I am like a wide eyed boy in a huge toy store who wants to find out what every toy can do before his parents take him home. I'm passionately curious about the world around me since when i can remember and that trait has never deserted me even now.I tend to be fascinated with more things than i can probably give my full attention to. I remember as a child dismantling electronic equipment to understand how it works despite being punished for it later or reading extensively about some interesting story the day before some exam which would not be asked in any exam. I don't know whether this has been actually a good thing or detrimental in my life but I guess I cant be anything else but me. Mine has been a life of curiosity and facination! I have this uncanny ability to find a sense of wonder in the things i'm doing which i think is a gift. All the elders in my life(parents,relatives,teachers) are very effusive that I make a career for myself but I dont really know if i have planned for a career as such.Some years ago I read an article by Shekar Kapur, the world renowned Director of Hindi and English language films.He said " I had removed the word career from my dictionary when i was 22yrs old as i find that word restricting" Well though i took more time than Shekar Kapur did to realize this I have come to the same conclusion too, more so in the last 3 yrs when I was doing my residency. I think i can be more than a single body of work. I can have multiple roles and do it just as well. Yes I would like to work as an ophthalmologist like i'm trained to but what i will eventually become will not depend on furthering a career or on monetary consideration but on what I believe i should be doing and how I think I can touch people's lives.
Now that i'm nearing the end of my residency I'm contemplating my next move from here on. During my residency I was first introduced to a sub-specialty in Ophthalmology called Orbit and Oculoplasty which initially did not much appeal to me until one day in the OT i saw a face being reconstructed after removal of a large mass of malignant tumour of the eyelid. It immediately caught my fancy. But i guess the turning point of my residency was when i assisted my boss in a procedure called Lateral orbitotomy where you have remove a tumour from the back of the eye after sawing through bone. I found that procedure so fascinating that I thought to myself, thats what i want to do! That was when i first thought of pursuing Orbit and oculoplasty as my sub-specialty and over the years it has become my favorite sub-specialty. The interest is so apparent i don't think anybody in my institute has any doubt as to which specialty I shall pursue. When told of my plans, my parents though supporting weren't very enthusiastic. So were many of my professors and relatives. They told me "why do you want to do something where you wont have enough cases and there's no money in it?" or that "why would you want to do anything other than cataract surgeries when there are so many to be done and also so much money in cataracts? " Well I dont know how but i was able to ignore all these people and i applied for a fellowship in orbit and oculoplasty in LVPEI, Hyderabad which is the best place in India for that sub-specialty. As i write this i'm waiting for the selection results which may or may not go in my favour.
I recently attended a conference where 2 of the leading figures of Orbit, oculoplasty and ocular oncology, Prof. JRR Collin and Dr. Carol Shields were conducting a workshop in their subject of expertise. They are the very people whose text books we read and i was completely bowled over by their enormous knowledge and genius in their subject. The clarity and simplicity with which they spoke has been so inspiring. I've been touched by Dr. Shields' passion for her subject. Their talk probably removed the last shreds of doubt from my mind about orbit and oculoplasty.
I recently attended a conference where 2 of the leading figures of Orbit, oculoplasty and ocular oncology, Prof. JRR Collin and Dr. Carol Shields were conducting a workshop in their subject of expertise. They are the very people whose text books we read and i was completely bowled over by their enormous knowledge and genius in their subject. The clarity and simplicity with which they spoke has been so inspiring. I've been touched by Dr. Shields' passion for her subject. Their talk probably removed the last shreds of doubt from my mind about orbit and oculoplasty.
I guess money has never driven me as much as passion has all my life. I have achieved whatever i passionately wanted to do and fortunately it has never really been for financial gain. So i guess my next step should be to do what I would love doing. That said i find even cataract surgeries and corneal surgeries fascinating too and maybe would not mind pursuing that either if for some reasons I may not get to do oculoplasty...John Irving, one of my favorite writers once said "I could have been a lot of things and even good at it but if I had been anything other than a writer my life wouldn't have been quite as satisfying" I guess Irving echoes my feelings towards orbit and oculoplasty. My life wouldn't be as satisfying if i couldn't pursue it. But unfortunately there are not many fellowships in India for this upcoming sub-specialty( in fact only 1 vacancy each in 3 big eye institutes in south india). So it has been a huge risk on my part by not applying for anything else. Right now I remember a sentence my professor of pediatrics in medical college used to say "Always give your best because if suppose you do not succeed, find peace in the fact that you couldn't have done anything more than your best".... So i'm keeping my fingers crossed. :-)
