Who Am I?

There has been a lot of talk about finding one’s identity lately. This is mostly due in part to Taylor Swift’s newest single “Look What You Made Me Do” or LWYMMD for short. While I think finding one’s identity is important, I do have some concerns with this song. However, I do not wish to make this post a roast on Taylor Swift.

Rather I would like to point out the underlying issue which brought this uncharacteristic song to the top of the charts.

We are all too ready to let others dictate our lives.

As soon as society decides that something in our personality is wrong, or if we hear that some crucial part of our lives is considered unimportant, we try to remove this aspect from our lives. We’ll change so that people will stop identifying us with something they’ve deemed as unworthy or unlovable.

We fear that the critics will identify us with that one thing

Even worse, we let that one piece become our entire identity. 

Taylor actively decided to highlight that she was a snake in her song. Women who are “slut-shamed” often start to just give themselves over to the next guy who looks her way. Academic failures will drop out of school because they do not believe that it is for them.

Whether we run from what we are hated for or embrace it more than we ought to, we all want to erase the hate.

After all, nothing is worse than being hated right?

No.

The worst thing we can do is lose ourselves for the sake of the hateful words around us. Sure, we can improve our lives for the sakes of those who are affected by us, but we cannot change who we are just so that a few harsh words don’t come our way.

Those words will always be there, regardless of how much we change. Someone else will receive the same words as us, and they cannot avoid it.

What are we to do?

I belive that there are two things we have to do in the face of the hate.

First, we have to embrace the reality of who we are.

Society may say things about snakes, mentally challenged, mentally ill, physically ill, millenials, baby boomers, Christians, Muslims, Jews, Atheists, Scientists, Musicians, Athletes…the list could go on forever. Whatever it is that people nit-pick about you, don’t let it change the reality of what it means to be a person who partakes in that activity, belief system, or way of life.

Unless they are part of that community, they may never fully understand the truth.

Take my lab for example.

We are described as a lab that does “esoteric bullshit,” which loosely means that we study small details of life that no one understands or believes is real. It seems like all we do is make up stuff and somehow make it sound relevant to the world.

“It’s not real,” they say

“It’s too good to be true,” reviewers say.

After enough rejected grants and manuscripts and proposals, I can honestly say that it would be easier if I just stopped and accepted that maybe everything they say about my work is true.  It would be nice to stop trying so hard to change the field of cell biology. My life and future career would be so much smoother if I could half-ass my experiments and just graduate.

However, my advisor does not allow for bullshit.

If we want people to accept our model, if we want to be successful, then we have to give it our best. In fact, the quality of my images, my blots, my sequencing, anything really is not considered worthwhile until everything is done perfectly and tell a story without a shadow of a doubt. We have to be the most straightforward and honest cell biologists in the field.

Unless we do what we do to our best ability, no one is going to believe us.

So too should we live our lives.

People will never fully understand what it is like to be someone else. As much as we would like to admit that we empathy for our neighbors, we often choose to take bits and pieces of the truth. We see the missing links, the imperfections, and the problems associated with someone else’s life. It’s not your fault that people don’t believe you. They just don’t know the truth about you.

So show them the truth.

Don’t half ass your life or try to be someone else to make them believe you.

Never give up.

Last Friday, I watched the movie Rudy (for the millionth time) on the ND football field. For those of my Dear Readers who do not know the story, Rudy is about a young man who was far too small to play football and not academically inclined fought his way through life and ultimately ended up playing two plays for Notre Dame.

The world said no, and yet Rudy continued to fight.

Rudy let himself be beat to a pulp practice after practice, and he never let someone tell him no.

Rudy embodies the second aspect of facing the haters.

The second thing we need to do in the face of adversity is believe. It is one thing to do our best, to be as true to who we are and do what we ought to, but it is a different thing entirely to believe in who we are. Belief forces us to face the unseen every day, and it calls us to be accept that we do not know everything.

To believe in oneself, in one’s mission, in something greater than us changes how we present ourselves.

If we choose to believe in that piece of ourselves that the world is so willing to discount, then we are untouchable. The words thrown at us cannot win if we believe in who we are, in what we do, in anything. Not because we aren’t affected, but because our outlook is past the haters.

When we believe, we act differently.

And people see those actions.

Rudy could not have dressed or even practice with the team had Coach Parseghian not seen the heart behind his practice. He could not have looked in to the eyes of that young man and give him a chance that no one thought should go to him. Coach Parseghian was a wonderful man, and his soul is certainly with his three grandchildren in Heaven, but he was no miracle worker.

He saw Rudy’s belief because of his actions.

Now, no one will see our hearts if we do not believe in ourselves first and in our own way.

My advisor forces his students to reiterate their results over and over again. At first, I thought this was because he forgot my results. I thought that he didn’t think I was important enough to go over data with. Eventually it got to the point that I stated my results in short, somewhat angry sentences. 

I could not be more clear.

Everything I did in lab was important. If not to my advisor, then to me and my 12 undergrads. I planned and executed extra experiments following my own ideas. All I wanted was to prove my hypothesis to myself, and I worked as hard as I could for as long as I could.

I believed in my project.

And my advisor heard me.

I’m still starstruck from the day when my advisor told me that I had progressed more than he expected, and that he was impressed with what I had done and what I planned to do.

The same thing happened with my own undergraduate mentee. I could sense her frustration as I forced her to share her data over and over again. It wasn’t that I didn’t understand what we were looking at. I wanted her to tell me what mattered. I wanted to see the fire in her eyes, the kind that I only saw in my advisor’s and a few other PI’s who worked on questions no one believed in.

It broke my mentee, just a little bit.

But man…when she finally got it, when she finally saw the value behind her own work, she shined.

She shined so much that she won an award for her talk, even though Notre Dame students were supposed to receive an award at that meeting. 

The director of undergraduate studies finally believed in our model because my mentee was able to clearly explain and define and demonstrate the truth behind what we studied. The light in her eyes and in the gestures she made, she brought us down the path of disbelief and showed just how real our novel mechanism was. It had taken years, but at long last, this professor actually understood what we studied.

My mentee was rewarded for her heart and her passion, which is far greater than the exceptional experiments that she performed.

And I could not be more proud of that acheivement.

People won’t believe that there is good in many of the things you do. People won’t believe in the truth if we ourselves do not believe. People will hate you and scorn you and abandon you. However, when they see your heart, they will turn around. They will see the truth for what it is.

Beauty.

The most beautiful souls that walk this Earth are those that are willing to risk it all for the sake of the truth. The truth of what their lives really mean. No one can change you, but you can choose to be changed by society.

Don’t let anyone tell you who you are.

Don’t do something because someone spoke down on you.

You are worth far more than any aspect of your life, of your career, of anything really.

You just have to believe.

The Truth About Faith and Science

Being a Catholic and a Cell Biologist is unfortunately one of the loneliest experiences.

In this modern day and age, people chalk faith up to being a collection of superstitions, not meant for those with any real intelligence. Many will say that perhaps there is a God, but He isn’t working in our day to day lives. He does not listen to us, and to follow a seemingly antiquated religion makes someone less credible.

My faith became a joke to many of my peers

And many would argue that I credit all of my work to a prayer or two.

This could not be further from the truth.

Having faith does not hinder my ability to be a scientist, rather my faith enhances my science. If “nothing will be impossible with God” (Luke 1:37), then any hypothesis I make can be tested. Moreover, the seemingly impossible experiments within the cell are less daunting. If God created this universe, and if He gave me a mind and the talents to observe that universe, then perhaps any technique can advance enough to see what I so desire.

But even then, my hypothesis can be wrong

My null hypothesis can be wrong.

Having faith allows me to recognize that life is far more complex and unexpected than my mind can conceive on its own. What I may deem to be the mechanism governing a biological function may look completely rational in my mind, but to the eyes of God it could be all too complicated and backwards.

People said DNA was not important and that proteins were the code of life.

They were wrong.

DNA, while complex, and becoming more intense with each publication, is the “language of God,” as coined by Francis Collins, the head of the Human Genome Project. I’m not saying that DNA itself is a reason to believe in an omnicient, omnipresent, omnipotent God, but DNA is just one example of the unexpected making more sense than the original hypothesis.

Each failure gives me the opportunity to say, “Ok God, show me what you have in store for us.”

Sometimes God does not provide an answer within the parameters of our original question, and we have to take a new research avenue. It is better than the one we originally were working on, and we find our place in the scientific community. No, I am not saying that God controls our thoughts and decision making and career paths, but He created the world, a world meant to be discovered. By the light of faith, I walk down the path, asking questions and moving wherever God’s creation may take me.

I’m not afraid to fail because that just means I am about to make a new turn.

I’m not afraid of being ridiculed because that means I am about to uncover something greater.

But I need to be clear about something.

Faith does not make science work.

To believe in God does not mean that I have to believe that God is making my molecular reactions happen. To believe in God does not mean that the images in the microscope are a direct result of God’s hand guiding mine through the plane. At the end of the day, it is our own hands working at the bench, our own minds generating hypotheses, our own hearts pouring out in to our work, our own blood, sweat, and tears covering our lab notebooks.

However, with faith, I know that I am not alone in the lab.

My faith reminds me that I am loved for who I am, and that I was specifically designed to discover the inner workings of the world. Each day, however difficult, is a gift made just for me and no one else.

Turning my work over to God is not me expecting Him to change the results, but rather it is me thanking Him for letting us scientists explore His wonderful creation in our own way. I can never do what some of my colleagues do, and they cannot do what I do. We are all unique minds working towards a greater understanding.

I have a purpose in the lab.

My faith gives me purpose.

And with purpose, I find peace and love in my heart. My hands are more stable as I move through a protocol. Nothing will change other than the steadiness of my hands and the gentle touch I bring to the experiment. With confidence enstilled from the love of God, I find myself working more effectively and creatively than when I chose to leave God out of the equation.

I have been praying over this concept, and perhaps my phrasing in a previous post made it look like I would give credit to God for labwork being successful. While it was nuanced in a vague story, I will make it more clear.

Scientific discoveries are not miracles, but rather the ability to work towards a discovery is a miracle.

Miracles are unexpected acts of mercy coming to otherwise emtpy places. Jesus performed miracles by forgiving others and saying that their faith had saved them. He does not just do a big act and call it a day; He brings love to an otherwise love-less situation. The physical acts seen in the Gospel were for the people to see and believe.

“Blessed are they who have not seen but believe,” ~John 20:29

My prayers, while seemingly unneccessary to my colleagues and many others, are the reason why I can in fact do the work that I do.

I work in a field that lacks techniques to discover our questions. I work with a mind that does not like to sit in one place for more than forty five minutes at a time. I work 458 miles away from home, and while many can get over homesickness, every passing day is difficult without their hugs and smiles. I work amongst many who say that my faith is foolish. I work where people do not like me because I skip and smile and laugh and dance.

So I walk in to the basement and sit behind the microscope

I make the Sign of the Cross

I pray that God helps me to use my talents without fear. I pray that I can be loving to those I encounter. I pray that I am open to failure and new avenues for research. I pray for my family and tell God that I love them.

My hands steady

My smile is brighter

My family is not as far away.

My results are beautiful. They are unexpected, and I never know what I am looking at, but I know that there is something glorious within my work.

People have to come to their own conclusion about where their faith lies. They can speak against those who choose to believe in a loving God who sent His Son to die for us, or they can passively ignore the prayers said by those who choose to believe in God. I cannot change anyone’s mind, nor do I want to.

I cannot do this work, this beautiful and necessary work, on my own, and my God gives me the strength and ability to dream so that I can find the difficult answers.

And all I can do is pray that He is with every other scientist I meet so that they too may have the strength and courage to pursue the questions no one else can do.

Miracle in the Basement

To some degree, all of us want to be noticed.

Whether it is in the workplace, the dating scene, the dinner table, the world at large, we all want to be acknowledged. If our presence isn’t felt, we at the very least want our absence to be noticed. After all, if no one notices our coming and our going, then how could we say that we mattered?

If anything, we want to be able to contribute something.

We want our worth to be made manifest in a way that could touch someone’s life.

I could go on and on about how each of us contributes to others in our own unique way. While that is true, there is something deeper that needs to be recognized. It is a mindset which held me for the better portion of my life, and I have been unable to comprehend its meaning until recently.

We don’t just want to contribute

We want to feel the contribution, to share in the experience, and to be acknowledged for it.

It doesn’t matter what the good deed is, we want people to know that we did something good. Instead of letting the work speak for itself, we find ways for people to find out who volunteered, who went on the mission trip, who gave to charity, who closed the deal, who helped someone through a tough time, who was the “important” person that changed the world for the better.

We give to those who can thank us.

I think that’s why we only serve people in our own physical spectrum. Instead of caring for everyone, we choose to go on mission trips to fill up social media with, and we reach out to those who are closest to us. 

It’s easy to serve those who are willing to accept our physical gifts.

But what about those intangible gifts?

What about Love?

Society has shifted to believe that service is almost entirely physical. Not to discredit those who feed the hungry and clothe the poor, but isn’t it so much easier to give something physical? We extracted love from our service efforts and replaced it with money and notoriety. 

Now certainly we still give love to others.

Sadly many of us, myself included, tend to keep love in a little box, only to be given to those who will be able to return it.

We care for our friends, smile at our acquaintances, and we put forth our best effort for those who already love us. Even though there are lonely souls in nursing homes and hurting souls in the halls we walk each day, we choose to keep to ourselves, guarding our hearts from anyone who may not be able to give our love back.

We would rather look at our phone than dare to have a conversation with an unfamiliar sad face.

Thing is…

Our love is not for us to give.

Love comes from God because God is Love. He gives us His very heart and asks us to share in His everlasting love for each and every one of us. It is impartial, and it unconditional. Christ gave His life for us, knowing that we would reject Him daily. There were no expected returns on the Cross, and yet we choose to attach expectations to every interaction we share.

I certainly did.

That is, until God called me out of myself.

He called me to love someone who would never be able to see my love, nor could he give me any return for my service.

There was a boy in my department who was failing in the lab. He was struggling to get any results, even after an entire academic year of work. Everyone in my cohort knew about it. Science fails all the time, and while none of us experienced such heartache, we felt his pain. Unfortunately, we could not do anything for him.

Or so I thought.

One Sunday at Mass, Father Dan spoke about how God’s kingdom is a community. We as Christians are meant to reach out to others, to notice others. He said that we could do physical things, but the best thing we could do for those in our community was to pray for them.

After all, the only everlasting thing we can give is God’s love.

As the words sank in the next day, God put the struggling boy on my heart. Unfortunately, there were  unfortunate social circumstances which surrounded this individual, myself, and those who were associated with us lead to an impenetrable silence. This silence made collaboration difficult, and it made my departmental service position difficult.

I told God no, I would not let my heart go out to someone who would never return my graces


With anger filling my heart, I hastily made the Sign of the Cross and selfishly shut my Lord down. No. Someone else could pray for him. Someone who actually knew him could be there. It's not my job.

I didn't even know him anymore.

Three days went by, and I could not get the thought out of my mind. It tore me up inside to turn away from God’s call, to ignore the message of the Mass, and I was ashamed. I knew that I could pray for anyone, but why should I pray for someone if I had no reason to associate myself with them at all? 

My heart broke as I saw the boy walking down the hallway.



My parents had raised me to see Christ in everyone, and here I was, actively avoiding His call. A prayer is not difficult. Prayers are part of our hearts, yes, but to lift up our crosses for others is a simple task.

Maybe I could lift up my crosses for this boy's cross.

I walked up to the door of this individual’s lab, made the Sign of the Cross, and rested my hand on the door:

“Lord, I don’t know what I am doing here, praying for someone I do not know anymore, but I am here. I want to give You all of the hurt and anger. Turn that in to joy and peace. Take that peace and rest it on the hands of the one whom You entrusted to me today. I don't care if I never see the fruits of this labor. I just want You to take the suffering and turn it in to joy.”

I felt an exceptional amount of peace from that prayer.

God’s love is not meant to be packed up in a box, hidden from the world. We are not supposed to ration out His love to our own needs. So when we choose to listen to Him and pray for others, we let God’s love out. The pressure on the walls of our souls is relieved by opening the gates.

A prayer for a hurting soul is safe. It is a pure and safe way to share God’s love with the world.

And it does make a huge difference, whether we share in the result or not.

Two days after I made my prayer on the door, a member of the boy’s lab came up to me and told me something that I would not have expected.

The experiment worked. 

Somehow the instability of the experiment didn't stop it from coming through. Somehow there was a new light in the basement, taking the difficult parts of life and turning them in to something greater. The man who gave me the good news didn't know what happened, but I did.

God was able to gently guide that boy’s hands and grant him peace in an anxious time. 

Prayer may look like it is just another drop in the ocean, but each prayer made in love changes the world. It may not be a big change, but there is a change. A new current filled with love serves the entire ocean.

And it doesn’t matter if the original raindrop receives the credit

I will never be able to share in this experience with the individual I prayed for. He'll probably never hear this story, and if he does, I don't know if he'll understand what happened that night. The thing is, it doesn't matter if I ever receive a "thank you" and I do not wish to receive any recognition.

What matters to me is that there was forgiveness and mercy in the basement where there was darkness before.

What mattered was that love was present in an unexpected place.

.

Perhaps you know someone that you cannot serve. Perhaps you know that there are people that you should not physically interact with. Perhaps you know of someone who is in need but you are unable to give anything to them.

Perhaps you know someone who needs God’s love, but will never be able to thank you for sharing it with them.

Pray for them.

God’s love is all we can give.

And when we share it…we receive far more than anything this earth can share.