Your Health Your Way

Winning Well: Legacy Over Applause

• James Ross • Season 1 • Episode 6

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We reflect on the quiet truth about winning through the lens of palliative care, legacy, and faith. We question success that “works,” name the soul cost of the hedonic treadmill, and offer three questions to build a life that holds when the applause fades.

• what palliative care really does
• the danger of success that feels empty
• the hedonic treadmill and validation addiction
• aligning goals with values and relationships
• three legacy questions for love, impact, becoming
• surrender as strength, not weakness
• numbering our days to gain wisdom
• practical ways to choose what endures




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SPEAKER_00:

Let me take you to a moment that's been sitting with me for some time now. I want you to picture this in your mind's eye. I want you to picture two graves. In one grave is a man who has built empires. His name is known in boardrooms, maybe known all across America. His calendar was full. His life looked like the kind of success that we're taught to chase. And in the other grave lies a man who lived a quiet life. No headlines, no great wealth. Maybe only a few people actually knew his name. And yet they're buried in the same earth. Same silence, same end. What really separated them? What actually made them the same? Because at the end, titles don't matter. Your resume doesn't matter. All of your accomplishments, they don't follow you. The applause fades. You can't take all the wealth and riches and stuff that you've accumulated with you. So what's left? What's actually left is the life that you actually lived. So today, what I just shared with you, I want you to keep that in your mind's eye as we talk about the quiet truth about winning. Not just winning for the sake of winning, but what it means to win well. In what I do as a physician, one of the hats that I wear is a palliative care physician. In palliative medicine, I get a front row seat to some very intense and oftentimes very difficult and sad situations and circumstances. I have a front row seat to enter into patients' and families' sufferings at a time when life is beginning to transition for people. At times patients are at a fork in the road. And with their with their families by their sides and their input of their physicians, they have to come up with a decision to decide which path do I take. Do we take the path of doing everything we can to treat everything that we can to extend life, to live longer? Or do we choose a different path? One that focuses exclusively on comfort, quality of life, not living longer, but living as symptom-free as you can for the time that you have left. A path that might include maybe hospice care. Now, in palliative care, we oftentimes hear that word and we think, oh, that's all hospice or end-of-life care. And that's not necessarily true. Palliative care is a specialty that helps patients and families that are navigating serious illnesses to help them improve their quality of life in any way that we can, whether they're doing everything they can to live longer or if they want to transition to end-of-life care. We help patients navigate these very difficult to control symptoms. We help cancer patients, particularly dealing with the effects of chemo or radiation, or even the pain that the cancer is causing them. But a big part of what we do in palliative care is we help patients and families really navigate complex medical decision making to help them navigate that fork in the road. And again, it's a very unique specialty in that we really enter into these difficult times to come alongside and support families and patients through some very difficult decisions. And so in doing this over the years, I've really seen how different families, different patients, different cultures, different backgrounds navigate these difficult times and difficult decisions. And it reminds me daily. I am daily reminded of how precious and how short life really is. And I don't know if it's the fact that I'm getting older, probably has something to do with that. But the reality is that we have a short time on this planet to find meaning and find purpose and find joy and find happiness. And so I'm daily reminded when I am visiting with patients and families, I get to witness these things. And it makes me think, as a man, as a husband, as a father, as a physician, it makes me start thinking about my life and wanting to examine things and be a little more introspective. And it has me thinking about how do I want to live my life? And how maybe we can encourage one another to live a life of meaning. So here's the reality: we live in a culture that pushes us to keep climbing, to make more money, to gain more recognition, to be more productive. And if you're wired like me, you might even enjoy the pressure sometimes. You might feel most alive when you're working towards something. But here's the danger. Sometimes the most dangerous kind of success is the one that works. Let me say that again. Sometimes the most dangerous kind of success is the one that works. Because when it works, when you finally get the thing you thought would fulfill you, and it doesn't, that's when you realize you've built something impressive on the wrong foundation. And we don't talk about that enough. We think success will solve all our restlessness, will solve all of our problems, but often it really just masks it. Let me ask you a different kind of question. If your life was a business and you were the CEO, how would you rate your leadership? Not in terms of hustle or goals, but in terms of alignment. Are you actually running your life? Or is it running you? Here's the truth that most people don't want to hear. But it's about legacy. Legacy isn't something you build someday. It's actually being built today. In your habits, in your calendar, in the things that you say yes to, in the things that you keep tolerating. Every decision you make has a cost, not just a financial one, but a soul cost. And if you don't slow down to count it, you'll wake up one day wildly successful, but painfully disconnected from yourself, from your people, maybe even from God. Let's call something out. Most people aren't chasing purpose. They're chasing a feeling. That feeling that you get when maybe people admire you, the thrill of a win, the I matter that you feel when your phone doesn't stop buzzing. But the truth is, those feelings don't last. And when the dopamine fades, we start chasing again. The cycle starts over, looking for that dopamine hit, right? More work, more validation, more distraction. That's not ambition, that's addiction. Oftentimes referred to sometimes as the hedonic treadmill. Constantly moving, never satisfied. If you don't get off that ride, you'll trade peace for pace. And you might even call it progress. So if I'm being honest, and I am, I've been there. I've been on that treadmill. And it's not something that um necessarily goes away. It's always there, it's always tempting me to get on. And I have been on that treadmill. I have chased what I thought was success or what would give me that feeling that I've finally accomplished something. And our culture sort of set up for this. I was in high school and I thought, well, if I get to a good college, then that'll that'll help me get to the next level. And if I get good grades in college, then maybe I can get to a great med school. And then once I accomplish that, well, if I get to great med school, maybe I can get to a great residency program. And if I get a great residency program, maybe then I can I can find a great uh position, a great job, and and I've finally arrived. But it seems like every time I arrived, I always felt like I had to keep chasing something. And in my own life, and maybe in yours, maybe we're chasing success or the idea of success or accomplishment because maybe we've been hurt or wounded along the path, and maybe we are in some ways kind of avoiding dealing with our own pains and our own issues, or maybe we we have experienced some things that that have set us on this course of chasing goals and success. And goals and success in and of themselves aren't evil, right? It's not bad. But in my own journey, in my own life, no, no matter the reality that I have accomplished some some some things. I have tasted of financial success. I've made a lot of money. I I have a lot of cars, and I have a nice big house, etc. You know, my my bank account may be full by most accounts, right? But the reality is that all of that stuff at the end of the day that I thought mattered really doesn't matter. When you look at the big picture, when you look at what really fills you up, makes you happy, those things don't bring you happiness. And I've wrestled with that. I'm just being honest, I've wrestled with that over the years. Thought I might have to have a certain lifestyle or a certain this or that or a certain car or a certain size house. And you might say, oh, well, Doc, that's easy for you to say. You make a lot of money. You've made a lot of money. But the sacrifices that I've made along the way, the pain that I have incurred, and the truth is the pain that I've caused others. I've missed out on a lot. Time with my wife, time with my children. I've made a lot of mistakes in my own ways of coping, problematic ways of coping. I've I've hurt a lot of people, I've hurt myself. But thank God that I've been waking up, so to speak. And look, there's no condemnation. If you're in this season of life and you're on that treadmill, hey, I get it. But as I'm learning, as I'm growing, as I'm developing into the person that I believe I'm supposed to be and become, I'm really understanding more and more every day the pitfalls and the traps that this world sets for us. And so let's dig into that a little bit more. What actually matters? I think it comes down to three questions. One, how well did you love? Two, what did you build that will outlast you? And three, who did you become in the process? So let's take the first question. How well did you love? Not perform. Not impress, but love. How well did you love the people in your home? How well did you love the people that no one else sees? Those are some important questions. And I try every day to check myself and say, am I really loving well? Am I really loving the people that God has put in my path today? I challenge you. Do the same thing. Are you loving the people that matter most in your life? Are you loving people that are in your path? Number two. Again, what did you build that will outlast you? Not what you consumed, not what you earned, not the stuff, but what you planted that will keep growing long after you've gone. Think about that. We can't take things with us, but what can we truly leave this world? How can we leave this world a better place? How can you make a difference in your corner of the universe, in your sphere of influence? What did you build? Not just materially, but what did you build that you know will definitely outlive you? What did you share with your family? What did you share with your kids that they will take with them and then share with their kids and their kids and so on and so forth? That's really where legacy, I believe, really starts to develop. Number three, who did you become in the process? Because here's the reality: you can achieve everything and lose yourself along the way. You can have a brand, but not know your own soul. The real work in your life isn't out there in your accomplishments. It's in here. It's in your character, it's in your spirit, it's in your surrender. My life has not been perfect. I'm very imperfect. I've made a lot of mistakes in my life. But I've learned through the various mistakes and the things that I've that have hurt myself or hurt others along the way, I've learned more about God's grace, forgiveness, forgiveness of self, forgiveness of others. And in this life, in different things, in successes and failures, it's it all is additive in becoming who I am today. And it will still continue to evolve, and I will continue to hopefully be better down the road, days, years from now. I want to keep growing and I want to in, I want to look at the man that I am and the man that I'm becoming and say, yeah, I like who that guy is. He's not perfect, but I like who he's becoming in the process. Now here's where everything shifts. The invitation isn't to hustle harder, okay? The invitation is to surrender deeper. The word surrender maybe sounds soft to some of you, maybe even weak, but I believe in God's kingdom, surrender is actually a sign of great strength. Surrender, in my humble view, is a path to clarity. It's a path of peace, and it's a path of power. You're not surrendering because you gave up, you're surrendering because you've finally aligned yourself with what actually matters. It's not just giving up what you have, it's giving all that you are. And in giving all that you are, you're realizing that what that means is that you're giving something that is actually eternal, that is beyond yourself. So that brings me to really one of my favorite psalms in the Bible. It's Psalm 90. And again, as I mentioned, in what I do, I get a front row seat to death and dying and how people choose to live their lives in every season of their life, at every stage and whatever season they find themselves in. But Psalm 90 says, teach us to number our days that we may gain a heart of wisdom. Teach us to number our days so that we may gain a heart of wisdom. That's not about being afraid of death, it's really about learning how to live. It's learning how to live like your time matters, like your choices count, to live like you've actually care about what you're doing, to live like you're actually giving an account. I like what Tolstoy says, and he said something like this live in such a way that you're always ready to die. Live in such a way that you're always ready to die. Again, not out of fear. That's where we miss it. We think about death and dying, and immediately we feel fear because we live in a culture that's very death phobic, right? But it's really not about fear. It's not out of fear. We live in such a way that we're always ready to die, not out of fear, but out of freedom. It's actually very liberating. Because when you live with the end in mind, you really stop wasting time on things that don't last, on things that don't matter, on things that have no eternal significance or consequence. So I'll leave you with this. You're already building something every day, everything that you say yes to, every scroll, every sacrifice. The question I have is, will it hold? Will it still matter when the applause fades? Will it still stand when the season shifts? Will it still be beautiful when no one's watching? The world may never see all of it. But heaven will. And at the end of your life, the loudest applause won't come from a crowd. It will hopefully come from the one who saw it all. Well done, good and faithful servant. That's the only win that lasts. See you next time.