We can’t always save and restore all of the broken pieces in our lives. The three different styles of kintsugi can help us choose what to keep, what to discard, and how to fill any gaps.
Continue readingThe pieces we keep
brokenness
Does time really heal all wounds?
We’ve all heard the saying that “Time heals all wounds” at one point or another, but is that really true? Let’s consider what the art of kintsugi might have to tell us about this claim.
Continue readingThe alchemy of kintsugi living
In alchemy, base metals were not removed so that they could be replaced by gold. Rather, they became gold through transformation. The same thing is true for the broken places in our lives that become gold through the alchemy of kintsugi living.
Continue readingYou are not your wounds
An important part of the healing process is letting go of our identification with what has happened to us and the broken places it created even as we hold tightly to the kintsugi gold we’ve discovered during our healing.
Continue readingMy broken heart
Guest post author Jill Slayton shares what she is learning from her grief after the death of her husband of 22 years and the inspiration that the art of kintsugi is playing in her healing.
Continue readingTransforming our pain
The work we do toward healing our wounds does as much (or more) for everyone around us as it does for ourselves. We have the choice to continue to transmit our suffering or to do the hard work of transforming that suffering so we can transmit healing and compassion.
Continue readingBoth beautiful and broken
It’s easy to get tunnel vision and see only the beauty or only the broken places in our lives. The truth is that they both coexist all the time. Embracing them both at the same time is one of the gifts kintsugi living can teach us about healthier living.
Continue readingNever not broken
The idea of being “never not broken” may sound discouraging on the surface, but I’m growing to see it more and more as a place of hope.
Continue readingThe missing piece
Sometimes I can’t find all of the pieces when I’m putting a stone back together with kintsugi. This can happen in the broken places in our lives too. How do you decide how to fill the gaps left behind by missing pieces in your life?
Continue readingSelf-brokenness
One of the biggest sources of our feelings of brokenness is ourselves and our belief that some parts of who we are aren’t good enough. Learning to lovingly welcome back home those parts of ourselves that we’ve tried to cut away is the beginning of healing.
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