A rare condition struck Vanessa Potter with blindness and paralysis almost over-night.

In 2012 Vanessa’s life was ticking along just fine. It wasn’t perfect, but she had a successful career and a loving family. Vanessa had just taken time out to set up a new business and hang out with her children. Unfortunately fate had other plans and Vanessa was hit with a mystery illness leaving her blind, paralysed and reeling.

The year it took for Vanessa’s sight to return changed her life and recovery was anything but usual. Vanessa’s response to her illness was to document the entire journey via an mp3 player. Her curiosity and quest for answers led her to Cambridge University, persuading neuroscientists to help her research her incredible visual rebirth. After collaborating on an EEG project that invited members of the public to see and hear their own mindful brainwaves translated into music and art, Vanessa was invited to give a TEDx talk in Ghent. Vanessa published her first book, Patient H69: The Story of my Second Sight, in 2017.

Vanessa’s curiosity didn’t end there, she publishes her latest book Finding My Right Mind: One Woman’s Experiment to Put.

Also, you can listen to Vanessa’s podcast where she will “look at what happens when meditation is challenging and how it can sometimes nudge up again trauma. I’ll ask why my inner critic needs a name (and an outfit) and how perfectionism is the worse aspiration I can have.” 

As always thank you for listening.