“Oh, screw beautiful. I’m brilliant.
If you want to appease me, compliment my brain."
What’s so fascinating about Cristina Yang?
"I'd say wish me luck, but... I don't need it."
As this OG Grey’s Anatomy team member matures over ten seasons
from a hungry young intern into a master cardiothoracic surgeon,
she retains her fierce intensity, less-than-sunny disposition,
and biting charm.
“I’m your new intern -- Ryan Spaulding.”
“Ugh, I'm never going to remember that.
You’re, uh, 4.2.”
The sarcastic Cardio-God-in-training was actually created as an avatar
for one of the most powerful women in Hollywood:
Grey's Anatomy showrunner, Shonda Rhimes,
modeled the character after herself.
She said, "I leaned into Cristina, wrote her more eloquently,
colored her more brightly, drew outside her lines.
Let her do and think and live in ways that voiced my dreams.
She did not want to get married. She had a genius that she chased.
She loved her work.
I gave her a strident desire to not have children
because while I adore children,
I wanted to watch her fight that feminist battle and win."
“I am not this-this beautiful vessel
for all that might be good about the future.”
Rhimes’ words speak to how Cristina is the vision of living freely --
making the choices that are most liberating
and exciting to you personally,
without worrying about how people will react.
"Ah, the only things in my fridge are water, vodka and diet soda
and I don't care."
Here’s our take on Cristina Yang’s unique way of seeing the world,
and what we can all take from her philosophy on life.
“You’re completely free. You can do whatever you want.
The world is your oyster. Make lemonade.”
If you're new here, be sure to subscribe
and click the bell to get notified about all our new videos.
A huge thank you to Brilliant for sponsoring today's video.
Brilliant is the best app to help you
develop new problem-solving skills and analytical abilities
that you can apply to your career.
They offer 60 fun interactive courses
in math, science, and computer science.
Click the link in the description below --
Brilliant.org/TheTake -- to sign up for a free account now.
The first 200 people who go to the link
will get 20% off an annual premium subscription.
Let’s take a look at the main tenets that make up the belief system
Cristina Yang lives by.
Above all, Cristina thinks you must:
Do what you love, and love what you do.
“You're off work, Cristina. Go enjoy your day.”
“No, I'll enjoy my day if I can help retrieve a heart, I promise.”
Her pure zeal for the actual work she does is a breath of fresh air
compared to shows where characters’ professional drive
is just about making money or their own ego.
"So I can try out the subanular stitches.”
“Well, I didn’t teach it to you so you could crochet.”
"Oh my god.”
She’s also unapologetic about her ambition,
and feels that -- to succeed -- you must be a shark.
"You did a cutthroat thing. Don’t come to me for absolution.
You want to be a shark -- be a shark."
Cristina’s dominant, take-no-prisoners attitude
reminds us that talent or aptitude alone isn’t enough.
To really rise to the top of your field,
you also need drive and assertiveness.
“Say hello to your competition. Eight of you will switch
to an easier specialty. Five of you will crack
under the pressure. Two of you will be asked to leave."
Cristina thrives in the shark tank that is Seattle Grace Hospital
by actively clawing her way into the most impressive surgeries
and seeking out the best mentors.
"If you can't give me a brilliant cardiothoracic attending
who is willing to teach me, then I can't get what I need
from this hospital."
And while her overbearing attitude
may not always come across as charming,
another tenet of her philosophy is: Don’t aim to please. Aim to win.
"Colleagues aren't friends. They're competitors."
Social norms tend to condition girls
to be overly courteous from a young age,
out of a fear of not being liked.
But Cristina bucks the expectation
that women must put others’ emotional needs first.
"Losers. And I am not a loser.”
She won’t humbly let her achievements go unacknowledged,
“stay in her place,” or hold her tongue;
she bosses around her colleagues
with an ego typically reserved for men in the workplace.
"Bambi, don’t say another word until after the hunter shoots your mother."
Meanwhile, as hard as she works, Cristina plays equally hard.
"Baby, you made it!"
The warden of Racine College, James deKoven,
first coined the phrase in the 1800s, though back then, it was known as,
“Work hard, play hard, pray hard.”
Since then, the phrase has lost its religious connotations,
becoming a moniker for an "all-in" approach to life.
"You want a second-best surgeon operating on you?
No, you want the very best."
In his book, What Are We? Exploring the Evolutionary Roots of Our Future,
Lonnie William Aarssen writes that humans have a “legacy drive” --
a desire to leave behind a legacy -- and a “leisure drive” --
or a desire for fun.
Cristina pulls all-nighters to get the job done.
"Sleep is for wimps. Sleep is for Mercy West residents."
But a key way she keeps her work drive alive is by balancing it
with fun and cutting loose. From break room sex sessions,
“That was definitely worth being late.”
to drunken baseball games,
“Are you drunk?” “She is. We are.”
to impromptu dance sessions,
she also helps the other doctors unwind.
"We have to dance it out. That’s how we finish."
Cristina doesn’t waste time performing her emotions.
“I am laughing. Just not externally.”
She won’t feign politeness, friendliness or social niceties,
or say what’s expected in a given social situation.
"Its small features and oversized eyes
trigger a hormonal response from humans.
It's autonomic.
It's what keeps us from eating them."
J. L. Austin was one of the first thinkers to implicitly discuss
the idea of “performativity” in his 1975 book,
How to Do Things with Words.
Austin wrote: “In very many cases, it is possible to perform an act
of exactly the same kind not by uttering words,
whether written or spoken, but in some other way.”
"We don't have to do that thing where I say something,
and then you say something, and then somebody cries,
and there's like a moment."
Underneath her brusque exterior, Cristina is a deeply emotional
human being.
“How are you fine? How are you just completely fine?
I am ruined, okay? I am dead. I am wrecked.”
(You might even read a symbolism
into the fact that she’s a doctor of the heart.)
"Do you know how much I love you?"
But because she’s not focused on demonstrating feeling for an audience,
her empathy is all the more real.
"Forgive him.” "It's not that easy."
"I know. Forgive him anyway."
In a special Christmas episode, Cristina connects by stepping outside
of her own perspective to imagine what the patient might want.
"Live so you can have kids, and you know what?
Raise them not to believe in Santa."
When she does express her emotions -- in carefully chosen moments
and to the inner circle of people she cares about --
they have that much more impact.
“There's a club. The Dead Dad's Club.
“I’m really sorry you had to join the club.”
Cristina's likewise not too concerned with conventional bedside manner
or proper etiquette.
“I don’t like you.”
“You don’t like me because of Meredith?”
“I don’t like you because you’re you.”
She lets her unfiltered thoughts flow, whether she’s with a patient --
"Swallowing Monopoly pieces wasn't exactly a genius move."
-- or a colleague.
“You know what? It's just a C. That’s barely a surgery.
A moron can do a C. No offense.”
Her impropriety and occasional disrespect for hierarchy
can get her into trouble.
“You disrespected me. You mocked me in my OR.
That can’t happen."
But her bluntness can also be a magical power.
"You know, I don’t believe in Santa either, Justin. Or God.
I believe in medicine. And it’s a medical miracle you’re alive."
Cristina believes in using sarcasm to navigate the world.
Sarcasm is Cristina’s first line of defense against bullies,
complex surgical procedures, serious questions,
“I’m serious.” “I’m getting a pretzel.”
and, just, well, people that annoy her.
“Do you need a leash? Let’s go!”
Ironically, Cristina also uses sarcasm
as a bridge to connect with others
in difficult situations.
“For me, I dream about you screaming. You wouldn’t stop screaming.
So thank you.”
Her warped sense of humor brings her closer to the people she loves.
“You realize this constitutes hugging?” “Shut up. I'm your person.”
Cheekiness, wicked playfulness and sardonic wit
are how she shows caring.
“I hate you both.”
The hot-button question of whether women can “have it all”
has been resurfacing in the past decade.
"We also have another problem,
which is that women face harder choices
between professional success and personal fulfillment."
Cristina, however, doesn’t want it all.
“I really, really, really don't want to be a mother.
I want to be a surgeon, and please... get it.”
She’s never wanted children,
and is open about this lack of desire,
even getting an abortion on prime-time TV.
In a fever dream in which Cristina imagines a marriage and two children
with Owen Hunt, she seems deflated -- as if she’s compromised her values
and what makes her happy for her husband’s sake.
"Every day, I go to work and do my job.
Then I come home and do that job.
I'm so tired. It's like I'm sleepwalking
all the time."
Cristina Yang’s first love is -- and always will be -- her career.
"Change my career after I'm married? What is this, 1953?"
Crucially, Cristina is one of very few women in film & TV
who doesn’t regret her decision not to have kids.
"I choose medicine, I choose me, I choose that over
the remote possibility that I might one day regret not having a child."
So she sent the clear message that it was okay for other female viewers
to feel the same.
"And by the way, it's alright to never want kids,
some people don't ever want kids!"
Still, to be fully content with the way
you’ve chosen to lead your life,
you have to accept that others might not get it.
"It isn’t about work; this isn’t a scheduling conflict.
I don’t want to be a mother!”
Cristina’s narrow focus on her career invites accusations of selfishness
and insensitivity.
"You live like you want, how you want, you get whatever you want.
All the time!"
Her decision to have an abortion causes a rift in her marriage
that can't be overcome.
“We’re not on the same page.” [laughing] “Because I don’t do
what you want me to do.” “Because you had an abortion.”
Owen justifies his decision to cheat because Cristina’s life values
differ from his own priority of building a family.
"If you're going to say you had sex with someone
because I had an abortion-" "I had sex with someone
because I was hurt!"
"And you wanted to hurt me back?" She and Meredith also butt heads
as Meredith takes the opposite path
from her, choosing to prioritize her family
and support her husband’s career to the detriment of her own.
“Congratulations, you’ve become the thing you worshipped.”
“You became the thing we laughed at.”
But while others might not always approve,
Cristina’s sticking to her guns pays off
with the rewards she’s wanted all along.
She becomes one of the youngest ever nominees for the coveted
Harper Avery Award,
“You’re Cristina Yang.” “Yes.”
and ends her run as "Cardio God" Cristina Yang,
leaving for a new chapter
at an esteemed medical institute in Switzerland.
"You've become everything I dreamed you'd be."
To be at peace when everything doesn’t immediately go to plan, though,
Cristina also learns to: Accept how much you can’t control.
Cristina comes to a hard realization over the course of the series:
ambition can’t solve everything.
Goals and grit can ensure many successes,
“When it all comes down to your training. Your choices.
Your wits. Your hands. Your stitch."
but in an unpredictable world dictated by random events,
some things simply are not in our hands.
Cristina learns this tough but necessary lesson
about the way the world works
when she’s denied the Harper Avery Award
due to political realities.
"The politics screwed you.
The foundation's relationship with us...
they used you.”
But one of the most impressive things about Cristina over time
is the way that she turns hardships into strengths.
Grey’s Anatomy achieves its characteristic,
high-octane drama week after week by brutally hitting its characters
with one tragedy after another.
Cristina suffers from numerous traumas, including being left at the altar,
“He’s gone.”
performing surgery while a gunman threatens to kill her,
“Owen, I can’t stop. I have to keep going.”
dealing with a bomb threat,
"You had to say you were going to die today?"
suffering a miscarriage,
"Cristina. Cristina!"
and surviving a plane crash.
“Where is she?”
“I don’t know! I only have one shoe!”
These incidents may break Cristina, temporarily.
“I can’t stop, I can't-I can’t stop-” “Crying. She can't stop crying.”
But in the end she embodies the cliché that what doesn’t kill you
makes you stronger.
“The best thing that ever happened to me
was you walking away from our wedding.
It made me stand on my own two feet.”
In fact, without trauma, there would be no Dr. Cristina Yang.
Her father’s death motivated her to become a surgeon
so that she could save other people.
"My hands felt his heart stop beating."
"That’s why I do this. It’s also why I win all the contests."
That doesn’t mean serious trauma
can be overcome through sheer willpower alone.
"If there’s an upside to freefalling,
it’s the chance you give your friends
to catch you."
This is why Cristina knows it’s so important to:
Pick your people.
“You’re my person.” “I am?”
Early on in the first few seasons of Grey's Anatomy,
Cristina learns the importance of
putting aside her utthroat instincts
to form bonds.
She even grows close to bubbly Izzy and hesitates when it comes
to ratting out her friend, even if that loyalty means
costing her time in the OR.
“Because I can’t tell you what happened in that room.
I can’t tell you. And before, I could have.
No guilt. No loyalties. No problem.”
And, despite Meredith’s steamy romance with Derek,
the protagonist’s soulmate on the show is arguably Cristina.
"Derek's the love of my life, but you're my soulmate."
They support each other through ten seasons of trauma,
complex surgical cases, and heartache,
giving each other much-needed reality checks along the way.
“As you weigh your options here, just consider the possibility
of shutting the hell up. Because I can’t listen to it anymore.”
Because of the depth of their friendship,
they can always trust each other to have their best interests at heart,
to give the best advice, and to lift each other up.
“He is very dreamy, but he is not the sun. You are.”
What more could you want in your “person?”
“And you’re my person.”
Perhaps what’s most compelling about Cristina,
as a character and role model, is the way that she breaks the mold
for both the stereotypical hard-working Asian lead
“Because I grew up in Beverly Hills. The only Chinese I know
is from a Mr. Chow’s menu. Besides, I’m Korean.”
and the typical female character onscreen.
“You know when you haven't had sex for a long time
and you forget how good it is, and so you want it less?”
“Yeah, that doesn't happen to me." The model minority stereotype
portrays many Asian-Americans onscreen
as meek, submissive, unsexy nerds
who just want to work hard, earn money,
and stay out of trouble.
Sure, Cristina does have two central traits of the model minority:
she works in a high-paying STEM field and is mercilessly competitive.
"Actually, I graduated first in my class at Stanford."
But she’s loud, opinionated and even rude.
“Grey here is going to become a surgeon,
while you dig ditches by the side of the road.”
She’s also mischievous and fun-loving,
"What are you-oh my god, what are you doing?!
What are you -- insane?!”
[laughing] “Let’s make lemonade.”
and far from being a sexless sidekick, attracts the attention
of many romantic suitors.
“I can do hot in my sleep. I look hot in scrubs.
I’m a hot person.”
And she isn’t particularly close to her family,
subverting the assumption that Asian children must respect
and obey their parents.
“I will kill her!” "I am your mother."
“We don’t do well with mothers here. Why don’t you leave
and come back later?”
Similarly, Cristina doesn’t worry about
presenting as traditionally feminine.
A self-proclaimed slob, she disdains laundry, cooking,
and other household tasks, letting her apartment turn into
the female version of the “man cave” and her male partner shoulder
the burden of domestic chores.
“I don't wash dishes, vacuum or put the toilet paper on the holder.
I hired a maid once. She ran away crying.”
She speaks crudely about sexual pleasure,
"This is a cry for help." "It's a cry for an orgasm."
and takes on the stereotypical role of the non-committal male
when she’s the one who wants to keep her relationship with her boss,
Dr. Burke, casual.
"It's a key." "Why?"
"Why is it a key? Are we feeling existential this morning?"
"If a key turns in a lock, and no one asked for the key
or even wanted it, does it make a sound?"
As a leading female Korean-American character
on one of TV’s most popular dramas, Cristina Yang sent a powerful message
to both women and Asian-Americans:
you can do whatever you want, however you want,
without feeling beholden to the unwritten rules
of whatever categories you belong to.
“You do enjoy crossing the line, don’t you?”
Following Sandra Oh’s departure from Grey’s Anatomy
after the season 10 finale, fans were completely beside themselves.
Ultimately, viewers remain so invested in Cristina Yang
because she was -- and still is --
a woman ahead of her time.
"I never wanted to work for you. I wanted to be you.”
She was a #GirlBoss who didn’t care about what other people thought
and pursued her dreams relentlessly -- one who also went out of her way
to help (or, rather, push) her colleagues to become
the best versions of themselves.
“Have some fire. Be unstoppable. Be a force of nature.
Be better than anyone here, and don’t give a damn
what anyone thinks.”
She’s also a complicated individual, who seamlessly interweaves
the varied tenets of her philosophy according to the situation.
In one moment, she’s the hyper-competent,
somewhat icy career woman who saves the day,
“Thank god you’re here." "Of course I’m here.”
and in the next, she’s a caustic yet compassionate,
fun-loving friend.
It’s in that nuanced balance that we find
the groundbreaking nature of Cristina Yang's character.
“Pretty good is not enough. I want to be great.”
This is The Take. What do you want our take on next?
Thank you to Brilliant for sponsoring today's video.
Brilliant is a problem-solving website and app that offers math
and science courses developed by award-winning professionals
from MIT, Microsoft, and Google.
If you're anything like our favorite onscreen doctors,
you'll know that strong critical thinking skills
and consistent practice are the keys to success.
Brilliant makes the learning process easy.
Their fun daily challenges feature games that teach you how
to solve math and science problems we face in real life.
And if you want to get a mental workout in logical reasoning and algebra,
check out their "Joy of Problem Solving" course.
Click the link in the description below --
Brilliant.org/TheTake -- to sign up for free.
If you're one of the first 200 people to click the link,
you'll get 20% off an annual premium subscription.