#104: Create clarity
Dr. René Laennec had a female patient in 1816 who was fat and facing some heart problems. Her obesity made it difficult for him to place his hands on her heart and feel her heartbeat properly.
And he was just too shy to lean in and place his ears on her chest directly.
At that moment, Laennec, recalled seeing kids play by placing one end of a long hollow stick to their ear - and how it amplified the noise that scratching of pins made on the other side of the stick.
Inspired by that memory, Laennec instantly rolled a long piece of paper into a cylinder to listen to his patient's heartbeat. And he was surprised to hear the percussion of the heart with much more clarity than he ever had before.
Laennec perfected this idea and created a cylindrical wooden tool and called it the stethoscope. He combined the two Greek words: “stethos” which meant chest, and “skopein” that meant to explore.
Over the next few years, he correlated the sounds he heard through his stethoscope with actual diseases and gave the world a beautiful non-invasive diagnostic tool. Doctors could now diagnose if their patients suffered from tuberculosis or pulmonary phthisis, or some other heart or lung diseases.
But Laennec didn’t come up with the theory of listening to people’s heartbeats on his own.
He stood on the shoulders of a few forgotten giants.
Fifty-five years before Laennec created the stethoscope, Dr Leopold Auenbrugger had written a 49-page book on his idea: how to listen to the heartbeat and understand if the patient had any problems.
Auenbrugger was a physician who also played music. But it wasn’t music that inspired him to create heart percussion as a diagnostic tool. It was his father who was an innkeeper.
Auenbrugger had often seen his father tap on the side of wine barrels to determine their contents. Inspired by that, Auenbrugger started tapping lightly on his patients’ chests to try and determine the density of their tissue and organs. Depending on whether the sound was higher or lower, clear or stifled - he could diagnose the patient's heart and lung ailments.
But Auenbrugger’s ideas were panned by other doctors. Because no one could consistently do what he could do. Listening to the heart seemed like art. And for 50 years, the idea went nowhere. Very few doctors tried listening to people’s hearts.
Until Jean Corvisart, Napoleon Bonaparte’s primary physician, came across his work. Corvisart took Auenbrugger’s 49-page booklet and translated it into a 400-page book - and taught it to his students.
One of his students was the young Laennec.
So, where do the ideas come from?
They can come from anywhere.
You got to remain curious and keep an open mind.
Sometimes an idea just needs clarity.
Auenbrugger’s invention of percussion as a diagnostic tool remained unpopular for 50+ years because it was inconsistent. It left the doctors in doubt. A process can’t become widespread if it confuses people.
When Laennec managed to amplify the sound with his stethoscope, did other doctors get a better grip on listening and understanding what was going on inside the human body?
If an idea is not getting widespread, it could be because it is not clear. Lack of clarity leads to reduced engagement.
Laennec’s own treatise on the diagnosis for the lung and the heart became extremely popular - and was translated and used by doctors all over Europe.
If you can do nothing else but make things clearer with your writing, speaking or illustration, it will be enough to engage people.
The publication I am introducing to you this week is The Gray Camper Van Writer. Just before the pandemic hit, Carol Seymore had an idea to buy a Camper Van so that she doesn’t have to stay in expensive motels while travelling.
What was more interesting was that she bought the van online. Then spent two years getting it fitted to her needs. Now she is living in it and writing stories from there.
I eagerly wait for her newsletter. With each issue, she is making me more and more jealous. Read her intro here.
The book I am reading (re-reading, in fact) this week is How To Change by Katy Milkman. I bought this book almost a year ago, read it and then forgot all about it until I stumbled upon it this week and realized that I have highlighted almost the whole book.
It is not your run-of-the-mill book where the author will give you a one-size-fits-all solution to making change. Instead, it is cutting-edge research-based books that go into personal barriers such as - impulsivity, procrastination, and forgetfulness - stopping you from making behaviour change.
Katy Milkman is a professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, host of Charles Schwab’s popular behavioural economics podcast Choiceology, and the former president of the Society for Judgment and Decision Making.
Yet her book doesn’t read like an academic book. Milkman goes into what works, what doesn’t, and why and also makes you feel like she is by your side cheering you on. Things like:
• Why timing can be everything when it comes to making a change.
• How to turn temptation and inertia into assets.
• That giving advice, even if it's about something you're struggling with, can help you achieve more.
Write Your Book In 30 Days sprint is into its second week.
On Wednesday, we had an interesting question during the group discussion. Why should I add another book to the pile when there are so many good books that already exist on the topic I am writing about?
My answer: No one can write a book you can. Your book is your story, and no one can tell your story. Whatever topic you are writing about, you are explaining it your way, and no one can explain things as you can.
It is your story; your way of explaining things makes your book unique.
There are so many cookbooks on the market, yet new ones keep coming out. Why? Because every cook’s recipes are slightly different. Even if they are making the same thing, there are differences.
And that is why people buy books. They want to learn your recipe, your story.
That’s all from me this week.
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It's true that clarity makes all the difference. Sometimes we get to that clarity by being willing to recombine in new ways what others have done - as your examples show! Thanks for your post!