The Art* Of Flight

Ever notice how much you can learn about life through art and sports? My sport is the long jump. Scratch that. The long flight. I’ve learned more through sports than I have through anything else so I decided to write about it! This blog is a series of adventures and ‘aha’ moments aimed at anyone who believes in the power of sport to teach life lessons, who pursues excellence of mind, body and spirit equally, and is interested in living skillfully, artfully and brilliantly!

 

I’ve been running and jumping since I was 11 but put track & field on hold at various points in my life: medical school was accompanied by time constraints and stress; the first part of residency brought a knee injury; and fellowship found me with a deep and sincere desire to become expert at interventional spine and sports medicine. I am also a spine and sports medicine doctor. People often wonder aloud how those two things go together (with an attendant facial expression that reads, “either you’re lying or you’re crazy.”). But how could they not go together? First, they are two parts of one whole: me! Second, both professions – medicine and flight – are beautiful, complementary pursuits that inform one another.

 

 

Track & field is like a safe haven for me. It’s always “been there for me” (cue the violins…) in a way that nothing else has. When I didn’t match into a surgical residency coming out of Harvard Medical School, my confusion, shame, frustration and let’s be frank, anger (I paid borrowed over $100,000 to end up with no job?!?!?! What?!?!?!) couldn’t be quantified. I was inconsolable.

 

The single place I could go where everything made sense again was the track. There, the universe is simple. Quiet. Calm. True. No bells and whistles. Just you, your sneaks, your intention and an oval of possibility. Effort, will, grit, allowing, focus, artistry and sincerity are the rule rather than the exception. There, misunderstanding and social politics don’t leak into the equation with their trademarks, confusion and nuance. There, it’s about breath, physical movement (what a pure expression of self), making something happen. Or not. It’s the place I went to, and go, where everything is always right. It’s the place I went to, and go, to right my ship when it seems to be toppling.

 

 

 

But medicine is also “there for me” (cue louder violins and throw in a swell of kettle drums…). When I’m unable to execute a physical feat well, when lack of adequate rest, over-zealous (read: dumb) training habits and poor mechanics conspire to produce an injury (subchondral bone fracture, patellar tendonitis, grade 1 ankle sprain to name a few), the track and the gym simply aren’t available to me. But my “other” profession is. Suddenly, through injury, the opportunity to forge even stronger connections with patients opens up.

 

 

During my fellowship in New York, a patient’s mother said she wanted to cry when I said “I know how frustrating this must be for your son, it’s a major part of his identity.” I get it. And I don’t take the privilege of patient-doctor connection for granted. What an honor it is to have studied something I love (musculoskeletal medicine!), talk about it with people I can relate to and help them get better. At “work.” What a coup! Not only have I been formally trained to diagnose and treat but I’ve been informally trained to know exactly what my patients are feeling when they say “I just want to run again;” exactly what they mean when they nervously ask “can I do more damage by exercising?” Thinking through the anatomy, the mechanics, the treatment options and synthesizing a plan is a true team effort between my patients and me and it’s a joy. A calling.

 

So if track and field (training, lifting, visualizing, sleeping, hydrating, stretching) is “home base,” a quiet and personal space of refuge, then medicine is my dugout, a shared space of idea exchange, strategizing, exploration and discovery.

 

 

This blog was my coach’s idea. As usual, it’s a brilliant one I’ve embraced with total trust. The fact is, I’ve learned and continue to learn so much on this journey that it seems wrong not to capture a few lessons, packaged in a few stories. My sister and I enjoy the expression God will keep teaching you a lesson until you learn it, and remind each other of it often. Well, I’ve been in God’s classroom now for a good, long while (I may qualify as a “super senior,” for the love of Pete) and the lessons just keep on coming, some for the first and others for the umpteenth time. Maybe in sharing a few, we’ll all move closer to (debt-free) graduation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So please feel free… To read, share, learn, grow as I explore the life lessons and wisdom enmeshed in this journey we’ve nicknamed long flying — more art than science, more messy than neat, all truth, nothing false. This is the beautiful, powerful art of flight.

*Note: “Art,” in this context, is synonymous for: magic, perils, freedom, wonders, joy, thrill, brow-beating life lessons, hazards, risks, rewards, release, triumphs, divinity, escape, purity, holiness, peace, presence and fulfillment. Among other things.