This is the Adventure

Note: This is really an elaborate answer to "what have you been up to?" that friends have been asking me and basically this post assumes you know me personally, my past, and my present.  It's been quite a long time since I've written one of these.

In a period of ennui and weather-induced "emo"-ness, I once said to a friend, "I need adventure."  Yesterday I realized that what I'm doing now is the adventure.  It's really been one long perilous adventure.  I've experienced more positive character growth this year than my previous years combined.  Time heals all I guess.

I wish I could avoid such an overused metaphor but this "road of life" explains it the best.  I was too focused on the destination and never stopped to admire the scenery.  Then again, the material I was learning before never seemed to provide much intellectual stimulation.  Anyone can regurgitate the PKA pathway or cdc's and cyclins for an exam yet I couldn't bring myself to do it.

But being so focused on the destination, I failed to see I was in the wrong spot.  I lacked passion or interest in the material yet having been so heavily invested, I felt I had to finish what I started.  My mind constructed negative thoughts and even worse, I listened to it.  Now, I learn to dissociate myself from the mind and really take an objective look at things.  It's so important to not let the mind make things more than what they really are.

A patient once told me to "find my passion" as that is the most important thing.  I think I found it.  Or at least, I'm feeling passionate about what I'm learning.  It's good that what I'm learning has had an impact on the world stage and new ideas keep coming.  It's good to see things I'm learning being mentioned on The Hour with George Stroumboulopoulos and The National. Cause that's where I want to go later in life - to see the world and effect change big or small, in the little towns or the big cities.

While before, I only saw stepping stones to where I want to end up.  Now, I'm taking in the moment and the experiences life's journey coincidentally presents.  Some can explain the series of coincidences as God's way of putting me on the right path - like Ted's elaborate tale of who he has to become before meeting the "Mother" of How I Met Your Mother.  I try not to think that because life is so unpredictable and it'd be pretentious to assume a sense of entitlement and destiny.  So, it's just easier to go with the flow.

I'll close off this episode of my life's story with something I learned yesterday that hit close to home.

Health care problem #1028379 (an "approximate" number):

"Celebrex" - for arthritis vs. "Cerebyx" - for epileptic seizures

You could make all the jokes you want about the illegible handwriting but there may be a bigger picture to the problem.  Come up with better names!  Yeah, chemical names are complicated but with drug companies pouring so much money into marketing and coming up with cool names for drugs that treat possibly fabricated "syndromes", it kind of scared me that my mom could easily have been given the wrong drug.  There is just no system in place when there should be safeguards against such "look-alikes/sound-alikes".  Screw-ups like this cost taxpayers money.  And don't get me started on the moral gray areas of drug companies.

Just one example of how the world needs fixin' in little ways and in big ways.  But for now, I must pay my dues.  April beckons.

I'd quote Batman Begins but from the overall theme of this post, I think it's obvious and might make you cringe at this point. 

Edit: The theme of this post was later coincidentally shown in Pixar's film Up, released about two months after this post.

(Sigh, if you must highlight, it's "Why do we fall, Master Wayne?")