WABI-SABI

The W in L’s

I always shield from writing these days, well, writing things I want to share with people. Not because I am going through a block Or because I want to intentionally not share these things but I think I do not want to only share things that break me.

In the beauty of impermanence and that everything would work out soon enough, I still see a need to share pieces of me.

So while I wait for the supposed big W, I would share some things once or twice.

Life use to be bed of roses, even if I barely saw it as so at the time. Thinking back to the moments and I always get mad at myself for not savoring the moment as I should have.

One of the concepts of life I dislike a lot has to be Murphy's law. I don’t like its existence In the first place, even more, I hate that it was coined from realism.

“Anything that can go wrong will go wrong”

“Nothing is as easy as it seems”

“Everything takes longer than you think it will”

Now I want to have a conversation with Edward Murphy. What did he see? What did he go through? What prompted these thoughts? He is too on point, how did he know?

I know life shouldn’t be as smooth as it is in our heads and in my quest of studying other languages, I found “WABI-SABI”.

I want to be able to console myself that nothing lasts, nothing is finished and nothing is perfect.

Murphy is right, so are the Japanese.

Because when I sit and put these things together, I realize there’s a common ground and it is in the imperfection of life.

The realization that life is a basket of choices and we can be dealt any ball from this basket.

One thing that keeps me in check as much as I do not like it is this Murphy’s law. 

When things don’t go my way or the way I intended for it to go, I smile and tell myself I guess it was supposed to go wrong from the start. When it later falls in place, a reminder that things can take longer than we expect and again, its fine.

The teachings from wabi-sabi has somehow kept me very sane these days. 

Wabi-Sabi is a Japanese word that is deeply rooted in explaining the beauty of imperfections, simplicity, and a reminder that nothing is permanent.

Some of the important lessons includes: 

1. NOTHING IS PERFECT:

As sweet as life gets, it somehow gets balanced with the shaky moments of confusion. A reminder that nothing is perfect and life in its full compass is even more dynamic. Everything in life is about timing. The perfection of things we dearly want lies in the time it is presented. A strong lesson is in my day to day life because after I get the body I strongly crave by working out vigorously, I see someone else and now I want that body as well, now I’m eating a lot to get thicker.

We are always in a continuous loop to improve while forgetting that nothing is perfect. 

2. THERE’S BEAUTY AND SATISFACTION BENEATH EVERYTHING

Realizing that diamonds are made from the hottest furnace you can imagine should serve as a reminder that no matter what it seems like, there’s always beauty at the end of chaos.

The triumph doesn’t have to be massive for one to see that the satisfaction we deserve will always present itself to us.

Living a simple life does not equate with being unhappy. Simplicity is attractive and even better seeing the beauty and satisfaction in it is lovely. So when something you think you are in dire need of doesn’t work as planned, take a step back and walk through it again. You would find not just satisfaction but you would see how beneath every L, there’s a W.

3. WE WILL ALL DIE, SO TIME IS OF GREAT VALUE

If we were allowed to live forever, we will misbehave. Death is a way of putting human power in check. As painful as death can be, it can take anyone at anytime notwithstanding the knowledge, talent, and wealth the person possesses. More reason why we should live today like there’s no tomorrow. Impact people we meet on our way and remember that no one lives forever so we should tread carefully. 

I will like to put a halt to the plenty things I have to say here because I could go on and on about what that saying represents to me and there would be no end.

I just wanted to share a beautiful thing with everyone. A word I think should stick with everyone. 

Either it’s Murphy’s law or it’s the Japanese’ beautiful word, they are both coined in a bid to remind us of our humanity. 

Like me and everyone else who demands too much from themselves, something to console us.

So when you catch yourself being at the brink of too much worrying and trying without success, remind yourself, WABI-SABI- accept the unpredictability and imperfection of the world, there’s beauty in chaos.

Yours,

Adetutu❤️