2009 Mash-up

Yesterday we sent out our e-newsletter with this video featured. We'd like to get your feedback on it. What things stood out to you about this video? What are some good ways to think about the lyrics, images, ideas within the top songs, music videos and artists in 2009? What do you think the 2010 mash-up will look like? How should we respond? Let's discuss!

Grey's Anatomy and Human Doing

Title: “What a Difference a Day Makes”
TV Show: Grey’s Anatomy
Company: ABC Studios
Location: Season Five, Episode 22 (7:18-8:00, 24:31-26:49)
Target Audience: College age students and 20 somethings
Cultural Impact: This show raises questions of life and death, identity, and often encourages love and sexuality however/with whomever as long as it makes you happy.

Growing up we’re always taught that what we do is important. Our actions and accomplishments make us who we are. Every day our culture undermines our worth, value, and significance as unique human beings unless we’re doing something important with our lives – whatever that means. Grey’s Anatomy sends this message to us through its doctors, patients, and frequent emphasis on being a “human doing” rather than a “human being.”

In episode 22 of Season 5 – “What a Difference a Day Makes” – we’re introduced to a girl named Becca. She arrives in the trauma unit of the ER after she was in a car accident with eight of her friends. They were on their way to their college graduation. As the doctors of Seattle Grace Hospital assess the damage and attempt to start treating her wounds, she realizes what she is missing. Her college graduation means everything to her. As the Valedictorian, she had a speech to give. Becca feels like she NEEDS to graduate from college. College was her life. School was her life. All she ever did was school. For someone whose life has been centered on her academics and schooling, college graduation day is the ultimate goal.

As elementary school, middle school, and high school students, we constantly look to the day way off in the distant future when all our hard work will pay off. We long to be a college graduate, a “grown up.” For Becca, that day was within her reach, yet she couldn’t grasp it from her stretcher in Trauma Room #2. Nearly in tears, Becca tells the doctors, “Today is the day my life’s supposed to start!” If graduation from college marks the beginning of life, what was the meaning of all the years before that?

It’s so tempting to base our worth and identity in the things that we’re good at – the things that consume our time and give us reputation and esteem in the eyes of others. We depend on those things, as Becca did, to give our life meaning. When people asked her, “Who are you?” her first response would probably be, “I’m Becca. I’m the class Valedictorian and soon-to-be college graduate.” That was her life. But we saw that when that foundation she had built for herself was suddenly ripped away, she was left with an identity crisis.

If I could give Becca advice I would encourage her to remember that she still has worth and value even if she can’t give her speech and can’t graduate. She was created intentionally, uniquely by God and that in itself gives her value.

Maybe Becca was on to something when she said “Today is the day my life’s supposed to start.” If she is willing to let go of her need to base her identity in her abilities, accomplishments, and actions, maybe she truly can start living – really living in the confidence that she matters not because of WHAT SHE DOES but WHO SHE IS.

By: Kristin¹

Notes

1. Kristin was a student at the Focus Leadership Institute (FLI) this past 2009 fall semester and will be going back to finish up her schooling at Corban College in Salem, OR. We miss her tons as she was an awesome intern for Axis in the FLI Practicum. Every semester, several FLI students are able to spend 96 hours as interns with AXiS and travel all around the country with us ministering to students.