Kintsugi

I'll go ahead and dedicate this blog to my dear sister in law, who had mishaps in her morning that inspired this post. All thanks to a broken trashcan! I'm not the first to have this idea, but it was an appreciated concept in my life today.

I've been having difficulty lately focusing on parts of my life that are in a sense, broken. Moments in which I made mistakes which I still regret. I suppose forgiving myself has been a struggle for most of my life. I can remember a few things that filled me with guilt for years before finally being able to let go of them. At this point in my life, I really only have two to three things that still haunt me in a sense... but their effect has been a heavy weight and I have been uncertain as to how to let go. So, this takes us back to the reason this post is dedicated to my beautiful sister in law.

So the idea here is, that this can be an allegory for our lives as well. Our lives can be more beautiful, because of moments in which they felt broken. 

Someone once told me that she believed my life story was evidence that the Lord had bigger plans for me. I suppose when she first said that, I wasn't sure why that might be so... but I have come to understand that my story is unique, even if there are others with similar experiences. The combination of events, the way I experienced things, the after effects, the ways in which I can grow because of them, that is unique. 

That's where this concept of kintsugi comes in... I can choose to believe that my life is more beautiful for having been broken. It is unique because of those breaks. And that feels like a very tangible way of understanding how I might be able to let go. The Lord can help us fit the pieces back together. He can be that golden lacquer that holds our broken lives together. He can make our lives more beautiful than we could on our own. And more unique than if we had never been broken. I suppose there is something to be said for the fact that if you find a life, filled with these "cracks of gold," it is evidence that they have returned to God again and again to be made whole. And there is a definite beauty in witnessing someone who has been able to find their strength in God despite life experiences, willing to go back to him again and again, who has been shaped and improved by the Lord so many times. There is a beauty in being broken, and made whole again. And no two lives crack in just the same way even if they experience the same trauma. This provides us with the promise that we can be a unique tool in the Lord's hands. A unique piece of artwork that can inspire people the way no one else can. I'm grateful for the mental image this provides. 

Personally, I'm still working on coming to and trusting in the Lord to help me repair the cracks, but I can see that the potential for a beautiful, unique, finished product, is real and possible. I don't have to be forever broken. I don't have to be unpolished and imperfect forever.

In case you missed it, the whole thing is also an allegory for the atonement ;)