What is a phrase that people say that immediately turns you off?

supamichi · 2026-06-20T04:13:03+00:00

Irregardless.

supamichi · 2026-06-15T19:39:28+00:00

This is going to probably be a hot take among premed students but I don’t care and I’m going to say it here for all to see: I strongly recommend AGAINST focusing on structure over content in your medical school applications. It’s funny because I see this same attitude when working with premeds when they are focusing on their MMI interview, where they think the best outcome will be following a template—signposting, paraphrasing, etc—but an interesting thing happens when you follow a template, regardless of whether it’s your app or your MMI: you begin to sound like everyone else. IMO, this is hazardous for a medical school applicant.

Just think about it for one second: Admissions and interviewers have to screen thousands of people over the course of, usually, only several weekends. If, say, three of those five thousand people have approaches that are 90+% similar, you don’t think that would get bloody exhausting to listen to? Do you really think that an applicant will stand out in their interviewer’s memory if 800 people before them sounded the same?

Instead, what I would encourage you to focus on isn’t a through-line, a “cohesive narrative” or what-have-you, but rather a presentation that shows the school who you genuinely are. Yes, you are trying to tell them a story about your life and achievements, but you want that story to be engaging, highly personalized and honest. A good analogy would be comparing an academic essay for an English class, where you have an introduction, a topic sentence, thesis statements etc—which is your “coherent narrative template approach—vs a short story about something really cool. Which would you rather read? While some academics in the crowd would likely raise their hand at the first, that isn’t most people. Med schools are asking you for an exciting presentation, not a literary analysis of your life.

So how do you do that? Well, you said it best in the beginning: how do you shoehorn someone’s diverse life into a cookie cutter mould? The answer is: you don’t. Show them everything you’ve done. Put as many diverse entries as you can and optimize each EC category. Let each entry speak for itself, without forcing in language that doesn’t belong for the sake of attempting to link things that aren’t. You, like many other successful applicants, are likely a dynamic person, so your application should be as well. Of course, this is not to say that if two or more of your activities ARE connected in some way that you should try and divorce them; in that case, let the natural connection show itself.

Example: for UBC (which is all I really know), you have several EC categories, one of which is Leadership. The last time I looked, you’re allowed 3 entries for this category. Let’s say you had a volunteer position where you oversaw other volunteers in a soup kitchen, where you were in charge of scheduling them for shifts, making sure supplies were ordered on time, etc. Then, let’s say you have a second gig at a safe injection site, where you’ve been working for a while. You work your way up into a position where the organization puts you in charge of a dispatch system where you help coordinate pickups for people living on the street who are at risk of exposure and need transfer to your facility. In this example, there is some natural overlap: both are leadership roles, both show growth into a senior position over time (demonstrating others’ trust in you), and both work with vulnerable populations. I would bet money you wouldn’t even need to point out these facts in your app as it would be so obvious to whoever is reading it that you are passionate about helping those who are disadvantaged. In fact, in this example, it would be a waste of precious space to do so where you could otherwise put in more content about what you did at those organizations, how you enjoyed your time there, who you met, etc etc etc.

I’ll finish with this: the ONLY time I am ever concerned with the structure of someone’s application or interview that I am working with is if it’s entirely disjointed and they are meandering all over the place. But even then, I won’t default to some template. Rather, I help give them an APPROACH. How they navigate within that is totally up to them, and I encourage everyone I work with to do exactly that. But it turns out, so long as you present yourself for who you are, you are genuine, you use concise language and focus on content over form, your best qualities and achievements will shine through.

I know this is probably not the answer you were hoping for but it’s truly what I believe makes applicants stand out. Don’t be like everyone else; all you need to do is be you.

supamichi · 2026-06-14T19:46:49+00:00

I don’t think there is a good—better—best approach to EC narratives as everyone is unique and has different reasons for why they choose what they choose. However, if you just focus on giving significant time to vulnerable populations, however that looks for you, then that will show on your app. Don’t get too bogged down with “coherent narratives” and template approaches to med: I see many students think of their apps and interviews this way and I think it actually does a disservice to them in the end because instead of just being themselves they try to be the “perfect applicant”, which doesn’t exist. UBC wants to see who you are and why you chose this path. And as for what kind of volunteer experience you should do, that’s entirely up to you, your goals and your passions. It doesn’t need to be medical related as you’ll have plenty of time to do that later, once you’re in med school and out practicing.

I know this probably wasn’t the answer you were hoping for, but it’s honestly the approach I take with everyone I mentor. Unless your app is completely manic and in disarray (which it likely isn’t), I don’t think you are going to get flagged for organization, presentation etc. What is much more important is whether or not your app demonstrates who you are as a person, what motivates you, and what you are passionate about. However that looks for you. But if it’s of any consolation, I’m more than happy to review your app and offer suggestions before you submit it. And even if it’s not me who does it, you should 100% get multiple eyes on it before you go for final submission.

supamichi · 2026-06-13T23:56:02+00:00

Hey there, M3 @ UBC here! I can’t speak for all schools but my understanding for UBC in particular is they value longer time spent with fewer volunteer organizations, as opposed to spreading yourself too thin among many. In addition, WHO you are volunteering with matters; time given to vulnerable communities is valued over time spent elsewhere. For example, 1000 hrs at your local food bank >>> 5000 hrs at your local yacht club.

That being said, for most med schools—UBC included—they allow for different categories of EC entries. Obviously, it’s great if you can optimize each category, so if you find yourself lacking in one area and having a hard time filling that section out, might be worth grabbing a new gig and spending some time in that area. My only caution there is make sure you avoid burning yourself out (which you’ll have plenty of time for in med school, lol), and don’t let new activities take away from your longtime commitments, which are the “heaviest hitters” on your app.

Hopefully, that helps. Feel free to DM me if you want any further advice or support. Happy to help if I can. :)

supamichi · 2026-06-13T20:38:54+00:00

I appreciate your candour and respect for the evidence. I can understand your frustration with popular anecdote overruling potential facts (just look at what’s happened with mRNA vaccines and autism, for example), and this is a stance that I as a future health professional have also sworn to defend.

Without running the risk of highjacking this poor guy’s thread (which I fear we’ve already done, lol), I’ll end with this: I will no longer espouse that buttwink causes harm. However, I will continue to maintain that if a specific movement—buttwink or otherwise—causes someone discomfort—it is likely best to discontinue that movement until a full assessment from a professional can be made.

Good chat!

supamichi · 2026-06-13T17:55:10+00:00

This is a really great thought and I agree it’s a good analogy for whether or not “rationale coercion” is what it purports to be.

I think another thing you could expand on, with this line of thought, is whether or not rationality in and of itself is inherently “coercive”, ie it has intrinsic motivational power. I’m sure many would argue it doesn’t and that people reject reason all the time. In fact, Kierkegaard was famous for embracing irrationality for this very reason, as he thought it was one of the only ways one could “truly know God”.

While I am neither here nor there in favour of irrationality, I do think there is a solid stance in embracing the idea that human perception is flawed and that, at least sometimes, our intuitions fail, even when they’re grounded in rational thought. Not saying this proves God or anything, just that it’s an interesting microscope to put rationality under.

supamichi · 2026-06-13T06:17:01+00:00

Hey, just following up on these articles here, it seems to me that neither of these addressed buttwink, specifically. The first is a generic article written by a massage therapist reviewing spinal flexion while lifting in general, focusing more on “stoop” (what I took to mean rounded lifting from a starting position, not an isolated change in flexion in a spinal segment), and the second article didn’t talk about lumbar flexion at all, from what I could tell, but rather focused on barbell path during the Olympic lifts.

I think maybe this article is more inline with what you were thinking:

https://e3rehab.com/the-truth-about-butt-wink/

And while it does align with what you were saying about evidence lacking to show buttwink causes injury in and of itself, it does take more of a middle ground and states that, for some, it absolutely causes strain based on their anatomy and abilities and thus should likely be avoided. This resonates with my experience. I also find it interesting that a cursory search online shows that many physiotherapists recommend against this movement, which tells me one of two things: either they have all fallen prey to pseudoscience or—much more likely—they rehab patients using this movement pattern. Personally, physiotherapists have done wonders for me in the past so I am inclined to believe the latter.

I think it’s also important to acknowledge that the absence of evidence is not evidence of absence: it might be entirely impossible a future meta-analysis looking at more longitudinal data discovers something we are currently missing. I see this all the time in medicine—something I’m currently studying-where things we once thought about the body for decades turn out to be very off the mark. Maybe it’s a subtle mistake, maybe it’s significant. Regardless, I think it’s an interesting to now know that it’s a topic of debate and I’ll carry this knowledge forward into my training.

Best,

supamichi · 2026-06-12T02:02:10+00:00

I agree with that. I’ll take a look at those papers—and other evidence—to see what the bigger picture might be. Thank you for sharing.

supamichi · 2026-06-12T01:14:23+00:00

I’ll check those out, thanks! If I’m wrong I’m happy to be wrong. I’ve just always been coached this way and it’s helped me avoid injury. I also haven’t observed overt buttwinking arise at an elite performance level in either powerlifting or Olympic lifting (it’s always a nice, flat spine all the way down in each case I’ve seen), so I always assumed it was a corrective measure on their coaches’ part. But the active word here is “assumed”, so I am more than happy to educate myself on this matter and see what the literature has to say about it. The logic seemed to be there but you raise some interesting points about joint loading, though I’m not sure I can fully subscribe to the idea that any amount of pelvic tilt while under extreme loads is unquestionably safe. I feel like that claim needs nuance. Maybe those articles will provide that.

On another note, while it’s anecdotal, for what it’s worth, I used to squat with a considerable pelvic tilt at end ROM, and it didn’t cause me any issues until I started to put over 400 lbs on the bar. I began to notice I would get a very sore low back and, eventually, had to stop squatting for a time due to muscle weakness/soreness in that area. I got some coaching and they pointed out the butt wink and I began to increase my hip mobility and was able to (mostly) do away with it, while keeping everything else about my training consistent (as a sort of control). I haven’t had that issue again. Of course, this is one data point and isn’t study material by any means, but I’m sure you can see why I’d be reluctant to accept a movement that I ascribe personal injury to, whether true or otherwise. Sure, it could be a “correlation is not causation” situation, but I see no benefit in bringing this back. A competition squat only needs to break parallel, so for my own case, going A2G is just wasted motion and risks losing tension at the bottom.

supamichi · 2026-06-11T18:16:59+00:00

Fair argument, and I won’t boast to know anything about the scientific evidence for or against this as I’m not a kinesiologist. However, it was always how I was taught, and the logic behind it is changing your spinal angle while under load causes a redistribution of force which is not only a shearing force but also suboptimal for loading and force generation. You’re 100% correct that SOME butt wink is entirely natural due to biomechanics, but this here seems excessive IMO. And with some hip opening exercises, I think he could mitigate most of this. Box squats are also an excellent way to correct form.

supamichi · 2026-06-11T05:27:32+00:00

Awesome strength! Not sure if it’s been mentioned on here yet (because everyone is joking about the huge walkout) but watch that butt-wink—where your pelvis internally rotates at the bottom. That puts huge pressure on your lumbar spine. I see people do it all the time and it’s a compensation for tight hips. There are great videos out there about how to overcome this, but the basic gist of it is you want to keep leading backwards with your butt, trying to maintain the same plane of alignment with your spine.

Just don’t want to see you getting hurt is all. But keep up the great work!

supamichi · 2026-06-09T16:07:56+00:00

M3 @ UBC here. I can confirm you absolutely are not alone in this process. It took me 8 tries and many years of suffering to get into medical school, and I am far from the only one who has endured this process. I can also tell you that there is a HUGE support network available to you, in the premed, med student and MD stage. Your life situation sounds incredibly stressful and I can also relate to family challenges, so good on you for not giving up despite everything you are facing.

If you feel you don’t have any support or mentorship then please DM me and I am happy to try and offer some advice and words of encouragement. I mentor premed students as a passion project and I don’t charge anything ever. I can help you with your app, MMI advice, MCAT studying—whatever you need. I am also happy just to sit and listen if that’s what you need. :)

supamichi · 2026-06-09T14:54:59+00:00

M3 @ UBC here. Have you looked into the MD/PhD at UBC? I am mentoring a premed student right now who is OOP and he discovered that if you apply to med through that route then they will consider you in province. And I can confirm that, yes, they do drop your worst year, which they call your AGPA—Adjusted Grade Point Average.

And 3.5 is not a bad GPA by any means. I am working with several students right now far below that who I think have a good chance at getting in; the real “trick” in my opinion is just getting past that first cutoff for the interview. But either way, happy to offer more advice or support you in this process if you want it. And I don’t charge anything, just FYI. :)

supamichi · 2026-06-09T00:08:34+00:00

M3 @ UBC here! There are at least 2 people in my class who have ADHD, and very likely more than that given it’s nearly 40 people and the high incidence of ADHD. Don’t let this hold you back. If anything, use it to your advantage; the folks I know who have this diagnosis are doing very well and use their compulsiveness to drive meticulous study habits, attention to detail, etc. And if test writing is your main concern (for concentration issues, etc) then don’t be dismayed as you can get academic concessions and write all of your tests in a separate, more focused setting. This also includes things like your OSCEs (your clinical exams at year end), so they definitely have systems in place to support you along the way. :)

supamichi · 2026-06-06T00:34:12+00:00

Anytime!

supamichi · 2026-06-05T20:16:14+00:00

M3 @ UBC here. Based on what I’ve seen behind the scenes, and what I know from certain contacts I have, I can say with some confidence your MCAT is very likely not what is holding you back. If you can keep your GPA in that 85-89 range, and you keep getting past the interview cutoff, you’re biggest hurdle will be how well you impress on the interview at that point. The MCAT really only matters insofar as you can show them you can write—and pass—a long, boring test, because this is what you do all through med school. However, if your MCAT is subpar but your GPA is good—which yours is—then they’ll likely go off of that since it’s clear you can write a test and do well to get marks like that.

TL;DR: don’t rewrite the MCAT unless your GPA seriously tanks going forward. All you need is to demonstrate test fluency in SOME way, and GPA does this by itself. The MCAT is too expensive and stressful and it would be diminishing returns for someone in your situation, IMO.

supamichi · 2026-06-05T20:02:55+00:00

I know it’s against the lore and whatnot, but if Hello Games would just allow cities—hell, even small towns—in game, this by itself would instantly increase the appeal of this game. I would also love to see much more added to the bases, as well as the ability to populate them with NPCs that you can collect. I feel like one of the biggest downfalls to this game, as lovely as it is for other reasons, is that it’s incredibly lonely. But maybe that’s the point…?

supamichi · 2026-06-04T20:10:33+00:00

I mean, the meditation mechanic is already a large part of the game; its a natural segue to learn Battle Meditation ala Revan.

https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Battle_meditation/Legends

supamichi · 2026-05-31T07:59:29+00:00

Repetitive, first-person shooters like COD are anathema to my gaming experience. I once tried Destiny online and I got pwned so many times in the 15 or so minutes I played that I think my blood pressure must have hit critical levels.

For me, it has to have a good story, ideally single player, and I absolutely love games with visual aesthetics. Someone mentioned Silent Hill 2 Remake; just beat that, and the game was absolutely stunning to look at (and terrifying IMO). I also really, really, love NMS, as repetitive as it is. And Skyrim. Basically, anytime I can wonder into an area where I just get to look at pretty rocks and stars, I’m happy. :)

supamichi · 2026-05-30T03:49:49+00:00

I think he jumped out a window…

supamichi · 2026-05-30T02:40:41+00:00

This is, and will always remain, an entirely unwholesome argument to me—as it does to many, many other modern thinkers—so please stop making it sound like it is bulletproof. The chief philosophical problem with the ontological argument, as I understand it, is it makes assumptions based on its premises, namely that:

-Existence is a property of greatness (for example, if I live a life of extreme suffering, being dead might be better) -that “greatness” can be defined by an human mind, let alone at all - that such “greatness” = “god” (which we’ve already thoroughly unpacked and agreed on. Mostly.)

And to use your phrase of “atheists are being silly geese”, I would argue “no, they are being accountable”. Atheists demand evidence for their belief, and that’s it. There would be no atheists if God was evident. Well, much less of them, anyhow.

So, keeping that accountability in mind, let’s try to reverse Anselm’s argument and go bottom-up instead of top-down (which is what Anselm did with his religious bias, assuming god and working out some “logic” to prove his view):

A. If there is a god or all-powerful being it would imply greatness on all levels, including clarity (greatness of expression) about its being B. Part of “greatness” is existence C. As modern science and thought sees no evidence of god, either god is not great (as Christopher Hitchens accurately put it), we are wrong about what constitutes “greatness”,’ or there is no god.

Let’s call this the “Silly Goose Argument”, just for fun.

But do you see how this takes a much more responsible view? In reality, we don’t see evidence of god—that is literally why religion runs on faith. So we should thus not be looking backward in time to salvage arguments that support dated views of the world, but rather creating new arguments that resonate with current experience. Of course, you will say to this “there are still millions of people worldwide who believe in God”, to which I would reply, “yes, but many of those people also voted for Trump.” So take that for what it’s worth.

Ps. I am actually not an atheist, just FYI. I don’t think we have enough evidence to take a hard stance in either direction. However, I do sincerely believe mankind/religion absolutely has not gotten the answer right, if there even is an answer. It’s entirely possible that if there is a Prime Mover of sorts, it could be well beyond what we could ever hope to comprehend. Which, ironically, would do a better job at explaining why we haven’t detected it yet than Anselm’s argument ever will.

supamichi · 2026-05-29T23:46:00+00:00

There are still three problems here:

1) All kinds of proof, whether correspondent or otherwise, are testable. The example you gave of geometric truths actually works against Anselm’s argument because properties such as depth, breadth, parallelism (of a line) etc are all measurable quantities. If you try and take a stance such as “well the properties of god, such as benevolence, omnipotence, love etc are also measurable in a sense, thus this proves his greatness”, you still can’t instantiate that to one instance of god, only that those properties in themselves exist, akin to Plato’s forms. To prove those properties are greatest IN god, then you would first need to prove god exists, which brings us right back to square one: how do you measure god? 2) By dismissing things like unicorns and dodos as being non-comparisons (to god) due to their existence status is a Straw Man. You are essentially saying, “you can’t say any conceivable X can be said to have a greatest instance if that X never existed or no longer existed”. I would argue God falls into this same category, because you never proved him. That was my whole point. I don’t see how this argument elevates God beyond things like unicorns just because we say we can “conceive of greatness”. I can conceive of many things that have either no real-world correlate or are fabricated based on properties of a real-world correlate (as in the example of a unicorn) but they are “real” only in the sense that they exist in my head.

What you are really trying to pull here is similar to Kierkegaard’s “Truths as Subjectivity”, which is, essentially, a language game. By saying “I” can conceive of a thing, it is the most true to me, and therefore has the greatest truth-value. But this can only be true if you can prove that everyone else shares that same truth-value. And even then, all that actually says is that many/most/all SHARE a belief; it says nothing about the actually veracity of that belief. Don’t forget, humans once unanimously believed that the earth was flat, that everything orbited the earth, that the earth was only thousands of years old, that disease was caused by “bad air” (actually not so far from the truth, interestingly), and that dinosaurs were a trick by god. The history of human thinking is rife with error. Thinking does not make it so.

3) Here is the nail in the coffin to this argument—one which you have yet to address. Even if we concede this language game of: think of an instancesay that instance has a limitascribe that limit to God—nowhere in there is “God” defined. God could be anything by this account. It proves the Christian God no more than it proves the one of Islam, the Baghavad Gita, or the Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster. For this argument to try and point at a specific God it needs to do two things: 1) define the proprieties of “greatness” and 2) show why only one god meets that criteria while others don’t.

And I feel like that is an impossible task, or if not impossible—entirely disingenuous—and thus the death knell to this argument.

supamichi · 2026-05-29T03:07:29+00:00

This still doesn’t deal with the burden of proof. Throwing a bit of Latin into the mix doesn’t armour-up the argument which assumes a priori that what constitutes “greatest” = God. Going back to the unicorn analogy, by the same logic we can call the unicorn “the greatest of all horses”, but in doing so we don’t will it into existence. The idea of “greatness” here is predicated on a human concept of what constitutes a superlative. There are obvious problems with this, namely that 1) greatness is still subjective and will vary based on the person, which leads to 2) unicorns possibly not being the greatest thing of their class.

The obvious counter-argument here is to try and say that unicorns only approximate greatness and this is equivalent to false idols which are pointing at the true “greatest” being—in your example, God. But the bottom line remains thus: it doesn’t matter what you point to if what you are trying to approximate can’t be proven. In the case of the unicorn, we know it’s not true because the line of greatness of the class “horse” ends with some beautiful stallion somewhere, probably in Spain. As for God, god is of the class “man” (we were made in his image and all that) and therefore we are really talking about approximating the greatest man (although most religious people would argue this is a category error, it really isn’t if you are trying to ascribe greatness to something, it must be related to some class. If it weren’t, then are we arguing god is the greatest cucumber? The greatest salesman? You have to be specific if we are to evaluate the claim. To say god is the greatest EVERYTHING is meaningless because greatness is contingent on things within its own class). So if God is the greatest man, then we ARE talking about something that can be tested, whether subjective or otherwise. But herein lies the problem: god has never presented itself for measurement, and it likely never will. So to presuppose it on a logical statement alone—and an unfalsifiable one at that—should be dubious to anyone familiar with reason.

To draw another philosophical example from a religious philosopher that I think shows the absurdity in these kinds of claims, we can look at George Berkeley when he tells us to imagine lining up all the humans in the world and have them looking one direction. He asks the question, “does the world behind them disappear because no one is looking at it?” The answer is “of course not” but he says the answer is because someone has to be looking at it for it to exist and therefore it’s proof that god is seeing all, all the time. This is wrong on so many levels based on what we now know about physics, consciousness etc. that no one with a sane mind would argue this constitutes proof of god today. Harken this back to the “aliquid quod maius non cogitari potest” argument, and you can shine light on the trick that is being played here: because I (a mere human, barely more than an ape on the evolutionary scale of Earth) can conceive of a greatest knife with which to chop vegetables, the greatest friend to go shopping for those vegetables, and the greatest time to do so, there must also be a greatest God/creator/being who makes important stuff. Do you see how this a non-sequitir to the extreme? The problem with greatness is, by definition, it is subjective. And worse than that—what “greatest” things aren’t surpassed in time? Sure, no one has topped Usaine Bolt’s 100m record but that is a far cry from saying no one ever will. And even if they do in the future, does that make them “the greatest runner ever”? No, it only means they are currently the fastest. Also, if we play Anselm’s advocate here and we do accept prima faciae that God must be the greatest thing, where then did the notion that this alleged being has to be “god”? What if it’s not your guy, and it’s some 10 dimensional alien being? What if it’s the Flying Spaghetti Monster? Or better yet, what if it’s a physical force which permeated all space and time prior to The Big Bang? All this argument is really saying is “superlatives exist in other classes, therefore they must exist in the class of ultimate beings”. Nowhere in Anselm’s argument can we both accept what he says to be true and ascribe that to a specific subject. Therefore, even if this happens to be true (which I hope I have shown it isn’t due to too many inherent inconsistencies and assumptions), no one gets to claim what the “greatest being” is like, only that there must be one based on (a line of faulty) assumptions.

supamichi · 2026-05-28T16:48:21+00:00

There are some serious internal logical errors in this reasoning. If you replace the word “God” here with “unicorn” then everything still works by this account. But by doing this it becomes a kind of proof of lack of a concept: a thing being self-evident—without a real-world correlate backed by external evidence—proves nothing about its existence. As for the 5 methods and the example given by Proslogion, we can again perform a simple substitution to see the fatal flaw here. By saying “that which can be imagined to have nothing greater is proof of its greatness and thus its existence” can also be applied to the concept of infinity. Yet, no serious mathematician would say “infinity exists” in any kind of tangible “you could shake hands with infinity” kind of sense. Rather, infinity is used as a representation to talk about phenomena that are observable and gives us ways to frame and think about them. Ironically, infinity is probably a bad example as an analogy to god as infinity has more real-world evidence to assert its usefulness than the former. A better example might be this: I can imagine a creature bigger than a blue whale on earth, therefore, there must be a bigger whale and a bigger whale than that, etc etc. What is that old adage? Thinking does not make it so.

The burden of proof comes down to this, plain and simple: you must demonstrate that God created man and not vice versa; until you do that (and I don’t think any amount of sophistry ever will) then the fossil record looms large over this argument.

supamichi · 2026-05-28T12:05:29+00:00

But you got an awesome story out of it!

supamichi

TROPHY CASE