61: The Importance of Multiple Pillars

For most of my life, I believed that the best way to achieve something meaningful was to concentrate all available resources on one goal.

Choose the target.

Eliminate distraction.

Use all of my time, energy, attention, and discipline to move toward it.

I believed that having multiple goals was inefficient. If energy was divided, progress would slow. If several interests competed for attention, none of them would reach their full potential.

This way of thinking served me well.

It helped me complete demanding surgical training, develop technical skill, establish a research laboratory. It also shaped the way I approached endurance sports.

I do not think this approach was wrong.

It was probably necessary during the expansion phase of my life.

But I have gradually realized that a life supported by only one major pillar also has a hidden weakness.

When that pillar shakes, the entire structure shakes with it.

For many years, surgery was not simply one part of my life. It was the central pillar around which almost everything else was organized. Even my sense of contribution was closely connected to my identity as a surgeon.

When my clinical role became uncertain, I initially felt that my whole life had become uncertain.

The problem was that too much of my identity had been placed on one pillar.

Recently, my thinking has begun to change.

Perhaps the next phase of life should not be built around one dominant role.

Perhaps it should be supported by several pillars.

At first, I worried that this would simply scatter my energy. But I am beginning to see that these are not unrelated goals competing against one another.

They may be different expressions of the same inner calling.

A morning run creates space for reflection. A reflection becomes an essay. An essay opens a conversation. A conversation helps another person recognize something within themselves. That experience may deepen how I mentor, lead, research, or care for a patient.

This is not necessarily fragmentation.

It may be integration.

In the first half of life, I gathered my energy to climb one mountain.

In the second half, I may need to cultivate a wider landscape.

This does not mean abandoning discipline or ambition. It means changing the question.

Instead of asking:

What is the one goal I must achieve?

I am beginning to ask:

What combination of activities allows the fullest and most faithful expression of the person I have become?

One pillar may become smaller.

Another may begin to grow.

Some may carry more weight during one season and less during another.

But the whole life no longer needs to stand or fall with a single role.

Perhaps multiple pillars are not a sign that focus has been lost.

Perhaps they are evidence that life has become large enough to hold more than one gift.