubadebate), has produced very good texts in recent years. In fact, in 2016 we together won the Grand Prize of the Reader for the book "Changing the Mindset.... Starting with the Bosses". It is a publishing house that works with great seriousness, commitment, excellence, and manages to produce very well-produced materials.

I made the proposal for "Discovering Psychology" in my capacity as coordinator of the book. I selected the writings that would be included in this first volume. I did the same with the images that accompany the texts, and with the interactive materials in which the reader can go on learning and getting to know themselves.

Then María de los Ángeles Navarro and Alexis Manuel Rodríguez joined in. The first, as a proofreader, adapted the demands of her work to the language specific to psychology, in which some neologisms appear, special expressions, with a specific meaning for the universe of the "psi". Thanks to that coupling, the texts not only read easily and pleasantly, but they maintain their meaning for the discipline.

The book's design work is a strong point, which draws attention and the desire to consume it. The designer, known as 10K (Alexis Manuel Rodríguez Diez cabezas de Armada, hence the 10K), has done excellent work, adapting it to the text, adding design to the book's messages. The overall production is attractive, friendly, suggestive and pleasant. It wins over readers.

The selection of texts was based on several premises. Among them I call attention to three.

First: that they be topics of interest to the population, things that people want to know. Thus, alongside traditionally interesting topics -is psychology a science?, what is personality?, intelligences, emotions- there appear questions that have to do with everyday aspects of the lives of many: the first three years of a child's life, should I take my child to a psychologist?, would psychology help me with my adolescent child?, what does it mean that we resemble our times?

Second: texts that know how to traverse the paths that unite academic knowledge and its pedagogy with popular forms of learning and knowing the world. A language that without losing its scientific rigor is accessible to everyone.

Third: that the pleasure of reading and learning always accompanies readers. When one reads and learns with pleasure, one reads more and learns more.

An element of vital importance is the work of UEB Osvaldo Sánchez, the printing plant whose workers and managers welcomed the project with such care and enthusiasm that they far exceeded everything we assumed. Despite not having the best conditions, the workers in the printing, binding and quality areas worked with such professionalism that the book is, in my judgment, excellent evidence of the good results, of high level, that can be achieved when everyone contributes their part with heart.

In representation of the workers, there in the Salón de Mayo, was the polygrapher worker Ramón Martínez, who received the tribute of all participants.

Something very important, and that in some way includes everything said, is referred to in the first pages, in the presentation:

"For many years, I believe since those early sixties when psychology emerged with new profiles in our country, Cuban psychologists have understood, and put into practice, the idea that the knowledge produced from our discipline should not be the exclusive domain of those of us who are professionals of psychology science and profession. That such knowledge is something so conducive to well-being, to human improvement, if assumed in a coherent and responsible way, that putting it within reach of all people is at the very least of great utility, and moreover, an inescapable duty of our condition as humanist professionals"

Another factor in mobilizing people to "get the book" has to do with the presence of psychologists, maintained for many years, in various radio programs, television programs, in the print media. Suffice it to mention Our Children (some of the authors were protagonists of those memorable programs) or The Triangle of Trust, and it would be false modesty not to mention It's Worth It which for more than 27 years has been by people's side, from the difficult initial months of the Special Period, to the equally complicated current times with tensions in daily life for whose confrontation people appreciate good reflection, good professional advice.

But without a doubt, the most important, and which became evident that Wednesday afternoon in the space known as Art on the Rampa, specially set up within the activities for the hot summer of 2018, is the thirst for knowledge of our people, the Cuban's love of reading and learning, knowing more, being a person with vast knowledge. Because beneath the not always good ways we behave, there is a good heart, a healthy and cultured spirituality, that recognizes and respects knowledge, that sets out to achieve it, and that joins in the attempt to be better people to have a better country.

In keeping with the book, the presentation, participatory and dialogical, was greatly appreciated by the participants. The director of Editorial Academia and great friend, Néstor del Prado, led an attractive contest, in which with creativity and dynamism people who answered motivating questions were rewarded with copies of the book. Especially significant was the participation of the two people with the most accumulated youth, 83 and 88 years old, both with enviable lucidity.

Those who arrived and were able to enter the presentation listened with attention and pleasure to several of the book's main authors. An interactive presentation in which the public and panelists gave themselves the enormous privilege of close human contact, of mutual gratitude -because there is no work until it is validated by its audience, because there is no successful endeavor if it is not recognized and appreciated by those it is aimed at.

There remains now the hope that the book can be republished and reach the hands of many more people who not only demand it, but deserve it. And we authors want to give them the gift that is the privilege of knowing and doing psychology.