“But when you leave, we will still be here. And if we do not drink tea, we cannot make it to tomorrow.”
- Veteran missionaries, to bright-eyed young missionaries
I just finished reading a book called, Rest: Living in Sabbath Simplicity by Keri Wyatt Kent. It’s a book that runs counter to the go-go-go world that society forces down our throat. It approaches the idea of the Sabbath from several different angles, and highlights the general importance of rest. Overall, moderately readable book, super important message.
I know I’m guilty of worshiping the productivity gods. In college I ran cross country, and took classic pre-med classes like biochemistry and physics. Basically, I was surrounded with overachievers of all kinds, and I thought I worked hard, but I was always blown away by the level of commitment displayed by my peers.
Being surrounded by such an overachieving atmosphere, my competitive side drew me to want gold stars, and push myself more and more. I figured, people would like me more, only if I did more. This tendency caused me to burn out repeatedly, and then go into a vegetable-like coma for days, inefficiently trying to recover.
At the same time, I also noticed that my peers had a frantic aura of not having enough time. I felt like I couldn’t ask them to help me with a problem set, cover one of my shifts at work, or even just chat about my problems. Seeing how inaccessible this made them, I promised myself not to carry that same aura.
So anyways, this desire to be accessible has intrigued me with the idea of Sabbath. Rest raised the important point that Sabbath is not just about rest and veging out, ie - sitting mindlessly in front of the TV for hours on end or sleeping through half the day.
Instead, it’s about separating ourselves from our self-importance, appreciating the people around us, and replenishing ourselves with the energy we need to face the week. I love this concept of intentional recovery, not only so I don’t have to deal with the stress of burnout, but also just so I can be accessible, and generally a nice person.
I think this sort of rest has to include a general mentality of rest, in addition to a set of behaviors.
As far as the mentality goes, it has to be an ongoing - every day and every moment - type of mentality focusing on rest. Simply being appreciative of those few moments in the middle of a busy day that I can take to read the sports section of the paper, or take an extra minute to breathe before I rush out of the shower. I kind of imagine stress being a cumulative thing, where I try not to let it get past a tipping point, so those small moments of reducing my stress level is a huge help.
The set of behaviors is a lot more complicated for me to figure out. As for a starting point, as much as it pains me not to “be productive” for a day, I think it has to start with taking a day off from work. Then, the focus has to move to those life-replenishing things. For me, I need enough alone time to blow off some steam by working out, but also time to reflect on my week by writing, like now.
Anyways, hopefully focusing on rest will help me make it to tomorrow.
from kenAre you thinking about something? Write about it and post it here! Email me! ken.e.noguchi@gmail.com
Last July, I read Gretchen Rubin’s The Happiness Project and her similarly titled blog. In her book, she has a chapter on career growth, the importance of constantly exposing yourself to criticism, and how she was inspired to start her blog. Reading the fear she overcame in starting her own blog was really what tipped me over the edge and put my writing public.
On said blog, she occasionally profiles different writers and asks her the following questions about happiness, to discover more life truths that other people have discovered. I thought it might be fun for me to attack these questions myself. Anyways, some thoughts:
What’s a simple activity that consistently makes you happier?
Showering. It just feels like a moment of quiet, peace, and cleanliness. I hate feeling sweaty and sticky, so it feels good to be clean and smell good. I can’t really explain why this makes me feel better, it just does and I love it. Let’s move on. Is there anything you find yourself doing repeatedly that gets in the way of your happiness?
I love being busy, challenging myself to become better, and stretching myself as far as possible. That always comes with taking on too much, and at the end of it, I just don’t have the mental and spiritual energy to appropriately deal with that stress. I’ve let that affect my relationships in the past, so I want to be aware of how far into fatigue debt I am.
Is there a happiness mantra or motto that you’ve found very helpful?It goes on. A few summers ago, I spent my life on a ranch in Wyoming. That summer I memorized several Robert Frost poems. I like him because of his understanding of life’s transitoriness (not a word, but should be). Anyways, Frost was quoted,
“If there is one thing I’ve learned about life, it is this: it goes on.”
This may be one of the most important things I’ve ever learned. Life has ups and downs, but usually, it goes on. It’s prevented me from letting myself get paralyzed and dwelling on the downs.
Do you work on being happier? If so, how?Yes, always. I always try to find ways to relieve my stress, find ways to optimize my general outlook towards life. I recently read Twelve Steps to a Compassionate Life by Karen Armstrong, a book about what religious history tells us about compassion. One of my favorite parts was about Buddhism.
When Siddhattha Gotama (the Buddha’s real name, thanks Wikipedia for making me look smarter than I am) attained enlightenment and inner peace towards the suffering brought on by life, he didn’t just sit by himself and enjoy his enlightened state. Rather, he took it upon himself to spread his newfound understanding and empower others to enjoy the relief that came with such peace.
My guess is that it’s not a zero/one question of do you have peace or not, but I think this is the purpose of life. To endure suffering, gain peace, and help others through their suffering. I think “happier” is analogous to “peace.” So yes, I do work on being happier.
I cut out some questions in the interest of length, but those are some thoughts I had on happiness.
from ken
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Have you ever thought, I should make an attempt to talk to (insert person you interact with but don’t actually talk to, like a grocery store cashier or bus driver)? Did you decide to make small talk with them by asking, “How’s it going?” or “How are you?” Was their verbal response, “Fine” or “Good, you?” but their body language sounded more like, “Move it along, nothing to see here.” I’ve been thinking about this dilemma for a while, wondering how I can avoid too much awkwardness, but also get an actual answer instead of a programmed response. Sidenote: I’ve been thinking about this situation a lot because I volunteer at a needle exchange. Sidenote again: For those of you who don’t know, a needle exchange is a public health program that provides injection drug users with free clean needles. In Portland, heroin is the drug of choice, and there’s a lot of Hep C and HIV carriers walking around, so we’re trying to reduce the transmission of these diseases. We’re also secretly trying to get everybody addicted to heroin, but do us a favor and don’t tell the needle exchange haters. Just kidding.Basically, here’s what happens: my volunteer buddy and I sit in a room chatting until a client walks in, counts out their dirty needles, drops them off in a biohazard bin, we swap them out for clean needles, ask their age, and they go on with their day. Repeat for about 200 clients, and that’s a day in the life. I’m all about the needle exchange kool-aid, but not because of its hotly debated public health benefits. I love it because it provides a safe-haven for people who have been told by society that they are failures and useless. “But Ken!”, you might be thinking, “Don’t drug users deserve to be shit on by society because they made a bad choice?” That can be argued, of course. But as someone who has had to make a choice before, I think it’s hard to make the right choice all the time, or even a right choice. It’s even harder when it feels like nobody cares about your decision or their consequences. Having just one person be nice to you, even if it’s only for a short two-minute interaction, can snap you back into a totally shifted view of reality. I know lots of times I find myself feeling alone in the lab, grinding out a gel-running-pipetting-tissue-harvesting session, completely forgetting that people exist. Then, I’ll take a break to get coffee, the barista will be nice to me, and it stupidly feels like a total shock to the system, “Whoa, I forgot that people exist in the world, and that people can be nice. Well, I guess I should be nice too.” But it’s hard to make people feel cared for, right? Especially in such a robotic interaction like our needle exchange where the regulars have the routine down and are in out and within a minute. I recently got some fantastic advice: to ask the question, “How’s life today?” This was a huge breakthrough for me. I’ve been testing this question out at the needle exchange, at Trader Joe’s, and people definitely gave me a more personal response to: “How’s life today?” One of our needle exchange regulars that I’ve started to establish some rapport with replied with a pained twang in his voice, “It’s been tough today.. but thanks a lot for asking man. How’s your’s?” It was a small victory, but it made my day. Anyways, that’s what I’ve been thinking about for the past week.from kenAre you thinking about something? Write about it and post it here! Email me! ken.e.noguchi@gmail.com
Jack Johnson once asked, “Where’d all the good people go?”
Several times on this blog, I’ve tried to work through my thoughts on what angle I want to take on social justice. [What is Social Justice?, From the one who has been entrusted with much] I’ve been involved from several different angles ranging from global poverty awareness, biomedical research, homelessness, to drug addiction. Seeing this range of problems, and combining that with the introspection that goes into this blog has really focused my eyes on an overarching question.
“Where’d all the good people go?”
I think the world lacks virtuous human beings, those that my friend Mooks and I would refer to as beasts at life.
Sidenote: Mooks and I once did a beasts at life fantasy draft over email, which was mostly to discuss people we knew, and the qualities that made them good at life. We did this to emphasize to ourselves, that there were traditional metrics used to measure human beings like physical appearance, income, popularity, number of cars, hotness of trophy wife, etc., and then there was a separate set of qualities we thought made you a beast at life.
Reading this book reminded me of something I said to myself last summer. I had just wrapped up my undergrad and I was planning on taking two years off before heading back to med school. I thought about why I wanted to take those two years off, and I reached the conclusion: I am at an academic level necessary to be the doctor I want to be, but I hadn’t attained the level of human being, aka beast of life status, that I needed.
Sidenote: you might think it’s cocky to try to be a “beast at life,” and you are probably right.
Anyways, I recently heard of Ben Franklin’s quest to attain moral perfection, which he started as a twenty year old. He took a systematic approach by listing out thirteen essential virtues and the days of the week. Each day he failed at one of the virtues he would put an x next to that box, with the goal of attaining as few x’s as possible.
The combination of the Jack Johnson’s song, Mooks’ idea of “beast at life”, and Ben Franklin’s systematic approach to attaining moral perfection, has motivated me to make a similar list of virtues. But instead of having the goal of attaining moral perfection, I would like to attain, being a beast at life. Mostly because I think it sounds better.
Anyways, based on qualities Mooks and I loved in others, here’s my list
Humility – Prioritize others, swallow pride.
Moderation – Some is good, more is not better.
Independence – A Ken can only be a good Ken.
Sacrifice – I want to sacrifice, but without placing this sort of burden on others: “FINE! I’ll do this for you, but you owe me a BIG one.”
Working Hard – When I die, I want my friends and enemies to say two things about me. 1- Yeah, he was a good guy, he helped me once. 2- Yeah, I don’t know if he was a good guy, but he sure worked hard. In fact, I might just want to hear the second one.
Gratitude – Keep on the sunny side.
Control – Have emotions, don’t let them have you.
Humility, again – Accept my limits.
To bring this back to social justice, the word radical and the word radish come from the same latin word meaning root. And so, a radical, like a radish, must always be concerned with its roots. I think the root cause of the global AIDS epidemic, homelessness, drug addiction, and maybe all social justice issues is that there are not enough good people in the world. I think we as humans need to be stronger.
I want to know what makes a beast at life, a beast, and more importantly, I want to know what prevents people from becoming a beast at life.
Arthur Lydiard, a legendary running coach who revolutionized distance running, was famous for having initially experimented his radical training methods on himself, an average runner. So, I figured it would be appropriate for me to experiment different aspects and angles on being a beast at life on myself, an average human being.
I have no deceptions about this, and I don’t expect to ever attain moral perfection, or maybe even reach a level of human being that I can accept as beast at life, but, I think I will have a lot of fun trying.
Worst case scenario, to turn back to the words of Jack Johnson:
“I want to turn the whole thing upside down, and I’ll share this love I find with everyone.”
from ken
Are you thinking about something? Write about it and post it here! Email me! ken.e.noguchi@gmail.com
There is no movie spoiler in this post. I was excited to watch the so-called facebook movie, the biography of the awkward-genius-nerd Mark Zuckerberg. It also happened to be the first Netflix movie I chose, and I was pumped about that. And the quick one sentence review is: I highly suggest the movie, I'd describe it as a sort of human emotion thriller.
“The Social Network” is the story of facebook: how Mark conceives the idea with the help of friends and classmates, how he develops the idea from an Internet sensation into a multi-billion dollar company, and how the few relationships resembling actual friendships are buried in the process. It’s an exciting story of entrepreneurial success at its highest, but at the same time, it’s a human tragedy of the greatest scale.
I wanted to highlight one scene in particular that I really felt for, the scene that ends the movie. Mark is sitting by himself and taking in what facebook has done. In his cut-throat attempt to build facebook and get himself to the top, he ditched his only real friend, and the girl he worked so hard to impress by getting to the top.
I know that exact moment. When you’re sitting, maybe by yourself, and you're thinking, and it hits you: “Wow... It’s gone...” The last vivid time I felt that was the day after my roommate moved out last year, just before I graduated college.
Sidenote on my roommate, we had always been great track training partners, so we roomed together my senior year, and we were great roommates too. Especially that last semester of college we really bonded. We ended many a night sitting in our room downing beers, eating about a thousand calories in salt and pepper Cape Cod Chips, and going on and on about our stupid lives.
Anyways, a day after he had left, I was in the car with a few of my friends driving around. We were all kind of zoned out, and as I was staring off into Ohio farmland, it hit me in succession.
My roommate had moved out.
My friends were all leaving.
I was leaving Kenyon.
I might see my friends again, but that time was lost forever.
I knew moving to Portland meant leaving college, but I hadn’t internalized that those unique “college” experiences might be gone. Being sprawled out on my couch drunkenly chatting late in to the night and sharing a Papa John’s pizza with my friends, or catching an hour of shut eye on the biology department couch in a failed attempt to stay up all night finishing a paper.
Back to the movie, I think that’s the moment Mark was having. Thinking back to his time with his girlfriend Erica and best friend Eduardo; realizing in his vicious devotion to the mission of facebook, what he had lost; maybe wishing he could have another chance to be better to them, to appreciate them, to tell them how he felt about them. That moment, that feeling of, “Wow, it’s really gone,” it sucks.
That’s something I’m still internalizing. That life happens in seasons with a beginning and an end, and that life is about adapting to those new seasons – both sunny and rainy. Change is hard to swallow, but I guess that’s something “The Social Network” reminds us of. People may move in and out of your life, but at least you can still stalk them on facebook.
(facebook friends, be warned)from ken Are you thinking about something? Write about it and post it here! Email me! ken.e.noguchi@gmail.com
Life in those years right after college, the most immediate thing I’ve noticed is: Shit. I can do whatever I want. My life road is wherever I want it to be.
Anyways, I was just drinking a beer, enjoying a contemplative moment listening to iTunes on shuffle, and “In the beginning” by K’naan came on. This was the song I titled my first post after. Hearing the song made me go back and read that post, which in turn reminded me of the goals I had in coming out to the west coast.
- love my life now- and of course, pursue “sidenotes,” which I defined as those random interests you have in your life that you never take the time to pursue, to figure out the right roads for me Thinking about these goals has made me realize something important about sidenotes.
“If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.”
- Rene Descartes
I came out here as a scientist to work in a cell biology lab, but when I hit a real struggle in my research, for a time, I thought I would throw it all away and pursue nursing or public health. Research can move so slow, and be so frustrating at times that I hate it. Some weeks, I randomly spent 50 60 hours in lab, with nothing to show at the end of it. I could have spent the week on my couch eating Lays and watching Glee and my week would have been equally as useful.
But when it comes down to it, I love the prospect of taking courses like “Eukaryotic Molecular Biology,” reading about cell signaling molecules like Akt and TfR2, and racking my brain to think of the necessary experiments to complete a publication. It’s a love/hate relationship, but realizing this made me set on applying for a research oriented grad program.
I also came out here as a college cross country and track athlete, which basically meant, I was a gym junkie. In college, several times a week I was at the KAC (Kenyon Athletic Center) twice a day. Not only because I wanted to be more fit, but because it just made me feel at peace to exercise.
But when I moved out to Portland, working out seemed like a boring hobby and didn’t really mesh with the alternative culture out here. After running a marathon, I ditched running cold turkey, cut off my gym membership and tried out several hobbies ranging from cycling, yoga, hiking, photography, playing the harmonica, drawing, baking, and none of them fit the bill.
About a month ago, I ended up rejoining a gym, and I’m currently in the process of taking up working out as a stress-relieving hobby. I don’t run, but I still love hitting the gym. There is nothing in my life that brings me more internal peace than a quick semi-intense 30 minute workout.
I guess at its essence, the concept of sidenotes is to try new things and figure out what you like, but more importantly what you don’t. By both considering a life in research, and a life away from it, I’ve basically figured out the next ten years of my life - hopefully training to be a physician-scientist. And by trying out a barrage of random hobbies, I’ve been drawn back to a hobby I’ve had all along that will hopefully keep me sane through those ten years - working out.
When I came out to the PDX, I was starving for that missing piece of the puzzle that would complete my life. But I guess really, pursuing those sidenotes has just brought me back to what I lived and loved in college, and the road narrowed, a little.
from kenAre you thinking about something? Write about it and post it here! Email me! ken.e.noguchi@gmail.com
This week is National Cover the Uninsured Week. At OHSU, the medical institute I work at, students have organized an array of events including panel discussions, seminars, and free clinic events.
Today, I went to a panel discussing providing healthcare for the uninsured. I think the panel members, mostly from the non-profit world, were supposed to talk about healthcare policy issues. However, that wasn’t really the mood. Most of what I was hearing was encouragement.
I think the panel members saw their past selves out in the crowd. I think they saw a bright-eyed batch of students unprepared for the struggle of caring for the neglected. They talked about supporting the neglected populations we were supposed to be talking about, but moreso they emphasized taking care of the optimistic students and young health professionals that are diving into these careers, and protecting them from burnout.
The talk was inspiring, or relieving, maybe. But one woman, the youngest, and easily the most enthusiastic of the bunch, had a comment that really struck me. She said: “I think cynical people are just people that were idealistic, but had their hearts broken.”
When I think back to when I first read the inspirational biography Mountains Beyond Mountains a couple winters ago, all I can remember is how fired up I was. Reading the courageous story of a physician working with the rural poor in Haiti, I could feel the optimism and will to change the world rushing through my body.
I was obsessed. I ate up anything and everything about the struggles of the world. I read about the civil struggle in Zimbabwe, social entrepreneurism in Rwanda, epidemic drug-resistant tuberculosis in Haiti, all of it.
I thought if I just pushed myself a little more, if I just stayed up another half hour studying biochemistry, if I just ran another mile, if I read another article about social medicine… I could move myself closer to becoming a stronger human being, to my dream of reaching medical school, to being on a stage where people might hear my voice, to changing the world.
I don’t know what tipped the scales. I think it happened sometime earlier, maybe the summer before my senior year when I worked in a lab at Harvard med school, poured on the miles to get ready for one last cross country season, and spent the rest of my time hammering away at the MCAT. (the med school admissions test)
I piled through flash cards, page after page of practice questions, and I think at some point, I snapped. I couldn’t handle the work, the stress, and it clicked. I couldn’t stop war in Zimbabwe. I couldn’t cure drug-resistant TB. I couldn’t save the world. It broke my heart.
It’s caused me to grow a cynical side since moving to Portland. It’s made me afraid to push myself, and I find myself being lazy a lot. I pretty much notice at the first sign of stress and cut myself slack. I tell myself I’m still a productive member of society.. But I have this one thought running through my head every day: "I use to be strong."
There’s a quote I’m reminded of: “The good news is that there is a way out of the dark forest. The bad news is that the way leads through hell.”
It sucked to burn out. It sucked to struggle through a year running on fumes to keep myself afloat. It sucks to feel past my prime at the ripe age of 22.
But on some days, when I can feel just a crack of that optimism leaking out of my heart, I can see that this initial burnout was necessary for me to ditch some of my unreasonable optimism, and cultivate a more realistic optimism.
Today, I read a quote from JFK’s inagural address that I hope to one day say, and mean. “And this will not be finished in the first one hundred days. Nor will it be finished in the first one thousand days, nor in the life of this Administration, nor even perhaps in our lifetime on this planet. But let us begin.”
I suppose, just because I can’t save the world, doesn’t mean I can’t try, eventually.
Related post, "What is Social Justice?"
from ken
Are you thinking about something? Write about it and post it here! Email me! ken.e.noguchi@gmail.com
I recently started reading a guide to meditation, Meditation: Simple Steps for Health and Well-Being by Andrea McCloud. It provides a more practical approach than becoming a monk. Of course, there are benefits to putting a lot of work in the practice of meditation, etc., but there has to be something to be said for accessibility. For myself, I would be happy putting in 30% effort into meditation to get 70% results back.
Anyways, I do really like the perspective this guide offers to meditation. Here’s the definition it starts off with:
“Meditation is a fancy word for paying attention – paying attention to yourself and paying attention to your world. Any time you are focused on one thing or you are absorbed in a specific activity – be it painting or running or eating – you are meditating.”
I feel like the core concept is the practice of bringing yourself back to yourself. It’s so easy to get overwhelmed and caught up in the moment. Just imagine, you’re sitting at your desk at work, doing your own thing. Then suddenly someone catches you off kilter and nails you with a, “LOOK AT THIS TERRIBLE THING, THIS IS YOUR FAULT!” The stress-inducing HPA-axis of the brain lights up, and the stress hormone cortisol flow through your veins. Your pupils dilate, your heart rate increases, you even think defensively and aggressively.
I heard somewhere that the first ten seconds of an anger response is beyond your control. The hormone instinctively gets released as a shock to the yelling and you can’t help but be defensive. But after those ten seconds, if you can realize you’re misbehaving and bring yourself down from your cortisol high, you can stop, or at least blunt the overreaction.
This of course, is where I think meditation can be handy. Going back to the definition of meditation, “Meditation is a fancy word for paying attention.” In those times when you want to react violently or negatively, you have to bring the attention back to what’s going on. Is this really a big deal?
Evolutionary biologists hypothesize that the HPA axis existed for a “fight-or-flight” response when a hunter encountered a potential prey or predator. The hunter’s stress axis would turn on, and the hunter could make a quick aggressive decision, to flee or to fight. Either way, the increased heart rate, blood flow, and pupil dilation all contribute to the instinct. These days, of course, our stressors are different. When our bosses criticize us, it’s not really appropriate to throw a spear through their face. And realistically, they are probably just trying to help us do our job.
Anyways, I’ve been trying to practice the first chapter of the meditation book. It’s pretty simple, and probably how every single book on meditation starts, but it’s called “Room to Breathe.” It suggests responding to stress by focusing on your breath, and shifting the emphasis off of whatever brought on the stress. It’s definitely helped me keep my emotions in check, and make sure that I can respond appropriately.
I won’t say using this strategy has been successful in eliminating stress, nor has it always prevented me from overreacting past that ten second free zone. That said, I think it’s been a step in the right direction. Now I feel like I’m at least being intentional about being patient. In the lifelong battle that is self-control, I’ll take it.
from ken
Are you thinking about something? Write about it and post it here! Email me! ken.e.noguchi@gmail.com
I recently read a couple books by the Brazilian author Paulo Coelho, The Pilgrimage and The Alchemist.
Coelho has an interesting story. As a child, he longed to be a writer, but his parents disapproved, so he instead ended up in law school. He dropped out after a year and quickly picked up a career as a songwriter. About ten years past, and he had a spiritual awakening while walking a Christian pilgrimage route in Northern Spain. He realized that he was living a satisfactory life, but not living out his true dream of becoming a writer. Within a year, The Pilgrimage and The Alchemist followed.
The Pilgrimage is an autobiography/novel about Coelho’s Northern Spain pilgrimage. He meets a guide that takes him on the treacherous journey as he learns reflective life practices along the way.
The Alchemist is by far his best-selling book, attaining a Guiness World Record mark of most translated book by a living author. It's a fable about a young shepherd who leaves his comfortable life behind to search for treasures hidden in the pyramids of Egypt. Only about 150 pgs, it’s an easy read, and it definitely left me feeling uplifted. I highly, highly recommend The Alchemist.
There are so many ideas I want to touch on from these books, but I’ll focus on just one for now. I wanted to talk about something that relates to the whole basis of The Alchemist, which starts from a young shepherd’s recurring dream. The shepherd can’t shake this deep-down desire that he’s supposed to chase down some distant treasure, and even though it sounds crazy, he finally builds up the courage to depart on the journey.
As for my "journey" of becoming a doctor, I have a similar scene that scrolls through my head every once in a while. I wouldn’t say it’s why I want to be a doctor nor would I call it a recurring dream, but it’s just an image that’s been stuck in my head for a while. I’ll explain:
I imagine myself walking the halls of my Pediatric Intensive Care Unit in the late hours of the night, maybe 1 or 2 AM. The rooms are dark, except for the dimmed hall lights. I run into a dad struggling with the loss of his only daughter. For the fifth time that day, I go over the ever worsening white blood cell counts of his daughter, and we get to talking about his life. We sit down, I pour us a glass of gin, or coffee, whichever is more available. He talks about his life, and I sit there listening. He might not decide to do a complete 180 with his life, but he thinks about it. And maybe the seed is planted for future change.
If you’re wasting the time to read this blog, odds are probably good that we’ve had a chat like this. It’s probably my favorite thing, speculating about life. I've seen hospitals, with emotions running high, as a place that opens the door for such thoughts. I want the opportunity to work somewhere that I can support people confronting these struggles, literally life and death. That would definitely be my dream job.
When I explain why I want to go into medicine, I don’t really talk about this scene because it doesn’t make a lot of sense. But the image is always in the back of my head. And I can’t help but be struck by the last line from The Pilgrimage:
“I guess it is true that people always arrive at the right moment at the place where someone awaits them.”
Hopefully one day in my future, I’ll be at the clinic at the right time.
from ken
Are you thinking about something? Write about it and post it here! Email me! ken.e.noguchi@gmail.com
Earlier today, I was thinking about a question: What do you consider to be your personal achievements? I thought about it for a bit, then bulleted out a few of my accomplishments. - Being elected one of the captains of my college cross country team, despite being the slowest
- Publishing a scientific article in a peer-reviewed journal
- Having the courage to move to across the country to Portland despite not knowing anyone
- Maintaining this blog for as long as I have, and learning to love writing
- Sustaining old friendships east of the Mississippi
As I looked over this list, and reflected a bit on what I’ve done with my life up to this point, I got to thinking. And I remembered the words of the humanity activist Shane Claiborne:
“I’m not too concerned with what I am going to do. I am more interested in who I am becoming.”
As I try to decide where to go with my life, and what sort of accomplishments to shoot for next, I’m really shifting my focus from tangible goals like getting x job or winning y award, to the sort of person I’m becoming. I figure, if I become more and more the sort of person I desire to be, the accomplishments will fall into place.
Sidenote, Amulya and I always used to talk about how we were “intangible” guys. At its core, it was basically our way to explain us not being as good as other people on paper. Other people might have higher IQ’s, harder abs, faster cars, wittier jokes, but the things that can’t counted, we had that. Or at least, it helped me sleep at night.
Anyways, I summed up the sort of person I want to become in three points:
1. I want a, “For the horde,” mentality. I think life was meant to be lived for the good of society. We were meant to both, be taken care of, and take care of. It’s hard for me to remember this, but I want to put myself in a position to give back. past post
2. I want to always place myself in an environment of growth. I want to have the courage to leave old environments and enter into brand new scary ones. I know it’s easy to get stale, and then be scared to leave that comfort, but I also know I will just get frustrated with myself in that stale zone. “Learning is not attained by chance, it must be sought for with ardor and attended to with diligence.” – Abigail Adams
3. I want to be grateful. I want to always remember the opportunities I’ve had, and have now. past post“There are only two ways to live your life. One is as though nothing is a miracle. The other is as though everything is a miracle.” – Albert Einstein
from ken
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