Funny Medical Students - The Brilliant Ones?

I have become a medical student for quite a while, at least for half a year already, considering my past experience of being one in IMU, and currently as a medical student in Monash University. I doubted with such a short period of time getting into medical field, i am not eligible to give comments nor to write about any scientific journals. However, this half year experience as medical student in both university might just have given me an insight of most medical students' thoughts.

I always wonder, what is it to be a medical student? What's the main purpose of me being a medical student? And what's the force that keep pushing me foward to complete this long course? The answer can be very simple. To be a medical student, it requires both true interest and burning enthusiasm towards medicine. And with these two elements, the purpose of being a medical student is given rise - to be a good doctor with ever-lasting thirst for knowledge and the principles of wanted to contribute to the society. So, in order to keep these 2 reasons alive, there should always be constant stimulants, or maybe just the thoughts itself of the reasons.

The answers are indeed very simple. But somehow, most of the medical students (at least from what i have noticed) don't act reasonably to their purpose of wanting to become a doctor, assuming if their reasons of wanting to become doctor are the same as mentioned above. The learning atmosphere in university where everyone suppose to learn and gain the knowledge together as peers and collegues, somehow has changed to a war field where everyone's having cold war with each other, wearing a smiley mask where in fact underlying the mask is nothing but eagerness of defeating each other. The notion of wanting to be smarter, or more precisely afraid of losing become so strong that it acts as the forces that drive them keep moving forward. It has become a competitive race, a game to be won; between survivals and losers, praised or humiliated, superiors and inferiors. They are studying to compete with others, instead of learning skills and knowledge for themselves in the future. From a beautiful starter changes to an ugly dessert, what a shame.

Personally, i believe that being a medical student, we are there to learn and to be trained, rather than being there to study. Study is more of a technical reading and memorizing the book activity, whereas learn and train are more of involving changes, to become and to master certain skills and knowledge, necessary to be a doctor. And supposingly, medical students should be smart enough to realize about the nature of the course. It is not just reading and memorizing piles of thick books, but to be able to apply the knowledge, to think like a mature person and act like a professional doctor are the main factors here. But somehow, most of the medical students now are unable to be like that, perhaps the egoness that existed in them after scoring lots of As and being recognized as the 'brilliant ones' has gone into their head that in order to maintain their 'reputation' , they will study so hard, as to score highest marks in the exam, and to defeat others.

Of course, it's always good when there's positive competition, because it helps in encouraging each other to work harder. But too much of it, it becomes destructive. After all, being a doctor isn't just about reading the books. The difference between a doctor and a normal person is not about how much the doctor knows, but the ability to think, to apply and to act like a professional one, which will make all the difference.