Operations like that lap chole have taught me how easily error can occur, but they’ve also showed me something else: effort does matter; diligence an… - Atul Gawande

Effort does matter; diligence and attention to the minutest details can save you.

Even worse than losing self-confidence, though, is reacting defensively. There are surgeons who will see faults everywhere except in themselves. They have no questions and no fears about their abilities. As a result, they learn nothing from their mistakes and know nothing of their limitations. As one surgeon told me, it is a rare but alarming thing to meet a surgeon without fear. “If you’re not a little afraid when you operate,” he said, “you’re bound to do a patient a grave disservice.

My third answer for becoming a positive deviant: Count something. Regardless of what one ultimately does in medicine — or outside medicine, for that matter — one should be a scientist in the world....If you count something you find interesting, you will learn something interesting.

At least two kinds of courage are required in aging and sickness. The first is the courage to confront the reality of mortality- the courage to seek out the truth of what is to be feared and what is to be hoped. But even more daunting is the second kind of courage - the courage to act on the truth we find.