Medicine’s ground state is uncertainty. And wisdom — for both patients and doctors — is defined by how one copes with it. - Atul Gawande

Modernization did not demote the elderly. It demoted the family. It gave people — the young and the old — a way of life with more liberty and control, including the liberty to be less beholden to other generations. The veneration of elders may be gone, but not because it has been replaced by veneration of youth. It’s been replaced by veneration of the independent self. * * *

We are used to thinking of doctoring as a solitary, intellectual task. But making medicine go right is less often like making a difficult diagnosis than like making sure everyone washes their hands.

As people become aware of the finitude of their life, they do not ask for much. They do not seek more riches. They do not seek more power. They ask only to be permitted, insofar as possible, to keep shaping the story of their life in the world — to make choices and sustain connections to others according to their own priorities.