It's old news that I've been using a convoluted "Skype/Gizmo/GrandCentral" ménage-à-trois system to replace my cursed cellphone experience. There were many things I liked about the cellphone-less way of life:

• Save $60 every month
• Save $$$ on the cellphone every couple of years
• Save myself from constant need to be on everyone else's time
• Save $60 every month
• Save time from fidgeting with gadgets.

The downside to not having a cellphone did not go unappreciated however.

• Miscommunications were hard to rectify if I was not around my computer
• Need for internet
• Cumbersome logic of having to use Skype for calling out and GrandCentral/Gizmo to take calls in.

Well, today I discovered that I can drop Skype's monthly 3 dollar unlimited call service for GrandCentral's somewhat unadvertised unlimited call feature. It seems that I can make phone calls by pressing the "Call" button on GrandCentral's web portal and it will automatically make a call for me and connect that call to my Gizmo account. This means that though I'm making a call to someone else, it is technically a free VoIP call-in as far as Gizmo is concerned. Ergo, absolutely free calls within US via GrandCentral/Gizmo.

Additional benefit to this approach to calling out is my GrandCentral caller ID actually shows up on the people receiving the call. SkypeOut did not allow me to have a caller ID without first having a cellphone (which defeats my purpose of using SkypeOut).

AT&T, it's been great. Thanks for all you've done for me over the years. Though your new 3G iPhone be enticing, we are no longer just taking time apart. We are through. You should go find somebody else who will treat you better with their fat bank account and a new BMW.

Slay my Siddhartha
Chop Bodhi Tree - A Fine Cross!
Nail Jesus, Find God

Many of you know that I'm a Kerouac fan.

This past week, I finally got around to acquainting myself with "On the Road" which is highly appropriate given my current occupation in Rocky Mount, NC where Kerouac used to visit his sister, Nin.
In one sentence, "On the Road" can be described as a crazy fable of Neal Cassidy and his posse which takes multiple journeys across the America involving love, lust and everything inbetween and without. The grand-theft-auto style of Cassidy was delight to my soul but also revealed a startling revelation - which is the interest of this writing.
As I ready for the end of medical school years and the practicum to follow, my heart yearns for a certain escape and dynamic quality. Certainly the road is ripe and tempting those who have been beating the paths less travelled. "On the Road" allures me to take to the road again, but I recognize, through Cassidy's example, the threat it poses for those I love - them whose values align with the predictable traditions of our fathers.
I believed that true spiritual development is irrespective of the "old" values which serve only to stabilize society to the detriment of true creative spiritual growth. This individual approach to spirituality has helped me escape the confines of organized religion, the 9-to-5 mentality, and most importantly the oxymoronic "scientific values" of 21st century.
To become a Cassidy myself, I would have to depend on generosity of people who have less than I. They would gladly feed me, clothe me, and drive me to wherever my soul fancied. This is somewhat socially irresponsible. To be a Cassidy means to become indebted to the world - especially the poor, the sick, and the downtrodden.
"On the Road" shook me to my core ridding me of the spiritual miscalculation of, yet again, what is right and wrong. I am going on the road while feeding the hungry, healing the sick and taking people to places that they've never been.

When Cassidy steal car, I Cassidy road.

Life can be loveless.

For a while early in my twenties, I felt this way. Life - the culmination of the body, mind, situations, relationships, and light - was just glim. Fortuantely, these hopeless, loveless times are not perpetual motions. Though it may take years, we often find ourselves in new strange adventures which fill our hearts with excitement. The entity without subject - Love - finds us, and suddenly we understand such profound things as Bob Marley is a prophet. Ideas like "everything's alright, and a child that cries is the child you soothe" fill your head with cotton candies and, though these ideas fleeting and immature, you are whole because you know you are love.

For a few year in my early twenties, I was this loveless zombie. Every step was heavy. The sky was always gray. I searched for my Buddha and Jesus drinking wine under a tree playing chess but, never finding either, cried nightmares of anger and revenge against no one but myself in the mirror. I thought it'd never end, and I gave up the search for love in some ways.

So it's was a surprise when this one morning in India, as I rode this small yellow truck with the volunteer camp friends, I recognized something about myself which was different from the days before. The best vague description of this experience was that I was happy beyond my prior self. I slept with the music of crashing Indian Ocean waves under the blanket of starry night skies. Life was a miracle and a grace. Everything was cool, clear and I had no fear in the darkness. This was the first time, I had found love in my heart again since childhood with the sense of newness every day and adventure in the most mundane things of life.

Sometime this third year of medical school, I had lost that love again. My days were dreary, and I lost the soul music. I woke up panicking every morning, not knowing where I'm supposed to go, who I'm supposed to see. I didn't know what to look for in a patient. I stuttered in front of my superiors. It was the wake-up-panicking-daily kind of stress that drained me. My function was to dread going to work and look forward to going home. I lost track of what I really love about what I do - the learning and the care of patients.

It was so until approximately the third week of my surgery rotation this March. I woke up one morning as usual. Got ready for work: brush teeth, take a shower, eat breakfast, get in scrubs and grab all the paper for the day. I grabbed the blue bicycle out of the shed, tucked my pant sleeves under my sock and started pedaling my way up the hill towards the hospital. As I moved past the houses, I was able to look at myself -- to watch myself think -- as I was looking forward to the day just like I did on that Indian truck. I loved what I do; and I loved who I am. Man, that spring air was fresh! I pedaled every Carolina spring morning - dispatching my doubts and fear under my bicycle tires. Freedom was delicious and hot like a bowl of soup at the end of a winter day's hike.

Now it's hot June summer in Rocky Mount, this North Carolina city where Jack Kerouac used to come visit his sister, Nin, every so often to rest and write of his adventures. I am nearing the end of my third year of medical school and also feeling the end of this long journey of medical school having less than a year of it left. As wonderful and crazy these past few years have been, I spend each day in electrifying expectancy for what new adventures are to come my way.

Dear America:

Hi. Harijan here.

Jack called yesterday. He asked me to say hello. He said it's getting really hot up in the mountains. He's feeling the Summer.

Since I was already charged with the season's greetings, I thought I'd also write on behalf of beatnicks, the real hippies, and whole people of this earth(the jury is still out on hipsters... heh....), to the young people of America. Yes, that includes the beautiful you.

It is now again incumbent on the shower-once-weekly crowd to inform you that life must not be so painful. In the daily drama that is 21st century, we are once again living nightmares during the day and daydreaming in our sleeps.

Though it is important that we respect and love nature for practical reasons like prevention of global warming, it may be that your needs for nature are greater than the nature's need of you. It is well that nature takes its clothes off it gets hot, bu t you cannot take off any more clothes than you already have.

Ret me ask you. When was the last time you sat on a mountain's shoulder and shared an afternoon shower? To look upon a wide land like the very old tree growing where two boulders meet, we can learn so much about our lives - the lessons without which we are bound to learn by mistakes.

The vast ocean and the sky that accompany in all combinations of shades welcome you day and night, sunrise and sunset. It's not good enough that we cry with sadness and happiness. We should cry with beauty of each moment irregardless of its "academic insignificance." And there is no greater teacher of the subject of mindless beauty-crying than the sight of the wavering dances between the water and celeste.

But don't be fooled by these grand gestures! A regular tree in your own yard might have some medicine you can use. Open your window and listen to the leaves rustling in the wind. Carefully....... listen. Be quiet in your throat but also in your mind. Arboreal jazz is still funk; you'll never hear the same beats again.

Now what of walking itself? You know, most of history is written walking. You ever pick up an interesting book where people just sit around a desk all day? Yes?

Well, I don't want to read it. I want to read about people walking and talking and smiling and laughing and eating and singing and dancing and smacking lips and smoking free air and going la-la-la like they don't have a clue or care in the world.

"Why did Bodhidharma go to the East?", some idiot asked once. I don't know, but I'm going to walk to the kitchen now to get some food.

The other day, I was hiking early in the morning. It was pretty awesome. I was feeling good. Weather was perfect! I ran into spidy web. I wa s annoyed and retarded my face with my hand as I failed to remove the silk. Then suddenly a satori out of nowhere: "When a person walks into a spiderweb on the trail in the morning, he is the first person to walk through that trail that morning." So it was an honor. To be the early bird. To get a flying lesson.

Then, BAM! I ran into another web. I thought I had already learned the lesson and I didn't feel like I needed it anymore. Blah blah. But, ohhhh! I realized: "When a person walks into a web twice in the morning, he learns that spiders are the first to close the trail if we don't walk the trail anymore."

AMIRITE??? URIKE?

Oh, yes, so getting back on track.

We need another revolution. A revolution for the planet. A revolution for the people.

What we need is a fundamental change in the way we view life. Our lives. Pure. Free. Simple. This means that we turn off the TV. This means that we listen less to the same people to whom we have given free reign on our perspectives. Take for example security and how it affected hitchhiking.

Since the 60s when hitchhiking in the US was at its peak to now, what do you think has changed that made hitchhinking that much difficult? Oh, that's right. It's just more dangerous now.

But wait a second, you mean to tell me that people.... PEOPLE... changed since 60s? You mean your parents, your siblings, your teachers, your friends, your doctors, lawyers, your assholes and saints have somehow changed since the 60s? Do you mean to tell me there are more raping, murdering, doped-up thugs on the highway now than in the 60s? (For more technical info: please wiki crime in the USA.)

Eh, sorry. Lynching was just starting to die out in the 60s if you remember our dark history.

What changed since the days of beatnicks and hippies is that our perception of safety and of "others" has changed. We don't trust because we don't know. We just believe what we see because it is easier to - again - not walk. If we walk, we'd find otherwise.

When our student body president, Eve Carson was murdered in the recent past, safety became a huge concern for the campus itself. From what I can recall, the emergency text-messaging system may have been pushed forward in time because of this incidence. I really applaud the community and the school for having come through such a trying time while feeling the sad ness and anger of a life taken away so forcibly. What we should not allow to happen from this is to have a false paranoia of safety. The murder rates per population has not changed significantly from year to year such that it would be a significant change that cannot be accounted by pure chance (state crime statistics- look it up you rself).

What I'm saying is that, though it's prudent to practice precautions, we need not think less securely of this world. We can still go over to the new neighbors and say hello. We can still make eye contact when we see someone down the street. And hell, we can still hitchhike. While I was hitchhiking this February, I've met some wonderful people who has helped me to learn that the world stands contrary to the boob stand.

So let me bring back to you a point. A closure.

We find it hard to breathe now. We are congested with unreasonable fears. Let's throw away the pretentious caution. Pay attention to the moment. First with the flowers and trees. Then to the mountains and the seas. We must now walk. We must get on the road - with a rucksack full of bare necessities of life and all the luxuries of love.

With love and gratitude,
Harijan.

I grew up in a Christian family in South Korea. As such, I have not had a formal training in meditation. I first started meditation two years ago. At the time, I was suffering from nightmare induced insomnia and depression. These nightmares were often about my father who was abusive to me in my development. It was the most miserable days of my life. I was willing to try anything that would help me go to sleep and feel better.

I had gone to the doctor, but he said that I was perfectly healthy. He recommended that maybe I could go get tested at the sleep center at Duke but warned me that the fee would be substantial. That was not an option for me. I would not go to the psychiatrist because I was barely getting by with paying bills and groceries. I think this is when I started drinking on a daily basis. The intoxication helped me to forget the nightmares somewhat, but at the same time, I was not living my life clearly either.

When I started meditation, I had no idea what was going on. There were so many different types of meditation. I often started daydreaming or fell asleep as soon as I closed my eyes. It was an exercise in frustration. I did not understand how counting breaths can help me understand the secrets of life or somehow turn me into an enlightened person. But then I realized that I was falling asleep during my meditation and found it very useful when I am anxious about falling asleep at night.

However, the real benefit of meditation came about a year later. Gradually, I began to understand things about myself, my father, and life in general. Although nobody has really explained to me how and why, I realized under what circumstances I was born in my family and –more importantly- under what circumstances my father grew up in. When I came to this, there was no reason to be hurt and scared because I understood things were as they were.

In being healed, I would have forgiven my father one would think. However, forgiveness implies that there was actually a wrongdoing on the behalf of other party. When I understood that my father did not know to treat me any better because he himself grew up in a post-Korean war era without supportive parents, I knew that there was no real harm. It did not mean that I would let him anyone else hurt me like that again, but I understood the circumstances surrounding the past events. I stopped having the nightmares and started sleeping like a baby.

This is not where my experience with meditation and depression ends, however.

A lot of people at school are puzzled about me. Of the many things I have heard about me, the two most interesting description was that I was “excessively happy” and “like contantly being on mushroom.” The following event was what I attribute to the change in my life.

It was early March of 2005. I was having a horrible sickness. I remember being in terrible fever at night. It was so painful that I wanted to die. Then I remembered from one of my lessons that embracing the physical pain was the way out of my psychological pain. At this time, I still had depression related problem even though my issues with Dad had mostly been resolved. So that is exactly what I did. I stopped resisting and hating the pain and “allowed” the pain to be a part of me. It was difficult, and I passed out in the midst of it.

The next morning was different. I was not sick anymore. The fever was gone. But there was something more significant than the missing fever. At first, I felt intoxicated since my mind was different. It was a few hours later that day I realized that I was not anxious and depressed anymore. Even more than that, nothing worried me. Thoughts of money, work, girlfriend, etc. did not really concern me. I thought it was so strange that I would not concern myself with things like that, so I thought long and hard about all the “bad things” in my life. To my surprise, I was somehow immune to generating negative emotions.

The next four days I did nothing but whatever I liked to do. I would lie down and listen to music or walk my dog around the town. Watch the clouds float by. Whatever I liked to do. I stopped going to work. It was heaven. I played video games.

Then I realized how sad everyone else was. This person was disappointed. That person was anxious. I remembered that I used to be that way. I wanted to explain to them that they did not need to feel that way – regardless of what predicaments they may be in. But it was so difficult to explain it to them, and no one really understood what I was trying to say. I taught meditation to few people, but they were easily discouraged and did not have the motivation to continue.

Since then, I met people like me who smiled gently and took life as it came. Some of these people were just born this way, but others came to the same conclusion that I came to through means other than “meditation.” (Some of these people I met in medical school.) Being with these people, I have realized that I am not the only one in this world who thinks Life is beautiful and, at least for me, meditation played a big part on my maturing process since it facilitated so much understanding.

As aspiring future holistic physicians, our responsibility is not only with physical health but also with healing our own psyche and spirit. Whether it may be yoga, meditation, worship, religion, or a poem, we owe it to ourselves and our patients to be healthy in all aspects of our lives. I can give many reasons why this is pertinent, but a better reason would be, “why not?” Why would you not want to live the rest of your life beautifully and vibrantly?

Physician, heal thyself.

House MD, as a show succumbs to yet another medical error. In the episode House's Head (Part 1), Gordon gives the bus driver antibiotic - reasoning that he has transverse myelitis. Transverse myelitis is not an infection and thus not treated with antibiotic. Everybody in the show continued without a word. Cuddy repeats this error again by saying, "he has TM. We're already giving him antibiotic" (or something like it). House just brushed the whole TM thing off.

Sorry, TM is treated with steroid.