Years ago, we’d hired him to install hardwood flooring in our new sun room. He’d missed the nail and left a small hammer mark in the expensive wood. My wife and I assured him that it was fine. We actually like a few dings because it gives the floor character and shows that it’s real.
I’m working on adopting that perspective for myself. My instinct is to present a faultless, unblemished version of myself to everyone. But that’s not a true picture. It’s not reality. Letting my blemishes and imperfections show makes me more alive, more relatable, more real. The posts where I admit my failings and mistakes regularly get more engagement than my success stories.
It makes sense. With so much fake, filtered, and curated content online, there’s a real hunger for the real, the raw, the unvarnished. We respond to it on a visceral level because we know that’s our personal reality. We’re all lovable, beautiful, and worthy, but we’re also scarred, imperfect creatures with growth edges. Like draws like. Deep calls to deep. Truth satisfies in a way the manufactured never can.
As you consider what to share online and with those around you, drop your guard a little. Open up. Be vulnerable. Be real. Let your cracks show, because, as the saying goes, that’s where your light shines through. If you do, you’ll help create a more honest and meaningful world, and you’ll take another step toward Becoming Yourself.
During the recent Spring Arts Festival that took over Tempe, Arizona where I live, the city hired an artist to paint a giant sunflower on the circle drive in front of my office building.
Between the cleaning, prep work, and painting, it shut down the little street for six days. Deliveries were halted. It was highly inconvenient. And who knows how much money it cost the city to pay workers to prep the space, buy the paint, and hire the artist.
As I watched the work progress directly below my office window, I was reminded of a quote:
It is the useless things that make life worth living and that make life dangerous too: wine, love, art, beauty. Without them life is safe, but not worth bothering with.
stephen fry
There is a superfluous nature to beauty. It’s not like food, water, oxygen, or shelter. We don’t need it to exist. But is the goal of human life mere existence? Just piling up as many days as possible before succumbing to the inevitability of death? I think not. I’d rather live a short abundant life than a long bleak one. I’m guessing you would too.
So I say bravo to the city of Tempe. I wholeheartedly support the use of my tax dollars on “superfluous” beauty. Thank you for making my life a little brighter, a little more colorful, and for bringing a smile to my face each time I glance out the window.
What “superfluous” beauty can you enjoy today? Take a walk in a park. Stroll an art gallery. Stream a YouTube nature video on your TV. Set out fresh flowers. Frame a picture you love. Surround yourself with beauty. If you do, you’ll breathe more life into living, and you’ll take another step toward Becoming Yourself.
I was crying over the TV show Britain’s Got Talent. For those who know me that will come as no great surprise. I’m a sentimental sap. But from a pure talent perspective, the performance that turned on the water works was pretty poor. So why was I crying? Why was the audience going wild? Why did one of the normally stoic British judges break down and weep? Take a look for yourself…
Did that strike you the way it has so many others? I think the secret of this performance’s impact lies in this quote:
There are only two things that pierce the human heart. One is beauty. The other is affliction.
SImone Weil
We human beings are emotional creatures. We’re made to feel deeply. But the pressure and drudgery of daily living often flattens our “emotional experience” curves into a relatively narrow range. Bright colors fade to neutrals. Uncontrollable laughter becomes a bemused smile. Deep heartache becomes an ongoing sense of mild disappointment.
As Simone Weil observed, two things that can wrench the emotional limiters from our hearts are beauty and affliction. Affliction tends to come along with enough regularity on its own and, while it does tap into our deeper emotions, not many of us would choose to seek it out. So that leaves us with beauty.
Simply put, we need it. A lot of it. To experience the fullness of life that I believe we are meant for, we need heaps of beauty to compensate for the affliction that life brings our way. It needs to be planned for, worked at, chased after. The enjoyment of beauty must be prioritized, budgeted, and indulged in.
Author John Eldredge notes the uniqueness of beauty:
We need not fear indulging here. The experience of beauty is unique to all the other pleasures in this: there is no possessive quality to it. Just because you love the landscape doesn’t mean you have to acquire the real estate. Simply to behold the flower is enough; there is nothing in me that wants to consume it. Beauty is the closest thing we have to fullness without possessing on this side of eternity. It heralds the Great Restoration. Perhaps that is why it is so healing—beauty is pure gift. It helps us in our letting go.
John eldredge, “The journey of desire: searching for the life you’ve always dreamed of”
I think that’s why I was crying over a mediocre performance by a group of elementary children. Their sense of abandonment was inspiring. Their unbridled joy was contagious. Their teacher’s pride in and commitment to his students was moving. It all touched something deep inside of me that whispered, “This is how life is meant to be.” And in that, it was beautiful.
So how will you experience beauty today? Wander a park, stroll an art gallery, savor a gourmet meal, see a play, listen to music you love, read a great book, watch an artfully made film, have a deep conversation with a friend. Embrace beauty. Drink it in. Open your eyes, mind, and heart to beauty in her many forms. If you do, you’ll take another step toward Becoming Yourself.
This post was originally published in May of 2019.
