Kintsugi

Kintsugi (kin-suh-jee), a 15th century Japanese art, still in practice today, takes broken objects such as a vase or bowl and restores them by using lacquer and precious metals such as gold.

Mending such a broken item in such a fashion not only does not hide the scars, cracks, and chips, it embraces them, showing the items unique beauty.

As mental health therapists we can begin to metaphorically practice such art with our own clients. 

Our clients may have pasts that are painful, pains they have hidden, pains that have been buried for far too long. Given our unique position as therapists, we can come alongside these clients and begin to speak strength into their pains, breathing life into their cracks. 

Clients can learn through this journey that while they may have unique hurts and emotional cracks, they also can have distinct beauties learned only through their own emotional scars. Clients learn overtime that their individual hardships can give birth to immense growth, resiliencies and self-compassion. 

Through their journey they can find a renewed spirit, no longer hiding life’s pain but turning life’s pain into a powerful light that helps illuminate the client’s journey forward. The shackles of fear, once felt to be insurmountable begin to wither, giving way to a new self, a self that understands that life’s previous pains may always be a part of their story, but they are no longer the core themes, the client finds new freedom grounded in love and self-belief.