Happy Friday! School is starting around the country, but not here yet. It’s still sunny summer with long days and beach trips and abundant locally grown fruits and vegetables. Tomato sandwiches and juicy perfect peaches. Mmmmm. Below are my five favorite finds of the week.
1) Summer Olympics – Watching the Olympics has been a joyful experience this week. I’m trying to keep up with the Refugee Team, and this BBC article is a helpful update. As for the Gold medals, several are being won, as you already know, to these two favorites of mine – Simone Biles and Michael Phelps. USA! USA! USA!
Photo Credit: The Guardian
Photo Credit: Live News Chat
2) Global Leadership Summit – This is an incredible leadership conference…the best I’ve ever attended. It’s simulcast from Chicago to sites all over the world. You’ll be hearing much more about the content in the days to come. I’m halfway through it as I post this. Brian Dodd does a live blog on it where you can gather quotes from each speaker, and on Twitter and Facebook, watch for the trending hashtag #gls16. Great content!
Photo Credit: Twitter
3) Life After Being Locked-In – Vegetative states and the locked-in syndrome have always been fascinating to me, as a nurse. An unforgettable moment for me in teaching nursing at Yale University years ago was walking into a patient’s room to meet him. He was in a wheelchair and when I entered he was looking in my direction. I said hello and he just continued to look at me…expression-less. This beautiful young man…seemingly not there at all…in some sort of vegetative state from a brain injury.
When I was a child, I watched a rerun of Alfred Hitchcock Presents episode “Breakdown” from the very first season in 1955. It was a psychological thriller about a man who survived a car accident but was paralyzed, completely unable to move or communicate. It was terrifying.
Martin Pistorius, a South African man living today in the UK, had his own terrifying journey, in real time, through being locked-in. At the age of 12, he developed some sort of illness where he quickly lost his abilities until he went into a full-blown coma. He stayed in this condition until he was 16…when he began waking up. Unfortunately, he looked no different and wasn’t able to communicate.
Photo Credit: YouTube
He continued “invisible” for almost another 10 years, until one of his therapists became aware that he was actually responsive. His story is amazing. Once it was discovered that he was actually conscious, he began the incredible journey of treatment and rehabilitation. He went on to learn to communicate with an adaptive device, graduated university, became a web designer, and wrote a book about his experience (Ghost Boy). During his locked-in experience, he found God his only companion and became a follower of Christ. Now, he has also found the love of his life in Joanna whom he married.
Photo Credit: NBC News
He communicates his own journey so well in this TEDx talk. The kindness and understanding in his demeanor speak volumes as well. Watch his TEDx talk below or at least read the transcript (in link above). I’m so glad to have discovered this young man and know his story.
He closed his talk with these words:
“We are told that actions speak louder than words. But I wonder, do they? Our words, however we communicate them, are just as powerful. Whether we speak the words with our own voices, type them with our eyes, or communicate them non-verbally to someone who speaks them for us, words are among our most powerful tools. I have come to you through a terrible darkness, pulled from it by caring souls and by language itself. The act of you listening to me today brings me farther into the light. We are shining here together. If there is one most difficult obstacle to my way of communicating, it is that sometimes I want to shout and other times simply to whisper a word of love or gratitude. It all sounds the same. But if you will, please imagine these next two words as warmly as you can: Thank you.“
4) Walking Her Home – Mark Schultz wrote this sweet song Walking Her Home after he was inspired by this older couple in his neighborhood. The husband was so tender with his wife and he told Mark that he’d promised her dad he’d walk her straight home after their first date and never leave her. He was still keeping that promise. We have all been touched by stories of an elderly spouse dying and the other dying shortly after. This CNN news report tells an especially sweet such story…
Photo Credit: Bellevision
…and here’s the song (with video from The Notebook, from the novel by Nicholas Sparks).
5) KevOnStage – Kevin Fredericks is a very funny guy. I just discovered his videos this week. Here’s a hilarious sample:
Here’s to a relaxing weekend. Hope you recover some of your sleep missed by late night Olympics watching…if you’re like me. Be safe and savor this life…and the people we have in it. God keep you.
