I didn't realize the importance of having a routine until I started doing really badly in class.
During my undergrad years, I was able to get away with doing things the night before deadlines. Yes, there were times when my procrastination/laziness caught up to me, but the consequences were never serious enough to make me change my habits. Throughout undergrad up to very recently, I coasted and instead of acknowledging symptoms of my apathy, I ignored them. I accepted mediocrity.
I was not always like this. I was not always unmotivated. I am smart and capable, but just not applying myself (for whatever reasons there may be). At least, those were things that I told myself as temporary balms to my ego. However, it is true that I was not always like this. Throughout middle school and early on in high school I completed work and projects way days and/or weeks before they were due. I would dedicate myself to certain projects to the point where teachers kept my work to use as examples for future classes. So what happened? Why did I lose steam?
Recently, I've come to terms with my shortcomings and trying to ways to remedy them. The most basic, and perhaps the most important, thing I can do is to set a daily routine for myself. This means, setting a chunk of my day aside to do academic work and assignments. It seems pretty basic and obvious, but it is something I have never been disciplined enough to consistently implement. Without structure and expected daily investment in doing work, it was easy to push things to a later time or date, sometimes indefinitely.
This summer, I attempted to take an accelerated course of Organic Chemistry, which was a whole semester of work squeezed into six weeks. From the beginning, I was expected to invest 4-6 hours of homework and reading on a daily basis, which I did not do. I assured myself that I was capable of completing the work in a smaller time frame. As a result, I had to withdraw from the class before the deadline. The alternative would have been to either drop the course after my second exam, which would result in a "WF" (withdrawal with failure) and/or accept that I would fail my exam (an inevitable consequence). Obviously, I chose to withdraw from the course before the deadline and decided on taking the course during the Fall 2015 semester, which I am doing now.
That experience made me realize that I'm not an exception to the commitment of hard work. If I really want to pursue becoming a doctor, the commitment I am required to put forth is very minimal to what I will need to exemplify in medical school. I have no one else to hold responsible for my success or failure other than myself. Therefore, it is up to me to condition myself into working hard and being disciplined enough to apply myself, consistently and regularly. If anything, becoming a doctor is more of a practice and conditioning of skills, including personal, behavioral, and medically-specific, than an inherent gift.
Having and implementing a routine is the first step I am taking.
