When I use the word 'healing', by that I mean that every disease has a physical element that we're very good at handling, but there's always a sense of the violation. 'Why me?' 'Why is my leg broken on the ski trip and not anyone else's?' And I think that medicine has done a terrible job of addressing that spiritual violation.

Abraham Verghese

Categorized in : Mean Jobs Spiritual

Wasn't that the definition of home? Not where you are from, but where you are wanted

Abraham Verghese

where-you-are definitions home

I think we learn from medicine everywhere that it is, at its heart, a human endeavor, requiring good science but also a limitless curiosity and interest in your fellow human being, and that the physician-patient relationship is key; all else follows from it.

Abraham Verghese

keys heart thinking

What we need in medical schools is not to teach empathy, as much as to preserve it. The process of learning huge volumes of information about disease, of learning a specialised language, can ironically make one lose sight of the patient one came to serve; empathy can be replaced by cynicism.

Abraham Verghese

empathy sight school

Tell us please, what treatment in an emergency is administered by ear?"....I met his gaze and I did not blink. "Words of comfort," I said to my father.

Abraham Verghese

ears comfort father

You are an instrument of God. Don't leave the instrument sitting in its case, my son. Play! Leave no part of your instrument unexplored. Why settle for 'Three Blind Mice' when you can can play the 'Gloria'? No, not Bach's 'Gloria.' Yours! Your 'Gloria' lives within you. The greatest sin is not finding it, ignoring what God made possible in you.

Abraham Verghese

three play son

Though I am fascinated by knowledge, I am even more fascinated by wisdom.

Abraham Verghese

fascinated

We come unbidden into this life, and if we are lucky we find a purpose beyond starvation, misery, and early death which, lest we forget, is the common lot. I grew up and I found my purpose and it was to become a physician. My intent wasn't to save the world as much as to heal myself. Few doctors will admit this, certainly not young ones, but subconsciously, in entering the profession, we must believe that ministering to others will heal our woundedness. And it can. but it can also deepen the wound.

Abraham Verghese

physicians doctors believe

In writing, as in medicine, there are no short cuts. You need stamina.

Abraham Verghese

medicine cutting writing

The most important innovation in medicine to come in the next 10 years: the power of the human hand.

Abraham Verghese

motivation inspiration hands

I was taking care of people my age who were dying. The constant feeling, hearing from them, was that life is transient and can end very quickly, so don't postpone your dreams.

Abraham Verghese

dream feelings people

The key to your happiness is to own your slippers, own who you are, own how you look, own your family, own the talents you have, and own the ones you don't. If you keep saying your slippers aren't yours, then you'll die searching, you'll die bitter, always feeling you were promised more. Not only our actions, but also our omissions, become our destiny.

Abraham Verghese

destiny keys motivational

Students undergo a conversion in the third year of medical school - not pre-clinical to clinical, but pre-cynical to cynical.

Abraham Verghese

cynical years school

A rich man's faults are covered with money, but a surgeon's faults are covered with earth.

Abraham Verghese

faults earth men

This is my life, I thought...I have excised the cancer from my past, cut it out; I have crossed the high plains, descended into the desert, traversed oceans, and planted my feet in new soil; I have been the apprentice, paid my dues, and have just become master of my ship. But when I look down, why do I see the ancient, tarred, mud-stained slippers that I buried at the start of the journey still stuck to my feet?

Abraham Verghese

cancer cutting ocean

We know the average American physician interrupts their patient in 14 seconds.

Abraham Verghese

healthcare physicians average

You live it forward, but understand it backward.

Abraham Verghese

inspire life

What treatment in an emergency is administered by ear?

Abraham Verghese

treatment emergencies ears

There is a point when grief exceeds the human capacity to emote, and as a result one is strangely composed-

Abraham Verghese

results grief capacity

Patients know in a heartbeat if they're getting a clumsy exam.

Abraham Verghese

heartbeat exam patient

She died chasing greatness and never saw it each time it was in her hand, so she kept seeking it elsewhere, but never understood the work required to get it or to keep it.

Abraham Verghese

saws greatness hands