How the art of imperfection brings tranquil liberation

In this moment … like a dandelion seed on the wind I’m falling deeper into wabi sabi perception.

Lovingly continuing to sip many times a day, every day from my nearly 15-year old white china coffee mug, handle broken off from two falls, tiny cracks appearing like frail hands on a ladies wrist watch.

Re-reading “Practical Wabi Sabi” by Simon G. Brown.

While looking for an image for you I came across this beautifully-written article by Robyn Griggs Lawrence, Editor of Natural Home, 2001 and author of another Wabi Sabi book, wherein he says:

“Broadly, wabi-sabi is everything that today’s sleek, mass-produced, technology-saturated culture isn’t. It’s flea markets, not shopping malls; aged wood, not swank floor coverings; one single morning glory, not a dozen red roses. Wabi-sabi understands the tender, raw beauty of a gray December landscape and the aching elegance of an abandoned building or shed. It celebrates cracks and crevices and rot and all the other marks that time and weather and use leave behind. To discover wabi-sabi is to see the singular beauty in something that may first look decrepit and ugly.

Wabi-sabi reminds us that we are all transient beings on this planet that our bodies, as well as the material world around us, are in the process of returning to dust. Nature’s cycles of growth, decay, and erosion are embodied in frayed edges, rust, liver spots. Through wabi-sabi, we learn to embrace both the glory and the melancholy found in these marks of passing time.”

Enjoy giving yourself permission to be yourself.

{Post-script: Did you notice my blog images refuse, no matter what I do technically, to center themselves symmetrically under my headlines thus making my posts visually imperfect? Wabi Sabi suggests the eye enjoys asymmetry. I attempt humble acceptance which may lead to tranquil liberty from design decorum.}

Image “In this moment” borrowed from Theresa Durant. Available to buy.