A broken bowl cannot be restored to its original state, but it gains a different kind of beauty when repaired with Kintsugi
Are you familiar with the technique called Kintsugi or Kintsukuroi (both read as "kintsugi")? It is a traditional Japanese technique for repairing chipped or broken tableware using natural lacquer and pure gold powder. After bonding the broken parts with lacquer, they are decorated with gold. By joining the fragments together, the tableware is transformed into an extremely beautiful work of art. Recovery from trauma has similarities to Kintsugi.
By first creating a state where you can feel that 'I have power,' and then 'looking back' at the memories from the time the trauma was received, the memory is overwritten as if you were already able to exercise this power and were functioning perfectly at the time the original trauma occurred. This newly reinforced experience significantly alters the past memory. This newly emerged resource becomes a bridge connecting the past and the present, that is, a 'remembered present.'
By using such a method, while the truth that a trauma-inducing event occurred and that you were severely wounded is preserved, you can regain your dignity and firm self-esteem through grief and intense anger. From this foundation of 'compassion for the self based in the present,' memories are gradually softened, reshaped, and rewoven into the fabric of personal identity.
If we consider a person who grew up accepted by their caregivers as a bowl without any chips, then a person with long-term, complex trauma is a bowl that is cracked or broken, and I believe that even if they do everything they can to recover, they cannot become a bowl without chips. Just to be clear, this is my opinion, not the opinion of the source I quoted.
When I see people who have grown up honestly and freely, I feel dazzled and dizzy. When I think about what my life would have been like if I had grown up like that, I feel truly painful.
I am sure I cannot go to that world, but I can become something in this world. Just as a broken bowl is transformed into an extremely beautiful work of art by joining its fragments together. That is a comfort. However, I do not want to be told this lightly by someone who does not understand this wound!
When you heal trauma wounds using this methodology, like the tide of the ocean coming in and going out, strength gradually fills you, and harmony, self-compassion, and dignity gradually return. Is there anything more beautiful and valuable than this?
I am sure this is where I am headed. I cannot stop my past wounds from aching when I see a bowl that has never been chipped, but I will still live on. I have become much more functional than when I was just rolling around as broken fragments.
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Self-introduction
My brain's fire alarm has stopped 'malfunctioning'
https://note.com/homoludens3839/n/nf4b02f181c00
It was my monthly therapy day. Fear and more fear. There is a reason why I cannot move.
https://note.com/homoludens3839/n/n20512360fecd
When my body felt safe, work requests started coming in.
https://note.com/homoludens3839/n/n79bcf7b3bc67
'Why is it painful when I'm with my parents?' Spot on. As expected, my parents are people with whom it is useless to talk.
https://note.com/homoludens3839/n/n5f92ccc4f084
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