Solace in Flawed Beauty
Based on Wabi-Sabi, a Japanese philosophy
The Indian cuckoo bird (Koel) is always valued for its melodious voice and not shunned for its color. Green mosses growing on a rustic old wall are considered artistically beautiful, not ugly. We acknowledge the beauty in the imperfections of mother nature. Then, why do we Humans want everything about us to be perfect? A perfect career, life partner, family, and looks? We never expect a melodious cuckoo to be as beautiful as a peacock as we accept them with their flaws. Then, why do we tangle ourselves in comparisons and are overly critical of our imperfections? With the desire for perfection, we keep burning ourselves under the constant pressure of excessively high standards to prove ourselves to others. Often, such compulsions lead us to disappointments and discontentment.
In the contemporary world where we are constantly living under materialistic pressures, Wabi-Sabi an ancient Japanese ideology reflects a fresh insight into living. It reveals to us, the art of living in imperfection and simplicity to enjoy an optimistically contended life.
These philosophies center around balancing our life on the wheels of impermanence, imperfection, and incompleteness. Wabi-Sabi conceptualized that nothing is permanent as everything in nature keeps changing and fades with time. Hence nothing is defined as Perfect. It also theorized on embracing the things with their flaws, damages, and incompleteness.
The Origin:
The Wabi-Sabi ideas came into existence by Sen no Rikyu, the sixteenth-century Zen monk who also started the concept of the famous Japanese tea ceremony. As a young lad, he went to a renowned tea master named Takeeno Joo for training. The latter wanted to test the abilities of his new apprentice and asked him to take care of the garden. Rikyu immaculately cleaned it from top to bottom. However, before presenting his work to his master, he shook a cherry tree, and Sakura flowers fell on the ground. This touch of incompleteness brought beauty to the scene and born the concept of Wabi-Sabi. It believes that imperfection and incompleteness leave behind a scope for improvement and transition.
I have already shared my views on minimalistic living as one of the principles of Wabi-Sabi in my article Minimalism — The Way to Rediscover Life. Here are my thoughts on finding the essence of life in imperfection through the lens of Wabi-Sabi philosophies.
# Highlight your Competencies
The shakuhachi, a traditional Japanese flute, beautifully inherits the ideas of Wabi-Sabi of highlighting one’s inner competencies. A flute is a simple structure made from a rough bamboo pipe, open at both ends with holes and a bottom end made from the bamboo stalk. Its craftsman has not devoted much time to its outer appearance and sophistication. But the long years of craftsmanship and refined engineering have been done to bring out its inner competence.
The melody carved out from this simple-looking instrument inspires us to work more on polishing our inner strength and skills than our outward appearance.
The Learnings
In today’s world, where your looks come with a higher stake, this ideology of Wabi-Sabi is a need of the hour. We spend endless time and money on our physical appearances but still remain unsatisfied.
On the contrary, by investing more of our efforts in brushing up our knowledge and skills, we can achieve to be much more confident and successful. At work, it is our skills and competence that stand out. Even in the glitz and glamour world, looks may give you the first break, but success comes with your craft to perform.
Skills are like diamonds, the more you edge them the more they sharpen and shine and radiate you with an optimistic persona.
#The beauty of aging
A brilliant philosophical idea of Wabi-Sabi I get to witness is the art of creating bonsai, miniature trees. This ideology contemplates growing more beautiful as time passes with patience, wisdom, and gratitude.
Growing old is the natural cycle of life and being a wise, contended, loving self is the beauty of aging. This philosophy needs to be understood well in today’s world, where every second person is going berserk in the horde of looking younger and perfect. In 2020 alone, the size of the anti-aging market worldwide was estimated to be about $60 billion U.S. Dollars. It is alarming to see how people are going under the knife for sculpted bodies and faces and later live with health issues. What’s the point of having a perfect exterior when your inner aura remains in a mess?
#Resilience in flaws
Another outstanding extension of the Japanese philosophy of Wabi-Sabi is the art of Kintsugi which sees beauty in imperfection by highlighting the flaws.
Origin of Kintsugi Art:
The Kintsugi art came into existence around the fifteenth century, when the Japanese Shogun of the Ashikaga shogunate, Ashikaga Yoshimasa, sent his favorite teacup, which broke, to China to get it repaired. The teacup was returned to him unsightly stapled with metal ligatures and was of no use. It was then sent to Japanese craftsmen for repair. The craftsmen decided to transform the cup into a jewel filling its cracks with lacquered resin, glue-like tree sap, and powdered gold, which gave a unique dimension to the teacup. Hence came into existence new art of repairing broken pottery named Kintsugi. In the ancient Japanese tea ceremonies to date, the Japanese teacups used are asymmetrical shapes based on Kintsugi art.
Under this craft, the broken pottery is not thrown away but repaired. The main principle of art is to not hide the scars of the shattered ceramic but to highlight them more strongly and beautifully.
The Learnings
In our lives, through the art of Kintsugi, we understand how to reconcile with failures and accidents and remain optimistically resilient. Whether it’s recovering from a personal loss or a job, injuries, divorce, or other traumas, we have two choices, either we miserably hide behind it or confront it head-on. Kintsugi art provides us with the insight to confront our problems by showing us that things can be repaired.
It reveals how to find beauty in our imperfections by embracing our golden cracks of hurts, failures, and flaws. By Accepting the imperfection in you and learning from failures you’re always moving forward in life by giving it a new dimension, similar to a broken pottery that gets repaired under Kintsugi craft.
Conclusion:
To conclude, Wabi-Sabi principles distinctly conceptualized that not a single person in this world is flawless nor is any relationship, whether it’s with your career, family, or a life partner. By chasing perfection, you’re denying yourself a continuous flow of change and further self-improvement.
Dr Rachel O’Neill, LPCC, a therapist at Talk space, says, about Wabi-Sabi philosophies, “Embracing the imperfect means that we celebrate our strengths. This shift of mindset from striving for an impossible ideal to embracing our strengths leads to a more positive and strength-oriented mindset.”
Imperfection is a form of FREEDOM setting you free from the chains of being perfect. Let’s adapt to Wabi-Sabi ideologies to give a beautiful twist to our lives.
Wishing you all a Merry Christmas and a Prosperous New year.
If you like this article, you may also like to read-
Minimalism — The Way to Rediscover Life
