The Fun Pursuits and the Fulfilling Pursuits - Some Thoughts for a Senior Resident About to Graduate

Very soon you’ll graduated residency, work as an attending, and suddenly find that you have a lot of time on your hands. What are you going to do? You haven’t had this much free time in years… maybe you’ve never had this much free time in your adult life.

From my experience, you’ll end up with activities that are a mix of 2 flavors: fun and fulfilling. I’ll use some examples from my own experience to illustrate.

Fun stuff is like candy, it may taste good, but it cannot really keep you full. After residency in the Midwest, I got a job in Brooklyn, NY. In addition to all that Brooklyn had to offer, I had easy access to the rest of New York City. Imagine living in New York City while being young, single, having a 6 figure income, and working 3 days a week. On my days off I went to museums, explored different neighborhoods across the city, ate at fancy restaurants, watched dozens of Broadway shows, listened to up and coming indie bands on weeknights, stayed up until the wee hours of the morning at jazz clubs, and spend many summer afternoons at the beach. I enjoyed all of those things, but after a year or so, I would come home after being out and feel empty, like something was missing.

Fulfilling stuff is like the meat in the meal, not candy. Fast forward a handful of years. I’m still living in Brooklyn and still doing most of those things I listed above. I’m doing them a lot less. I’m doing a few other activities and spending a lot more time on them. I started writing, and managing my then-fiance’s business. Instead of spending a weeknday finding the hottest place in New York for a weekday lunch or spending the summer afternoon at the beach, I’m sitting in a neighborhood coffee shop filling out spreadsheets for the business or researching for my books. 3 out of 4 nonclinical days is basically in a coffee shop doing this. It’s not as fun as the stuff in the previous paragraph, but I feel I get more out of it. I enjoy them in a different way. I feel like I’m doing something meaningful. Given the choice between the stuff in the paragraph above or working on my projects in the coffee shop, I choose the latter. It’s more fulfilling.

Most of us will need a balance of fun and fulfilling. A trap a lot of people fall into is only doing the fun stuff, but that’s like eating only candy. You’ll find something is missing.

What activities are fun and which are fulfilling can differ from person to person. If you already know what you will find fulfilling, certainly go pursue that. If you do not, explore the options around you broadly. Maybe it will be your family, volunteering opportunities, advocacy, a creative hobby, a side business, etc. The only limits are your own imagination and your innate interests. But whatever it is, I’m pretty sure that you will be better off for devoting your time to something fulfilling.

About me: As of this publishing  I still practice emergency medicine a couple days a month, but am exploring another professional opportunity as a medical director at an advertising agency. Some of the fulfilling things I did led me down this road including self publishing my 2 books: The Handbook of Medical Charting and A Guide to Clinical Decision Making.