President Bush presents The Lincoln Medal to Dr. Benjamin Carson
Benjamin Solomon Carson was born in 1951 in Detroit, Michigan. When he was 8, his father left the family and his parents were divorced. Carson, his older brother Curtis, and his mother Sonya moved to Boston to live with relatives for a year, before returning to Detroit's inner city, where Carson would spend most of his boyhood. Thrust into a world of poverty after her divorce, Sonya Carson, with only a third-grade education, worked as a domestic to provide for her boys. She turned for comfort and strength to the teachings of the Seventh Day Adventist church. It was there, while listening to a sermon, that Carson decided to pursue medicine, initially as a missionary, and discovered the safe haven and strength God and scriptures afforded.
Dr. Carso And His Mother
Drawing upon her faith in God, and the power of positive thinking and the intellect to solve problems, Sonya Carson set about laying the academic and moral groundwork that would transform Carson's life and help make his dreams for success a reality. When the family returned to Detroit in 1960, Carson found himself at the bottom of his class in the predominately white Higgens Elementary school. Years later the then famous surgeon Ben Carson, M.D., would describe himself as the fifth-grade "class dummy," a child who, taunted by classmates and ignored by teachers, was soon convinced of his own stupidity and that being black meant the world was stacked against him. Two events his fifth grade year changed his perception of the world and his ability.
A pair of prescription glasses enabled Carson for the first time to see the writing on the chalkboard and have a clear view of his lessons. Determined that he see and develop his intellectual potential, as well, his mother turned off the TV at home and required each of her sons to read at least two books a week and write a report on each for her to read. Years later, Carson would learn that his mother, with only a third-grade education, had been unable to read the reports. Her unrelenting insistence, and Carson's work in this regard, paid off with big rewards. By reading books, Carson began to acquire the knowledge that would send him to the head of his class, earn the respect of his classmates and teacher, and convince him of his self-worth and potential.
As he began to apply himself in school, and experience the heady triumph of knowledge, Carson was forced to control a temper that threatened his accomplishments and his future. In his books, and to rapt audiences, he tells the tale of his attempt to stab a classmate who tried to change a radio station in a dispute. His knife blade hit the boy's belt buckle, instead of his flesh. Shocked by the ease with which he'd justified and unleashed such anger - nearly taking another's life, and effectively ending his own - Carson locked himself for hours in the bathroom at home, reading the Bible, seeking the wisdom and self-restraint he would need to build a future. When he finally left the bathroom, he left behind his willingness ever to let another person control him, by responding in anger, realizing how self-destructive an emotion it was. Freed from the bondage of anger, empowered by the knowledge that education could open doors, and with a record of academic achievement at Southwestern High School, Carson won a scholarship to Yale.
The Road to Discovery - The Yale Years: Throughout his childhood, Ben Carson's mother would tell him that God would help him if he helped himself by giving his best. Carson earned high marks in high school, and entered Yale in 1969 on an academic scholarship. At Yale, Carson found he was no longer at the top in his class; in fact, he soon found himself floundering in an Ivy League institution that required strong study skills and good oral comprehension in a lecture setting. Used to delaying school work until the day before a test, without learning subjects in depth, Carson found himself unable to keep pace with his classmates and work load, which required more than sporadic bursts of attention to master.
As he tells the story, he was cramming late one night for the next day's chemistry exam. His future at Yale would be determined by the outcome. He needed a high score to remain at the Ivy League university. Exhausted and overwhelmed, he asked God for help. Soon thereafter, he closed the text book, in despair of ever becoming a doctor. That night, Carson dreamed the he was in an auditorium. A professor was working out chemistry problems on the chalk board. Carson woke up and worked on solving those problems. When he opened his chemistry exam booklet that morning, he felt a "chill" in the lecture hall, he would write later. The exam problems were identical to those in his dream. He knew the answers. He passed chemistry and subsequently remained at Yale.
In thanking God, he vowed to do what ever it took to enable him to succeed and create his childhood dream of becoming a doctor. In his first autobiographical book Gifted Hands, Dr. Carson chronicles the self reflection, acquired learning skills, and study strategies that enabled him to turn his academic performance around. He tells of meeting and falling in love with his future wife Candy Rustin, a talented musician pursuing a triple major at Yale.
He was graduated from Yale with a degree in psychology in 1973. That Fall, Candy began her junior year at Yale, and Carson began his first year of medical school at the university he told his Yale classmates, "my Father owns."
My Father's House - The Michigan Years: When Ben Carson told his Yale classmates "my Father owns" the University of Michigan School of Medicine, he was referring to God. But his well-heeled contemporaries, accustomed to high-achieving relatives, needed no further explanation, and Carson never gave it.
It was while operating a crane in a steel company, the summer before entering Michigan medical school, that Carson became convinced of his keen sense of hand and eye coordination. This, and the ability to understand physical relationships and to think in three dimensions, would ultimately lead to his decision to become a surgeon, a specialist who must be able to foresee the consequences of each stroke of his hand.
During his clinical year at Michigan medical school, traditionally the third year of four, he drew upon these abilities to solve three dimensional problems, and to develop a new technique enabling neurosurgeons to pinpoint the hole in the base of the skull. This technique saved precious time in conducting surgery on the brain.
As surprised as his professors and fellow students by his ability in the neurosurgery arena, Carson decided that he had at last found the niche in which he could excel. After graduation from Michigan in 1977, he remained at the school for his residency training in neurosurgery. A change in leadership there in 1980 prompted his decision to apply to another medical institution to continue his neurosurgery training: Johns Hopkins. Again, he faced an obstacle. Johns Hopkins accepted only two students a year for neurosurgery residency, and more than 125 individuals had applied.
Neurosurgery Prevails - Hopkins Years Begin: In his interview with George Udvarhelyi, M.D., then head of the neurosurgery residency program at Johns Hopkins, Ben Carson, M.D., was reminded that no knowledge is wasted. As a boy, he had been introduced to classical music by his older brother Curtis. Enamored by its soulful beauty, he set about learning all he could about its history and composers. He became a connoisseur of classical composition and technique. Years later, he would write that he believes his common affinity with Dr. Udvarhelyi for classical music, which they discussed extensively during their initial conversation, was a factor in his subsequent acceptance into the neurosurgery program at Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions. In years since, he has cited this beneficial exchange as a reminder of the power of an education.
After completing his neurosurgery training at Hopkins, Carson, with his wife Candy, whom he married in 1975, moved to Australia for an additional two years of intensive training in the specialty. In 1984, Carson would return to Hopkins, named the youngest-ever director of pediatric neurosurgery, at the age of 33.
PHILOSOPHY
With groups of all ages, Ben Carson, M.D., shares the philosophies that have enabled him to overcome obstacles in his personal, professional, and spiritual life. The lessons he has learned about himself and the world have enabled him to leave behind a life of poverty in America's inner cities for that of a successful and highly respected surgeon, businessman, and motivational speaker.
In boardrooms, school auditoriums, books, and churches, Dr. Carson tells his audiences that the keys to a life of satisfaction, accomplishment, and peace lie in one's ability to discover his or her potential for excellence; the acquisition of knowledge to develop it; and a willingness to help others. Education, he says, is liberation.
He introduces young people to the wealth of opportunities and lifestyles that exist in intellectual pursuits, far beyond the narrow worlds of sports and entertainment, so mistakenly glorified in today's celebrity culture of TV, movies, and popular music. He calls upon us all to strive for excellence and recognize our God-given abilities.
The Big Picture
In a modern world that idolizes the exploits of entertainment and sports figures, young people are at particular risk of missing life's "big picture" - the rich variety of outlooks, professions, and achievements available to all willing to broaden their horizons and perspectives. Dr. Ben Carson calls upon young people to study themselves, to identify their God-given talents, and then to seek out individuals, mentors, who can help them develop them.
Convinced of his own inability in childhood to excel in school or improve his circumstances, Dr. Carson has a particular affinity with children and adolescents who fear failure and have no vision of success. Attributing his own turn around to a mother who refused to let him surrender to all the excuses for failure, he is a man with a mission to show others the way to self-respect, self-confidence, and personal and professional success.
Students who excel academically, read extensively, says Carson. When he was a boy, his mother made reading a mandatory exercise in her sons' lives. At a young age Carson experienced the power of knowledge, acquired from reading books. With information at his command, he experienced academic success for the first time, to the astonishment of teachers and other students who had expected as little of him as he had expected of himself.
No. Excuses
Whatever one's handicaps or hardships in life, individuals can choose how to respond to difficulties, says Dr. Ben Carson. "We do not have to be victims of circumstances, however grim," he says.
In his books and before audiences, he draws upon his own experience of growing up impoverished and confronted by racism, and the life he brought forth. In his book Think Big, Dr. Carson writes: "Young folks need to know that the way to escape their often dismal situations is contained within themselves. They can't expect other people to do it for them. Perhaps I can't do much, but I can provide one living example of someone who made it and who came from, what we all call, a disadvantaged background."
To those who cite racism as the impediment to their success, Carson replies that obstacles of any kind are to be hurdled, and ignorance confronted where ever it's found. In childhood and in his medical career, he experienced the personal affronts and low expectations of those who judged him by the color of his skin. He refused, however, to allow them to become excuses for inaction, failure, or anger: "I've always remembered my mother telling us, even as children, that when it comes to prejudices, some people are just ignorant, and need to be educated."
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Dr. Ben Carlson
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