Invictus

Is it June already? I'm still in school, yeppers.

I just went for a run after a 2 month hiatus. My foot hasn't gotten better or worse, so I figured I could do a light jog. The reason I decided to run today was I felt stressed out. Exams are around the corner while everyone else is enjoying summer. I want to kick and whine and skip my 8am, but with that 6:30 alarm I am reminded of how privileged I am that I have a job. It doesn't pay (yet?), but this job will blossom into a career.

While I am still on this 15 minute break, I also wanted to share a tidbit of today's class. My physician advocacy elective invited a doctor who espoused mentorship and life balance. School likes to throw in these "Don't lose yourself!" moments throughout the blocks, but today's words moved me enough to share my thoughts...of disagreement.

He invited us to read Invictus by William Ernest Henley. And he urged us to counter it, banish it. Even outright proclaim "you are wrong". You are wrong to assume control over your life and you are certainly not the master of your fate.

Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll.
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

While I understand his point, that you can't try to control everything, he focused too literally, thereby missing the impetus. The poem is about determination and drive, to confront the assault of arrows that may befall and to look beyond the horizon. I am utterly inspired by this captain because while you can't control all external factors, you can control what you do. You are your own director, what comes to fruition stems from your sweat and labor. You control how you react in the face of named perils - the exams, meetings, presentations. The captain is prepared with an able crew to weather a storm as I am prepared to regurgitate the worms that crawl under your skin (and how to treat it! most important). Responsibility are seeds to credibility, knowledge, and improvement; personal actions are its vehicle.

So while I want to kick and scream about another wave of examinations, I am humbled by my place in the institution (the world for that matter). I am a captain, a lover, an artist, a realist. I aspire, am inspired, and perspire to straddle my ambitions and to let no Menace thwart my dreams.