Rage As Power

Rage has carried me through nearly unbearable, terrible periods in my life.

Take medical school.

I hated it from the very first day.

I never wanted to be a doctor but ended up in med school for a variety of reasons.

I knew there was no going back: what else would I do if I didn't get my M.D.?

An undergraduate degree from UCLA in political science didn't offer a whole lot of promising opportunities.

So it was that I started medical school.

And I finished it: on time, graduating with my class "in the top half," as they say.

But not by a whole lot.

Med school was a death march for me.

Boring, hard and frustrating, it was a seemingly endless progression of uncertainty–filled and sleep–deprived days and nights.

There was rarely anything that enabled me to forget how miserable I was.

I have a very high tolerance for personal discomfort, boredom and misery.

Such characteristics do enable one to accomplish quite a lot when others are throwing in the towel and saying, "this is ridiculous."

Rage is power.