Self-Examination
photo by Noah Buscher
It’s often said that time flies when you’re having fun. I think that time flies regardless. I’m coming up on my third year in university, nearing my 20s, and suspect that I’ve just had my first real identity crisis.
With the world slowly returning to less restricted activity, it felt as though I’d taken in a sharp breath after nearly two years at a standstill. No longer was I submerged under horrible headlines and bogged down with questions of mortality and fulfillment. But, almost instantaneously thereafter, I was left spluttering out in confusion and sloshing around in a pool of hopes and dreams that tasted strange in my mouth. A little too chlorinated for my liking. I was having to contend with one thoroughly delayed 5-year plan, and with the thought that the ‘near future’ to which I abstractly referred every once in a while, was now effectively here.
No doubt, two years ago, I was bordering a little on obnoxious in my ambition. Carving out monthly schedules and vision boards that were going to fast-track me into medical school and beyond. I now chuckle just thinking back. But at my most confused, I remember craving the certainty with which the younger me knew exactly who she was, what she was accomplishing, and where she was heading — however misguided and clueless. It felt like I was waking up to time quickly passing me by, and I was struggling to catch up.
One of my cousins is getting married. Another’s been conscripted into the army. A couple of my friends studying in the UK graduate this year and are diving head-first either into the workforce or into postgraduate studies. This is not to say that I felt as though I was lagging behind. No, I was still lurching forward all the same. Registering for fall classes in New York, trying out a new yoga class to broaden my horizons, working to gain more world experience. If I were asked to describe what I was getting up to, I probably wouldn’t have run out of things to say.
In fact, just recently, I was applying indiscriminately to every position remotely within my field of interest. And while I could write a million cover letters describing my qualifications and outlining my personal interest, it was during the interviews when prompted to introduce myself that I was at a loss for words. Sure, I could chalk it up to nerves, to the fact that no one really enjoys being put on the spot so suddenly. But when the interview was long over and there was no longer any pressure on me to deliver a neat answer; when I was in bed tossing, turning, and poring over the minute details of my day; when I had seemingly all the time in the world as the night stretched before me, I still had trouble hitting the bullseye. Almost like I didn’t know myself — like there was a schism of the self.
Some days, I alternated between feeling like I was doing myself a great disservice by questioning my identity and feeling like there really wasn’t much to me at all. The better part of my brain understood that there was neither rhyme nor reason to that type of thinking. I was fueled by exhaustion and insecurity, yet, it’s still no easy feat to shake off your own inner saboteur. I might not believe that time only flies when you’re having fun, but I do certainly subscribe to the idea that you’re often your worst critic.
I’m at a strange stage in life where I don’t necessarily have to have everything figured out, but where there are also significant consequences otherwise. I recently decided to apply for medical school nearing the end of my senior year, a whole year after the ‘traditional’ applicant does. While, in the grand scheme of things, a 22-year-old medical student rarely differs from a 21-year-old one, the extra year that now stands between me and medical school applications often seemed more like time waiting before my real life would begin. There was comfort in believing — even wrongly — that once I made it, I’d know what my purpose was. I’d finally be well-adjusted and comfortable in my own skin, but until then, who was I? What was I that others weren’t?
The short answer that I’ve now come to figure out is: probably nothing. I’m very likely nothing that someone else wasn’t before me and won’t be after me. And it’s not so much the end as the means that makes me distinctive. I’m probably not special in the things that I’ve seen or done, but I certainly am in the way that I’ve done them. In the way I either fondly or disdainfully recall them. In the way that I internalize them to power me through yet another experience that countless others have also had.
I’m special in the way that I think about and present myself and my accomplishments to the world before me. Even if I’m not entirely confident as I’d like to be. Even if I’m inching slowly to the finish line, rather than sprinting forward. And I’m hoping that’s enough for medical school applications, for future job interviews — and most importantly — for myself whenever I want to turn my critical eye inward for another self-examination.
