Yankee Stadium 2011
No baseball game that day. I was sitting in the stands for my daughter's graduation from NYU. I know my daughter was out there among those thousands of other graduates, a former president of the United States gave the keynote speech, and I learned for the first time of Ada Yonath, who was awarded a doctorate by the university that afternoon, honoris causa.
Dr. Yonath had earned her first doctorate -- in chemistry -- in 1968 -- and earned two more post doctorate degrees in the meantime. What was so memorable for me was hearing the extraordinary resilience she manifested on her journey to that afternoon. Did I mention that two years earlier she had been awarded the Nobel Prize for Chemistry?
Here's an excerpt from the Nobel Prize committee's description:
"In the late 1970s, Yonath decided to focus on one of the mysteries of living cells: protein biosynthesis. She began with ribosomes, where protein synthesis occurs. These were still a puzzle to scientists because they had yet to determine ribosomes' molecular structure. Normally one would use X-ray crystallography to map the structure of a molecule. But given its size, lack of internal symmetry and instability, the ribosome was considered impossible to crystallize – and Yonath was considered a dreamer or a fool for trying.
'I was described as a dreamer, a fantasist, even as the village idiot. I didn't care. What I cared about was convincing people to allow me to go on with my work.'"
She persisted for 25,000 tries.
Those of us who got an mRNA vaccine for Covid 19 are among those indebted to her persistence.
"In principle, an mRNA vaccine comprises synthetic mRNA molecules coded with the sequence of immunogen, that direct the cell machine, ribosomes, to produce vaccine protein antigens and generate an immune response. Once the vaccine is delivered into the cells, the ribosomes translate the mRNA vaccine sequence and produce the antigen, which is the spike protein of SARS-CoV-2 for the COVID-19 vaccine."
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8780073/
As fascinated as I am with the chemistry, what causes me to focus my attention on Dr. Yonath is her extraordinary manifestation of the three components of Charles Snyder's Hope Theory. Snyder hypothesized that we move forward under three conditions:
Goals Thinking: the clear conceptualization of valuable goals.
Pathways Thinking: the capacity to develop specific strategies to reach those goals.
Agency Thinking: the ability to initiate and sustain the motivation for using those strategies.
From Webster's: "Hope implies little certainty but suggests confidence or assurance in the possibility that what one desires or longs for will happen."
The work I do is in this space between little certainty and possibility. It's the often relentless work of identifying the goal, developing the strategy, before acting with courage. Psychologists Linda and Charlie Bloom call holding this tension, "a demanding discipline."
I keep returning to Dr. Yonath's lifelong example in maintaining this demanding discipline.
And I think of my daughter, Carolina; my colleague, Robert Brown; their partners; and others embracing the demanding discipline of parenting young children.
At the same time, always close to courage is hubris: the pride and overconfidence that precedes a fall. One has to resist the naysayers; nonetheless, the definition of tragedy is a brave and intelligent person who fails to heed warnings.
Here it is: be relentless; be brave; don't be a fool. I did already mention "demanding discipline;" now for the fifth time. Go well!
Warmly,
Francis Sopper