Insights

I like to consider myself a gardener. I love gardening, getting my hands dirty, planting stuff I hope will grow and inevitably having it not grow. You know…gardening!

I don’t really garden for food, but I garden for flowers. I will plant flowers and harvest seeds where I can so that I can grow more flowers the next season. I will grow flowers that attract bees, butterflies, hummingbirds, all of it! I have beds that are organized and beds that are some of the most chaotically beautiful things.

There are many mornings where letting our dog out takes a little longer than normal because we stop and watch the bees and butterflies enjoy our garden. They don’t care that it isn’t perfect. They don’t care that weeds exist. To them there is beauty in the chaos, beauty in the imperfections.

In the sixteenth century the Japanese tea ceremonies underwent a massive shift. The perfect, pristine dishes were replaced with bowls and cups that were chipped. People started to drink from pottery that was worn and weathered. This practice is called wabi sabi.

Wabi Sabi is the art of honoring the beauty in imperfection. It is NOT about creating intentional imperfections, but instead about accepting that flaws are inevitable and that these flaws don’t stop something from serving their purpose.

Jared Isaacman, who is currently in space with SpaceX, when taking his space walk said, “Back at home we all have a lot of work to do, but from here — looks like a perfect world,” Our world has its imperfections, plenty of them, but if we look closely, we can see the beauty. Amidst the weeds we can see the seeds sprouting. Amidst the seeds sprouting we can see the existing flowers that are doing what they are created to do, and when we look at all of it together, there is beauty, there is joy and there is hope.

We see in the creation account that when God created, He said it was good. In His omniscience He was aware of the coming fall. He was aware that His creation wouldn’t always be how it was in the beginning and yet He still called it good.

As we go through our day to day lives may we embrace wabi sabi. May we realize that there are imperfections in our world, but may we embrace these imperfections then realize and acknowledge their beauty. After all, it is good.

Joel Gutowsky
Director of Student Life
Logos Preparatory Academy