Broken Like Pottery

In this time of the pandemic, we are fearful, anxious, and scared. Some of us have lost loved ones, jobs, or health care. We struggle to believe that when this is over, we will be able to return to something close to normal. 

Each loss fractures us like pottery. 

When a loved one dies, we can remain broken, determined to continue living as we have and honor the relationship we had with the one who died. We do not want to change anything and risk losing what we have left. We want to sit and savor how it was special, because it was, and because nothing outside the relationship ever came close in importance.

For a time, we need to be broken. We need to accept that we are broken without trying to fix it, as Megan Devine says. We need to acknowledge that right now we are not okay, and that it’s okay to not be okay.

The fracture lines threaten to cause the rest of us to fall apart. Yet these cracks are where the light is able to come through our protective shell and reach our darkness. This is where the caring of others comes through to ease our suffering, if we tell them and let them help.

The compassion of others is the resin that holds our shattered life together.

There will come a time when we find that we want to go on living. Maybe not today. Maybe not next week. But one day we will feel something pulling us on. One day we will wake up and hear the birds singing as they greet the rising of the sun, and, for a brief moment, we will feel joy. One day we will rise and begin reassembling our pieces to see what life has left. 

No matter how skillfully the repairs are done, our cracks are still evident, if not to our eyes, then to our fingertips as we stroke our surface. Yet the repairs steady us and make us feel strong again.

In the Japanese art of kintsugi, cracks in valuable pottery are repaired with a resin that includes precious metals like gold, silver, or platinum that accent the cracks. It is honoring the experiences of grief rather than trying to hide them away.

Cracks in pottery are like the lines on the weathered faces of our elders—wisdom lines, laugh lines, and the lines left by sorrow and hardship. The lines that trail through our heart are the map of our journeys.

Being broken and repaired is part of living a life of the heart.

I feel more valuable to others now because I have been broken, because I understand something about this journey. Grief has taught me to notice where others are broken, and taught me the importance of sharing the compassion I received from others.

A face without lines is an empty canvas. 

A heart that hasn’t been broken does not understand the strength of love. 

(pottery bowl by Barry Hall)