untitled opus I

About yesterday...

Perhaps not every opportunity needs to be seized.  Not every opportunity is an opportunity.  This one simply wasn't enough for me to give up things for.  Learn from the experience.  Move on.

About tomorrow...

just sort of do it?

It all started with an invitation to an internship at a new friend's film production company here in San Francisco.

Everything was going to be great - I would watch and observe the editor and director at work, learn a lot of new things, and perhaps help with film projects.

Now, one week later, the internship has begun and ended prematurely; and my overthinking mind is left to analyze it to death.

First of all, it wasn't exactly an internship.  It was going to be like a semi-internship as I could only devote a couple of visits to the office each week.  During the first and final week, I was there three times, for a total of eight hours.  It didn't take long for me to feel that any time spent at the semi-internship meant time taken away from cello practice, tennis games, and, of course, script writing.  Besides, I was helping the company with research on business expansion and wasn't quite getting the hands-on experience I had hoped for.

At least that's what I told myself.

So, after one week, I told my boss Carl that the timing wasn't right, and I was overly ambitious to think that I could devote enough time to his company.  He took it very well, saying that when I am ready to commit to filmmaking, I would be able to give up the other things in my life and devote myself to it completely.

I had doubts.  Just like Meryl Streep at the end of the film "Doubt."

That's when I called my cousin Debbie, who is a singer/composer in Taiwan.  She had been through a tough period of searching for her place in the music world, so I knew she would be able to understand my situation.  Plus she always gives it to me straight.  No sugar-coating anything.  Sort of like a more pleasant, prettier, female version of me.

Minutes into our conversation, she was already pointing all the things I had feared were true but didn't want to confront.  Here were the questions she raised:

What makes me think I could gauge what the company is like after eight hours working with them?  Why should anyone hire an intern who could only devote eight hours a week?  Why should I expect to be handed projects that were to my liking?  What could I possibly expect to accomplish by working eight hours a week?  Why should I expect to be taught anything?  Obviously, this isn't medical school.

But the most important question was this:  if I am seriously passionate about film, why can't I give up everything else to do it, to breathe it, to live it?

I have lots of answers to each and every question, none of them really good.

As a side note, this brought up a brief conversation about the concept that each of us already knows the answer to the important questions in life, but 99.9999% of us have our minds clouded by greed, pride, and whatever other sins and desires you can think of.  But I digress.

I don't want to believe that my personality will lead me to everywhere and consequently nowhere (that's what my father tells me and hence advises me to stick with medicine).  But I do believe it is time to seriously reevaluate my priorities and what I really want to accomplish.

It would be nice to have answers handed to me.  But I know it won't happen that way.  The path toward my goals is likely 10 times more difficult that I was preparing for, and I am standing at every intersection, ready to provide all sorts of obstacle.  

The next time an opportunity presents itself, will I "just do it" or will I "just sort of do it"?

I have an answer:  I need to get rid of "me."

practice makes imperfect

At my cello lesson yesterday, my instructor Irina noted that, unlike some of her other students, I am very receptive to changes.

Her comment took me by surprise.  

I have enough self-awareness to know that I am open to constructive criticism, but it never occurred to me that others might not.  That's the part I don't understand - if you could improve something about you, why wouldn't you do it? 

Now I'm not talking about going to a plastic surgeon to get a face lift (at least not yet, ask me in 20 years; maybe 10), but simple things like improving the way you hold the cello bow, the way you hit a forehand on the tennis court, or the way you approach an eligible bachelor to ask him out on a first date.  If you could learn to do things better, why not?

Sure, it isn't always easy.  Often very difficult I should day.  But still - isn't that what life is about - finding ways to learn, to improve ourselves?  The corollary to all this is that it makes my life a bit more challenging - meaning I would never be satisfied with myself and that I would always feel that there is more to achieve, more to improve.  That's where the concept of the imperfect human comes in - I need to remind myself that my goal is improvement, not perfection.

Last year I read a book given to me by a colleague at Kaiser.  She has a strong interest in hypnotherapy and the concept of reincarnation.  An idea proposed by the author is that the purpose of each lifetime is to find and overcome a character flaw.  I must admit that it is quite easy to find my character flaw(s), but overcoming it is another story, as it is with most people.

But again, the issue here is change - finding that which needs improvement and addressing it.  Maybe that's why I'm so restless...  Maybe I'm closer to Nirvana than I know...

...Maybe I need to practice the cello a bit more today.

veni, vini, vici

This afternoon at 5 pm I was sitting in the Taube Tennis Stadium at Stanford University.  I don't know how many seats there were at the stadium - a few thousand would be my guess.  I was the only person there.

Over the past four days I attended the US Gay Open, a tennis tournament organized by the Gay & Lesbian Tennis Federation.  I wasn't there as a player; I was a volunteer - I didn't think I had enough match toughness to be in a tournament like this.  I thought it would be embarrassing if, instead of serving properly, I had to toss and retoss the ball because my left arm couldn't follow my brain's orders.  So the only other alternative to experience this tournament for the first time was to volunteer.  I had a blast.

I set up courts, prepared drinks, bought breakfast.  I even managed (very successfully I might add) the consolation rounds on a cool Sunday morning.

But more importantly, I met lots of people.  I saw them.  And I heard them.  Then I appreciated them.  

I saw how players competed at all levels, many higher than my own, but also many below.  I saw amazing points that ended after a series of unbelievable volleys, overheads, slices, topspin forehands.  I saw doubles partners hugging each other after a win or a loss and encouraging each other.  I saw people having fun no matter how they played.

Then this afternoon, when the regular matches had finished and all the spectators had departed, only the players of World Team Tennis and a few members of the organizing team remained.  They were playing on the outside courts, leaving me alone to reflect on the past few days in the stadium.  I heard screams.  I had laughter.  I had cheers.  

I left my solitude in the main stadium and ran up to check out the matches.  

I saw players wearing outfits that would probably send Queen Elizabeth to the cardic cath lab if they were ever to appear at Wimbledon.  There were tiaras, tutus, one-piece skirts.  Most of these were worn by the guys.  Watching them close up, you would laugh at how funny the guys looked.  Watching them from far away, you would laugh because you saw people having fun.  I noticed that I couldn't tell if the laughters I heard were male or female voices.  Then I realized it didn't matter.  They were tennis players who loved what they were doing at the moment in the Taube Stadium at Stanford University in Palo Alto, California.

So I decided I would play at next year's tournament.  So what if I couldn't get my serves in.  So what if some of my forehands would go long.  So what if I would dump the easiest overheads into the net.  I'll just keep hitting the ball and keep loving it.

I came.  I saw.  I heard.  I'll conquer.

the russians are coming

Well, not exactly.  But changes are coming.

Sometime last year I had this feeling that 2009 would be the last year that I would practice medicine.  It has been seven years since I finished residency, and it is now more than just a seven year itch:  it has become practically a wound.

To make the long story short, I've found a job as a medical consultant.  No, it isn't filmmaking.  I'm quite aware of that.  The teleplay that I'm working on with my friend in New York is coming along nicely, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed.  In the meantime, I'll start my new job in September - seven years and one month after I began working at Kaiser Permanente - five years and one month longer than my residency classmates and I had estimated I would last in medicine.

Last week I met a ballet dancer.  A Russian ballet dancer.  As expected, he was in perfect physical shape, charming, handsome.  I was intrigued to hear his story, his life, his plans.  In turn, I told him of mine.  He then mentioned that he had an idea for a dance-based theater project and that it might be fun for me to write it with him.  When I shared with him that it would be "incredibly, incredibly, incredibly" amazing if one day I would work on such a project and also work for a film production company, he immediately corrected me, saying that it would be at most "incredible," not "incredible, incredible, incredible."

I confessed my ignorance.  So he proceeded to remind me that if I work on something really hard then ultimately achieve the desired result, then there isn't much there that is incredible.

Well, of course he was right.  I don't know if I was misusing the word incredible, if I never understood its meaning in the first place, or if I was not giving myself the credit I'm due.  This isn't a multiple choice question - I already know the answer.

I remember that when I working in Santa Rosa as a full time primary care doctor, I had imagined how amazing it would be if I could one day work just a few days a week and spend the rest of my time pursuing the things I loved.  Well, that's exactly what happened.  I spent three years in Santa Rosa searching for my passion, I found it in filmmaking, and I moved to San Francisco to work part-time while learning about the art, playing tennis, going to Paris for months at a time...

Then during this period of hedonism, I imagined how amazing it would be if I could one day not be a doctor any more, then be lucky enough to find some job related to filmmaking while working on various writing or photography projects.  All this is slowly coming true.  I've worked hard to make it come true.  So what's so incredible about that?

Nothing.  Absoultely nothing at all.  So I'll march on to my own little symphony and keep exploring opportunities that take me to my dreams.  What once seemed amazing will one day be what I'm living.

Changes are coming.

come

I'm no longer going to wait for the future to arrive.

Instead, I'm going to bring my future to me.  

today is friday

Today is Friday.

On Monday, I wanted an apple.  I didn't see one.

On Tuesday, I saw a beautiful apple, but I didn't want one any more.  

I did nothing.

Wednesday came and gone.

Thursday was when I felt like wanting an apple again.  I couldn't find one.

Today is Friday.  I haven't come across an apple yet.  I still want one.

Tomorrow will be Saturday.  Already.  

From now on, I will keep my eyes open and take the apple when I see one.  

Because I don't want to miss it again.