2020 hit differently in a way that was truly unique. The buzzword of the year has to be unprecedented, as in, we used the word an unprecedented amount over the last 12 months. But with all the time spent indoors, there was ample opportunity for introspection and reflection. These are some of my insights from the year of COVID.

Security is an illusion.

2020 showed how exposed and vulnerable we are as humans. It didn’t take much to tip the balance between order and chaos. Our routines were interrupted and for a time the only constant was confusion. Many people lost their jobs and…

Loneliness in your twenties almost sounds like it should be an oxymoron. I was promised that this decade would be fun-filled with friends, love, parties, and freedom. But much like university, my twenties have failed to live up to the expectations I had conjured up. Instead, most of this decade has seen me wrangle with a life-changing career move, many false starts, entrepreneurial dead ends, and the prize among all of this, loneliness.

I met up with a friend last week, and she mentioned that despite trying to keep in contact with friends, she was finding her attempts unsuccessful, which…

A couple of months ago, I had an idea for an experiment. I knew that I’d have some spare time on my hands come August and thought it’d be interesting to use that time to help someone else with something they needed.

Back in 2019, I went on an 8-week career workshop, and sometime during it I remember being told a story about a woman who found her new career path after helping out a friend with a design project. This idea came back to me and I thought: why don’t I do the same thing? …

I walked very quickly. My chest felt tight and my breathing was short and sharp, partly because I was going so fast and partly because I was scared. What if he was still coming after me? Every so often I looked over my shoulder to make sure I wasn’t being followed.

What a weird situation to be in. I ran through the scene again in my mind even as I made my way past shoppers milling around casually with their shopping bags. Why would that happen to me, I asked myself, and why would I choose today of all days…

Only a small percentage of patient encounters stay with me years after leaving medicine. It’s usually the ones that didn’t go well. The ones that were unique in their complexity or were just truly unsettling.

The human mind has a propensity for the negative and mine is no different.

I remember once leaving a patient and feeling weirdly shaken and hollow like I’d stared into an abyss and walked away emptied of all emotion. Being a doctor gives you a rare window into other people’s lives. It’s a privilege. But sometimes it’s not so easy to distance yourself from the…

I remember once I had really bad writer’s block. It got to the point where I felt so frustrated, even when I stepped away from the screen. I couldn’t seem to shake it off. It hovered over me for the best part of 2 weeks and I was sure that I was the world’s worst writer.

One day I was on the phone with my friend and we were catching each other up on recent events: things we’d experienced, seen on social media, or just talking about how we were feeling.

During the call, he’d told me a brief story…

Sometimes, I’ll just be minding my own business and he’ll catch me unawares. I could be bent over tying up the bin bag or emptying the laundry and all of a sudden, a line from one of his songs comes out of my mouth before I can stop it. I snap out of it quickly and look around to see if anyone has heard me. I don’t want the association.

Why does this keep happening? Having watched the R Kelly documentary, Surviving R Kelly, I decided that I was never going to listen to another R Kelly song. Truthfully, I…

I’ve not read Atomic Habits, ironically a daily reading habit is something I’m still trying to cultivate. However, I am subscribed to James Clear’s newsletter which delivers bitesize pieces of wisdom to my inbox every week.

Time debt

One week, I came across an idea in one of the newsletters that I thought was incredibly enlightening.

James wrote:

“Saying no saves you time in the future. Saying yes costs you time in the future.

No is like a time credit. You can spend that block of time in the future.

Yes is like a time debt. You have to repay that commitment…