Listening and Wabi Sabi

I am blessed with a spiritual director who is an extraordinarily good listener.  As I pondered my gratitude for this gift I also recognized that her listening enabled me to be more at home with myself and gentler with myself.   Everyone likes to be heard and understood but it is far more important to be at home with ourselves.  I didn’t quite recognize the connection between listening and feeling at home until I read this quote from Rachel Naomi Remen’s Kitchen Wisdom:  Our Listening creates a sanctuary for the homeless parts within another person.

 

As we begin this New Year what a great challenge for us!  The most important gift we give one another is the gift of listening.  A sanctuary is a safe haven.  Our listening can create this safe haven for others.  But what are “the homeless parts” within us that seek this safe haven?  As I pondered that question I got lost in my varied cracks, flaws and imperfections and the shame that so easily creeps within me when I see myself as less than worthy or less than perfect.  These are the homeless parts within me – the parts that I deny within myself over and over because I am convinced that everyone else has it more together or more contained than I.  A good listener enables me to let go of the need to prove myself and not worry about what people will think if we fail or give up or seem less than perfect in any other fashion.  Perhaps it is a good listener who enables us to be at home with the broken, homeless parts of who we are.

 

Thinking about my “homeless parts”, I have decided to embrace the Japanese world view of wabi sabi.  In this world view the aesthetic is described as one that is "imperfect, impermanent, and incomplete".  Wabi Sabi is the art of appreciating the beauty in the naturally imperfect world.  This Japanese philosophy celebrates beauty in what’s natural, flaws and all.  Wabi Sabi nurtures all that is authentic by acknowledging three simple realities: nothing lasts, nothing is finished, and nothing is perfect." (Powell, Rich)rd R. (2004). Wabi Sabi Simple. Adams Media)

 

What if we learned to cherish the flaws and the cracks in our messy lives, the homeless parts within us.  After all, it is the cracks in our life that let in the light – a good thing by any standard.  We can do this each day by listening to one another and creating a sanctuary for the homeless parts within another person.  The challenge is on!