S6E24: Identity, Growth, and Legacy

Hạ: I also watched the movie "Past Lives" and they were talking about this concept that everyone, even a stranger that brushes past you on the street, you have had a past life with them or some connection with them too.

Leen: Oh, that's deep. I don't know.

Mariam: Wait, what is this movie?

Hạ: "Past Lives."

Mariam: Oh, I should watch it. That sounds deep.

Hạ: It's a really good film. I like it.

Mariam: Wait, who's leading? Who's going to do the lead?

Hạ: We're all leading. It's a collective lead.

Mariam: Who's initiating the welcome?

Hạ: I can initiate since I did the outline.

Mariam: Let's do it, Ha. Go for it.

Hạ: Hello, hello, dear listeners. I can't believe it, but somehow we have reached the season finale. Wow. But basically, all to say is we've now reached the last episode.

And for our dear listeners, this is Ha, by the way, and I am in the virtual studio with Mariam and Leen. We're actually recording across three different time zones from across the U.S., from Pacific Time to Eastern Time. So what a treat.

Leen: I'm a little surprised there. I'm actually in your time zone, Ha.

Hạ: Oh. Well then.

Mariam: JK.

Hạ: You took away the excitement, Leen.

Leen: I know. My bad. Just trying to be honest with our listeners here.

Mariam: Just trying to be honest to our listeners here.

Leen: It's important things that matter.

Hạ: Yeah. And for this final episode of the season, Mariam, Leen, and I are the ones who are closing the season out because Harjit, Lina, and Margaux started off opening the season. So we kind of wanted to do a fancy-schmancy book-ending sort of deal, because we be artistic like that.

Mariam: Yeah. We're so creative.

Leen: It's so creative. Put us in a museum already.

Mariam: You guys, are we the three most awkward ones?

Leen: We are.

Hạ: Awko Taco.

Mariam: The Awko Tacos, as Ha likes to say.

Hạ: Yes, Awko Taco.

Leen: Oh, perfect. I'm glad.

Hạ: So anyway, I was thinking back to my trip to Spain, back when I was still a fourth-year medical student and hadn't started residency yet. And in Spain there was a point where we were in Barcelona, and it kind of became a tour of the architecture by Antoni Gaudi, because we went to Park Guell, and then we went to one of his buildings.

And then we also went to the place that he's most well known probably for, is La Sagrada Familia, which, for people who haven't heard about it, is this really massive cathedral structure in Spain that actually still isn't finished. It's still getting built as we speak right now, and there's still a lot more that they're adding to it.

And when I was there, we toured through the museum that talked a little bit about the history of La Sagrada Familia. And one of the things that really struck out to me was that when Gaudi built it, the way that he did his molds, the way that he did his notes, it was really built with this understanding that even though he started it, he might not be the one to finish it, and that other architects would continue to really build off of his original framework.

And I thought that was pretty poignant because I think a lot of times when we think about architects or artists from history, we really think about them taking ownership of the building or whatever piece of artwork that they decide to work on.

I haven't ever really heard about them thinking about, "This is going to move beyond my own timeline and that I'm trying to really build it in a way so that other people can expand on it," which is what's happening with La Sagrada Familia right now.

So all of this really made me think about the concept that I would love to talk about for this episode, which is legacy. And the idea of how legacy is related to our identity, and how it's related to our growth, and whatever else that word legacy brings up in us when we hear about it.

Leen: Interestingly enough, I think the first time I was told of the word legacy was actually as a pre-med, which that seems like such a big stretch. What am I going to do as a pre-med?

But I remember when I was applying to medical school and I was sitting down with one of the counselors and she said, "There are many people who go in, they do these little projects here and there, and they put that on their application. But the thing that's really going to make you stand out is when you create a legacy."

Kind of two things. One was, "Oh my gosh, I'm just a pre-med. I don't have the resources or whatever it is to establish a legacy." And two, the other thing that kind of bothered me in that sense was we're using legacy as a brand, right? But the more I think about it, I realized legacy is not necessarily something that you just start and finish.

It might not be something that you're aware you're doing. It's not a single task. It might be something over time you are building and putting together through your identity. I think that's a really great way to expand on it.

Maybe one day you're looking back, you're going to be like, "Wow, I created this individual with so many aspects around them that create this one overlying image or idea that people can refer to, look up to, follow in your path." And I think that truly is what a legacy is.

And I think that's where, whether it's through mentorship, whether it's through you being there as a person . . . I know the other day someone said, "Leen, I really want to be like you." And I was like, "What? What the heck does that mean?" And they were saying, "You're going to conferences, you're educated, you go around and you're always passionate what you're talking about and everything." And I just stopped for a second. I was like, "Is that me? Is that really me?"

I guess that is when the first notion . . . I was thinking, "Man, maybe I'm starting to finally take the first steps towards building my own legacy in that regards." And it's something that I think is the opposite of what started out. It isn't a brand that I'm selling myself for, but in the end it's something that I'm giving back to, right?

Mariam: Yeah, I think that was really well said, Leen. When you were talking about how your pre-med advisor was telling you about leaving a legacy, it definitely reminded me of a lot of what our admin in the School of Medicine say. They love to use these big sexy words, like legacy, and it is really about branding at the end of the day.

It's kind of interesting reflecting on what that actually means in this conversation. I feel like this is like a much more authentic space than I guess the School of Medicine creates.

Yeah, a lot of it is about branding, but more recently I'm about to apply to residency and I started to write my personal statement. Spoiler alert: It's kind of centered on my mother's stories and kind of the legacy that she's left for me and my journey and my growth as a person who wants to go into women's health.

And it just had me thinking a little bit similar to how you were saying, Leen. When we think about kind of just our growth through this journey in medicine or just our journey through life, it's not this start point and endpoint, but it's kind of just this ongoing journey.

I was starting to think about that a lot in reflecting about my mother and how she's influenced kind of my purpose and my why. And a lot of it extends outside of medicine, but I just thought it was a really interesting example of how legacy is kind of just this broader thing that we think about in connection with our identity, and just kind of people that have influenced us in the past and how we pay it forward.

Hạ: When we were talking about how legacy can have this role with the branding, but then legacy can also have this role that's a bit more healing . . . Legacy is an interesting word because it can have two contexts, right? And I will admit the first context that I really thought about legacy was actually in the terms of legacy admissions. That was the first time I started hearing the word legacy a bit more normally.

Legacy admissions, for people who don't know, is the idea that if you have parents who formerly went to this university or this college, or have contributed to it in a certain extent, you kind of have a slight upper edge in admissions. And it's kind of something that has pretty much not the best connotation.

When I think about it, I realize that a lot of times legacy is what we make of it. And similarly, a lot of times when you think about legacy in the concept of branding, I feel like it's so weird because when you think about legacy as creating a brand, it re-centers on being really individualistic, really capitalistic.

But the truth of the matter is I feel that if you transform it, it actually pushes against the individualism and the capitalism, because it really is about building the collective and recognizing that you are more than just yourself. You are more than just this moment in time.

I think when I started understanding and thinking about legacy and the more healing perspective, it was very transformative for the way that I approached activism and the way that I approached the work that I did. I always saw it instead of me having to do the thing and being successful at it, it was more me laying down the foundations or the bricks so that other people can build on it, if that makes sense.

Leen: I was just thinking, as you were talking, legacy . . . I feel like if you were to lay it out against kind of your life map in a sense, it kind of goes through two phases.

I think the first one, growing up. I'm going to kind of use my example. Growing up, you are a part of your parents' legacy per se. And I'm not saying this as like, "Oh, you're their kids and genetics and whatever." No. I'm saying this as they have a story that they built through, that they went through in order to get them to where they are, and then you were introduced into that story, and you are a product of almost their footprints and how they went, right?

For instance, my parents struggling to . . . And really, they fought for their education within Palestine and then they succeeded and they were able to be accepted into the graduate schools here in the U.S. These are the historical experiences that shape our generation.

And that can go back into generational trauma. That's part of it. It can be generational experiences, per se, where you see their struggle, you see how they had to go through, you saw the world against them.

And now you're seeing this from the perspective of, "Now I'm the individual going through these steps, but I was formed by their legacy, their story that they left for me, and now here I am making my own footsteps based off of that."

And I think that really just goes to show for those who've had long-term standing of generational legacies, why we tend to look up to them in society so much. And you get these big family names, and these big projects, and God knows what else.

But I think for us, it's on a much smaller level. We see, "Wow, my parents did this and this is why I'm here."

I always think, "What if they didn't leave?" I don't know. Would I have gotten my bachelor's degree? I don't know what I would've been like, right? It's crazy to see how now they've just established a whole new legacy and a whole new part of the world.

So legacy I feel like we can try to brand it, we can try to make it capitalistic, but true legacy is so much more than that. It's the one that gives you the butterflies in your stomach when you're sitting there and you're like, "Oh my god, I can't believe I'm talking to this person," or, "I can't believe this story. How did they go through this story?" or, "How did I end up here?" I think that's what really hits you.

Hạ: It's one of those words I feel like . . . For some reason, I'm thinking about time a lot, and I feel that a lot of times concepts and words are rooted in just one aspect. We think about certain words with the past, with the future with the present. But legacy is just so powerful because it kind of draws from the past to define who we are in the present, but also really what we want to do for the future.

Leen: That sounds so epic just to say, "Legacy transcends time."

Mariam: It really does, though. I feel like what you both said was just so . . . I think it resonated a lot with me. Just like I mentioned earlier, legacy for some reason is just reminding me a lot of my mom, and I think it really is just kind of similar to how you were talking, Leen.

I think specifically from the background of coming from immigrant parents, we reflect a lot on kind of just their story and their community and how we've carried that through.

I think when we were young, it was kind of communicated to us that the expectation, at least in my experience, was to carry that forward in this new country.

I was thinking just about how it is powerful when you see people from your community and you hear their stories and you kind of think about this concept of legacy. And for me, it was my mom's stories, but also it's been seeing other Afghan people in medicine, or just Afghan people forming community in the States, and how powerful that feels, but also simultaneously how complicated that feels too with being this generation that is kind of upholding this legacy. But it obviously looks so different than the generations prior.

Carrying also the expectations of what the prior generation would like that legacy to look like versus how we, as this generation carrying out the legacy, kind of transform it, if that makes sense.

I feel like this is a really deep conversation. It's hard to put into words. But something I have been feeling a lot is just as an Afghan woman in medicine who wants to practice medicine in a very specific way, giving back to not only my community but other communities of color, it's just interesting because it's very different than my parents' pursuit of education and their goals or the generation prior. And I guess when you're carrying that forward, sometimes you get stuck and you're like, "Am I doing this right?" for lack of a better word. I don't know.

Leen: But that brings up a good point. At what point do we make legacy constraining? At point do we make legacy a privilege? At what point do we make legacy to be something that prevents development of your own self-identity? And I think that's where we start getting the whole privilege circle coming in and the whole oppressive circles coming in, and that's where we have to be very careful.

And it's really hard because legacy by its name means you worked very hard to establish what this is as a story. The next part of that is, "Let's work really hard to make sure that this part of our story that we worked so hard for does not become oppressive."

Hạ: Yeah, I think we can always . . . I really do believe in the transformative power, but it comes down to how you really center it. And when you center it on societal expectations or these undefined rules that still exist and are floating in the air, it can be really stifling.

But when you try to really take that word, and take the connotations, and take all the associations and break it down into pieces, per se, you can really look deep into it.

I like to center a lot of my thoughts on love, and on community, and on healing, and I think that is the way I check myself when I feel like the societal pressures and burdens are pushing me to be going on the more oppressive route, the more capitalistic route, the more very burdened route.

And when I think about legacy, we want to carry our family's legacy out of love, we want to continue . . . or the legacy of our ancestors. I like to think that I have the blood and the soul of my ancestors running all throughout me.

When I think about going from there with thinking, "I want to do all of this out of love. I want to build community and create legacy for the future out of love," it helps me kind of think about different ways to approach it.

Leen: That story reminds me more of the idea of our personal individual legacies that we're currently working to build within ourselves. And I think going through these things, we start to think, "Is what I'm doing currently in medicine going to lead me down that path where I will be able to build something that I will look back at and be proud at, but also be able to be influence for others to be able to use my footsteps in order to kind of help them as well?"

I think sometimes that's really nerve-racking, because the medical training by its nature is very standardized to some degree, in the sense that residents, I feel like, across the nation can talk about how we all have the same experiences: lack of sleep, work, charting, patients, and the cycle goes on and on.

And I think my biggest struggle during residency was realizing, "Well, where do I come in? Where does my individual pursuit of why I did this to myself come in?" I didn't go into medicine necessarily to be like this, to be just a cycle of work, shift work, and see the same thing over and over again. And I thought "Well, I went into medicine for a very big reason in my personal endeavors." You start to lose that part of yourself within the training.

When you get back to those transverse points where you're trying to reapply, thinking of, "What's the next step in my career? What's the next step in my future?" Ultimately, medicine is very future-binding. I mean, it's one of those careers that is very much going to be tied to all aspects of your life.

And so you try to say, "Am I making the right next choice? Am I making a choice that's going to make me happier in medicine and hopefully happier in life?" And these are legacy-turning moments that I think, looking back on, we are very stressed about, but 10 years from now, you look back and you're like "Wow, I can't believe I did that," or, "That was really life changing."

Mariam: Yeah. I also think, just going back to when you're in these moments of big life changes, it's also okay for your legacy to change. I think about what my goals were going into medical school, and they're very different now just four years later applying into residency. And I'm sure they're going to be a lot different when I finish residency and go into my career. And so it's just kind of an evolving, ever-shifting thing, especially as it pertains to medicine.

I don't know. I think I feel this a lot. I feel I'm obligated to leave a certain legacy as a woman of color in medicine, or with my different backgrounds and identities and values. And it's funny how we really try to confine ourselves to what we really believe in and things that we value, which I think is a very beautiful thing, but it's also just always evolving and changing.

And this is kind of what I was alluding to prior. With the previous generations, with my mom specifically . . . I go back to her a lot, as I was talking about, just reflecting on her experiences.

My mom, very similar to your parents, Leen, was really big on education. And the reason she was is because she had to leave pharmacy school in Afghanistan. When she came to the States, she was lucky enough to pursue education again, but it wasn't what she wanted because of difficult life circumstances, because of finances, and things like that.

And she was so proud when I got into medical school because she envisioned, "This is the next generation. This is my daughter and she is a doctor." And I think I internalized a lot of her expectations of what she wanted in me, and I too was proud about being a doctor and being this person in my community that's able to serve in this role. But then also, the things that I want out of my life, especially as I'm going further in training, are not medicine. You know what I mean?

Leen: Yeah, I completely understand that.

Mariam: And this is the thing, I come from, again, a generation that has more opportunities to grow and explore and do other things. And those are things that aren't necessarily mutually exclusive to what my mother and the generations prior perceived for us.

It is kind of hard sometimes when you're thinking about what you truly want and how you feel kind of obligated, in a sense, to pay certain things forward based on the prior generation.

Again, I'm really speaking mostly from the perspective of my own community and my family, and it definitely looks different with different communities and things like that. But with this concept of legacy, it feels so empowering but it also sometimes feels very restricting in a lot of ways. Yeah, I don’t know.

Hạ: It's really hard, and especially in medicine, I think it also comes back, this perspective, that a lot of people in our society, especially when you're in the medical field, make the career everything about you.

And it's one of the things that I've been trying to . . . In a lot of conversations that I've had with people that I now currently meet, a lot of times I say, "I think where I go to college and what I do for my career, being in medicine, should be the least interesting things about me." I think that there's so much more to who I am than that. But I think that's what a lot of people want to center on and try to define.

It's also what a lot of people . . . When I got into the college that I got to, and when I became a doctor, a lot of people like to say, "Wow, you're building on your family's legacy. You're living the American dream." That's what a lot of people like to put into my perspective and personality, because I also came from a family of immigrants. I came from a single-parent household. It's very easy to kind of create this narrative in a way, this story about who you are, and to kind of create yourself. It's very easy to fall into that.

And it felt hard because it sometimes when I was in college, I often felt like I had to be a certain person because of all the legacies that were holding onto me, and I burnt out really quickly.

I think when I approached medical school, I started going, "I'm just going to kind of take things in stride and see where things lead me." And I kind of started centering things. For my legacy, I started centering things on less big things and I started centering like, "This is just what I'm doing. This is just a part of my career. It's less important, and that my legacy extends into other things than just medicine. It extends into the things that I'm passionate about, the things that make me joyful and happy. It extends into the ways I interact with loved ones, and the ways that I interact with my enemies and all of that."

What I've currently started trying to work on is I've just been trying to go on runs in nature. In SF, I'm really close to the Embarcadero, so I'm running by the sea. And when I do that, it makes me realize that just existing in this moment, and being able to enjoy the sea, and to think about how beautiful it is, and thinking about, "Oh, when my mom comes here, I want to show this to her. Or when anyone I love comes here, I want to show it to them." I started realizing that that little thing was kind of building a legacy too.

And I know that was a huge ramble and tangent. It's just you both sharing your really beautiful words just made me start thinking about it.

Mariam: That was the most beautiful thing I've heard all week, and I want to cry because it honestly was so validating. This just became a therapy session.

Leen: I love how we started out trying to figure out what legacy meant and all that, and then we come to a close on, "This is what it means to us." I think you hit the nail on the head. I really do.

Mariam: Seriously. Yeah.

Leen: I love the part where you said when you see something is beautiful, you just want to show it to your mom, you want to show it to someone you love. And I think that all the time too. When I'm in the city, I'm like, "I really wish I could show my brother this."

I'm thinking legacy for me at the end is that I'm able to show the people that I love the things that I'm experiencing. "Look where I was able to go and let me show you what this is." To just experience life at its fullest in that moment.

And obviously, legacy is not something we always set the standard. It's sometimes just what happens when someone reads your story. But I think the little moments are the true parts of where you get to experience your legacy, is where you get to show people around you life, essentially.

Mariam: Yeah. I just think that's so beautiful. I just want to cry.

Leen: No crying.

Mariam: I'm legitimately emotional.

Leen: You cry, I'll cry.

Mariam: I'm going to just be super vulnerable here. I've been in a lot of distress because applying to residency you have to put a whole bunch of stuff on your application that, I'm sorry, is frankly just BS. It's just you're showcasing yourself and you're kind of . . . A lot of it feels really inauthentic. You're listing how many things you've published.

There are parts of it that can feel empowering and authentic when you're talking about your story in your personal statement. But I think something that I've really struggled with in this application cycle is, "What do I want from this process? I know these are the things that I love and value, but I'm in this system that ultimately doesn't feel always super authentic."

And I try to sound as authentic as I can on my application, but in reality there are some things that programs look for, right? And there are some boxes that you have to check.

Not just specific to our school, but any space like a medical school, when people talk about diversity work, or DEI work, they look to the people of color and there's this weird sense of obligation that POCs in those spaces have to perform and do specific things and care about specific things.

And I think what ends up happening is we internalize a lot of that obligation, and we get so burnt out in it. At least for me, I felt like I lost a part of myself in kind of living in this bubble of a system, and feeling like as a person of color in medicine I needed to do X, Y, and Z.

But things that have been kind of centering me a little bit more recently is just thinking about the things that bring me joy.

This is why I was about to cry. A few days ago was my dad's birthday. He passed away when I was a senior in high school. And every single year, I try to do something to commemorate his birthday, but I happened to be on nights. I was on my sub-I and I was on nights. I wasn't really able to do anything for his birthday. And today, I'm actually . . . this conversation has motivated me to actually do something to commemorate him.

I just think that it's those little things that have kept me true to who I am in this process. And I know that sounds kind of weird and maybe detached from our conversation of legacy, but it was just something that I was feeling as Ha was talking.

It's so easy to get lost in what you feel obligated to do based on your experiences and your identity. And it's hard sometimes to feel connected to the joy of living, and I think that's a very powerful way to live your life. I think that's, in its own way, just living out this legacy, is experiencing the joy.

Leen: No, I don't think it's a little thing. I think that's actually a very big thing. So I think that's really beautiful, Mariam. I think you should do something. You should absolutely do something.

Hạ: I am.

Hạ: I love that. Yes, do it.

Mariam: I'm going to either do donuts or ice cream or pizza. Those were my dad's favorite American foods.

Leen: All of them. One hundred percent all of them.

Hạ: Cupcakes.

Leen: All of them.

Mariam: The sad part is he wasn't a big cupcake person. I'm the cupcake person. It was tragic.

Hạ: Unfortunate.

Leen: Well, share your passion with his passion and get cupcakes.

Hạ: That's legacy building here.

Mariam: Legacy building. He might have loved cupcakes. We just don’t know. Aw. Therapy session. I loved that.

Leen: My computer is literally about to die.

Hạ: Yes. Well, let's wrap things up before Leen disappears in the abyss, thanks to her computer.

Mariam: Well, thank you to our listeners for listening to our season finale for Season 6. Woo. That was such a pathetic woo. I'm sorry.

Leen: I loved it. That was great.

Mariam: I just cringed as I heard it. Thank you to our listeners. I had such a great time this past season recording with you guys. Stay tuned for our next season.

As always, follow us on Instagram @bundleofhers if you're not already following us. And then look for us on any podcast/streaming app situation. I never know how to say this part, but our generation knows how to find podcasts. Spotify, Apple, all the things. We have a website. You can also look there.

Anyway, yeah, we'll see you guys next season. Bye.

Hạ: Bye.

Leen: Season 8 is going to be great.

Hạ: It's Season 7.

Leen: Oh, my bad.

Mariam: But eight, I'm sure, if we get to eight, will be great.

Leen: Seven is going to be heaven.

Mariam: Eight is going to be great.

Leen: We're just working on cheesy rhymes. I'm a rapper in my downtime.

Hạ: Nine is going be fine.

Mariam: Nine is going to be fine. Ten is going to be . . .

Leen: Oh, look at that.

Mariam: . . . I don't know.