You Know What Wesabi is. How About Wabi Sabi?

Create beauty. Value imperfection. Live Deeply.

These words are the sub-title of a book by Richard R Powell.

The book is about a Japanese idea called Wabi Sabi.

What's so special about this idea?

You can think of it as the "original simplicity movement".

700 years old, Japanese monks rejected the pretentiousness of Chinese tea ceremonies with ornate utensils, replacing them with simple tea bowls like this -- in what would come to be known as Wabi tea ceremonies.

From this, Wabi Sabi grew into a world view. A way of life. And an aesthetic.

Powell describes it this way... 

Wabi-Sabi  nurtures all that is authentic by acknowledging three simple realities:  

                                    Nothing Lasts. 

                                    Nothing is Finished. 

                                    Nothing is Perfect. 

The cup gets chipped. The paper yellows. The leaves turn from green to orange to brown and then fall.

A wabibito sees the natural life-force behind all of this and gets in step with it.

Wabi Sabi  then is to appreciate things as they are. 

Here are some of the ways you might put the principles of Wabi Sabi in action in your life....

Let Go Of The Past

When you were in your 20s, you had the body and mind of a 20 year old.  

Now you are older.  You have a different body and mind.  Observe it. Value it. Work with it.

Accept That Nothing Lasts

You were once King of the Hill.  Or Queen of All You Surveyed. 

Now things have changed.  Enjoy your new state. Find beauty in it. Create beauty from it.

Don't Let Your Unachieved Goals Get You Down

You had some goals and ideas. Life interrupted them again and again. So your goals and ideas are ever in an unfinished, incomplete state.

Expect this. It is the Way of Life.

Enjoy the effort.  The movement. The process. 

Observe the dynamism in every day. 

"It is what it is"  as my former boss Judy would say.

Don't Expect Perfection Of Anyone Or Anything

Good, scintillating, wonderful, right, clever. 

This is how you want everything in your life to be.

The outcome of expecting perfection - whether in our job, lifestyle, partner, children, purchases - is frustration.

Don't focus on what is lacking in anything.

Just observe what is.

Become A Student of Life And How It Changes

A wabibito finds materials that age interesting because they exhibit observable changes over time.

Become a wabibito.

Stop fighting to keep everything in life just as it is.

Instead look upon everything that is happening - even the losses and decay - with the eye of a curious and enchanted observer.

It might bring you to the point where, Thoreau-like, you can resonate with the essence of Wabi Sabi as described on the back cover of  "Wabi Sabi - The Art of Everyday Life" by Diane Durston"...

.."tranquil simplicity, rustic elegance, imperfect beauty".

Happy Super Bowl Sunday. Hope it's not too late to suggest you make it a Wabi Sabi day.

Note: Wabi Sabi Simple is just one of the many books that explores Wabi Sabi.  

Here are some others: