The Fur Burners Theory: Choosing Freedom Over Medicine

He realized that pursuing freedom over security led him to a fulfilling life beyond medicine.

### Embracing Change: A Journey from Medicine to Creative Freedom
* 🔥 The Fur Burners Theory illustrates how focusing on one aspect of life, like **work**, can diminish attention to others, such as **health and relationships**.
* The author reflects on how the demanding nature of medicine **consumed their time**, leading to **missed opportunities with loved ones**, particularly a poignant moment with their **grandfather**.
* 💔 Realizing that the **relentless pursuit of success in medicine** was costing them **valuable experiences**, they sought alternatives that would allow for a **better work-life balance**.
* 🔍 After considering options like less demanding specialties and private practice, the author ultimately chose to pursue a **part-time career in the U.S.** while creating **online content**.
* 📈 Surprisingly, this shift led to earning a **decent income through content creation**, providing newfound freedom and the ability to **engage in hobbies and spend quality time with family**.
* 🌍 The global pandemic presented obstacles, prompting a period of **reflection and creativity**, which further solidified the author's desire to **leave medicine and embrace a more autonomous lifestyle**.
* 💡 Ultimately, the decision to leave medicine stemmed from recognizing that their **true passion lay in content creation**, allowing them to **help others and pursue personal growth**.
* 📚 The author encourages others to **explore their creative potential** through platforms like Skillshare, which offers resources to **develop new skills and identities** beyond traditional career paths.

I don't know if you've heard it before, but there is something called the fur burners Theory. This Theory basically states that our lives can be thought of as a stove with fur burners on it, where one burner is for work, another for health, another for relationships, and another for hobbies. According to that theory, every time you turn up the heat in one burner, the heat in the other burners goes down. That's kind of my problem with medicine, that I feel that to practice it, especially to practice the way I wanted to practice it, you almost have to accept a life where all of the other burners except for the one of work are pretty much turned off. I just find that very sad, to be honest. I didn't think about this too much as a student or as an intern because I was just so focused on my studies and on playing the game that I almost never stopped to reflect if that game made any sense at all. But as the years went on, little by little, I started to realize that yes

medicine was, in fact, awesome, but it also stilled the most valuable thing I had: my time. This struck me one day when I went to visit my grandparents. Because you see, I was so focused all those years in studies, and I always convinced myself that I was so busy that for me, taking an afternoon and spending time with them felt almost like a sacrifice. So, I didn't visit them as often, and when I did go to visit them, I didn't stay for long. Until one day, I went ahead and paid him a visit and an afternoon, and I tried to do what I used to love doing with them when I was little, which is to play a board game. And in that moment, for the first time ever, my granddad wasn't able to play. His hands just couldn't. That's when I realized that I had lost all of the chances I could to play one last board game with him because I was just so busy studying, so busy seeking that success that everybody seemed to talk about. This made me think a lot, and I started

to realize that if I continue to live like this, the same thing will start to happen with all of the other aspects of my life. I would start to lose the opportunities to play the last game with all of them, the last game with my partner, my friends, my family, even with my hobbies. Because I don't know if you've ever tried it, but sometimes you try to pick up a hobby right where you left off just to realize that it's not the same anymore, that you don't enjoy it as much as you used to. And so, that's when I decided that despite my passion for medicine, I was not going to live a life where I kept sacrificing the things that I value the most just to be successful and earn a living. So naturally, I started to look for solutions, and I realized that I had about three main options to choose from. Number one, I could enter a less demanding specialty, something that allows me to have a better work-life balance, something like dermatology, or ophthalmology, or radiology. But the truth

is that none of those specialties were ever of any interest to me. I just enjoyed internal medicine and infectious diseases. That was my thing, and I really didn't have any intention to study anything else, so that wasn't an option for me. Number two, I could dedicate myself to private practice because, as you may know, private practice is a little bit more relaxed, more flexible, demands less hours, and pays better, so you can have a better work-life balance. But again, this also didn't work a lot for me because the thing I really loved about medicine, the thing that made it really a career and not just another job, was the academic part, was doing rounds, was being able to teach students, was being able to take the time and do exercises with them and teach them how to interpret EKG. Those kinds of things were the things that really fired my engines, that really made me love medicine in the first place. So yeah, this option wasn't really that appealing to me. Number three, I could go somewhere that pays really, really

well and just work part-time. That's the option I ended up choosing, and I ended up choosing to do so in the US. So, from that point forward, I started to dedicate myself completely to achieving this new goal of mine. So, I studied for the steps, I did research, I published a paper, I improved my English, I improved my CV, I did like every little thing they wanted, and after a couple of years of work, I had done pretty much everything they wanted, everything except doing a rotation in the state. That was really the only thing missing, but of course, there was a problem. By the time I had done everything else, by the time I was done with all of the other exams, and I started to apply to rotations, rotations started to close because, of course, a global pandemic had to occur. So, I didn't know what to do in the moment because I had nothing else to do. I had no more exams to do, but also no rotation to apply to. And yes, although I could have practiced medicine in those few months, I didn't really

wanted to do that, so at least not in Colombia. So, I felt kind of stuck. I felt that life had put an obstacle in my way and was making me stop when all I wanted to do was to keep moving forward. So, under those circumstances, I decided to do the only thing that made sense for me at the time, which was to take some time off. I just thought, Okay, I've worked this hard for these many years. I think I can use these two months while everything reopens to just spend time with my family, maybe resume some of my old hobbies, you know, experience a little bit of that life that I've always wanted to have. But the thing you have to understand about me is that I've never been the type of person that just takes vacations to binge Netflix endlessly and stays in bed. No, I always want to stay active. I always want, I always kind of love to do stuff. Of course, not just any type of stuff and not for 12 hours a day, but I do love to stay engaged with

some time with some sort of challenge, some sort of hobby. So, during those few months, I started to dedicate myself to what was my hobby or my challenge at the time, which was literally shooting videos in my room, just like I'm doing now. And so, I started to share videos about the things I learned from the USMLE, some tips and tricks to earn a better score in that test. I also started to interview more and more doctors. I also created these very same channels to improve my speaking skills. I started to share tips about effective techniques. I created a few courses on thoracic radiology and microbiology and the science of effective learning. I mean, I literally delved deep into this hobby that I was having, and as I kept doing this, the strangest thing started to happen. I started to earn a living. I know nothing like the three hundred thousand dollars that I could make as an attending in the US, but a decent amount nonetheless, at least something that made me live comfortably in Colombia, be independent, save some money, buy fancy stuff here and there, and

kind of enjoy my life, and this was very, very weird because I don't know about you, but I've always had this notion that the only people who are able to make it online, were able to make a living online, are the famous and the charismatic. And here I was, nor famous, nor charismatic, and still somehow earning a living. So, very, very weird. But this was also very weird because it started to show me a completely different way to earn a living. Because I don't know if you're aware, but most of your income as a Creator, which is the thing I basically become, doesn't come from the stuff you keep doing every day. Just like a doctor, a doctor earns his living by going to the hospital every single day. He gets paid every single month because of the stuff he did in that particular month. The income of a Creator works very differently. Most of the income, at least for me, most of the income I have, like 90% of my income, doesn't come from the things I did that

month instead. It comes from the things I did in the past, from videos I published months ago or even years ago. People usually call this passive income, and passive income is really, really liberating because if something, I simply want to take a day off, well, I just take a day off. If someday I just want to take a whole weekend with my family to go on vacation, I can just take a weekend off and go with my family on vacation, and nothing really happens, like my income stays pretty much the same. Sure, you still have to put some type of effort and be creative and keep learning new skills and keep improving your craft, but this kind of work gives you a lot more freedom and autonomy of your time. And with that newfound freedom and autonomy, you're able to do stuff like spend more quality time with family and friends, practical hobbies, to read books that you never thought you could read. I mean, I was literally reading some books that I never thought I could have the time to read: history, psychology, philosophy, literature, a whole world that I just

thought I would never have the time to properly delve into. So what did I do with all this new information about a different lifestyle? Not much. I mean, I still felt like this was just too good to be true, like kind of unrealistic to have as a permanent lifestyle, that it was going to be transitory, and that the wisest thing was just to keep taking advantage of these few months to rest, recharge batteries, earning a few bucks on the side, and then keep working and focusing on my plan to enter residency in the US. So that's precisely what I did. I continued doing this kind of stuff until I eventually got notified that rotations in the US were starting to reopen. So I applied, I got accepted, and I started my rotation. However, from the moment I set foot inside of that hospital, I started to feel very strangely because I started to feel completely out of place. And that was very weird for me because I've always felt very like at home, like a fish in the water while being in

the hospital, especially when I was doing a rotation on something that I enjoyed, like infectious diseases. And yet, here I was, doing and staying in an amazing hospital in my favorite specialty, with very, very kind people, and still, for some reason, feeling completely out of place. After speaking about this with my family and with my girlfriend, I thought that maybe this was just a problem of adaptation. After all, I had spent the last few months living a vacation-type of lifestyle, so maybe I just needed a couple of weeks to get used to being a doctor again. So, that's what I did. I took a deep breath, and I gave myself the chance to adapt. And I actually did that really, really fast. After just a couple of weeks, I was used again to waking up early, to going to the gym before rounds, to studying in the afternoon, to going into the hospital 8 to 12 hours a day, to that kind of stuff. And in fact, I even started to have really amazing days, days when everything went well, where everything went according to plan, where I had

energy and I crashed in the gym, and I got to help patients, and I got congratulated in rounds like if everything went the way it was supposed to. And yet, even in those days, I still had that feeling that this wasn't really my place. Of course, my natural instinct was to keep looking for problems, keep looking for things that weren't as perfect as they should, to attribute my feelings to those type of things. But I eventually realized that those minor inconveniences and problems weren't really the issue, weren't really at the core of my feeling. The problem was really that this just wasn't my dream anymore. Yes, this was very dreamy. This was perfect. I, as I told you, people were kind, the hospital was great, I was in my special, my favorite specialty, I was learning, I was helping patients, everything was fine. But this just wasn't the thing that really moved my engines anymore. I had a different dream. I had a different pathway that I wanted to pursue, and

that's when I realized that what I first interpreted as an obstacle or as a punishment from life was actually the best opportunity I could have ever had to discover a better pathway, a better way to live my life. I don't know if things happen for a reason; people usually say these other things happen for a reason. I don't know if things happen for a reason or not, but it sure feels that way. So, after coming to terms with this, I decided that I needed to leave medicine, but taking the decision wasn't as easy as it sounds. In fact, I just kept changing my mind over and over again. I remember that I constantly called my girlfriend, telling her one day, You know what? I am gonna quit medicine, just to call her the next day saying, You know what? Medicine is not that bad. Most of this indecision came basically due to fear. I was fearful of making a decision like this because, to be honest, I've never been good at making this sort of life-changing decisions and risking it all. In fact, I think that's one of the

reasons that explain why I chose to study medicine. Because medicine is kind of like this very well-established and restrictive path. I mean, yes, it has alternatives and choices, and you can go into dermatology or radiology or surgery, and you can do private practice or stay in the academic field or do research, so you have options. But in the end, all the pathways are kind of established for you, are kind of very restricted in the sense that you know that if you turn right, you're gonna end up there, and you know exactly how there looks like. In contrast, this new dream of mine was everything except established and restrictive. I mean, it literally had no path. I imagine it like an open field where you can go anywhere you want, left, right, center, go back, go forward, you can do whatever you want. That's part of the appeal, that you have total freedom and total autonomy over your time and your decisions. But it's also kind of scary because there's no one telling you, Okay, so if you go here, you're gonna end up

there and you first of all you don't know what's here, and you don't know what's there, so that is very scary because you automatically start filling those caps with potential problems, with pessimistic thinking. You start thinking, Oh, but what if I turn here, and then this happens, and that doesn't work, and I lose my channel, and I lose everything, and I end up in the street. So, the way I eventually handled this, like this fear of mine, was just to accept the nature of the problem. The nature of the problem is that every pro has an associated con; like that's the way it is. So, yes, the medical pathway is very secure, and that's appealing, but that is precisely what makes it very restrictive and takes away your freedom and autonomy. And the same thing happens with my path. You have a lot of freedom and autonomy, but you lose a bit of that certainty, a bit of that safety. So, you kind of have to choose what is more important to you, what are you more willing to put in the

line to risk in order to get the other value, and I realize that for me, it's more important freedom and autonomy than security. Another thing I ended up realizing was that pessimistic thinking can be applied both ways, because yes, next month YouTube can be taken down, and my channel can get demonetized, and income policies can change any minute. But you know what? I can also lose my license. I can also get fired. I can also make a terrible mistake and get a lawsuit. I mean, a bunch of bad stuff can happen either way, so basing my decision on the fact that things can go wrong is a non-starter, because everything can always go wrong. And in the end, the most important thing is not that bad things can happen, is that you can't actively prevent them and implement solutions in case they do occur. That's why any semi-reasonable doctor pays an insurance and stays updated with literature, because that prevents bad things from happening and solves them a little bit in case they do happen. So what I did to

help me see things a little bit more clearly. I took out a piece of paper and wrote down all of my fears, all the things that were clogging up my brain that I thought could end up ruining me. I put them all on paper, and beside each one of them, I started to write down strategies I could implement to both prevent them from happening and to solve them or to fix them in case it did happen. By doing this exercise, I realized that as horrible as some problems were, there was always something I could do to solve them or at least to ameliorate them. And that even in the worst-case scenario where literally the internet breaks down, I can still find a solution in that case. For instance, I can resume my medical practice. And yes, I'm aware that having a gap that I'm having, that I'm creating in this very same moment, reduces dramatically my chances of entering, let's say, in the United States and even in Colombia. But fortunately enough, this is a very, very

big world, and there are plenty of other options available. For instance, I for myself know that my plan B in case everything fails is Spain because Spain has a great quality of life, and I really appreciate that. And B, because entering residency in Spain is a matter of just standing out in one single exam called MIR. That's it. They don't look at your CV, at your publications, your gaps, nothing. All they care for is your performance in that single standardized exam. And if there's one thing I've learned how to do really well, it's ace medical exams. So, that's my plan B in case everything goes wrong. That's what I'll be doing then. And that's also why my medical diploma is being validated in Europe as we speak. Now, the other thing that sometimes worried me was this thought that giving up medicine meant accepting that I've wasted the last eight years of my life. And to be honest, I now think that this is nonsense. I mean, I don't know if I emphasized it enough, but the reason I

now have the job that I have is because I entered a career that I loved so much that it led me to create a YouTube channel about it. I think that our past is almost always conducive to our present, even in ways that we do not fully comprehend. So, I truly believe that if I hadn't gone through everything I went through, if I hadn't studied medicine, if I hadn't tried to apply to Residents in the states, I would probably wouldn't be here. So, under that kind of reasoning, I don't think I wasted anything because everything I went through was crucial to help me get here. But even if I did accept it that my past wasn't at all conducive to my present, I still believe that choosing to stay in medicine would have been a mistake. There were cities like this no matter what happens, and no matter what I do, I already spent eight years of my life studying medicine, and nothing I will do, nothing I can do will bring those eight years back. Those eight years are gone, so I can choose to have wasted eight

years of my life and live a life that doesn't make me happy, or I can choose to have wasted eight years of my life and live a life that does make me happy now. In either case, the past will remain the same because guess what? The past always remains the same. But in one option, I get to be happy. So you tell me which option makes more sense, alright? And the last period that used to make me hesitate my decision a lot was thinking that this wasn't the best moment to make the jump. I mean, I already knew and I already had established that I wanted to make the jump. I just didn't know when it was best to do so. And some part of me always thought that the best thing to do would be to just finish residence first, secure some kind of future in case things go south, build a bigger audience in the meantime, and then after three to five years of doing so, then make the jump. For quite a while, this seemed like the most reasonable plan, like the plan with

Best of Both Worlds. However, I realized a couple of things. First of all, I realized that doing residency, like everything, has an associated cost opportunity. That by choosing to do residency, I'm not only choosing to do residency, I'm also accepting to have 80 hours per week where I don't get to improve my craft, right? Don't get to create more quality content, where I don't get to improve my skills as a creator. I realized that if my dream is truly to live off my content, the best chance I have of doing so is by investing all of my efforts into it, not just a couple of hours I have after a 12-hour shift. Additionally, I realized that if I ever want to quit my job as a doctor, this is the safest time to do so. I mean, think about it. When is it better to quit? When you're in your 20s without many responsibilities and with few bills to pay and with basically no one depending on you, or when you're in your 40s with family to take care of?

a ton of bills to pay, a lifestyle to maintain, all right, and finally, because I'm sure that some of you will post this in a comment, no, I don't feel bad leaving medicine because I believe I can still help a lot of people, even if I don't get to do so as a doctor. So far, I've tried to help, and I think I've helped a lot of medical students around the world to be better students, and that makes me really, really proud. Now, I'm not sure if that's what I'll keep doing from now on because I'm currently experimenting a bit more with general personal growth in a new channel that I recently opened, which is in Spanish, so probably not something you're really interested in. But yeah, I still believe I can make a difference, and well, that's what I'll try to do from now on. But yeah, that's basically my reasoning behind why I quit and what I'm gonna be doing next. Now, in case you also want to explore other more creative careers different than medicine,

or whatever you happen to be studying, I have a recommendation that might help you in that process. That recommendation is a class, a class that I recently watched in Skillshare called Make Creativity Your Career by Andy J. Pizza. So, this is basically a class that can help you figure out what your creative identity is and how you can use it to, as the title says, make creativity your career. It's really simple, really short, but it's also full of interactive exercises that make you get perspective and things and take action, and that is really the beauty of a Skillshare. That is one of the few platforms in the market that really goes that extra mile to make the student the active player in the learning process. In case you didn't know, Skillshare also offers a ton of other classes on a wide variety of topics like productivity, habit formation, animation, personal growth. You can even find some classes on cooking, and all these classes are of high quality. They allow you to interact and leave questions, create projects, they even allow you to teach post classes and help

others grow in their process. I, for myself, published a class over there called The Science of Effective Learning, where I basically teach the best evidence-based learning techniques for students. And the best thing is that you can start learning all of these topics for free. You just need to be one of the first 1000 subscribers that joins using the link in the description below. With that link, you get a whole free month of scripture, and in that month, you can watch all of the classes you want in all the topics you're interested in, and everything completely for free. So make sure to use this opportunity and start exploring your creativity today. Thanks a lot, Skillshare, for sponsoring this video. Thank you for tuning in. I'll see you in the next one.

Why I Didn’t Apply to Residency

Santiago AQ

The Fur Burners Theory and Its Impact on Life

The Fur Burners Theory suggests that focusing on one aspect of life, like work, causes other areas, such as health and relationships, to suffer.

The author reflects on how their demanding medical career led to neglecting valuable time with loved ones.

This realization prompted a search for solutions, including the possibility of entering a less demanding specialty for a better work-life balance.

Navigating a Medical Career: Personal Journey

The speaker was solely interested in internal medicine and infectious diseases, finding academic involvement and teaching students the most fulfilling aspects of medicine.

They considered private practice for better work-life balance but ultimately chose to work part-time in the US for higher pay.

A global pandemic disrupted their plans for rotations, leading them to take a two-month break to spend time with family and engage in old hobbies while waiting for opportunities to reopen.

The speaker dedicated themselves to shooting videos and sharing USMLE tips, which unexpectedly led to earning a comfortable living in Colombia.

They discovered that most of their income as a creator came from past work, providing them with passive income and greater freedom.

This newfound autonomy allowed them to spend more quality time with family, pursue hobbies, and read books they never thought they had time for.

The narrator initially embraced a vacation-like lifestyle while waiting for US rotations to reopen, but felt out of place upon starting the hospital rotation in their favorite specialty.

Despite quickly adapting to the demands of being a doctor again, they continued to feel that the role no longer aligned with their true passions.

Ultimately, the narrator realized that their dream had shifted, and they were no longer motivated by the traditional path of medicine.

The author realized that what seemed like an obstacle was actually an opportunity for a better life.

Deciding to leave medicine was challenging, leading to constant indecision driven by fear.

The appeal of a new, unrestricted path offered freedom and autonomy, but also brought uncertainty and potential problems.

Embracing Uncertainty and Finding Solutions

The author values freedom and autonomy over security, realizing that bad things can happen in any situation.

They wrote down their fears and developed strategies to prevent and solve potential problems, finding comfort in having a plan B in Spain.

The author rejects the idea that leaving medicine means wasting the last eight years, seeing their experiences as valuable regardless of the outcome.

The Impact of Past Experiences on Career Choices

The speaker believes that their past experiences, including studying medicine and applying for residency, were crucial in leading them to their current job and YouTube channel.

They argue that regardless of whether their past was conducive to their present, staying in medicine would have been a mistake.

The speaker reflects on the opportunity cost of doing residency and realizes that investing all their efforts into content creation is the best chance to achieve their dream, while also acknowledging that their 20s are the safest time to make a career change.

Transitioning from Medicine to Personal Growth

The speaker has left medicine but believes they can still make a positive impact by helping medical students.

They are now exploring personal growth through a new Spanish channel and recommending a Skillshare class on making creativity a career.

Skillshare offers a variety of high-quality classes, and the speaker is providing a free month of subscription for the first 1000 subscribers through a link in the description.