I know how you feel. That isolated moment when you doubt your intellectual abilities after getting a grade bellow a B in your Chem midterm and your thoughts run into that one girl who told you once that she has a 4.0 since freshman year. That time when you were determined to study hard for the next Chem Midterm but yet ended up watching BuzzFeed videos all night. You tell yourself, when you are faced with these moments, "I'm not fit for this career path. I'm just lazy and not smart enough."
Let me tell you, that even if you say that to yourself you shouldn't have to give up the pre-med track. Because even if at the end of the day all your pre-requisites and volunteer experiences and MCAT score don't add up to you getting into medical school, there is still something you can get out of it. A lot you can get out if it.
A wise friend of mine said to me recently, "It doesn't matter what title you have. At least you can know more than other people and have that extra knowledge that not everyone has." I thought more about this and agreed that all the struggle you are afraid to even confront is not going to be flushed down the toilet. it will be worth it, and it's simple how.
One scenario could be that you have done all your pre-requisites and given your MCAT but your MCAT score isn't that good. If that happens and you feel so drained that you don't want to sit for the MCAT again, don't throw away all your MCAT books or give them away. Keep them. Revise them whenever you need to. When would you need it? Well, you know random instances when you come across a cool scientific article and need some reference information to really get at it. Or you can help explain to other people the nature of a certain disease or how a certain body part works biochemically.
You can tutor on campus and make some sweet bucks out of it. You can upload your notes online and be that awesome nerd friend everybody wants. The prospects are endless, and you never know when you need this knowledge. The point here is that curiosity never dies. If you throw away your MCAT books or your physics notes and such, at times you may randomly feel the need to check back on them and their absence will make you regret your choices.
This brings me to the big message here. You may be lazy, and not have a sharp memory, but one thing you most probably possess in you is an inexhaustible curiosity. There's a little poster in my room that says, "Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss you will land among the stars." I try to motivate myself that way and look at the positive side for once. Letting that curiosity cease just because of one failure out of the many in life is not such a wise thing to do. So if you are that undeniably dubious pre-med student but at the same time possess that inexhaustible curiosity in you, kudos to you and I hope you never give up on yourself too soon.
