Your Life’s Mission and Vision
The first time I heard about the concept of a life mission, I recoiled. It seemed potentially self-aggrandizing. Yet, the more I thought about it, it made a lot of sense to spend time really thinking about the purpose of my life. As a physician, I always have a lot of competing interests. I have more opportunities than hours in a day. In a previous post, I discussed aligning my time with my values. Values were easier for me to define and develop. A life mission seemed too big.
As an emergency physician and educator, I am interested in a lot of areas. For me, I spend the majority of my time on simulation education and gender equity. At first glance, these seem like very disparate areas, which got me thinking if I needed to cut out or reduce one area. There is always the risk of doing too many things, and none well at all. Also, sometimes when we’re doing a lot of things, the work product lacks depth or originality. I then reflected on why I do medical simulation and gender equity work. The common thread is that I respect and value physicians tremendously. We gave away a large part of our 20s, some of our 30s (and more if you entered medicine later in life). We master large amounts of knowledge and often deal with complex and intense life experiences. We also work long hours, in a culture that largely is fueled by perfectionism, competition, and stoicism. In short, it’s really tough being a physician.
My attraction to medical simulation is driven by the desire to help physicians perform under pressure. In medicine, there are high acuity, low occurrence (HALO) events. These events often cause extreme anxiety and when they don’t go well can lead to shame and guilt. Through medical simulation, I help prepare physicians to master these HALO events in safe and controlled settings. One of the most rewarding moments is when a physician or medical student comes up to me after a simulation-based educational event and says, “Remember that sim case we did, Dr. Austin? I saw a patient (day or weeks) later, and I was more prepared. Thank you.” I care very deeply for the patients that benefit from well-trained physicians as well, but there’s a special component to me in preparing physicians to do the hardest parts of our job. Also, I know that if I miss a clinical shift, someone will cover for me. That is rarely the case with simulation education. I also know if someone filled in for me, it wouldn’t be the same experience as with me. I’m not saying that I’m the best simulationist in the world, but I know that I offer a unique and impactful experience for my learners.
When I look at my gender equity work, I again, am drawn to improving the lives of physicians. Women physicians face bias, discrimination, and other unique stressors that are driving us out of medicine. Research shows that nearly 40% of women physicians go part-time or leave medicine all together within six years of residency. 1 This is particularly infuriating, as there is an increasing body of research that suggests that women physicians and surgeons may have better patient outcomes in key areas such as decreased postoperative complications and hospital re-admissions. 2,3
My next step was considering the Japanese concept of ikigai, and how it applies to my life. Iki means life, gai means benefit or worth.4 This requires taking some time to reflect on what you love, what the world needs, what you get paid for and what you’re good at. Sometimes we struggle to name what we love doing. For me, this question is most easily answered by considering what activities I do that result in a flow state. Flow is described as being immersed and often losing sense of time. You are not easily distracted. Professionally, I enter flow states while writing, doing medical simulation, and making curriculum. Often early in our careers, we may not be able to align all four parts of the ikigai diagram, but it’s helpful to know how many boxes you’re checking with any activity.
After taking time to think about my ikigai, specifically what I’m good at and what I love, I came up with my life’s mission- to help physicians live better lives. How I do this is through medical simulation, gender equity work, and coaching. This new focus, it helps me channel my strengths towards what the world needs to improve the lives of physicians.
Finally, I considered my vision for 2022. Vision is about what inspires and motivates us. I think about mission as the what, vision as the why, and values as the how. For example, my mission is to improve the lives of physicians. My vision is that I will support physicians living healthy, fulfilling joyful lives via medical education delivered via simulation, writing, and coaching. The how is inspired by my values, which include innovation, autonomy, and authenticity. To do my life’s mission, I must walk in my values.
This then inspired me to make my vision board for 2022. My vision board is a mix of my personal and professional goals, as one of my values is work-life harmony. Below is an example of my vision board.
Vision board (left to right, top to bottom) with reminders to: write, read, podcast, coach and travel. I keep my vision board on my computer desktop, as when I’m doing sometimes the not fun part of editing a podcast, it reminds me that this is part of my vision. While the editing portion can be long and monotonous, the product of sharing a helpful concept with my colleagues is worth it.
This is a very big process, that is much easier with a group. Dr. Lawrence and I created The Revitalize Women Physician Circle to help women physicians define and refine their values, vision, and mission. We invite you to attend The Revitalize Room, a free monthly virtual get-together with women physicians on Jan 19th at 4pm PT. We will talk more about how to create a vision board to fuel your 2022 success. Email revitalizemm.info@gmail.com to register and receive the Zoom Link.
References:
1. Why women leave the workplace: https://www.modernhealthcare.com/labor/women-healthcare-are-breaking-point-and-theyre-leaving
2. Tsugawa Y, Jena AB, Figueroa JF, Orav EJ, Blumenthal DM, Jha AK. Comparison of Hospital Mortality and Readmission Rates for Medicare Patients Treated by Male vs Female Physicians. JAMA Intern Med. 2017;177(2):206–213
3. Wallis C J, Ravi B, Coburn N, Nam R K, Detsky A S, Satkunasivam R et al. Comparison of postoperative outcomes among patients treated by male and female surgeons: a population based matched cohort study BMJ 2017; 359:j4366