The Autobiographical Sketch

It's that time again...or rather, I should say, the time has finally come. Internship applications: autobiographical sketch, training experience & career goals, theoretical orientation, and of course the stance on cultural diversity. I've been avoiding having to write these statements like the plague. I got started last year, put all of 0.05% effort into fulfilling a first pass requirement. Then, I decided to stay an extra year due to numerous factors: desire to publish, realization of sunken costs & time (so why not add another year? What's one year in the grand scheme of things?), not ready to leave SF quite yet/possible conviction to continue sewing seeds where roots were laid, best friend forever moved to SF from NYC (we'd been praying for years that we'd get the opportunity to live in the same place for once), end of 2.5 year relationship followed by questions of what is my purpose now & the like, defense of clinical oral examination and 98 page dissertation proposal coupled with complete burnout further explaining my avoidance & investment of 0.05% effort.

It finally hit me today that I can only avoid internship applications for so long. Okay, fine. It didn't really hit me. A more accurate explanation is I got a request/demand from my advisor for my completed essays-autobiographical sketch, training experience and career goals, theoretical orientation, and stance on cultural diversity-and thought, "Oh Crap." So here I am now, further procrastinating by blogging about the fact that I need to get going on these essays. I figured I'd use this space to try and take a stab at the first one, the autobiographical sketch.

Please provide an autobiographical statement. There is no "correct" format for this question. Answer this as if someone had asked you "tell me something about yourself." It is an opportunity for you to provide the internship site some information about yourself.

Let me just start by saying that the idea of writing yet another personal statement that may or may not convince a committee of strangers to choose me from hundreds of other applicants aiming to do the same thing makes me want to hurl. I know I'm early in my career. In fact, I'm not even @ the career mark quite yet. You may say that it's too soon for me to feel this way, but I can't tell you enough that I'm really tired of having to sell myself. The application process is never ending. Life is an application process it seems.

Most of the statement you'll be receiving will detail the journey of how some graduate student stumbled onto the field. Others might be oozing with passion overflowing from experience with a loved one. And then I'm 100% certain that ALL statements will convey the overused theme "I want to help people." I'm not excluding myself from any of these categories. I joined corporate America immediately after college, was provoked by the idea of pursuing mercy & justice for the poor after spending summer in the slums of Bangkok, and then took an unexpected turn after callouses formed on my fingertips, resultant from punching numbers on a calculator to ensure debits equalled credits...give or take a couple thousand in between of course. My paternal grandmother had a diagnosis of Parkinson's Disease and exhibited symptoms of Lewy Body Dementia. I want to help people and have had this desire ever since I was a small child (I think I take after my mother who often experienced an overwhelming need to invite strangers to holiday and family dinners...they had to be Chinese of course though). So yes, I'm an ex-accountant turned psychologist, a descendant of a victim of Parkinson's, and a good citizen/humanitarian/helper.

I know you're all seeking good matches for your program. I want to tell you that I feel I'm a good match, but I don't really know what that means. The phrase, "a good match" is a little too simplistic for my liking. I want to offer you something more than just "a good match." And when I say more, I'm not referring to better or worse...just more. You see, I'm 29 years old and not quite ready to write the story of my life in 500 words or less. I still have a lot of living to do and I'm certain you're program will only be small part of this living. Not to say it won't be an important part as I expect it will be a stepping stone to something greater. The thing is I try not to live or plan my life too far advance, so to say you're program is exactly what I am looking for and will help me get where I want to go would well...be a lie. I've learned in order to be good at anything whether it be a career, relationship, or even hobby, you kind of have to roll with the punches. I'm at a point where I'm still rolling.

It's been a difficult yet humbling couple of years. I figured out I was deathly afraid of disappointment...not just disappointment, but negative feelings altogether. This came about after I was called to examine my defenses. It became clear that I spend a lot of time and energy pretending I don't care about things I actually do in fact care about. I don't like to care because I don't like to be disappointed. Unfortunately, I wasn't made to be this apathetic person who doesn't really care about many things. I seem to care about too many things. In fact, I'm always thinking about something whether it be the mess of a healthcare system we have, the morbidly obese candidate for bariatric surgery, the borderline patient who gave me the hee bee jee bees, my close friend who just suffered a break-up, my friends who don't yet know the Lord but need Him so much, my posture, getting enough sleep, and of course the ongoing quest to find my purpose as I walk around with this gnawing feeling that I was made for something bigger than myself. My best friend referred to me as "intense" the other day. I didn't think of myself intense. I mean I laugh a lot and at most things. I regularly engage in what I call "ugly dancing." Even my dreams have a way of being plain silly and goofy. Still, I couldn't argue with her. Goofiness aside, I do operate at a consistent level of intensity.

Thus, I often feel like there isn't enough time to acknowledge the illogical negative "things" that pinch at me along the way. I'm strong on survival, but lacking on all the touchy feely things connected to the gooey epicenter of my being. I've learned however that there's no way to avoid the negative touchy feely things...except to stand in the middle of it all-disappointment, pain, hurt, sorrow, and all. I tell this to my patients and I tell this to myself.

The thing is I care about this...this thing I am doing here. I want to be picked, chosen. I want to know that I'm good enough and that out of the hundreds of applicants, I won't just fall by the wayside. I want to know that I'm interesting, unique and my efforts these last few years were not in vain. I need to know that even if I don't get picked for this one, there is another one that is even better..."a better match." I want to ensure I'm right where I'm supposed to be and that where I end up will help me to further propel mercy & justice from the front lines of my gooey epicenter. I'm writing in search of all these things even though I know it may end in disappointment and that I may have to stand in it and live through it many more times & over.

The deep truth is that our human suffering need not be an obstacle to the joy and peace we so desire, but we can become, instead, the means to it...Living our brokenness under the curse means that we experience our pain as a confirmation of our negative feelings about ourselves. it is like saying, "I always suspected that I was useless or worthless and now I am sure of it because of what is happening to me." there is always something in us searching for an explanation of what takes place in our lives and, if we have already yielded to the temptation to self-rejection, then every form of misfortune only deepens it. -Henri Nouwen

How I got Fulfull my Lifelong Dream of Living a Cliche Moment

It has happenned. I never imagined I'd ever get to partake in something so cliche. I've heard jokes being made about the scenario from time to time. I remember watching a parody of it way back when I was still interested in Tiny Toons, a comparison between Good Boy Buster and Bad Boy Monte. It was a public service announcement at one point, an affiliation with the Boy Scouts of America. Never would I have expected something like this to occur during my lifetime. Yes, I got to help a little old lady cross the street...and it happened exactly as I would've imagined.

I was on my usual 9-mile run wearing my earphones and thinking about very unimportant things. Picking up the pace along Fulton Avenue, I saw her standing there on the sidewalk not moving. She gestured and I wondered whether she was just having a moment or whether she was trying to get my attention. I stopped short in my stride and paused the song that was playing on my Ipod.

I could barely hear her with the Sunday afternoon traffic passing us by. She She had a very soft voice. "This is very heavy," she said. She was carrying two medium sized bags and a cane. "I have arthritis and can't see very well." I asked her where she needed to go. She pointed to a house diagonally across the street. I took her bags and slowly walked with her across the street. She thanked me and told me I could leave the bags at the front of her door. I told her I'd bring them up the stairs for her. She was somewhat hesitant and squinted her eyes giving me a good long look (probably sizing me up). I'm sure she concluded my 5'3 frame would not fare very well in a match with her cane and decided to let me continue with my role of playing "the good Boy Scout." She let me lug the two bags up her steps and requested I close the gate on my way out.

And that's how I got to fulfull my dream of helping a little old lady cross the street =D

Ramblings of a Psychologist

I keep promising myself that I will write again. I always wanted to be a writer. At times, I fantasize about living the life of a struggling literary artist. Who doesn't? Sure, you're always wondering how you'll come up with the following month's rent and how to construct a "thanks for taking the time to read my submission" letter that doesn't scream "screw you for saying 'no' to my piece." Even still, a life devoted to putting 'angsty meanderings' into words and crafting something that pretends to say so much when really says nothing at all is oh so appealing...only at times of course.

I was struggling there for a couple of months; having a hard time with the idea of having spent the last 4 years of my life undergoing training in order to make the commitment to helping other people have better lives. You see, it's always been my dream to change the world. I wanted/want to do something great. And while I struggle with wanting to do it just so I know I can be something great, I also know deep in my heart I really just want to do something great for God. As much as I don't like to admit it, His heart for the people of this world breaks my heart. I guess I just didn't think I'd be committing to this with the knowledge my own life isn't exactly "better" in the way I want it to be.

Working with veterans these last couple if years, I've come to understand that "Better" is a relative term. I've also come to understand there's no "good guy" or "bad guy." There's really only the individual human nature and the collective human nature. To be honest, I understand all this just enough to understand that I don't really understand much of anything at all. As psychologists, we like to think we understand. We want to understand our patients, our instructors, ourselves-we're mandated to go to therapy in order to quicken the process of understanding ourselves. In my opinion, understanding is overrated.

I don't understand why we're always at war. I don't understand why people voluntarily sign up to go to war. I don't understand why society expects people to function "normally" after they've gone to war. And really...I don't understand why there's the expectation that life is somehow going to be fair because honestly it's not. Life isn't really fair for anybody, that much I do understand.

It's easy to just read lab reports, analyze psychological assessments, and/or just recommend a pill that will make the pain go away. Despite all the progress of modern medicine many diseases and illnesses persist and ache many a weary soul. In moments like these I realize my clinical training based on science has many shortcomings. Patients come in hopes of finding understanding even though they know the majority of us haven't a clue what it's like to have spent what felt like an eternity in the deep and dark depths of their lives. In most instances I have to confess audibly, "You're right...I don't understand, I just don't know." And then I wait for an unexplainable compassion that allows me to follow with, "but I'm here and I'm listening...and I want to understand."