But I’m living proof that grace wins every time.

I wake up almost every morning with the worries already piling up and crowding my head.

What lectures didn’t I review, let alone listen to, yesterday? Are those lectures on the optic nerve and visual fields this morning going to be as confusing and overwhelming as I anticipate they will be? Longer term, how am I going to learn all of this plus everything else I need to know for Step 1 of our Boards in June? And even longer term, how am I going to get through this med school thing and residency without losing my head when I can barely think past the next 24 hours?

I doubt myself. I doubt my abilities. I doubt my strength and desire to push through this theme, the ones after it, and the difficult weeks, months, and years ahead, all to ultimately help others which is why I set out on this arduous path in the first place.

I miss my family. I miss my dog. I miss the carefree life of high school and college when my biggest concerns were finding the perfect Homecoming dress and putting together a perfect schedule for the following semester.

My classmates around me seems so put together and motivated. They park themselves in the library for hours on end, poring over the hundreds of Powerpoint slides with a fierce desire to ace the next exam while I sit a few cubicles over arguing with the part of me that wants to throw in the towel and go home. “I’m not good enough. I’m not smart enough. I can’t do this,” I think.

Yet despite this internal battle, almost always when the tears just barely begin to well up in my eyes, a feeling of peace overwhelms me. Maybe I’m not good or smart enough and maybe I can’t do this. But with God, all things are possible. The only thing I have been asked to do is to follow and love Him, which right now, as much as I don’t love it, means I need to do my part and try my hardest to learn this material to the best of my ability. All I can ask of myself is my best effort, and God will take care of the rest. In a world and a life with so much uncertainty and unexpected challenges, I find comfort that my worries are irrational in light of a God that will see me through any and all circumstances and will never abandon me.

And so, I press on, trying to replace my worries with God’s love and grace, which, no matter what happens, will protect and carry me wherever this crazy life should take me.

Merck Manuals Student Stories Reblog: One Test Down, Only Fourteen More to Go…

Some thoughts after finishing my first exam of the school year over on the Merck Manuals blog.

O, my soul, faint not. O, my soul, keep up in love.

There seems little point in a religion which is merely a weekly social event (apart, of course, from the normal pleasures of a weekly social event), as opposed to one which tells you exactly how to live, which colors and stains everything. What’s the point of faith unless you and it are serious-seriously serious-unless your religion fills, directs, stains, and sustains your life?

–Julian Barnes

I know I’m stressed and that something isn’t right when my daily morning runs are not relaxing ones that recharge and refocus me for the day ahead.

Running is a, perhaps, unexpectedly spiritual sort of ritual for me, a form of prayer if you will, during which I can listen to and speak with God, my arms and legs moving at a rhythm that matches the exchange of guiding words in my head. Lately, I haven’t been able to shut my mind off to the worldly distractions of life, and it has been a really unsettling few weeks for me.

I started my second year of med school on Monday, and while I’m happy to be stationed in one place and to be back into a routine and with my friends again, this year, with leadership positions in clubs and groups on campus (did I ever mention how not being able to say no has got to be my hamartia (why yes, I did steal that from The Fault in Our Stars), or fatal flaw?), Tulip duties (it’s more than you might think…), some serious racing goals, and Step 1 of our Boards on the horizon next June which will play a large role in where I end up for residency, in addition to trying to maintain relationships with my family and old friends and develop ones with new ones, this year is proving to already be a busy one. When did things get so serious over here?!

I hate feeling like God isn’t the center of my life, and it’s a feeling that’s just been continually growing throughout the summer where it was far too easy to neglect and get lazy about my faith. I have some serious soul searching and re-prioritizing to do, friends, if I want to make this year as God-centered, stress-free as possible, successful, and happy as possible; please say a prayer for me if you get a chance!