A Conversation to Remember and Day 7

"The difference in terms of how you feel about your dreams when
you have "space" vs. when you don't have "space" is scary.

When you have so many responsibilities and things to do and you
can't seem to keep your head above water, your dreams have no
spark. They feel like burdens. Like anchors.

But when you start simplifying, minimizing, creating systems,
becoming more efficient, and that space starts to grow, that
same dream has room to breathe.

It feels light. Energizing. Exciting.

It's not suffocating anymore."

- Brian Kim MIT of 4/26/13
www.briankim.net

When I just read it for the first time, I felt confused about what was being talked about. I read it again and all of a sudden it made sense. When you are swamped with things you have to do to achieve your goals, it can be a burden more than a blessing. People associate hard work with the feeling of burden often times. It's important to do the simplest yet most effective things that way we don't burn ourselves out. A process of taking things in manageable steps. A good example of this just occurred yesterday in fact. My brother and I had just a deep, honest, stimulating conversation about life, our topic that we proposed to write about which my brother and I are ardent about (cancer related) & books that she's read that relate to the epidemic of cancer (ex: the omnivore's dilemma), spirituality, the story of Lucky, her own nursing experience, the future of medicine, introversion (as she is also an introvert is what she said)/ why I am the way I am, the depth that I have, and she also recounted to us, for the second time, the effectiveness of a simple yet profound statement to ask people, especially patients. "What's important to you?". This simple question has yielded answers that she could never have thought of or expected. This simple question is deep and it truly allows one to build connection with that individual. Many times patients will love you for asking this question because they will see the discussion you have from this as signs that you care and are on the same side with the same goal: to get them back to as healthy as they can be.

I loved our talk. She is great with positive body language that encourages you to continue talking about what's on your mind. Head nods; voice tone of interest/curiosity; active listening; and circulating honest opinions from each one of allowed our conversation to go to its level of depth. Definitely my favorite professor and very likely still tops the list out of favorite teachers I've had throughout my 20 year life. Spectacular professor. Encouraging, and a definite a role model for me in the sense that she is a promoter of yourself, of your talents, of your ideas; a disciplined individual who thinks for what she wants in life and looks for the bigger picture instead of falling into the trap of materialism; a person who genuinely cares for other people in every sense of the word; an individual with the courage, integrity, humility, and compassion to do what is necessary to care for others; and a person, after all her experiences in life, is still motivated and lives with purpose. Respect.

Today is Day 7 of my 30 day challenge to build the habit of becoming a habitual early-riser.