The Journey Begins

Hey all!

It's been a crazy two months ever since I got out of school. I went into summer with a pretty solid idea of what the next couple years of my life were going to look like. I would work as an intern at Bosch, hopefully get an offer, finish my Masters degree, and then return full-time at Bosch. Everything seemed to be going according to my plan.

Obviously, God's plan was different.

This has been a couple years in the making, but this internal struggle really came to its climax the beginning of June. I won't get in to too much detail (probably will write a post about it at a later date), but basically, I've been debating engineering versus medicine for quite some time now. While working at Bosch and Medtronic last summer, I really questioned whether I could see myself as an engineer for the rest of the my life. It's not that the work was especially challenging (although there were certain moments), I just felt like my passion wasn't always there. If I am going to dedicate a significant portion of my life to a career, I want to be doing something that lies at the intersection of my passion and the world's needs. Now please don't get me wrong, I believe engineering has its purpose. I can list off a ton of examples where engineering has improved the lives of millions. The problem for me is that I don't think engineering is where my God given passion truly lies. It's something that I'm good at, but not something I'm completely passionate about.

That's where medicine comes in. For those of you who don't know, I was technically both a Pre-Med student and Mech. Eng student. If you want to know how it was, words can't even begin to describe how much it sucks. Luckily though, amidst the many times I almost quit Pre-Med, my dad forced me to finish the MCAT, which I'm now very grateful for. I'll be honest, I don't have tons of experience in the medical field. Besides the 40+ hours volunteering at the hospital (which really is nothing) and shadowing Robert Chang, I'm pretty much new to the medical field. Regardless, this brief glimpse of the medical field was enough to convince me that this was something I would be completely passionate about. When I add in the medical missionary testimonies at Knox and Urbana, I felt like medicine was something that would enable me to passionately and purposefully serve God's kingdom. Throw in the fact that my girlfriend wants to be a nurse, I felt like God was basically saying, "Andrew just choose medicine."

Anyways, that's pretty much a quick overview of what's been going on in my life recently. I wanted to start a blog as a way for me to record my thoughts and practice my writing skills. I already submitted my medical school primary app and writing the personal statement was one of the most difficult things I've done in a long time (over 9 drafts). It definitely doesn't help that Mech. Eng has basically turned me into a technical writer, one who gets straight to the point and is devoid of emotions. Hopefully through blogging though, I can improve my non-technical writing as well as address many of the questions I will likely come across in secondary applications and interviews.

In one year, my life will be radically different. Maybe I'll be in medical school, or maybe I'll be trying to find a job (more on this later). Regardless, thanks for following my journey! Can't wait to see what God has in store for me

Andrew