The Legacy of a Guru
By Eugenio Jose F. Ramos, MD
In our individual careers, we encounter people who draw our attention, pique our interest, challenge our comforts, and as our engagement with them evolve into something more intimate, touch our lives. I don’t think it is entirely luck that they land in our midst. I think it is more about being open to whatever is out there that crosses our path. With our senses laid open, we become vulnerable to possibilities and opportunities. When we embrace them, a connection takes root and grows, sometimes in directions that are not planned. What keeps that connection alive is the energy that glows like ember in the recesses of our memory just waiting to spark when passion is stoked.
This is how a legacy is created – both of the people who inspire us and of ours, as well. We are moved by the clarity of their insights and the breadth of their wisdom because of which the course of our lives change. The younger generations that learn from us in return give significance to what we ourselves have done for them (even when we didn’t seek out to) perhaps as a mere by-product of our own quest for self-actualization. When we think about it, we really need not worry about leaving a legacy; all we need to do is live a life of generosity in the service of humanity.
When one gets older, as we all do, priorities change. Those things that we used to consider important lose their luster. The decline in physical prowess, the ascent of new knowledge and technology, and the restless energy of the youth around us would not be too kind to the once-too-powerful ego, particularly of those in positions of stature, as the matter of relevance – more accurately the loss of it – comes to fore. The call to make a significant contribution – to the community where we live, the profession that frames our careers, our government that is in a perpetual need of a vision, and Philippine society that makes progress ever so challenging – becomes louder and more compelling as we realize that time is no longer on our side, and wealth unspent and unshared is of very little value. This is that time of our lives when self-awareness either confronts or consoles us, and self-mastery gives us comfort.
I first met Professor Eduardo Morato at the launch of the Medical City Institute of Personalized Molecular Medicine (IPMM). He was one of the first patients under our Regenerative Medicine program, and he was there to give a testimony of his personal experience. Soft-spoken, humble and very pleasant to talk to, he manifested a certain graciousness that belied a snobbish intellectual appeal. There was always a smile on his face as if everything was alright, even when something was not alright. (I think the word is equanimity).
I became his cardiologist after that, and then we became friends. I would facilitate hospital admissions and referrals to other doctors; he would feed me useful information on certain flaws in our hospital processes. Conversation with him I sought for – in my clinic, at the hemodialysis unit, or at his bedside.I relished listening to his cynical remarks about certain doctors and hospital staff, delivered with a mischievous smirk. I guess many doctors were caught off-guard handling his questions, expecting a patient who would just believe and follow what they’d say. Not Professor EdMo; his confidence with himself and what he had learned about health and medicine, his sense of humor and ability to respectfully disagree truly made him a good model for our Patient Partnership philosophy.
When he turned 73 in July 2020, he was honored by family, friends and his students and colleagues from the Asian Institute of Management (AIM) and the Ateneo Graduate School of Business (AGSB) with a book GURU. What a book! More than just a tribute to his character and competence, it is actually about his impact through the years on the quality of thinking and reasoning, planning and organizing, leading and managing of people he had engaged with – including his family members and house help. Since the first time that I met him, and the subsequent times that he would be in my clinic and the hospital, what had impressed and inspired me was mainly how he thought, spoke and carried himself, how he took his illnesses and discomfort matter-of-factly. He had been sickly for many years, and yet one cannot really say that he was ill.
Self-awareness and self-mastery in living color. Irreverence towards norms that appealed to my own healthy disrespect for rules that don’t make sense. A sense of humor that put a permanent grin on his face. An easy ability to say ‘no’ with a chuckle.
When he invited me to give a short talk along with Gina Lopez in a book launch more than 4 years ago (he had written more than 50 books), that was the first time I realized that I was friend to a very important person. A person of influence. A highly respected guru. Which was a good thing, because it told me that my appreciation of him had nothing to do with who or what he was in the literati society.
I would EdMo in our hemodialysis unit regularly until his demise; he gave clear instructions when it would be time to let go. He writes about his physical health in GURU in the last pages allotted to him by the book’s author, Exequiel Villacorta, Jr. (edited by Paulynn Paredes Sicam, published by Rex Printing Co, Inc., Philippine copyright 2020). Admirably, in spite of his many ailments for many years, he was no less prolific than he ever was. He had been his own healer, driven by a strong desire to survive. He writes that his most productive, most fulfilling, and happiest years came when his physical health was turning from bad to worse. He attributed his longevity to the love and support of his family and friends and to his devotion to the Blessed Virgin.
“I want my family to remember me as someone who cared about them more than himself, and I want you to care about somebody other than yourself.”
– Eduardo A. Morato, Jr
GURU: A Tribute
From family to friends to colleagues to students to doctors to the younger generation that now acquire important lessons from their interactions with him, from the erudition of his books, the lessons remembered from his lectures, from the graciousness of a life lived well, from his own person as he manifests self-mastery over his illness and the unpredictability of the conditions in him and around him, Professor Eduardo A. Morato, Jr. has truly established a legacy that should be emulated, propagated and perpetuated. He will live forever. In the minds and hearts of the fortunate people he has touched.
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