The Art of Kintsugi

Last weekend I learned the art of Kintsugi — not just the concept, but actually the hands-on practice of the art. Kintsugi is the Japanese art of repairing broken pottery using glue mixed with gold. In our class, we actually broke a piece of pottery and then glued it back together! We then painted the broken lines with gold powder. 

This activity was a holistic experience in connecting with body, mind and spirit. 

There was the physical breaking of the bowl and mending the cracks. My eyes filled with tears even as I walked up to take the hammer in my hand. 

Mentally I was challenged as I was forced to sit still while allowing the glue to dry, only to have the pieces break apart again when they didn’t quite stick together. 

I was fed spiritually as I was invited to connect the bowl to my own brokenness and work through the repairing process of grief and creating beauty around the broken lines. 

It was truly a beautiful experience.

Kintsugi is poetically translated to mean, “golden joinery” or “golden repair.” Interesting enough, yoga in sanskrit is translated as “to join, to unite or to yoke together.”

It was especially meaningful for me to acknowledge the stillness I was able to feel while I held my pieces together, recognizing that yoga has been an incredible part of my own healing journey. 

In that holding I reflected on how difficult such a task would have been for me even a year ago. I know I would have tried too hard, compared myself to others, belittled myself, wanted things to go more quickly, etc..etc..etc… But that day, I found peace in the quiet and gave myself compassion when I had to start over. 

We all have broken pieces to mend in our stories and we all have the opportunity to put those pieces back together and paint them with gold. That was my favorite part —the gluing was a bit painful, but the gold painting was so significant to me. Again, I took my time in creating “beauty out of ashes.”

Healing can be a beautiful process. Of course, when we feel so broken the cracks are deep and the gold is invisible. Sometimes it may even feel easier to stay broken than to truly heal. But I can testify from deep and personal experience that the joy surpasses the pain. The gold will make the scars beautiful. Broken things can be mended. It truly can feel like “golden repair.” 

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“It is only an appreciation of this divine love that will make our own lesser suffering first bearable, then understandable, and finally redemptive.”  President Jeffrey R. Holland⁠