Charles Pépin’s editorial: “I would like this morning, and for the last time, to tell you a story: the story of the vital impulse. This force which according to Bergson runs through all living things. It is this force which makes ivy grow, gives it the ingenuity to get around obstacles, just as it is this force which makes the horse gallop. It is also this force which makes us, humans, more creative than ivy, and living a more complex life than that of the horse. It is this force which makes geniuses creative and expresses itself in the intuitions of scientists. Bergson’s thesis is astonishing: even if the vital impulse is not expressed in the same way in the growth of a plant and in the genius of a painter, it is still the same vital impulse: it is the same life which pulses, never stops reinventing itself, as if there were at the very heart of the living a force of creativity.
“You see,” Nietzsche’s Zarathustra already said in Life, “I am that which must always overcome itself.” This means that Life is never content to be what it is, that it is always a little more than itself, or at least aspires to be. This means that obstacles, even trials, can have the virtue of allowing us to measure the strength of this life within us. It is then against adversity that life unfolds, reveals itself, and that we find resources whose existence we would never have suspected in calm weather.
To talk about it this morning, I have the joy of welcoming an exceptional woman who has a lot to teach us about this Vital impulse, about this way in which we can find within ourselves, in the very heart of adversity, the resources we need. French wheelchair tennis champion, ranked 13th in the world, she is aiming for a medal at the Paris Paralympic Games which begin on August 28, that is to say Wednesday. Victim of a road accident which cost her a leg, she who was then only an amateur athlete and worked in the audiovisual sector reacted immediately, in the very second she understood that she would not get her leg back: “in 2024, I will do the Paris Paralympic Games”. That was in 2018 and today, six years later, a few days before these Games, Pauline Déroulède is with us under the sun of Plato and in her company, we will try to answer this difficult question: what is the vital impulse? Where does this life force in us come from?
In the starting blocks Listen later
Lecture listen 3 min
A saving promise
Pauline Déroulède remembers: “My partner immediately read the distress in my eyes and swept away all the worries, the fears that I could have while being on the ground, on the floor, with one leg missing with her promise to love me all her life. Even today, with a lot of humor, I tell her that she doesn’t have to hold it. She is free to leave. But this ordeal has made our love stronger. And today, we have a wonderful little girl with us in our lives…”
A strong objective
“I made the promise to do the Paralympic Games in the recovery room after the accident to my very worried loved ones, whom I wanted to reassure. I also needed to set myself a strong and ambitious goal because having goals in my life has always been a driving force. At that time, I didn’t know in which discipline, or how, or if I would be able to. It was a way of committing myself. There was the Pauline before the accident and the one after. I think that this reaction was a matter of survival instinct. I had no choice. ” analyzes the Paralympic athlete.
An accident surrounded
“In the hospital, I was surrounded by inspiring people, models of resilience. Of course, there were extremely difficult moments when I felt alone, especially in the evenings in the hospital, when the lights go out, when the visits are over, when you have to deal with your own fate. But for all that, I was very lucky. I was very privileged to be so well surrounded.” says Pauline Déroulède.
A provision favorable to resilience
The day before, psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Boris Cyrulnik was a guest on the show. For him, good resilience requires certain conditions, including having been emotionally secure before the shock. Pauline Déroulède agrees with him: “Before, I was very privileged, loved, fulfilled professionally and personally. I was perhaps well built, with a good head on my shoulders, and that certainly played a role later on. Above all, alone, I don’t think I would be here, in front of you, talking to you, preparing myself, competing in the Games. Honestly, it’s really a team achievement to be standing today with the prosthesis that allows you to do almost everything.”
The rest with the mental preparation, the high-performance equipment… Is worth listening to.
Estelle Gapp’s sports column
“I’m seizing the opportunity and I’m offering you, Pauline, a little quiz, a little journey through time…
Do you know where the word “tennis” comes from? Is it a French or English word? Do you know who the first female tennis champion in history is?
To answer you, I invite you to open the fascinating “Dictionnaire amoureux du tennis” (A Dictionary of Tennis) published by Plon, by Laurent Binet and Antoine Benneteau… We are in 1599. The word “tennis” appears under the pen of a certain… William Shakespeare! The play Henry V takes place in the middle of the Hundred Years’ War, at the famous Battle of Agincourt, in 1415. The Dauphin of France negotiates the withdrawal of the English by offering them… a basket full of tennis balls!
Henry V snubs him and replies: “Be thanked for your present and your trouble. When our rackets are adjusted to these balls. Thanks to God, we will play in France a game that will blow your father’s crown.” On October 25, 1415, Charles of Orleans, future father of Louis XII, was taken prisoner. During the 25 years of his captivity, he introduced the English to the famous “jeu de paume”, the ancestor of tennis, which is played with the hand. From the palm, therefore, he throws the ball while shouting “Tenetz” in old French… The word, distorted by the English accent, will gradually become “tennis”…
Meanwhile, in Paris, a woman becomes the first indoor champion: and you will see, Pauline Déroulède, that she resembles you: here is what the Annals of 1427 say about it: “In that year there came to Paris a woman named Margot, quite young, like 28 to 30 years old, who was from the country of Henault, who played tennis the best that any man had seen, and with this she played in front of the hand and behind the hand very powerfully, very maliciously, very skillfully, as a man could do, and few men came to whom she did not win, except the most powerful players”
Back to the present, Pauline, here is the advice of Laurent Binet and Antoine Benneteau, a few days before the Paralympic Games: “Hold your racket as if your life depended on it; with this state of mind, you will experience all the joys of this sport; Hold on, because it can also create great sadness.
Stand your ground, because it is a sport of confrontation; Keep your eyes on this bouncing object called the ball, and that you will have to tame; Keep the pace that your opponent sets for you, and who could well be the first to run out of steam; Keep the promise to give your all during a match
Hold the hand of your child who will cry when he knows his first defeat”; But above all, Pauline: Stand up straight when you receive your Olympic medal, because you will have it, we are with you with all our hearts!
This is your last show, Charles… You who are a great player, but above all a great tennis spectator, I throw the ball back to you… it’s up to you to transform it into a match ball…”
Under Plato’s Sun Listen Later
Lecture listen 51 min
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