Finding the edge of one's limits.

Often you'll be pretty satisfied with the way that your life is going, and where I'm at right now is no exception - I'm in a fantastic university course, I'm keeping fit, I have many good relationships and I'm working on developing a number of skills which will surely be beneficial in the future. My training schedule in terms of rock climbing and triathlon training is gaining some sort of shape (I'm planning to try to do a triathlon by next year), and everything is going fine :D

...

And then I got sick.

Well; I'd already had a flu shot so I wasn't really sure I had the flu, but with the setback of a severe sore throat, what did I decide to do?

Train harder. I actually ended up riding my bike from around Killara to Sydney Univeristy, which is a merry 23km trip, then from USyd to Cremorne; another 10 km or so. By this stage I was thoroughly buggered, and I called it quits after doing the cremorne -> artarmon leg. I got a train home - needless to say it was pretty tough, but a good experience. It also taught me a few things which are easily translated to many other things that you'll do in life:

• Planning can only get you so far. Yes, it is highly important to make sure you plan out everything in advance and try to cover as many unforeseen circumstances in order to minimize risk, but a lot of the time you won't actually figure out what risks are involved unless you're proceeding with the activity. Take for example, I'd set up the bike the night before and checked the brakes were working, the gears were fine, and it rode well; but I was still caught out once or twice when the gear change kicked in when going up a hill, and my lights had ran out of battery so I had to get new ones on the fly. Not exactly mistakes that you want to be making, and many may argue that this is simply lack of foresight; but had I not taken the opportunity to get out there, I wouldn't have had the opportunity to make those mistakes.
• Often, things really aren't that bad. I thought the route to the city would be gruelling and incredibly dangerous; yet here I was riding along the bike route that runs underneath the gore hill freeway, on essentially a straight-line to the city. Most of the ride is downhill as well, which made it pretty easy to get through. It is most certainly something I'll be doing more often!!
• Pushing your limits is a good way to reach the next level in training, and yesterday was a great example of that. I'd been stuck doing the same timing on runs for a little while, but this was a great opportunity to see if it actually would be viable to bike all the way to uni in the mornings, to save some money, and has also become a really good training tool. With petrol prices continuing to hike up, I don't see why I wouldn't use this resource more often in the future.

Anyway that's all I have to say for a little while. I'm currently working on something pretty big, and that'll be released over the next 6-12 months, whilst I'm training for triathlon. In the mean time, stay focused and set your goals - and make sure you're actively pursuing them! 

A sense of pride

There are times where I'm feeling really great, and this is one of them - which was triggered by the events of the last couple of weeks. I'm going to admit that I've been feeling a bit weighed down by a few things recently - such as decisions for later in med school, family, and just not feeling 100% about the training, but I'm feeling a lot better now. A large reason for this is that I actually managed to go and talk to someone about what was up, which really helped.

Sometimes friends just aren't appropriate to talk to certain things about. My best mate went away for the last week but came back and that helped me get out of the ditch a bit, but I also managed to talk to one of my tutors at the University last week, and she really helped me in clearing a few things up. It's often great to talk to people who have been through what you have, and know where your thoughts are aimed at. It's also just great to talk to people you have an awesome connection with - so don't keep things bottled up inside. This past fortnight has really taught me not to do that (and I'm already one of the guys who is pretty honest in speaking his mind).

But since yesterday, I've gained a real perspective on what the timeline over the next few years will be like. In two years, my friends will have finished University; yet I'll be doing rotations in hospital. In four years time, I'll be an intern at a hospital, working my way into surgery, which is going to be great. It's that level of comfort and perspective, just knowing that you have to stay positive, which will really keep you on track. So don't lose sight of that!

Finally, it's good to be studying/working at an institution that you're truly proud of. There have been moments at each of the Universities that I have been in, when I have walked through the gates and looked at the signature architecture of that university/school, and really thought: "Wow. I'm am a member of a great academic institution; but in the future, I'm also going to further the reputation of this place." Yes - you might complain that it sounds arrogant; but I really don't mean it in that way. I simply mean that you should feel great pride because you inevitably will be promoting the institution you studied at when you're achieving great success later.

Stick with that level of dedication and achievement. And always make sure you work hard at been a well-rounded individual; there is no other area in life more important than understanding as many things as possible - at least not for me.

Stay focused!

Lemming

Quick update on year 11 HSC chem course

Hey guys,

Things are going pretty well with the year 11 HSC chemistry course, and there's quite a bit of information up there until the water section, which I'll continue plugging away at over the next couple of months. Just wanted to put up a quick post to let you know that I'll be starting on the year 12 HSC chemistry course before I finish up my tutoring, which may be relatively soon (quite sad about that :\ ).

I'll get some more piano videos and other whatnot soon - I'm quite busy with a lot of other things at the moment and so I'll be posting some stuff about that soon.

Additionally, I've started posting some anatomy topics on hubpages as well, and currently there's two up: The anatomy of the trachea, and the anatomy of the knee - soon to come is the anatomy of the rotator cuff. Might put something up about embryology soon as well - we shall see.