At the conclusion of a Toastmasters meeting, the leader
said, “The theme for our next meeting will be wabi-sabi.”
Well…that theme was quite different from recent ones, such
as enthusiasm, being prepared, rise and
shine, etc., all of which were easily understood. But wabi-sabi????
Naturally, I made a bee-line for her after the meeting and
smiled as I asked, “Just what is wabi-sabi?”
“It’s a Japanese word that means a way of seeing beauty in things that are
imperfect, like a cracked vase. People who understand wabi-sabi intentionally place the vase so that the imperfection can
be seen rather than hidden.”
After the meeting, I logged on to the internet to find out
more about
wabi-sabi. I learned that ancients
Greeks once prized beauty; westerners desire perfection; but those who practice
wabi-sabi value authenticity. They
see beauty in things that are imperfect, impermanent, and/or incomplete. For
example, they find beauty in things that are rough, irregular, natural, rustic…things
with “character,” such as a table with a few dings and dongs, a chipped cup,
wrinkled faces, etc.
My goodness! I thought.
I’ve been practicing wabi-sabi
for years and didn’t even know it! To
prove it, I looked through my collection of digital photos and found many
images I’d made of what I considered beautiful “finds.” I’d found them in
unexpected places. For example: an outhouse made of rough wood standing beside
acres of sunflowers in full bloom, outgrown children’s shoes being used as small
planters, an old worn-out shoe providing a home to a plant in need of care, textured
walls in an abandoned building, dried blooms silhouetted again a November sky…
One of my all-time favorite wabi-sabi photos is one of my mother’s hands, taken when she was 86
years old. I liked it so much I even wrote a poem about her hands and placed those
words onto the photo itself.
The more we accept the imperfect elements in our
environment and consider them interesting and beautiful, the more willing we’ll
be to let go of our relentless quest for perfection—not only in things but also
in people—including ourselves!
