Why Suffering Is Beautiful | A Japanese Philosophy that Changes the Way You Think about Pain

this video is sponsored by the book summary app blinkist use my link in the description and you'll receive a 7-Day free trial and 40% off blinkist annual premium membership all things are created and destined to be broken someday I think being broken or damaged is never a bad thing kokawa hioki if we are one of the luckier ones when we are very young we mostly assume life will be smooth our innocence imbus us with the ideals of stability and Perfection the structure of existence has not yet been BL blemished cracked or broken we assume life

will mostly continue this way in this form all the pieces neatly in their place of course this is only if we are lucky enough to have not already been scathed or damaged in young age which many of us are whenever the bad times do come for us or whenever we experience our first real traumatic event it can leave a bruise a scar or it can completely break us the causal event or period of time can be self-inflicted accidental or the product of others cruelty or indifference be it of strangers or people that are supposed to

be there for us whatever the case may be when these moments happen or these times come naturally we want nothing more than for them to be over with then when they hopefully do pass we want nothing more than to forget about them we want the good times to come back or finally come at all but in this though totally blameless and understandable we might find ourselves pretending that the bad times or negative events never even happened at all consciously or unconsciously we might repress deny rationalize ignore and so on but repression denial and ignorance rarely

absolve us from the effects of the events or times we are attempting to repress or deny even if we are not fully aware of the effects or their Source they can often endure the renowned psychiatrist and author Dr Bessel Vander Coke is one of the world's foremost experts on trauma and Trauma recovery in his groundbreaking book The the body keeps the score Vander culk refers to his decades worth of trauma-based scientific research and therapeutic practice exploring various forms and sources of trauma as well as methods of treatment and Recovery vander's work notably illuminated the clear

relationship between physiological events and states and psychological experiences and behaviors in particular he explains how the body functions as a sort of scorecard or memory bank for information absorbed during traumatic events this absorbed and integrated information subsequently Cali Ates or recalibrates one's neurological functions affecting one's perceptions thoughts and behaviors the stored information is most notably expressed when triggered by experiences of physiological Sensations reminiscent of the original traumatic event or events Vander Kul writes we have learned that trauma is not just an event that took place sometime in the past it is also the imprint left

by that experience on mind brain and body this imprint has ongoing consequences for how the human organism manages to survive in the present trauma results in a fundamental reorganization of the way mind and brain manage perceptions it changes not only how we think and what we think about but also our very capacity to think in order to begin to recover from these traumatic events and the psychophysiological imprints Left Behind Vander culk says that we must not ignore deny or repress the reality of these imprints and their sources but rather we must acknowledge accept and embrace

them with self-compassion and then participate in activities and beliefs that Foster strength self- assertion and reintegration Vander culk writes as long as you keep secrets and suppress information you're fundamentally at war with yourself hiding your core feelings takes an enormous amount of energy it saps your motivation to pursue worthwhile goals and it leaves you feeling bored and shut down only after you identify the source of these responses can you start using your feelings as signals of problems that require your urgent attention the critical issue is allowing yourself to know what you know that takes an

enormous amount of Courage the impulse to reject or deny anything that represents negative time periods in our lives bad qualities in ourselves or terrible events in our past is extremely understandable both from a natural self-preservation perspective as well as a social and cultural perspective particularly in the Western World we seem to want to so relentlessly hold on to that naive childlike idealization of perfection we want things to be perfect uncracked unbroken and eternal we we deny the reality of things the fact that everything is imperfect cracked broken and transient particularly in the west things are

valuable if they are in pristine condition things have been fixed if we don't see the marks of their repair but perhaps this view in at least some sense is it sbroken and dysfunctional perhaps there is some value in at least considering an alternative view looking in the opposite direction of the West we might look to one Japanese art and philosophy that beautifully Embraces the flaw OD and broken experiences of existence known as kuki as an art kuki is a method of repairing broken ceramic wear by mending the pieces back together using lacquer mixed with powdered

gold or sometimes silver or platinum the term literally translates into golden joinery although the precise origins of the technique are unknown It is believed to have possibly begun around the late 15th century after the Japanese Shogun ashikaga yoshim Masa broke one of his cherished tea bowls when yoshim Masa sent the bowl to China to be repaired it was returned to him with metal Staples holding the broken pieces together though functional yoshim Masa in at least this version of the story was not pleased with the brutish ugly look and feel of the bull the repair looked

forced and cold like it was denying the fact of its damage and like it was lacking attention and care and so yoshim Masa instead called upon Japanese Craftsmen to assist him in repairing the bowl again this time in a manner that was more aesthetically pleasing the bow was then returned to him again now with the brok broken pieces artistically incorporated into a new design the lines and fragments where the bowl had been broken now being embraced and accentuated with gold lacer presumably this time yoshim Masa was pleased and the Art of kugi began ultimately this

not only led to the development of kugi as an art but also as a part of philosophy kugi emerged alongside and is associated with the Japanese philosophy known as wabisabi wabisabi is a philosophical worldview that Embraces the value of transience imperfection and incompleteness both from an aesthetic and ontological perspective rather than fighting these qualities wabisabi places them at the center of its value structure seeing them as beautiful and necessary kugi of course Embraces and expresses these values perfectly practitioners and followers of wabisabi believe that kugi ceramic wear becomes more beautiful more valuable and more desirable

than the original unbroken vessel the Brokenness when embraced and artfully mended with patience and effort becomes part of its unique shape unique story and unique value rather than trashing the piece and resisting the damaging event through kugi the gold lacquer illuminates and reveres the damage as a natural and unavoidable part of existence the decay of time the uncertainty of the world and the fragility of being perhaps even more significantly the gold lacquer often makes the ceramic wear stronger adding reinforcement to otherwise weak areas as as humans arguably we can work according to the same process

of kuki or at least we can try we are antifragile beings who with the right attention care and practices can at least sometimes become stronger after damages and shocks when discussing how various systems in nature and Technology can become stronger as a result of chaos disorder and damage the author ins stti Nim Nicholas TB writes antifragility is beyond resilience or robustness the res resilient resists shocks and stays the same the antifragile gets better the process of gugi visually shows this to us it reveals to us the maturity and Beauty found in accepting the events that

damaged us it symbolizes our ability to endure and sustain in the face of these events and it showcases that with patience and the willingness to repair and build from them we can remain functional beautiful and potentially even become stronger of course outside of the analogy of ceramic wear and the Simplicity of Pros actually recognizing embracing and going through this process is extraordinarily difficult the damage we may have sustained may be more severe than what any one person can reasonably overcome on their own and often for all of us damage can be hard to see from

the inside professional help can be and often is essential and we should embrace this too ultimately Brokenness and suffering is a lacquer that coats over and connects us us all if we make it past those first few innocent years of life we will inevitably be scratched stained and likely knocked off the counter broken into several if not many many pieces we will each be used and damaged by Life by ourselves and by others but we can each choose to try to acknowledge our pieces on the floor instead of sweeping them under the rug we can

pick them up and inspect them we can patiently see where they fit and we can place them back in the rightful position mending them with self-compassion and acceptance the process of acknowledging and embracing one's own suffering imperfection Brokenness and transience not only improves the quality of one's experience of their life but it also AIDS one in the ability to help and connect with others and the world we begin to recognize more and more the suffering imperfection Brokenness and transience of all things and in this we can perhaps begin to better connect the individual pieces of

Our Lives to the whole Melting Pot of existence contributing to its strength and beauty our individual suffering may be a spectrum but our unification through it can perhaps be [Music] absolute vander's book the body keeps the score can be an intense read but its value for people dealing with various pains mental physical or both as well as for individuals who have friends or family who are can be immeasurable the book illuminates things like the commonness of trauma the nature of flashbacks and traumatic memories and the effectiveness of certain treatments as well as activities like yoga

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