Wabi Sabi - my new favorite thing...

Wabi what?  Wabi sabi.  Have you heard these words?  They’re Japanese.  I recently learned about this when I was watching Jamie Windsor’s You Tube Video “When Bad Photos are better”. A friend and fellow photographer shared it in a Facebook group recently and it really, really resonated with me and inspired me to think about how so-called bad can actually be good. Wabi Sabi is a philosophy which leads us to see that because nothing is ever perfect or permanent or finished, because of those inherent truths, things are truly beautiful. It's both sad when you think about it, but also really inspiring. It seems to go against what we strive for while somehow also celebrating our individuality and all the things in our world that are perfectly imperfect. 

A peony growing in the garden in the spring is beautiful. It smells lovely and it has all those beautiful fluffy pedals that nature somehow created on a plant growing out of the dirt. It's beautiful only for a few days because pretty quickly those pedals start to fade. They turn into a slimy brown substance, the plant wilts and the stems fall over under the weight of the giant flowers.

A chocolate chip cookie is delicious coming out of the oven. Fresh baked cookies - is there anything better than that? But that same cookie, two weeks later, is not quite as tasty.

A birthday party that we've planned and celebrated with our friends and family is a wonderful experience. It’s an event where hopefully everybody has fun when they're there, but it comes to an end. It doesn't last forever. If you went to a birthday party that did last forever, it wouldn’t be that much fun.

The peony, the chocolate chip cookie and the birthday party, they're all beautiful, wonderful things to experience and see and be a part of. But they don't last forever and they shouldn't. If they did last forever, they wouldn't be special. 

We work really hard to achieve a level of standard in our art and in our work. We have something in mind, a goal, a place we want to be, a level that we want to get to. That's what we pour all of our time and energy and efforts. But we know that perfection will never be achieved because we always try again and we can always do it just a little bit better the next time. We know that no matter how long and hard we've worked over the years, that if we stop now, today, our skills and abilities will get a little worse every single day that we don't keep working and moving forward.

I know that could seem depressing, but I really don't think so at all. There's so much beauty in the work that we do. What would happen if we actually achieved perfection? Would we continue on knowing that we could never get any better because we were already perfect?

Life is beautiful because it's messy and temporary and continues on after us, the same way that it evolved before us. Every moment is unique and special, never ever to happen again. There's more to do, more to look forward to, more to celebrate. When you're working hard this year, carefully and purposefully getting better and better and better, think about the beauty in Wabi Sabi. Think about the beauty and the fact that nothing is ever perfect or permanent or finished. Remember to show yourself some love.

• Some love for your spirit that makes your work uniquely yours

• Some love for the fact that your journey is never going to be done

• Some love for the once in your lifetime moments that you get to share with the people around you