Supporting an Aspiring Doctor

Maintaining Balance Through Medical School and Beyond

Tag: fail

The Brazen Rediscovery of the Bottomless Wallet

December 23, 2020 /

I’m sure that others can relate when I say that the holiday season causes the urge to give (and spend money). People want to give their time, money and goods to help others so that we can all have a wonderful holiday season. Lots of people like to give, but it can be difficult depending on their financial situation.

I have found that “my heart is bigger than my wallet“ on many occasions. There are people in my life that I want to give to, but I can’t afford to do so on the intended level. That being said, it doesn’t stop me from giving what I can to those around me in my life.

The Bottomless Wallet

The “bottomless wallet” has the power of mind control. It calls to the owner, taunting them to open it. Soon after being coaxed, they are put in a trance that blinds them from sound thinking and judgement. The bottomless wallet has the power to take us down before realizing what we have done.

This is obviously a bit of humor, but it is how it feels sometimes. When I get out my wallet, there are times that I feel I should make a purchase. Sometimes I lose sight of exactly what I should be buying for, and the kind of items that I am purchasing. We have lots of influences in our lives swaying us to buy products and it can be hard to keep our cards and cash in our pocket.

Every year around the holidays the amount of purchases seems to climb. I tend to make some larger purchases while I hope to get a good deal. I rediscover the influence that the items for sale have on my life. It’s not something that we tend to notice, but we get attached to a certain lifestyle or particular item in our life.

A Christmas Budget Struggle

Every year I set a budget and make the attempt to stick to it for gifts. Since I started making the goal for myself, about 6 years, I have not once kept myself from overspending. There are just too many things for sale during the holiday season that seem to catch my eye. There are gifts available for my wife, our parents (my wife’s and mine) and my siblings. It can be hard not to buy things, especially when the items seem to be the “perfect gift”.

Though my bank account has a limit, my wallet seems to be bottomless. When making purchases I can just swipe and swipe and swipe without any obstacles in my way. This is especially relevant when the expenditures are charged to a credit card, instead of my debit card. I’m sure that you have had some of the same situations in your life. It can be hard not to spend money, especially when we can see that our bank account has a balance.

This is exactly what is intended for consumers and it can be hard not to fall into the trap. Items go “on sale” bringing people into stores giving them the sense that they are getting a deal on goods. It can be difficult to hold back from spending, but it can be the difference between hitting your budget or overspending. With the growing amount of online retailing in the United States, I have found it easier to stick to a budget. Once I get my little grubby paws on something tangible, it can be much harder to put it back on the shelf.

The Broken Budget

In order to hit my set goal for spending I have often asked myself a few questions:

  • Is my budget too small?
  • Should my budget be larger?
  • Do I need more self control?

For the most part I lean toward having a lack of self control. It is really hard to get gifts for our families and friends without going over budget. Even when setting a dollar limit, it’s hard to choose how much to spend the money. It doesn’t matter what I set my limit to be, I will usually go over. I’m sure that others are in the same boat, and it can be frustrating from the standpoint of our personal finances.

It’s not that I don’t think that the recipients of my gifts deserve less, but there are times where I can’t afford the gift that might be “perfect” for them. This is something that I have to accept when considering how much to spend on others and overall during the holiday season. I have not figured out exactly how much to spend during the holidays and probably won’t find a perfect number.

I have found that being generous with others shouldn’t (or can’t) be measured. I don’t think that we can look at two people and measure how generous they are and pick who is a better person. The amount of money that we spend during the holidays in not indicative of how much we love those around us. There is much more to our relationships with others than a price tag. We may not have to spend a lot on those around us, but I think there are times that warrant larger transactions. I tend to lean toward the idea of larger transactions being necessary to help someone fulfill their needs, not wants.

Final Thought

The main focus of this post is to be proactive and generous with others. We should try to put others before ourselves, though it is a hard task. This doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t care for ourselves (that is the wrong idea) but we aim our sights on helping others first. I have failed many times, and often, at putting others before myself. Trying again each year with a consistent record of falling short. Maintaining outward focus is hard, especially when we have wants of our own.

How To Fail While Avoiding Failure.

December 9, 2020 /

Failure is an interesting concept to me because it changes depending on the perspective. If we make an attempt for a goal in life, but we don’t achieve our goal, we tend to say that we “failed.” If it is a constant and continuing process of failing we tend to say that some is a “failure.” But why is this the case?

Important Definitions

The definition of fail is to be unsuccessful in achieving one’s goal. By this definition, if we make the attempt to achieve anything and do not succeed, we have failed. That doesn’t mean that we won’t learn anything along the way, but we have failed. It’s not fun to fail and lose out on achieving our goals. Failing to reach our goals is part of life. We set goals and strive to achieve them and occasionally roadblocks stop us. It is demoralizing and crushing to our morale when we fall short. This usually results in losing the prize at the end of hard work. There are times when we set a goal that is a stretch for our abilities but making goals that are difficult is what pushes us to try our best.

The definition of failure is lack of success. It is possible for us to fail to achieve our goals, but we are not a failure by this definition. Failure would be if we arrived for our goal, failed, but did not come away with anything from the experience. Failure is a lack of learning and success in any way.

Repetitive Failed Goals

I, like most people, sets goals for myself and strive to achieve them. To be honest, I fail quite regularly. I have been working on remodeling part of my basement now for over a year and have failed nearly every milestone that I set in the beginning. I originally wanted to complete the project by Christmas of 2019 and it looks like it will not be completed by Christmas 2020. It is hard to push ourselves when we are not motivated or the reward doesn’t seem to outweigh the input of work. My basement is a great reward and there has been a lot of work input to reach where I am today. I hope to complete the project by the end of the year, but it will take more determination and effort than I have invested recently.

Looking back at my progress I can see that even though I have failed nearly all of my goals, I have come a long way. The space is painted, flooring installed, electrical run, and it’s almost complete. This has still happened with a long list of failed goals. So with all these failed goals, should I consider myself a failure?

Failing ≠ Failure

It’s easier for me to see my progress with something tangible like my basement. I can walk down my stairs and look at the ceiling, walls, and floor and easily depict whether or not a task has been completed, and a goal met. It may be harder to tell when looking at our lives. Not everything that we set a goal to complete is as simple as my basement project. Not all goals we set in our lives have obvious milestones leading up to the primary goal.

Medical students take a Step 1 exam around the end of their second year across the nation. Some of them take it earlier or later, but this seems to be the norm. This is a huge test (if you know a medical student ask them about it) and failing is not an option. Failure is possible and a small percentage of students that fail every year seem to be cast into a different class of students. That failed exam is carved into their permanent academic record. They can retake the exam but the previous failure will always show. I don’t know anyone that has failed but I think this is due to knowing some really good students. From my perspective it seems that most of the students are scared or terrified that they will fail, and use it as motivation to study harder and push for their goal of passing. Students that fail on their first attempt can retake it and become doctors. Failing creates a different path for them, but it is possible. It’s probably best to avoid it but many ask themselves “What if I fail?”

It’s hard to put a positive spin on a failed Step 1 exam due to the repercussions in the students life. Here are some questions that I think we can ask ourselves when we fail our goals.

  1. Is this failed attempt going to ruin my life?
  2. Is there anything positive that has come from this attempt?
  3. Did I achieve anything along the way?

The most important questions are below.

  1. Did I try my best?
  2. What did I learn from this failed attempt?
  3. Is this goal worth trying for again?

The first three questions help to gain some perspective of the situation. I think that in every failure that we experience, there is something positive. It isn’t easy to see positive points after a failed attempt. We may not be able to look back and find it right away, but I believe that it exists. The second three questions are the more important questions in my opinion. The separation between a failed attempt and failure is being able to look at how hard we worked, what we can learn, and if it’s worth pursuing again.

Avoiding Failure

For me the defining line between failing and being a failure is what we learn and how we take our next steps. If we strive to achieve and goals and succeed, then well done. In the event that we fail to achieve our goal but do not learn anything, that is failure.

If failure is defined as a lack of success then as long as we have some sort of success, failure does not occur. I believe that we can always learn from times that we fail. We may learn more about ourselves on how we should/could have handled the situation when compared to success. Maybe we learn that the goal isn’t worth the effort because we don’t enjoy the road to success (or the prize) as much as we thought we would. Maybe we realize where we caused our downfall and can prepare for the next attempt.

The key to avoiding failure is to do our best, learn, and find a way to achieve our goals. There are goals in life that are not achievable. Our mind and body have limits but I don’t think that we usually push ourselves far enough to find them. There is a point where we will be limited and won’t achieve a goal.

It’s hard to tell when the challenge is too much or we didn’t try hard enough. We tend to be limited by our will power and the desire to press on toward our goal. Keeping devoted to a task is hard, especially if the road to the finish line is rough.

Final Thought

I think that people are not failures or achieve failure unless they do not look at what happened and learn from it. Taking the time to look at the situation and think about what happened makes a huge difference in the success when someone tries again. We need to learn from our (and others) past mistakes so that we can be more success on our endeavors of the future. Keep pushing for your goals, learn along the way, and do your best.

If we fail to achieve our goal while learning nothing, we have achieved failure.

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