"Deferred Life" Syndrome

We often catch ourselves thinking: what if we had our current knowledge and experience 10-15 years ago? We would have been wiser, more farsighted, and made different choices. But I’m not talking about buying Bitcoin for pennies and becoming a millionaire today. Let’s leave that idea for Instagram memes. I’m talking about the moments in life we took for granted, didn’t value, missed, or rushed through without pausing to enjoy. The saddest part of all this is that we forgot to feel joy.

These thoughts haunted me for a long time. But one day, I had an epiphany that changed my perspective on everything. It’s this realization that I want to share.

Disclaimer: Everything described below is based on my personal experience. Times change, as do the circumstances we find ourselves in. This post is written solely with the intent of being helpful to readers.

Temporary Struggles

When I first started residency, the biggest challenge for me was waking up early every morning. For many, this might seem trivial, but for me, it was a real struggle. Back in medical school, I came up with my own "system": I would go to bed immediately after classes at 5 PM, wake up at midnight, and study through the night. By 7 AM, I would slowly get ready for the day, attend classes, and then repeat the cycle. This routine kept me afloat during my last four years in medical school.

After passing the USMLE and moving to Tashkent, a new chapter began. It brought with it a different challenge: I started teaching. This was completely new to me, and I had no idea how to approach it. Every evening, I sat at my computer preparing slides, while my wife made dumplings that she carefully rationed for the week, keeping track of every single one. We tried to stay optimistic, believing that these hardships were temporary and that a brighter future awaited us.

After dinner, I would return to work, preparing materials for the next day’s class. Often, I didn’t go to bed until dawn, only to wake up closer to noon and barely make it to my lessons. If you’ve watched my lectures, you’ve probably noticed my disheveled hair in the videos - a clear sign that I didn’t have time to tidy up while rushing to class.

We were slowly adjusting to life in Tashkent and settling in, but throughout that time, I held onto one thought: "Once I get into residency, life will change. For now, I just have to endure."

Residency

When it finally happened, I got my long-awaited Match, and my family and I moved to Texas. It felt like the turning point I had been waiting for. But reality turned out to be far from what I had imagined. The new life came with its own challenges - early mornings, long days in the clinic, and constant immersion in new knowledge I hadn’t even considered before. Standards, protocols, guidelines, courses - it all felt like an endless waterfall of information.

One morning, as I struggled to wake up again, a thought crossed my mind: "I dreamed about this. Is this really what I wanted?" That night, I decided to reflect on my life from the very beginning, as if replaying an old film on a cassette.

Childhood

That same night, lying in bed, I started rewinding my life and asking myself if this was truly what I had wanted. I decided to start from the very beginning - back when I was still in kindergarten. At the time, I found it incredibly boring and, by my final year, I remember desperately wanting to go to school. I was tired of being little - it was time to grow up.

School began, and I quickly became one of my teacher's least favorite students. She would scold me almost daily, reminding me that I didn’t have the proper uniform or watercolor paints like the other kids, and that drawing with pencils in her class was forbidden. For some reason, the school’s principal decided that first-graders' uniforms should be made of denim - both top and bottom - while the standard black-and-white uniforms were banned. My parents couldn’t afford such an expensive uniform or those cursed watercolor paints.

I still remember those moments vividly - how my teacher would use me as an example of a "bad" student, even though I performed better academically than most of my peers. But it didn’t shield me from her mockery. Over the years, my relationship with her improved significantly, and we even became closer. But as the saying goes, I forgave, but I didn’t forget.

What’s most interesting is how I perceived all of this as something temporary, something I just needed to endure. I didn’t particularly enjoy school and kept waiting for it to end, for the day I could finally leave it all behind and go to college. It was time to grow up, ditch the backpack, and start carrying a briefcase - just like the adults.

College and Medical School

At first glance, college seemed exciting. New faces, students from different schools, and new connections - it was all inspiring. I enjoyed making friends, getting to know people, and sharing stories. But that sense of novelty quickly faded. Within just a couple of months, I realized that, essentially, nothing had changed. The same four walls, the same rules - only the scenery was different. The building and location were new, but life itself remained the same. Disappointment began to set in, and once again, I found myself waiting for the next stage, the next step. The main goal was to endure.

Then came medical school - and it was a true test of endurance. The rules became even stricter, and the attitude toward students was cold and demeaning. We weren’t seen as individuals or future professionals, but as “biological waste.” It felt like the faculty genuinely believed we had chosen the wrong career and were now wasting their precious time.

I don’t want to go into the painful details of this experience called “medical school” because many of you reading this have likely gone through something similar. Being helpless in the face of injustice, crushed by a system that calls itself education, leaves a deep scar.

My heart was broken. I felt like a nobody, but I held onto one goal: just finish school and move on. Every day, I told myself: "Just a little more, hang in there. The most important thing is to survive this." Because ahead, I hoped, lay the real life I had been waiting for.

"The Real Life"

If we return to the beginning of this story, I think you already understand where I’m going with this. We all make plans, dream, and imagine how one day everything will change. We convince ourselves that somewhere ahead, at a certain stage in life, true happiness awaits us. Today, however, feels like just preparation for tomorrow - merely a temporary trial to endure so we can eventually reach that point where we shrug off all our burdens, look in the mirror, and sincerely say, “I’m happy now.”

But as Steve Jobs once said, “My favorite things in life don’t cost any money. It’s very clear that the most precious resource we all have is time.”

Time. The one resource that cannot be reclaimed or purchased.

Lying in bed and reflecting on my life, I suddenly realized: I hadn’t truly been living for most of it; I had just been trying to survive. Day after day, I treated each moment as preparation for the next, constantly deferring bits of joy and satisfaction, expecting that real life would begin just a little later - once I achieved something extraordinary.

Now, looking back, we often realize how beautiful our childhood was, our school years, the moments we spent with family and friends. At the time, it all seemed so simple and ordinary. But the most striking realization is this: why did we think it would last forever? Why did we believe that the best was always ahead, and thus, we didn’t need to savor the happiness available to us here and now?

This realization changes everything. Life cannot be postponed. It’s not a loan you can take out today and repay later, when things get better. The price is always paid in the moment, whether we like it or not.

My Modest Conclusions

I’ve come to understand this: we need to live each day by finding joy in what we already have - and even in what we don’t have. The greatest wealth we possess is time. Realizing that it’s not infinite, that one day it will simply run out, makes every moment priceless. This realization serves as a reminder that every single day holds something worth living for mindfully.

Now, even tasks that used to feel unpleasant or irritating, I approach with more enthusiasm. I know that one day I’ll look back and think, “It wasn’t all that bad. Those were good times.”

I’ve started noticing moments I used to overlook. Sometimes, on my way to work, I stop just to close my eyes and feel the wind on my face. I try to imprint that moment in my memory, to experience it fully, because it’s unique and will never happen again.

I now truly understand Jobs’s words: “Time cannot be bought.” If it could, both he and the wealthiest people on Earth would live forever. But the truth is, no one is eternal. Only the realization that our lifespan is finite gives us the strength to live consciously.

I often tell my students: if you’ve started preparing for the USMLE and can dedicate even a couple of hours a day to studying - that’s a blessing. If you can brew a cup of coffee, sit at your desk, and study in peace, know this: you’re living the best time of your life.

Don’t postpone life. Happiness isn’t somewhere in the future - it’s here and now. You won’t get a second chance to live this life or relive its best moments. The only way to truly be happy is to cherish every day, every moment, every breath. Life doesn’t wait for us to wake up. It’s happening right now.

No one has ever been granted a second chance to live their life or relive its best moments twice.

Farkhod

If you enjoyed this story, let me know - I’ll write more.

Thank you!

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