It's the Saturday before intern year is about to begin. Everyone keeps asking: "Are you excited?!" What do you say? "No" (while thinking, OMG what am I doing, can I do this, how is this even possible) "Yes" (I can't wait to take on more responsibility than I've ever had before). The real answer is some combination between excitement and fear. I am trying to convince myself to stay on the positive side of the rollercoaster of emotions I think I (and all of my fellow interns-to-be) have been feeling recently. The rollercoaster between, "I can do this" and "OMG, I'm going to be found out as a failure."
Recently, someone asked me why I wanted to become a physician. How easy it is to forget after 4 years of undergraduate, 4 years of working and 4 long years of medical school. Why did I want to do it? I recently attended an integrative medicine rotation in Arizona and one of the take-home messages was: "keep finding the meaning in your work" and that meaning will continually change. How interesting it is that your meaning, your focus changes all the time. When you look for it - it keeps popping up. I am reading a wonderful book " Cutting for stone" and the book makes reference to physicians propensity to forget about comforting the patient and caring for the patients' being. That was my initial purpose for going into medicine. Along the way, my focus has picked up more meaning: encouraging healthy lifestyles, encouraging people to eat well, feed their bodies, eat from the earth, move, be active. But, essentially, I want to care for people - and sometimes that doesn't mean giving pills.
My goals for this year:
1. stay positive, remember that I am blessed to be in my position. I am so lucky to be able to hear peoples' stories, to be charged with gathering essential information for medical decision making.
2. Continue to live a healthy lifestyle: which leads to more specific goals:
3. Run one race a month
4. Do something for my soul on my one day off a week: run, yoga, dance class, ride.
5. Remember to stay involved in other peoples' lives.
6. Chart what I learn: post a line a day: something I learned.
Recently, someone asked me why I wanted to become a physician. How easy it is to forget after 4 years of undergraduate, 4 years of working and 4 long years of medical school. Why did I want to do it? I recently attended an integrative medicine rotation in Arizona and one of the take-home messages was: "keep finding the meaning in your work" and that meaning will continually change. How interesting it is that your meaning, your focus changes all the time. When you look for it - it keeps popping up. I am reading a wonderful book " Cutting for stone" and the book makes reference to physicians propensity to forget about comforting the patient and caring for the patients' being. That was my initial purpose for going into medicine. Along the way, my focus has picked up more meaning: encouraging healthy lifestyles, encouraging people to eat well, feed their bodies, eat from the earth, move, be active. But, essentially, I want to care for people - and sometimes that doesn't mean giving pills.
My goals for this year:
1. stay positive, remember that I am blessed to be in my position. I am so lucky to be able to hear peoples' stories, to be charged with gathering essential information for medical decision making.
2. Continue to live a healthy lifestyle: which leads to more specific goals:
3. Run one race a month
4. Do something for my soul on my one day off a week: run, yoga, dance class, ride.
5. Remember to stay involved in other peoples' lives.
6. Chart what I learn: post a line a day: something I learned.
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