If you’ll allow me to set the stage through some brief family history, I’m going to write about brokenness, the art of kintsugi, fingerprints, and those damn elephants that wreak havoc in the living rooms of our life. Interesting combination huh?
I’ve always strived to be a transparent person; to let people know I rarely have the answers… I’ve tried to consistently avoid the poser-mask, to be authentic so I could live with myself. My strength has typically been a willingness to share my own struggles so the people I talk with knew there was no judgment… that I could relate to their circumstances, but also to offer more questions and challenge people to find the courage to take a deep and honest look at their own story.
I’m a work in progress and sometimes when I’m digging through my past, something gets unearthed that leads to an “Oh shit!” moment. I liken it to doing a full remodel on an old house: in the process of gutting a room to remodel, you discover something that lay hid behind the walls and must immediately be addressed before you can move forward. It may be hard, and the things we discover hidden behind those walls may lead to delays and additional costs, but if addressed properly, it can lead to a better outcome and avoid simply putting lipstick on the pig.
Okay, let’s lay the groundwork quickly and get to the point because I really do believe there is something valuable mixed in here to ponder.
FAMILY DRAMA… BROKENNESS
I believe it was early 2016 when my daughter initiated a ritual that has continued as long as we’re both in town, a weekly get-together at a local coffee shop where we talk about work, religion, politics, hiking… life really. I’ve always valued this time, especially as I consider it was driven by her and not the need of this old fart to maintain connections with my kid.
Yesterday was another Friday morning conversation, and due to some memories triggered by my activities on a recent trip, she asked questions that led down a path toward the topic of my birth family. My 34-year-old daughter does not really know her family on my side other than a few memories when she was younger, and interactions that took place over about a 5-month period prior to my dad’s passing in 2011, and much of that is influenced by my decisions to have nothing to do with them even though two of the three remaining family members live within 60 miles of me.
Significant events took place in the mid-80’s, when I was a 20-something young man trying to figure out who I was after giving up basketball. I always defined myself as an athlete, and when it became apparent that season of my life was coming to an end, I’ll admit I was lost… wandering aimlessly. My compass was broken, and I had no idea where I was going or who I wanted to be. The problems grew exponentially when a perfect storm hit. After 35 years of marriage, my mom left my dad for another man who had money, and I believe the entire family was blindsided by this event. My sisters were 6 and 9 years older than I and married or on their way to becoming married, but I understand this impacted all of us in very different ways.
I want to fast-forward as much as possible because there are some good things to talk about, so I will describe in the most basic way that by the late 1980’s, I was in survival mode and making decisions from a very wounded place in my soul. Things happened… more damage occurred in my heart, but I also inflicted damage on others. Hurtful things were done, hurtful things were said… shit happened.
My daughter was born in 1990 and by 1991 her mother and I were divorced. I felt it was important to admit to my daughter that I was a trainwreck during those years; I felt it was important to allow her the opportunity to freely talk about how my decisions impacted her… not just the decision to divorce, but to also allow the door to be unlocked and opened into the early and mid 1990’s as she was growing… how did my brokenness impact her, what crap did I create that she has to work through in therapy as an adult… Even as we talked yesterday, I sensed the importance of the conversation. We’ve touched on all this before, but they’re never a one and done thing. Things come up, things get processed, new things surface, new perspectives come into view. The opportunity to freely talk must always be an open door.
BROKENNESS…A PART OF THE HUMAN CONDITION
As we talked about brokenness, I shared that my experience over the years working as a probation officer has allowed me to share in the stories of good people who sometimes got caught up in bad situations. Sure, there were plenty of repeat offenders… but I can say that even in many of those cases, they were good people that were limping through their own story. Like I said about myself several paragraphs above… oftentimes people are “in survival mode… they’re making decisions from a wounded place in their own soul; hurtful things are done, hurtful things are said… shit happens.”
Please understand, I am not tooting my own horn here, but over the years in my job, my coworkers and supervisors recognized I could work effectively with some difficult personalities. I assure you it was not some unique talent I possessed. The secret sauce was being willing to be transparent; I was willing to allow myself to be a human being and share when appropriate that in so many ways, we walked a similar path. It’s not rocket-science here… if you’re willing to be vulnerable and let people know in very tangible ways that you truly do relate to where they are coming from, it’s amazing how the guard drops and people get real about their struggles… and it’s not some leap to understand that when trust is developed, people can handle being called out on their bullshit in a way that leads to productive outcomes.
I’ve also come to the conclusion over the years that we are all broken people. Life can often be harsh, and it’s not just those living out on the margins of society that are broken. Oftentimes, I believe many of us just have the ability to conceal it better than others. Which leads to the art of kintsugi.
THE ART OF KINTSUGI
Many people may be familiar with the art of kintsugi, but if not, it’s a Japanese art of repairing broken pottery or ceramic by mending the fractures with lacquer, usually mixed with gold, silver, or platinum. The gold, silver, or platinum actually highlight the fractures… draw attention to them.
Unfortunately, our human nature is to cover up the brokenness, but in this form of art, the break is highlighted and honored. It’s what sets every piece of pottery apart from every other piece, it makes it unique. Do you sense where this is going yet?
If we could come to grips with seeing our brokenness as something that sets us apart, makes us unique… AND… a big “and” here, if we would embrace the process of allowing our brokenness to be put back together, we could see that the experiences we’ve endured and overcome actually add to the value and the beauty of who we are as an individual.
BROKENNESS IS LIKE FINGERPRINTS
If you will accept this, I would suggest that our brokenness is very much like our unique set of fingerprints. It’s common knowledge we all have a different set of fingerprints, and this sets us apart from one another. In the same way, if we would embrace our brokenness, if we would embrace the limp we walk with in this life, we could then see it as the unique cracks that when highlighted with the gold, silver, or platinum, set us apart and draw attention to our unique beauty as an individual. We don’t have to put a mask on and blend in with those around us… we can be seen for who we are and be valued for our unique experiences which are being overcome.
I share this next thought with prior permission from my daughter, and to make a point about the importance of embracing the brokenness instead of hiding it. Although initially her mother and I were not aware of what was going on in her life, at the time our ritual of weekly coffee get-togethers began, she was in a relationship that was becoming increasingly violent. She found the courage to get out several months after we started meeting, but even then, I was clueless. Over probably a 6–9-month time span after she left the relationship, things were revealed in our conversations… things she experienced.
I share this to make this point: there was a conversation one morning about what she was going through, and I heard the word “survivor” spoken several times. It bothered me because I honestly hate that word. Cancer-survivor… domestic violence survivor… I have no doubt that likely rubs someone the wrong way, but the coach in me… the probation officer in me… the life coach in me, hates the idea that we create an identity that is connected to something negative in our lives.
WHO DO YOU WANT TO BE?
At some point during that conversation, I asked my daughter a question? Who do you want to be, a Survivor, or a Thriver? I meant no disrespect to her experience, but I am such a believer in the idea that we truly become the person we identify with. You are more likely to hit what you’re aiming for, not what you are not aiming for. I believe there are many people out there who are stuck in the event that created the brokenness because they continue to identify with the event. I don’t apologize for not being a therapist, for not having a string of initials after my name… I don’t apologize for being battle tested over the years and having wisdom in my later years that in many circumstances was often learned through my lack of wisdom in younger years. Sometimes hard lessons must be endured…
In the metaphor about the broken pottery, the breaks in the pottery create a portion of the story, the gold, silver, or platinum highlight the uniqueness of the story of each pot, but the breakage is not the story anymore than the events that lead to our brokenness fully describe our story.
But what about the elephant?
MAKING PEACE WITH THE ELEPHANT
As I shared these thoughts early this morning with my writer friend over coffee, I said something about our injuries being similar to the elephant in the room we learn to live with but never want to acknowledge. He asked if I ever thought a person could remove the elephant from our story. My initial thought was that we cannot remove the elephant anymore than we can remove the cracks in the pottery… and why would we want to? If the cracks in the repaired pottery set us apart and add to our value, we should not want to remove the elephant. Our goal then would be to not only acknowledge the elephant but to make peace with the elephant. And part of making peace with the elephant is preparing an appropriate place for the elephant to exist in our story but getting it out of the living room before it creates more damage should be a priority. We laughed about that, but I think there is some truth in there.
I know there are likely holes in this thinking, but all I can do is see how this thinking has worked in so many conversations over the years with not only people within the legal system, but with people who were willing to get real in conversations over a cup of coffee.
My hope here would be that a person is willing to do the work, to unearth the things that lay in the shadows of our life but still remain influential to the present-day decisions we make. I would hope for those who embrace this process to not be focused on the cracks, but to instead begin the process of using the gold, silver, and platinum to repair the cracks and put the vessel back together… and to see the beauty created through overcoming the events that led to the brokenness in the first place. I would hope that those of you who embark on this process would have the insight to know we all have brokenness within us… even those who we perceive to have their shit together… and understand that many simply do not want to acknowledge it but instead, wear a costume that conceals it.
I truly believe you are actually a trailblazer when you choose to embark on this process because you have chosen to leave the well-worn path of the herd and enter into the adventure of climbing a mountain many avoid.
I’m not yet at the summit… but I hope to see you at the top.