So you are a broken man? Your past was full of every type of abuse you can think of. You perpetrated many things that society shuns. God only knows to the fullest extent your sins and how you are not worthy to have any success. This way of thinking is full of pain and suffering. I understand we all have a past we are not proud of. We often beat ourselves up over things that we did 10, 15, or even 30+ years ago.
There are veterans who are ashamed of what they did in the name of protecting their brothers and sisters in battle. War is hell, in every sense of the word. They come back with the images they saw and the death they were surrounded by. Some with wounds, others with a deep mental shift in what they thought they believed about men.
There are scars from life that shine through every day. Some people hide the scars while others display them almost with pride. This is Kintsugi being applied to your life. You may tell yourself that you are broken and beyond repair. Yet there is an art form in Japan that takes the broken elements and celebrates them, and because of that, you see that those broken pieces actually made the broken item better.
What is Kintsugi?
It is said that a Japanese Shogun sent a piece of damaged pottery back to china to be repaired and when it came back the cracks in it were considered ugly and made the pottery unusable. So he found a man who was able to repair it and he used gold as a mean’s to seal the pottery back up. The results made this piece of pottery even more valuable.
This, is with the Japanese philosophy of Wabi-Sabi where they embrace the imperfections of items that gave birth to the beauty of Kintsugi. The fact that the bowl or vase was broken doesn’t mean that it cant still be useful or ugly. In fact, it is the actual imperfections or the damage that it took that makes it beautiful. This is a lesson you can take from your life.
How does this apply to my life?
We have all been through something, and many people don’t like to hear it but you are living the life you are supposed to live. Yeah, there are those who scream, “you mean I was supposed to have been beaten and mentally abused?” The hard line is yes. You needed that experience to become the wonderful person you are today.
You made it through the horrifying ordeal. How you respond to that ordeal is what will make your life great or not. Are you going to become a great person in spite of the events in your life, or are you going to be identified as the broken piece of pottery on the ground?
Are you going to have scars of gold, or are you going to have jagged edges that cut and hurt other people? All because you went through something hard and challenging?
You may tell yourself that you are a broken person. You can’t be great because of what you went through. I say that’s a lie you are telling yourself so you don’t have to do the uncomfortable work of pulling the pieces together and start gluing them. You may ask but I am damaged goods. Congrats so are the rest of the human population.
We all have had something that may or may not be viewed as traumatic. The events of our life have shaped us for the better not the worse. The fact that you made it through that hard and cruel challenge proves how resilient you truly are, and I personally hope that you see that your life is beautiful. Those scars will heal with gold in their place. If you will see how you survived and made it out you can be seen as an inspiration for those who come after you.
Look for the gold
If you take the courage to look at what you have gone through be it the battles of your childhood or the hell of war. You will see that you have developed some pretty amazing skills. You have learned how to survive. Thanks to these qualifications you have abilities others don’t have. You have changed. It is now up to you to decide, is it for the better or for the worse?
Are your scars made of gold or are they a cheap plaster and super glue? Are you able to still retain water or do you leak from those breaks you suffered from? All of this is your choice. Yes, life dealt you a bad hand but it is now up to you to play them. Many people have won even though they didn’t have a full house or a royal flush.
You now have the opportunity to be an inspiration to others who have been dealt the same cards. You are able to be triumphant over your oppressors or you can be a mental prisoner and suffer for the events you had no control over. Do you want to be the victor or the victim? This is your path. You have the ability to change course at any time and go.
What about the other people in your life? What about those who hurt you? You can show them they have no power over you. You are not going to be stuck in the mire of self-pity anymore. You are going to take the steps to perform massive actions in your life.
Your life is for you. Not them. You have spent too much of your time letting horrible things happen in your life. Control your life. It is time to step up and grab the reigns because you have had the power this whole time to change course to go forth and ride!
