Fractured Living: The Cost of Taking The Path More Traveled

I went to medical school on a faulty assumption: even though I didn’t want to do it, I could do it and still be happy. Spitting at Robert Frost’s counsel, I took the road more traveled, and indeed, it made all the difference.

In hero mythology, there’s a sequence when the hero is presented a glimpse down a path which could save him much suffering, but it requires a sacrifice of something the hero fears losing. The hero considers the choice, but ultimately refuses the path, afraid. This refusal catapults him across the leagues of the sea away from home (home being himself).

Before going to medical school, I was blessed with such a glimpse. I took a two-year position between undergraduate and post-graduate education, working at HealthCorps, where I taught nutrition and fitness classes to middle and high schoolers. I loved that job. Ask anyone who knew me, it was all I talked about. The work, connection, and daily “want to” was something I had never experienced. It was truly meaningful work. I was finding myself inside it. I owned the ground beneath my feet. Of course, this work had an expiration, my contract could last no more than two years. It was a vehicle, not a destination.

There, a choice presented itself: go to medical school or follow my soul where it led. Below the surface, the choice distilled further: choose fear or choose life.  

I chose fear. Why? Well, here’s a psychiatrist’s quick and dirty assessment of his childhood.

I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes at nine years old. From diagnosis, I was told the daily management of blood sugar and insulin injections would thwart my dreams (playing football). And largely, I was successful in proving those predictions wrong, living out what was in my heart, while inside relative restriction. Perfectly? Not even close, but all things considered, my life was a good outcome. I learned how to live in restriction.  

Yet, previous life experiences can be blinding: here and now, I didn’t have to go to medical school, but it felt like I did.

There were expectations from those around me, sure, but deep down, I wasn’t ready to defend the ground beneath my feet. I feared what the tribe would think about a rejection of medical school for… working in the mountains as a ski lift operator? I had a dream of figuring it out but had nothing hold up against medical school’s guarantees.

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The summer between HealthCorps’ end and the start of medical school, I went to three weddings of friends from college. It was that season of life. At the third wedding, I was catching up with a friend that had been at the other two weddings as well. After hearing me discuss (again) my dreams of exploration and travel, he interrupted, “When are you gonna do it?” He called my bluff. He knew I wasn’t ready, and I knew it too.

Hence, I took the road of compromise, and prayed I would keep the growing connection with myself. I refused the call. In the vacuum between my soul and society’s expectations, my ability to live inside restriction appeared as a stop-gap solution. A strength from the last chapter of my life was now my undoing in the next.

I entered medical school, dodged the call, and began renting the ground beneath my feet.  

That’s where compromise is interesting. It feels like it has boundaries, impacting only that which it touches. Not compromises of the soul though, those are uncontainable.  

Over the following years, the burgeoning, whole, expanding version of myself slowly receded out of the sunlight. I tried like hell to keep it on life support—mountain biking, surfing, or snowboarding as often as possible—with no restoration. My passions became tainted reminders of who I’d been. The mountains and the ocean weren’t the same anymore; I wasn’t there.

The same thing happened in my personal life; Thanksgiving dinners weren’t as touching and birthday celebrations not as joyful. I was there, yes, and I still enjoyed my family and friends, but I couldn’t arrive to the moment no matter how hard I tried.

This is fractured living; the cost of giving up the ground beneath your feet. The price for dodging the call.

Nevertheless, lost across leagues, I never forgot the glimpse. Fractured living was once whole. I had felt it in my bones, a rooted life staked into the earth beneath my bare feet. It haunted me. In the middle of the night, sleepless, the life I remembered would emerge from my popcorn ceiling like an autostereogram.  

Lost, I had to dive into the depths to locate my compass that was once true. I found it and now I’m here, reoriented and with some work ahead. I hold nothing rational in my hands, only a decision to choose life. A gamble, sure, but like all good bets, one I make on a sliver of knowing that speaks inside a mountain of fear.

That sliver of knowing has never changed; I’m not supposed to practice medicine.

Most days I refurbish furniture. It feels good. I write and that feels good. While doing those things, I feel the ground beneath my feet again.

And if that stays the case, I’m playing with house money.