When I first started medical school, I was fascinated by the science. I liked how it challenged me to think. But once I began practicing medicine as a pediatrician, I realized medicine was much more than science, it was an art.  Just being good at learning the science doesn’t make you a good clinician who can look at a patient as a whole and make a good differential diagnosis.

All good physicians eventually embrace the idea that medicine is an art. And, as with any art, we must keep learning, progressing, developing and perfecting it. There is a reason it is called “practicing medicine.”  No doctor knows it all.

When I became a father, I was struck by some parallels. Raising a child is not an act we perform, but an art we practice. There are skills that need to be developed, that aren’t always inherent or intuitive for each person.  A physician can’t merely place his or her hands on a patient and heal them, as much as they may wish that were true. A parent can’t assume that just because he or she has had a child, they’re going to be great parents.

Parenting and medicine are both arts. Neither are static and both evolve constantly.   Illness and patients change and alter a doctor’s course of action. Children develop and change, requiring parents to be flexible and reassess or redirect. A good physician must listen to their patient and respond appropriately to changes in their condition. A good parent has to listen to their children and respond to their developmental path as well.

Doctors and parents alike need to practice their art. They have to think about what they want to accomplish, set goals, and set them in motion.

That is why it is so important to develop and continue to perfect your own parenting personality.  Know yourself and your child. Both of you are developing and progressing. Practice the art of parenting with an eye focused on love, respect and positivity. Realize no parent is perfect, yet always be willing to learn and practice. Be creative and open to new ideas. Admit your parenting miscues and learn from them. Grow as your child does. Learn together and practice the ART of parenting and not the mere ACT of raising a child.

Good physicians and pediatricians become better and more nuanced as they learn and grow into the Art of Medicine. So, too, do parents become better at understanding not only their children, but themselves as well, as they grow into the Art of Parenting.