Medicine is a very tough thing. I mean, everyone is going to die. Sooner or later. That's a tough thing to face.

Compliments are the helium that fills everyone's balloon; they elevate the person receiving them so he or she can fly over life's troubles and land safely on the other side.

The tree doesn't die, nor do I when you cut off a branch or a finger, we both heal so we don't lose all the sap or blood. That to me is total shock. Also that water defies the laws of physics by becoming less dense when frozen. Life really is a miracle and all the things that are been built into us through it.

If you watch how nature deals with adversity, continually renewing itself, you can't help but learn.

You can see people draw the past, present and future as well as dream about it. You go to bed at night and have a dream that says there's a lump in your right breast and the doctor who is foreign, with an accent tells you it's cancer.

Disease is surely one of the ways in which we are tried by life and offered the chance to be heroic. Though few of us will win Olympic gold medals or slay dragons, disease can be the spark or gift that allows many of us to live out our personal myths and become heroes.

The doctor that acts out of love doesn't burn out. He or she may get tired physically, but not emotionally.