“Be extraordinary”

I watch Grey’s Anatomy. Well, at least the show. I can’t watch a book, obviously. The phrase ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ is taken from a book written by one Doctor Gray, who described, in greater detail than those before him, the human body. So Gray’s Anatomy was a surgical textbook for many years (I am talking about the book, if you haven’t realized already).

Going back to what I watch, I have followed the show since the middle of season two. I would have followed it from the start of season two, except for the fact that it had a time slot which so happened to coincide with my dinner after I returned home from my grandma’s place every week, so I missed the first half of season two. But I have watched most of the episodes since then.

If you watch Grey’s Anatomy because of the guy’s or the girl’s physique, well, that’s your way of looking at the show. I personally enjoy the way the show uses the events in the days of the characters, and uses them to put forward a theme. Of course, I stay for the conflicts and the relationships which develop between the characters, but that’s mostly secondary.

Now time to get down to business.

The title character, Meredith Grey, is the daughter of a well-known surgeon, Dr. Ellis Grey, who was more devoted to her work than her family. She started cheating on her husband with another married doctor while she was at work, but the other doctor, eventually, told her that he had to go back to his wife.

Depressed, Ellis Grey attempted suicide. After she had slit her wrists, she told her daughter, Meredith Grey, to “Be extraordinary”. Meredith waited until her mother had passed out before she called the emergency services. To cut a long story short, her mother survived the ordeal, and died much later on in life, but ever since then, Meredith had always tried to live up to her mother’s request.

So Meredith became extraordinary in the only way she knew how; after living with a workaholic mother who was a surgeon for many years, she too became a surgeon, and did her best to be the best.

However, she always flirted with danger. While most people would run away from a person with a bomb, she went towards him/her. I don’t know what exactly transpired, as that was at the beginning of season 2…sigh….

Then, when she was pushed into the cold, frigid waters of a river in winter, instead of getting herself out when she surfaced, she allowed herself to sink back into the water.

So she ended up going for counseling towards the end of season 4, partly because of her suicidal behavior, partly because of her mother’s death. Through a long, dramatic, theatrical process (which makes for better drama than for reality), she had to finally come to terms with what happened when her mother attempted suicide and the effects it had on her.

The person counseling her was, of course, a psychiatrist. So she pointed out that Meredith had all the tools she needed to figure out her mother’s state of mind when her mother attempted to commit suicide. Both were surgeons, who were extremely devoted to their work, and had problems with holding a relationship.

So after some soul searching, she finally discovered a few facts; if her mother had wanted to die, she would have slashed the carotid artery rather than her wrists. So her mother didn’t really want to die; she only wanted to get her lover’s attention by attempting suicide. The psychiatrist then told her that she could learn from her mother’s mistakes.

Meredith then realized then when her mother told her to be ‘extraordinary’, it was not with respect to work, but rather, with respect to relationships. Her mother had failed in every way possible; she had a husband who left her and a lover who wanted to go back to his own wife. She wanted Meredith to be extraordinary with people and family, not just work.

When we hear something from people, we put it into context. This normally allows us to bring out the complete, whole and true meaning of what a person is saying. However, when the context we choose to put a person’s words in is wrong, we lose the meaning altogether.

Children look up to their parents for direction, wisdom and security. Thus, it is only natural for us to do what our parents do, or to see the wisdom of this world from our parents view. However, as we grow up, we see more of the world than we originally saw, and we might neglect to see the wisdom of this world in the light of the new perspective we obtain.

Meredith Grey put her mother’s words in the only context she knew: as a surgeon. Then, following in her mother’s footsteps, she became a surgeon and tried to be extraordinary, although she was missing out the entire point of her mother’s words.

When she finally realized what the words meant, she found the freedom to be free from her bad memories.

I believe it is the same for us too. When we are told something, wrap our minds around it, then go about life stumbling around because we have a mental block as to what it could mean, we find that something is missing. But when we find out what it actually means, then we find more meaning to it, and life in general, and liberated from what used to be a stumbling block for us to grow further.