What are you passionate about? Is it really medicine, or is medicine just a guaranteed way to make a nice buck?
If you were to win $100 million in the lottery tomorrow, would you continue to do the same things you are doing now, or that you have planned to do in the future?
The question posed above is important. It’s the “truth” question. Be truthful with yourself and you’ll discover if you’re really passionate about medicine, your job, or whatever it is that you do to put food on the table.
For me, I would definitely continue along the same path that I’m on right now if I won the lottery. I absolutely love the things that I am doing, and I would do them for free if I had to. It is certainly nice that it puts a decent paycheck into my hands each month, but that’s not the point. I know I’m in the right place.
My grandfather never went to college and worked as a machinist in a plant for a good portion of his life. Very typical blue-collar work that is common for my family. He couldn’t tell me about complex chemical formulas, or the physiological changes of the human body during pregnancy. Instead, he taught me how to fix lawnmowers and cars when they broke down, and how to do odd jobs around the house.
Despite that fact that the had very little formal education, my grandfather was very “street smart.” He had lived life, and realized the mistakes that he had made. Mistakes that he could look back on and see, but that he couldn’t do much about for himself personally. He truly cared for me and wanted to change my life, to share with me some shred of information so that I could have something that he never did. One day before he passed away, he did just that.
“Find something that you love doing so much that you would do it for free, and then find a way to make a living doing it. If you can accomplish this, you’ll never work a day in your life.”
Take that to heart. I did, and it truly did change my life.
I think most relatively-intelligent people (who could seriously consider taking the MCAT and going to Hell for four years) have the ability to do what you just said. I’m not sure everyone has that ability, but I would hope so.
If you have the ability to do a lot of different things, why be unhappy? There are so many ways to help others, make a difference, while being relatively happy yourself.
like i said over at pandabear’s – first, thanks for the service you’re providing. it’s definitely important to take a long hard look at what medicine really is before diving in (i especially like the idea of shadowing a resident for a whole month straight – i definitely plan on doing that before doing it for the rest of my life).
second – can you elaborate more on careers that an MD can be used for? (other than medicine), and maybe what it is that you do?
sorry for the ramble and thanks again
Cherokee – It certainly isn’t easy to do something you genuinely love and get paid for it, but it can definitely be done.
L – I’ve started a category called Alternative Careers that looks at some of the non-clinical jobs that can be done with an M.D. There isn’t much there right now, but hopefully it will grow over time.
As far as what I do, I founded and run a company full-time. My industry is technology and marketing.
Hey Hoover-
What’s your current situation? I’m sure if I read enough articles I could find this, but I was just wondering if you were in med school and finished, or quit to work at your company, etc.
B, I finished medical school. I’m working at my company full-time.
Love this post. You are doing a great job here ..thanks for that .