Eric Tian

I’d like to tell a story about a man. The thing is, I don’t know much about him, despite us meeting just last week. I cannot recall even his face or his name. Only what he did and said.

It was sunset and I was getting ready to do my last set when I saw him. He was Asian, in his mid-60s to 70s, with a woman of a similar age. He wore a simple striped T-shirt, brown shorts and sandals. The two walked towards the exercise park I was next to, the man leading slightly ahead.

Without a word, he jumped on a bar and began to do pull-ups. Clean ones, too. Picture perfect form. I didn’t mean to stare, but I was so shocked I couldn’t help myself. He did five, then 10, then 20 and then I lost count. He must have done at least 40 in a row before he began to slow down. When the show was over, he had barely broke a sweat. He began walking to his female companion, who was doing stretches a few metres away.

I don’t usually approach strangers in public, but I felt like I had just witnessed something extraordinary.

“Excuse me,” I called out. He turned around. “That was great.”

We stared at each other for a moment. Then, noticing his puzzlement, I realised he didn’t speak English. I awkwardly flashed a smile and gave him a thumbs up.

“In a haddar.” He said. Now it was my turn to be confused.

“In a what?”

“In a haddar.”

Without another word, he took off on a run, leaving me and his female companion behind. He went the opposite way he came from. I thought I would never see him again.

But as I walked home, our paths crossed once more. He was running on the footpath towards me and the evening streetlights provided a long shadow. He had seen me too and seemed excited about something. I thought he would slow down. But he just flew past, in his same T-shirt and sandals, and said the same phrase again.

“Innaehada.”

It was Korean. Next to the passing street cars, I pulled open my phone and looked it up.

Innaehada. Korean for endure; persevere; be patient. His secret to my wonder.

If you see clothes in the laundry basket, there is nothing wrong with you. You have clean clothes in the closet. You have clothes on your body. There are dirty clothes on the floor. There are clothes you should probably donate or throw away. There are lost garments somewhere unknown. And some end up in the laundry basket.

It exists in a cycle.

In my hyperproductive sphere, I have increasingly noticed things described in binary terms:

• Workout: done or missed.
• Anki reviews: cleared or not.
• To-do list: crushed or failed.

What if we viewed our lives in more of a cycle, something that ebbs and flows?

There are always things that are done, things soon to be done, things waiting to be done, and things that can be discarded. A natural cycle of action.

I was recently commenting to my friend how my “to-read” pile is never zero. My rate of finishing books is always slower than my rate of finding new books to read.

“Is that a problem?” they asked. “Sounds perfectly normal.”

They were right. It is an endless, perfect cycle: a river that flows continuously, rather than a bucket that is filled and emptied.

Sometimes I wonder what Odysseus felt,
Returning to Ithica
20 years later.
Seeing his wife haggled by suitors,
His own home disrespected,
His own name forgotten.

Or Perseus, as he hunted Medusa,
Knowing that one wayward glance
Would turn his skin to stone,
And be the end of his story.

Or Achilles, who fought at Troy
Knowing that he could flee
And never be caught,
Yet fighting,
Knowing he would be slain.

Or Heracles and his 12 labours,
Facing the hydra,
The three-headed Cerberus,
The stench of the Augean stables,
Even carrying heaven on his shoulders.

These battles, I want to ask,
Were they worth it?
Being remembered by history,
Exalted as mankind’s heroes,
That is.

And for the stories with quiet, unremarkable battles,
Ones fought more domestically, within oneself,
Like the billions of caterpillars transforming
In hidden corners of the forest,
We forget.

History is generous to brazen courage.

On the Anaesthetics team, you get the privilege of witnessing how different surgeons behave.

The variety is enormous. Some surgeons are friendly and approachable, cracking jokes and laughing with the team. They will thank everyone when the surgery is done and remember your name. Then there are others who rarely smile, look at you, let alone ask who you are. They might only address you when they need something.

What’s interesting is how teams respond to these different personalities. Teams with kind surgeons are more likely to proactively help out and with more enthusiasm. But teams with unkind surgeons are more likely to be more stressed, communicate less, and make mistakes. I have seen nurses drop things, anaesthetists fumble, and scrub techs questioning their movements. These surgeries often leave me feeling separated from the team and wishing the surgery was over sooner.

There are routinely discussions on how to improve surgical outcomes. Three-point ID checks, routine hand washing, checking allergies: these things are all important, but the question of personality is never raised. Maybe it’s time.

It’s funny how badly we predict things.

Last week, there were two agendas on my schedule: one medicine-related task I was dreading, and one work-related event I was looking forward to. My crippling worry of the former was equal to my hope for the latter. A perfect yin and yang.

Without going into details, the opposite ended up occurring. The medicine-related task I was dreading turned out well beyond my wildest dreams. And the event I was looking forward to turned into a living nightmare. My initial expectations of these events made the results even more surprising.

Both of these outcomes were beyond my control.

Now I think it easier to have fewer expectations. Like the man who, in response to life’s dynamic events, only utters, “We’ll see.”

I once met a guy who told me he didn’t believe in laziness.

“What do you mean, you don’t believe in it?” I asked. “Don’t you ever feel lazy?”

“Not really,” he replied. If he didn’t believe in something, he explained, it simply didn’t exist. So, he just didn’t believe in anything that slowed from his goals.

After this shift in mindset, he soon reached an unprecedented level of productivity. By listening to his stories it became obvious he possessed a fountain of energy that led him to achieve a great deal. I was convinced that what he was saying was true: he had eliminated laziness from his life. All from one change in belief.

Derek Sivers once wrote: “Beliefs make emotions. Emotions make actions. So choose whatever belief makes you take the action you want.” I think my friend would approve of this message.

In 2014, a team of psychologists found that feedback could be 40% more effective by prefacing it with these 19 words:

“I’m giving you these comments because I have very high expectations and I know that you can reach them.”. This is in contrast to the traditional feedback sandwich, where constructive criticism is masked between two layers of compliments. Not a great way of giving feedback, it turns out. If anything, feedback sandwiches benefit the giver more than the receiver, as they feel that no feelings have been hurt.

A 40% increase is a lot, especially for just a few seconds. I think part of the effectiveness lies in:

1. Knowing that the feedback is genuine, with no artificial compliments.
2. Feeling that somebody is truly behind your back.

A much better formula for constructive feedback.

My father is sleeping
On our battered couch.
It is midnight,
and I am a child again.

I think of his earlier years
Eating on broken tables,
Empty pockets, but
Full hearts.
Spiders lurking in corners,
Observing him leaving before dawn,
And arriving post dusk.

His worn out face trembles a little.

I stare at his blistered hands,
Which moulded our lives,
And feel his gentle snores
Vibrating into my chest.
He sleeps like a rock,
Deeper than the ocean,
Travel-weary.

How long you stayed awake
All those years, guiding us,
Through turmoils and helplessness,
Creating lessons that will last
Past eternity.

Sleep, papa.
I hope that in this couch,
You dream well.
I am watching over you.
My time has come at last.

It was midnight, September 2023, and the next day I was going to fail medical school.

In a few hours, my research presentation was due and I was woefully underprepared. A combination of factors including supervisors going on leave, missing data, and a woeful lack of expertise in the field meant my project didn’t do what it set out to do, and was littered with unverified results and conclusions. I felt nauseous, tachycardic, and short of breath. I began seeing myself out of my own body. I was in the midst of a panic attack.

Staring at my Powerpoint slides, it struck me that I could just end it all. A quick note to my loved ones, and a jump off the balcony – that’s all it would take. The presentation terrified me to my core.

It was one of my worst experiences of medical school. Yet probably the most transformative.

Because long story short, I passed. A solid pass as well, with the examiner recommending that I publish my data, with a few suggestions for change. I couldn’t believe it. And afterwards, it felt like anything that came my way could be overcome.

I realised then that all my greatest boosts in confidence in my life stemmed from immense struggle; being tested with the real possibility of failure. But these tests, I believe, help us to find and transform us into better beings.

From Kemi Sogunle, author and life coach:
“The tests we face in life’s journey are not to reveal our weaknesses but to help us discover our inner strengths. We can only know how strong we are when we strive and thrive beyond the challenges we face.”

Avoiding failure is often better than shooting at goals. I have written about this in chess, but I think it also applies to other domains. One method to do this is the inversion technique.

For example: “I want to be fitter in 2024”.

A fine goal, but vague, for one can easily be distracted by protein powder, gym locations, what shoes to buy. Focusing on everything but the actual exercising. Instead, ask yourself, how would you theoretically become the most unfit person of yourself?

1. Never sleep
2. Eat lots of junk food
3. Never exercise
4. Be around lazy people

Inversing this gives us a good starting point:

1. Get quality sleep
2. Eat clean
3. Exercise
4. Find a community that prioritises health

Or an example closer to home: “I want to be a better writer in 2024”.

How would you ensure you become a worse writer in 2024?

1. Never write
2. Never read
3. Write about dull things

The inversion technique gives us some simple starting points:

1. Write
2. Read
3. Write about things that interest you

I’d say these are fine starting points.

Before assessing complex solutions, look at avoiding disaster.