Happy Sunday friends, and cheers to the first Sunday Morning Rounds of 2025! 🥂
This edition of Sunday Morning Rounds features:
✅ Advice for fourth-year med students creating their residency rank list
✅ Videos to help EM residents prepare for a big upcoming exam
✅ Brand new book notes
...and more! Be sure to read the whole newsletter to make sure you don't miss anything👀
At the end of 2024, I was feeling a little overwhelmed😐. As I reflected on the year, I started thinking about all the things I had to get done, big decisions I would have to make soon, random junk that was accumulating in my closet...it all started weighing on me at once🪨.
In order to get out of this glum headspace, I decided to come up with a theme for 2025:
Addition by subtraction➕.
I'm a big fan of competitive cooking shows🧑🍳, which is where I first heard this saying. Addition by subtraction means improving something by removing unnecessary components or distractions🧑🏻🔧. On those cooking shows contestants would sometimes add too many ingredients to their dish, and the final product ended up being more mess than mastery🤢. That's where addition by subtraction came in: Remove excess ingredients, simplify processes, and finish with a higher quality end product.
I began to think about how addition by subtraction could apply to various aspects of my life. I read this book on Japanese minimalism🗾 and distilled down my takeaways which you can read right here📖.
I started to find tasks I could quickly offload✔️, old emails I could delete📧, even clothes I no longer wore that I could be donate👖.
In a world where it's easy to end up with excess, this has been a breath of fresh air😌.
So here's my challenge to you: Can you find ways to implement addition by subtraction into your own life?🤨
If you're a medical student, that could mean simplifying your study resources and focusing on only the most helpful ones (like my USMLE high yield images😜). If you're a resident, it could be saying no to opportunities that don't align with your interests or career goals.
No matter the situation, there are always opportunities to employ addition by subtraction and find ways to improve the process. I've been able to find some, and I hope you will too!🕺🏻
📃 Residency Rank List Tips: Click here to watch my video on helpful tips for creating your residency rank list
🚑 EM High Yield Facts: If you're an EM resident, the annual In-Training Exam (ITE) is about 1 month away! Be sure to watch my Emergency Medicine High Yield Facts videos to help prepare.
📚 My Favorite Books: Discover some of my other favorite books on productivity and self-improvement right here.
🛍️ Med Student & Resident Essentials: Check out my Amazon Shop for a collection of some of my favorite products for medical students and residents!
📱 Social Media: Find me at @MedSchoolMoose on TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram to enjoy more of my content!