The Diving Bell and the Butterfly
Last year, I read a book called Half Empty, Half Full: Understanding the Psychological Roots of Optimism by psychologist Susan Vaughan. It’s not your typical “self help” book which I tend to steer away from. Instead, like the name suggests, it discusses the psychology behind optimistic and negative behaviors. The book is not “vegan-friendly” per se, as there are many references to experiments conducted on animals. That said, there was a section of the book that truly inspired me. It is the story of Jean-Dominique Bauby.
Bauby was the well-known editor of French magazine Elle. He suffered a massive stroke in 1995 which left him almost completely paralyzed and speechless, a condition called Locked-In Syndrome. He was only able to blink his left eye and grunt by moving his mouth a little. You would imagine this might destroy an individual, but not Bauby. He managed to remain positive and actually authored the book Le Scaphandre et le papillon, an account of what ordinary events are like for someone in his condition. He authored the book letter by letter. Someone recited a frequency-ordered alphabet repeatedly and he blinked each time he heard the next letter he wanted to use. He would then blink twice at the end of each word. It is estimated that each word in the book took about two minutes to “write.” What an amazing display of will power and optimistic behavior !
The book was eventually made into a movie. I saw it last night. It’s not a movie for the faint of heart. It would be quite impossible, I think, to turn the life of a man who cannot move and ultimately dies into a movie that wouldn’t be the least bit depressing. But at the same time, as cliche as it sounds, it is a beautiful movie about the power of the human spirit that will inspire you to do the craziest, most impossible thing you can imagine.
My favorite line in the movie captures just how inspirational Bauby was to those around him: “Jean-Do, there is no place I have ever been, that is more beautiful than your thoughts. And if sometimes I am at the bottom of the sea with you, you are also my butterfly.”
