How is this whole leaving medicine thing going?
I often worry about how to make enough money. I wonder if I can figure this out. I doubt myself, ponder if I made a mistake. Fear pulses shake me from sleep, followed by flashes of relief when I consider a return to medicine, which would keep the lights on and pay the student loans numbering in the hundreds of thousands. There’s security. There’s certainty. It’s something akin to a warm blanket on a cold night in the woods. For a long time, accepting that blanket was instinct. Second nature.
But I can’t forget what the last eight years were in the woods; gnawing aches in my heart, unescapable emptiness, and a growing resentment toward life. Every single day I thought about leaving medicine, going after what I wanted, and steeled the resolve necessary to build it, suffering many moments where I got scared of the cold and snagged whatever cover necessary to shield the elements.
Now, I do not wish to be kept warm, thinking that “it’ll just work out” or “I’ll figure it out tomorrow”, because even here inside fear, sleepless nights, and endless uncertainty, it is so much better than it was. Even though it is far colder, it is definitely better. I’m trying to enjoy the prospect of building a new career. I’m choosing to relish this uncertainty that I avoided at all costs for the better part of a decade.
My personal journal entry, dating April 17th, 2016, is a compass pointing away from those familiar woods of compromise and pacification:
I just feel trapped. Like I’m losing my soul. Watching things play out and not even being here. There’s something speaking to me, right now, it’s here. I feel paralyzed, heart-broken, and beatdown. I deserve to be one with this world… Fight for your fucking soul. No one else can or ever will. This is your show. Own it. Be who you want to be. Suck this shit up. If you don’t like it, change it.
It wasn’t the only entry of this kind. There are many like it. It took all of them to get here. Each were a small twig I gathered like kindling, until a spark caught and the fire finally lit.
Now I aim to keep it lit, one twig and one moment at a time, while I build a path out.
(P.S. If you’re in a wilderness of your own making, I’m here to help build fires. Feel free to reach out below or on social media @FightmasterMD.)
