How you guys view seeing friends and people succeed

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Like seeing people you knew from high school or friends succeeding at this route. Than seeing yourself stumble. Do you guys ever feel envious these people succeed like i hope they fail or happy for them?
 
I would rather see myself succeed than stumble.

Why does it matter what they're doing? Use their successes as inspiration. It's not like being envious accomplishes anything.

EDIT: Oh wait, it's you again. Be as salty as you want. Your spite will surely make their career fail and yours prosper.
 
It's natural to harbor some brief anger at people who get things you want, but don't have. It's normal and how humans evolved to behave.

I've noticed that I usually won't feel as good seeing someone's post on FB about their thing, as I will if they tell me directly. Acting happy toward someone who can see that you're happy makes one feel better than acting happy when they can't, such as when one's sitting in front of a computer.

I lean toward egoism, in that altruism in the philosophical sense is kind of an illusion. We do things to feel better ourselves, and sometimes that includes acting happy at the success of others. We act happy, they act happy in return, we feel good because of that--everyone gets along.
 
Lost in Translation said:
I would rather see myself succeed than stumble.

Why does it matter what they're doing? Use their successes as inspiration. It's not like being envious accomplishes anything.

EDIT: Oh wait, it's you again. Be as salty as you want. Your spite will surely make their career fail and yours prosper.
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Story time?
 
Fuarky said:
Like seeing people you knew from high school or friends succeeding at this route. Than seeing yourself stumble. Do you guys ever feel envious these people succeed like i hope they fail or happy for them?
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or you could put that energy into succeeding at this route
 
Fuarky said:
Like seeing people you knew from high school or friends succeeding at this route. Than seeing yourself stumble. Do you guys ever feel envious these people succeed like i hope they fail or happy for them?
Click to expand...

I don't have any friends pursuing medicine. They're all engineers or financial analysts. I just shrug and keep doing what I'm doing (although I do ask them for help/advice regarding something in their fields).
 
Dang, everyone is getting on OP's butt about this post; it seemed like an honest and harmless question to me. Is there something I'm missing?
 
I laugh, because, honestly these posts I see on social medial sometimes are funny.

Anyways, lets keep it real, I think of how much better I would make the opportunity and the things I would do different (not be so lame about it).

Just give it time

704 said:
I feel like if they are truly your friends, you would love to see them succeed.
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^ THIS
 
I will admit that it can be a challenge at times, but it is just a matter of putting forth your best effort. I strive for my own progress, and as long as I know that I worked as hard as I could have at something that I find value in, I'm happy.
 
None of my high school friends are pre-med but I am applying this cycle with other pre-meds. Ive learned that for life in general being envious does nothing but give you stress and make you feel down. I choose to just be happy for people when they succeed even Im not succeeding at the moment. Its something I had to work on for a bit, cause there is nothing more annoying than feeling down about something you cant change (especially when its about the success of someone else).
 
[QUOTE="J Senpai, post: 17091448, membe
 
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Most of the people I knew in highschool who wanted to be pre-med have long since given up lol. I only know a few close friends who made it, and they all outshined me like a damn Super Nova. Never once was anything but happy for them though.

Now if you want to talk about people I already hated who are succeeding, thats a whole other ballgame...@NotASerialKiller helps me out with them😏
 
BaeDreaming said:
None of my high school friends are pre-med but I am applying this cycle with other pre-meds. Ive learned that for life in general being envious does nothing but give you stress and make you feel down. I choose to just be happy for people when they succeed even Im not succeeding at the moment. Its something I had to work on for a bit, cause there is nothing more annoying than feeling down about something you cant change (especially when its about the success of someone else).
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I could care less about people who I don't know or never talked to but with me its more relating to success of high school aquaitances/friends.
 
Typically I am really only genuinely "happy" for people that I can relate to the situation they are in. When someone says they get into medical school, I can say I am happy for them, but I really can't empathize since I have no frame of reference for "happiness" in that situation. It's mostly like, "oh, congratulations, I have no idea what this thing you've accomplished is like." Similar to when someone has a kid, gets married, etc. It's awesome, but I have no idea what it's like.
 
Fuarky said:
I could care less about people who I don't know or never talked to but with me its more relating to success of high school aquaitances/friends.
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I meant people in my college now. My premed friends from school, not people I dont know.
 
BaeDreaming said:
I meant people in my college now. My premed friends from school, not people I dont know.
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With me still I have this problem only with my old aquaitances/friends like from hs and none at all with anybody at college.
 
People from high school, no. The amount of med school students coming from my high school is ridiculous, because in that country, ANYONE who can pay from it will get in. Their "MCAT" is basically just an intro to bio final, they don't need to do any ECs, and GPAs only matter if they're trying to get into the #1 school in the country.

People from college, no. I'm lucky enough that most of my pre-med friends were chill people that I would be really happy to see succeed. I only had 1 friend who was an obsessively annoying pre-med, but just give him a beer and a burrito, and then he chills out and I can root for him too.

Plus, I chose the longer path to being a doctor and I'm okay with that. No ragrets! Not even a single letter
 
Cyberdyne 101 said:
I love to see others succeed, even if I feel trapped in Oblivion. Their success inspires me.
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With me met a kid at my school last year who was senior when I was first year and he was going into medicine he inspired me but all the feelings of being envious of success of others is mainly my high school friends and aquaitances and nobody else
 
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Svenson said:
Dang, everyone is getting on OP's butt about this post; it seemed like an honest and harmless question to me. Is there something I'm missing?
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My apologies if my post seemed that way. I did not have that intention.
 
Lets be honest- it's impossible to be always purely happy for other people's success, in the case where you're struggling at the same route. I don't think
that's being self- centered and a dingus of a human being; it's just being human and I suppose, insecure.
But I won't go so far as to wish for their failure. That's just odd.
 
99% of the time, I am happy for everyone's success. There's like . . . one person I know who I feel very strongly should not be a doctor and it pained me when he got into a foreign medical school (he did not have the chops to go MD or DO in the US.) But I wouldn't ever call that person my friend, so I think that's a little different.
 
There will always be people who are better and worse than you are. Are you envious of Mark Zuckerberg or Bill Gates? Envy will get you nowhere. The only person you should be comparing yourself to is yourself.



Fuarky said:
Like seeing people you knew from high school or friends succeeding at this route. Than seeing yourself stumble. Do you guys ever feel envious these people succeed like i hope they fail or happy for them?
Click to expand...
 
I'm the biggest hater alive.

Hate seeing people succeed.
 
It depends on who it is. Finding out this horrible gunner from undergrad had gotten into med school the cycle I got rejected made me feel terrible. Finding out it was in the Carribean made me feel better.
 
Mad Jack said:
I'm super happy for them because I'm not a self-centered, compeititve dingus of a human being.
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If you're insinuating OP is a self-centered dingus, that's a bit judgey. I think they're is being honest with themselves and open about it. Look out! It's the fundamental attribution error!

@Fuarky , if you are distressed by strong negative feelings toward the successful people in your life, you may want to look at your social environment or the situations you find yourself in -- as well as your behavior -- when you feel this way, as we know that our situations and behaviors affect our attitudes.
 
I was actually just about to make this thread from a slightly different perspective: seeing how the admissions process works and doesn't work for people. I know two people--both through work--and they are having radically different cycles. One of them has a ton of interviews and an acceptance. The other has only a couple so far (that I know of), and one of those interviews has already met with either rejection or wait-list (not entirely clear of the details). Both same demographically (aka same gender, same race/ethnicity/same home state).

The frustrating part, for me at least, is having worked with them both, I would much rather be colleagues with the one who is having a less successful cycle!! I'm not sure WHAT is going on, but it's really frustrating. The one who has an acceptance in hand has said some ridiculous stuff to me--the kind of things that would just be red flags if they came out in an interview (not sexist or anything, just wildly immature, unrealistic, and entitled) not to mention some shady/manipulative behavior with how he's managing job and interview responsibilities. I can't imagine thinking this person is ready for medical school and the responsibilities of being a doctor...and yet they're the one who's gotten in so far.

I know that stats are a big part of admissions, but it really is disappointing to see how that plays out in real time. I'm not sure what the successful guy's stats are, but I'm guessing they're impressive based on the amount of interviews he's garnered so far. Oh well, I guess this is just the rose colored glasses coming off and me realizing that, despite the insane amount of competition, some people that make it to medical school still kinda terrible.

As a side note, I've had a hard time with comparing myself to others. Conventional wisdom says that people tear the competition down because they are insecure--to that I say, "Of COURSE I'm insecure!! This process is volatile, unpredictable, and high-stakes!" I've chilled out a lot, but let's just say that when my irritating coworker got the first interview invite between the two of us, I may have panicked and cried in the copy room. Don't beat yourself up over feeling competitive and angry, that's normal. It's how you react to that feeling that makes you a dingus or not.
 
J Senpai said:
If you're insinuating OP is a self-centered dingus, that's a bit judgey. I think they're is being honest with themselves and open about it. Look out! It's the fundamental attribution error!

@Fuarky , if you are distressed by strong negative feelings toward the successful people in your life, you may want to look at your social environment or the situations you find yourself in -- as well as your behavior -- when you feel this way, as we know that our situations and behaviors affect our attitudes.
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If you look at OP's history, they kind of are a dingus. Maybe not a self-centered one, but a dingus nonetheless.
 
feather421 said:
I know that stats are a big part of admissions, but it really is disappointing to see how that plays out in real time. I'm not sure what the successful guy's stats are, but I'm guessing they're impressive based on the amount of interviews he's garnered so far. Oh well, I guess this is just the rose colored glasses coming off and me realizing that, despite the insane amount of competition, some people that make it to medical school still kinda terrible.
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This is kinda obvious if you've ever had a crappy doctor. (And it's also obvious just from seeing some of the posts of people here on SDN. :laugh:) Admissions is an imperfect process, doctors are just people, and many of them suck.
 
catmario said:
Lets be honest- it's impossible to be always purely happy for other people's success, in the case where you're struggling at the same route. I don't think
that's being self- centered and a dingus of a human being; it's just being human and I suppose, insecure.
But I won't go so far as to wish for their failure. That's just odd.
Click to expand...
I don't see it that way. When one of my friends does well, it just makes me think "Good for them, and if they can do this so can I."
 
As a bit of an old fart, I can say with complete certainty that success, maybe more than anything else, is fleeting. Whether or not they share it on social media, everyone has crap happen sooner or later. Be happy for your friends while they are having success because I promise it won't last forever. Neither will yours or mine. Like many things in life it ebbs and flows.

I would also consider that definitions of success are a very personal thing. When I see a friend who's successfully climbed the finance ladder and has a mortgage and 3 kids, I thank my lucky stars it isn't me because that is not at all what I want personally. Im happy for him as that seems to be what he wants, but spending my days in that kind of job sounds like utter misery and don't even get me started on having a gaggle of kids. To each his or her own.

So success is a deeply personal and individual thing. The only universal commonality is that it never ever lasts.
 
It has been an incredibly humbling experience for me. It is really interesting to see all the people I've known since freshman year go through this process and how different it is going for everybody. There are people I know whose acceptance seemed like a foregone conclusion a couple of months ago. Now? They are still waiting to hear back from anyone.

Another comment I have on this process is this--the system obviously greatly favors those who are able to excel academically, but those people are not necessarily material for good doctors. In some cases, I think that their actions indicate that they would be terrible doctors. But with the amount of competition that there is, there must be a way to cut out a lot of people, and I really don't see an alternative.

I believe that I have put myself in a position where I will get into medical school...eventually. I believe that if I don't get in this time, it will not be because my application is bad per se, but because it is not good enough. In the meantime, it is a waste of precious intellectual and emotional resources to lament the success of others when it really doesn't affect anyone but them.

I always try to remember what my father used to say..."Keep the faith, and trust in the unknown end."
 
Why wouldn't you be happy for a friend?
 
Sometimes it's hard to stay upbeat when you see all your friends doing well and you're having a hard time. But I like to keep this quote in mind: "blowing out someone else's candle won't make yours shine any brighter."
 
operaman said:
As a bit of an old fart, I can say with complete certainty that success, maybe more than anything else, is fleeting. Whether or not they share it on social media, everyone has crap happen sooner or later. Be happy for your friends while they are having success because I promise it won't last forever. Neither will yours or mine. Like many things in life it ebbs and flows.

I would also consider that definitions of success are a very personal thing. When I see a friend who's successfully climbed the finance ladder and has a mortgage and 3 kids, I thank my lucky stars it isn't me because that is not at all what I want personally. Im happy for him as that seems to be what he wants, but spending my days in that kind of job sounds like utter misery and don't even get me started on having a gaggle of kids. To each his or her own.

So success is a deeply personal and individual thing. The only universal commonality is that it never ever lasts.
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I agree and disagree with your premise. You're saying you should celebrate because they will eventually fail, which kind of sucks. I say celebrate because why not, let's ****ing celebrate. When things go bad, we can mourn together.
 
i am happy for them? how else would you respond?
 
kevin-hart-feat-.jpg
 
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