It’s easy to feel like you are a mess and that you are too broken to put back together, but I recently learned that its through our brokenness that we see our true beauty.
Before Lockdown, I attended Awareness Arts – a group that ran in the Youth Enquiry Service looking at different issues and raising awareness of them through art. One of the sessions in particular, really stuck with me and it was the day that we looked at mental health. We were talking about how difficult it can be to talk about and how often, people see it as a sign of weakness and brokenness when you reach out for support, when actually it is a sign of strength.
The activity for that session was Kintsugi, where we smashed a jar and then glued it back together, painting gold over the cracks. In Japan, broken objects are often repaired with gold. The flaw, is seen as a unique piece of the objects history, which only adds to its beauty.
Now, whenever I am feeling broken, I remember this and you should too. We may go through things which break us, but as we repair its shows our true beauty.
Next time you drop something, or accidently smash a plate, glue it back together and cover it in gold, to keep as a reminder that even in our brokenness we are beautiful!
