Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story

“Because Mother never talked to anyone about the details of her divorce, people assumed the worst and circulated wild stories about her. ‘I just decided that I had to go about my own business,’ Mother once told me, ‘and ignore what people said.’”

Carson’s mother inspires and motivates him both with her words and with her actions. The idea of ignoring others’ opinions is expressed by Carson below in no. 23.

“Through my imagination and emotions I lived that story with the couple, and I thought, That’s exactly what I should do — get sheltered in the cleft of the rock. Although I was only eight, my decision seemed perfectly natural. Other kids my age were getting baptized and joining the church, so when the message and music touched me emotionally, I responded.”

A pastor’s sermon about a missionary doctor, which he hears at age eight, inspires Carson both to get baptized and to set his sights on becoming a doctor. His faith and his choice of profession are constants in his life from that time on.

“Higgins Elementary School was predominately White. Classes were tough, and the fifth graders that I joined could outdo me in every single subject. To my amazement, I didn’t understand anything that was going on. I had no competition for the bottom of the class. To make it worse, I seriously believed I’d been doing satisfactory work back in Boston.”

The family returns to Detroit from Boston, and Carson starts fifth grade in a mostly White school. There, he faces prejudice both for his race and for having low grades.

“I could easily have decided that life was cruel, that being Black meant everything was stacked against me. And I might have gone that way except for two things that happened during fifth grade to change my perception of the whole world.”

This statement at the end of chapter 3 sets the stage for chapter 4, in which Carson gets his first pair of glasses and achieves academic success in the mostly White school he attends.

“‘Bennie,’ she said again and again, ‘if you can read, honey, you can learn just about anything you want to know. The doors of the world are open to people who can read.’”

Discovering that her sons were not as well-schooled in Boston as she had thought, Carson’s mother requires her sons to read two books a week. Although he initially protests, Carson discovers that reading improves his performance in school and increases his vocabulary and spelling abilities.

“Wilson Junior High was still predominantly White, but both Curtis and I became outstanding students there. It was at Wilson that I first excelled among White kids. Although not a conscious thing on my part, I like to look back and think that my intellectual growth helped to erase the stereotypical idea of Blacks being intellectually inferior.”

Carson reflects on the change in his academic abilities. He comes to believe that these changes had benefits, not just for himself, but also for the White students who witnessed his success.

“When we were younger, through her silence Mother had protected us from the truth about Dad and her emotional problems. Now it was our turn to protect her so she wouldn’t worry. We chose the same method.”

Carson reflects on his mother’s modeling behavior and adopts it in his own life. Just as she had protected her sons by not sharing information that would have been extremely difficult for them to handle, they choose to keep experiences from her.

“Except for a brief period in my life, I’ve not been much concerned about what I wore, because like Mother always said, ‘Bennie, what’s inside counts the most. Anybody can dress up on the outside and be dead inside.’”

Although Carson does not make the connection here (after p. 25 of the book, his father is not referenced, except for his absence), his father was also concerned about appearance. Earlier in the book, he quoted his father as saying, “‘You got to look sharp all the time, Bennie. Dress the way you want to be.’” He emphasized clothes and possessions, and he enjoyed being around people.”

“I could accept being poor, but I died a thousand deaths thinking that other kids would know it. If I had thought more logically about the food stamps, I would have realized that quite a few of my friends’ families used them, too. Yet every time I left the house with the stamps burning in my pocket, I worried that someone might see me or hear about my using food stamps and then talk about me.”

Carson’s concern with appearance extends beyond clothes. He is also concerned that people will be prejudiced against him because his family is poor.

“I stared at the broken blade and went weak. I had almost killed him. I had almost killed my friend. If the buckle hadn’t protected him, Bob would have been lying at my feet, dying or severely wounded. He didn’t say anything, just looked at me, unbelieving. ‘I—I’m sorry,’ I muttered, dropping the handle. I couldn’t look him in the eye. Without a word, I turned and ran home.”

After assaulting a seventh-grade peer in the head with a lock, nearly hitting his mother, and throwing a rock at a neighborhood boy, hitting him in the face and smashing his glasses, in ninth grade, Carson assaults his friend Bob with a knife. He is horrified both by what he has done and by what he is.

“‘Lord,’ I whispered, ‘You have to take this temper from me. If You don’t, I’ll never be free from it. I’ll end up doing things a lot worse than trying to stab one of my best friends.’ Already heavy into psychology (I had been reading Psychology Today for a year), I knew that temper was a personality trait. Standard thinking in the field pointed out the difficulty, if not the impossibility, of modifying personality traits. Even today some experts believe that the best we can do is accept our limitations and adjust to them. Tears streamed between my fingers. ‘Lord, despite what all the experts tell me, You can change me. You can free me forever from this destructive personality trait.’”

Recognizing a fierce temper that he is afraid he cannot change himself based on his reading about psychology, Carson turns to God for a cure. The change of heart he experiences deepens his faith, making it more personal.

“I also came to realize that if people could make me angry, they could control me. Why should I give someone else such power over my life?”

After reflection, Carson gains another insight into his temper. He figures out that his angry responses allow others to control both him and his life, and rejects giving them this power.

“For a long time it bothered me that I had graduated third in my senior high school class. It’s probably a character flaw, but I can’t help myself. It wasn’t that I had to be first in everything, but I should have been number one. If I hadn’t gotten so sidetracked by the need for peer approval, I would have been at the head of my class. In thinking toward college, I determined that would never happen again. From now on, I’d be the best student I was capable of being.”

Carson explains his attitude towards his own abilities and achievements. He acknowledges that his focus on achievement and being the best is likely “a character flaw.”

“The only explanation just blew me away. The one answer was humbling in its simplicity. For whatever reason, the God of the universe, the God who holds galaxies in His hands, had seen a reason to reach down to a campus room on Planet Earth and send a dream to a discouraged ghetto kid who wanted to become a doctor…‘It’s clear that You want me to be a doctor,’ I said to God. ‘I’m going to do everything within my power to be one. I’m going to learn to study. I promise You that I’ll never do this to You again.’”

Carson failed to adequately prepare for a chemistry final at Yale and became extremely distressed the day before the exam. Here, he explains the coincidence of a dream that night revealing the entire content of the test as being a direct revelation from God. The dream allowed him to achieve a ninety-seven on the test and continue in the pre-med program at Yale.

“Influence could get me inside the door, but my productivity and the quality of my work were the real tests…It’s not what you know but the kind of job you do that makes the difference.”

In his college years, Carson gets employment several times through recommendations. He realizes that a recommendation only helps him get the job— then he must work to keep it. It appears that “what” may be a typo for “whom.”

“I became acutely aware of an unusual ability—a divine gift, I believe—of extraordinary eye and hand coordination. It’s my belief that God gives us all gifts, special abilities that we have the privilege of developing to help us serve Him and humanity. And the gift of eye and hand coordination has been an invaluable asset in surgery. This gift goes beyond eye-hand coordination, encompassing the ability to understand physical relationships, to think in three dimensions. Good surgeons must understand the consequences of each action, for they’re often not able to see what’s happening on the other side of the area in which they’re actually working…For some reason, I am able to ‘see’ in three dimensions. In fact, it seems incredibly simple. It’s just something I happen to be able to do…During my studies at medical school and the years afterward, I realized the value of this skill. For me it is the most significant talent God has given me and the reason people sometimes say I have gifted hands.”

Carson explains the origin of the phrase used as the title of the book. He attributes the phrase “gifted hands” to a special visual ability that he has, combined with outstanding hand–eye coordination.

“From just having an interest in neurosurgery, the field soon intrigued me so much it became a compulsion. You may have noticed that I’d had that happen before. I have to know more, I’d find myself thinking. Everything available in print on the subject became an article I had to read. Because of my intense concentration and my driving desire to know more, without intending to I began to outshine the interns."

Carson approaches neurosurgery with the same intense dedication he had committed to earlier projects of self-education. He also implies that his motivation continues to stem from being the best he can be, rather than competition.

“No knowledge is ever wasted.” 

Carson makes this comment immediately after his interest in and knowledge of music gave him a personal connection to the head of the neurosurgery training program interviewing him for acceptance into the John Hopkins program. He attributes his admission, in part, to this knowledge that he had attained in the hopes of appearing on College Bowl.

“But in any career, whether it’s that of a TV repairman, a musician, a secretary—or a surgeon—an individual must believe in himself and in his abilities. To do his best, one needs a confidence that says, ‘I can do anything, and if I can’t do it, I know how to get help.’”

As in so many of his aspirational sayings, Carson echoes the words of his mother. In this case, the reader may recall Sonya Carson’s words, “I can do it. If I don’t know how right now, I learn fast.” (Chapter 3, p. 28) This quotation is also interesting in contrast to his critique of kids spending their time on music (Chapter 22, p. 236).

“‘There isn’t anybody in the world who isn’t worth something,’ I say. If you’re nice to them, they’ll be nice to you. The same people you meet on the way up are the same kind of people you meet on the way down. Besides that, every person you meet is one of God’s children…I truly believe that being a successful neurosurgeon doesn’t mean I’m better than anybody else. It means that I’m fortunate because God gave me the talent to do this job well. I also believe that what talents I have I need to be willing to share with others.”

Carson makes this statement after discussing the value of his interactions with the “‘common people’ like ward clerks or aides” in the hospital at Johns Hopkins during his residency (118). In previous statements in the book about cultivating his talents, Carson has expressed the desire to be the best he can be for himself (e.g., “I wanted to be the very best I could be—for me” Chapter 4, p. 40). Here, Carson’s words display an outward facing reason for developing his gifts.

“The only pressure I felt during my internship, and in the years since, has been a self-imposed obligation to act as a role model for Black youngsters.”

Here, Carson focuses on his ability to be a role model for young Blacks. This idea is further developed in THINK BIG in Chapter 22.

“Many of our pressing racial problems will be taken care of when we who are among the minorities stand on our own feet and refuse to look to anybody else to save us from our situations. The culture in which we live stresses looking out for number one. Without adopting such a self-centered value system, we can demand the best of ourselves while we are extending our hands to help others."

While the first sentence calls for people who are minorities to act with independence, not relying on outside assistance from others, the third sentence touts avoiding self-centeredness and helping others. A possible interpretation is that Carson is advocating that minorities as a subset of society should be independent and not rely on members of other groups (e.g., Whites), but instead, help each other. 

“The situation with Denise . . . confirmed in me that when people know their capabilities, and they know their material (or job), it doesn’t matter who opposes them. Regardless of the reputation of the critics or their popularity, power, or how much they think they know, their opinions become irrelevant."

This is Carson’s final statement of his “I did it my way” theme. Here, he goes beyond his previous focus on creative rule breaking to discuss action in the face of personal opposition.