By Vanisaben Patel.

How do you keep yourself motivated during medical school during tough times? What advice would you give to an entering 1st-year podiatry student?

The term “medical school” itself comes with the stigma of stress, more stress, and even more stress. Often when people think of medical school students, the characteristics that instantly come to mind are,

“no free time, stressed, grey hairs, no social life”

and the list could go on and on. There is no doubt in my mind or any of my colleagues around the nation that medical school is tough on the mind, body, and relationships outside of school and within it. For many of us, this is uncharted territory and it is an experience we learn to grow with on a day by day basis. In my undergraduate school, I was rarely in any state of stress. I was happy with my involvement, friends, and relationships so nothing really seemed to ever go wrong. 

I learned that you can either let the self-doubt consume you or fight past the struggle.

After I graduated undergrad, it was a matter of 2 months until I would face this new beast known as medical school. In medical school, the stress of just being in such a rigorous curriculum was what always caused me to worry and created self-doubt in my mind as it did with many of those around me. I learned that you can either let the self-doubt consume you or fight past the struggle. Luckily for me, I was able to find my motivation early on in my years in medical school and for me, it was as simple as a post-it note and Google.

Every Sunday I would search for a quote on Google that best reflected how I was feeling versus how I wanted to feel about the week. For example, if I was very upset or tired, I would try to find an uplifting quote that would keep me motivated all week. I would put the post-it note with the quote in three different places so it would serve as a constant reminder of my goal for the week.

I would place it on my bathroom mirror,

on the wall behind my desk,

and on my door so that every time I would leave and come back for the day, my note would be there as a constant reminder.

While this doesn’t seem like much, I love to read and reflect deeper into songs, quotes and poems because of the awakening of the mind it can bring. This would always help me and did more than I could imagine mentally for me during preparation for Boards Part 1, a truly stressful time period. These quotes taught me that regardless of how I am feeling one day, everything can change in the matter of a second and that the more I look into how I want to feel, the more I will become the person I aspire to be. 

Motivation helps determine the mood for the rest of your day, week, month or year…

Motivation is a true key to success regardless of if you’re in medical school or just in the everyday struggles that come with life. Motivation helps determine the mood for the rest of your day, week, month or year and can play such a vital role in your success as you continue through life. I think it’s important to find what helps you obtain the determination to keep going on with whatever goals you have set. For me, a simple quote and post-it note affected my mind, body, and recharged me on a day to day basis which in turn, allowed me to live my life with a healthy mentality and outlook.

by Vanisaben Patel.

School: Barry University School of Podiatric Medicine

 

Motivation is a True Key to Success

Motivation, Student Life

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