When I Do An Operation, It's Half

In Many Ways, The Effort To Study Philosophy Was My Rebellion Away From Medicine. I'm The Son Of Two Indian Immigrant Physicians, So The Natural Path For Me Would Have Been To Become A Doctor. I Ended Up Doing The Master's Degree At Oxford In Politics, Philosophy, And Economics While Already Having A Seat In Medical School. I Was Keeping That As My Escape Hatch. But My Hope Was That I Might Become A Philosopher Or Something Else Entirely.

Having Great Components Is Not Enough, And Yet We've Been Obsessed In Medicine With Components. We Want The Best Drugs, The Best Technologies, The Best Specialists, But We Don't Think Too Much About How It All Comes Together.

What Is Needed, However, Isn't Just That People Working Together Be Nice To Each Other. It Is Discipline. Discipline Is Hard--harder Than Trustworthiness And Skill And Perhaps Even Than Selflessness. We Are By Nature Flawed And Inconstant Creatures. We Can't Even Keep From Snacking Between Meals. We Are Not Built For Discipline. We Are Built For Novelty And Excitement, Not For Careful Attention To Detail. Discipline Is Something We Have To Work At.

Just Using A Checklist Requires [doctors] To Embrace Different Values From Ones We've Had, Like Humility, Discipline, Teamwork.

In The End, People Don't View Their Life As Merely The Average Of All Its Moments-which, After All, Is Mostly Nothing Much Plus Some Sleep. For Human Beings, Life Is Meaningful Because It Is A Story. A Story Has A Sense Of A Whole, And Its Arc Is Determined By The Significant Moments, The Ones Where Something Happens. Measurements Of People's Minute-by-minute Levels Of Pleasure And Pain Miss This Fundamental Aspect Of Human Existence. A Seemingly Happy Life Maybe Empty. A Seemingly Difficult Life May Be Devoted To A Great Cause. We Have Purposes Larger Than Ourselves.