Being Broken

Being Broken

A sculptor traveled to Japan to take part in various art exhibitions. He had brought several hand-made clay cups as gifts for his host. As he began to unpack, he found that the baggage handling process had broken four of the cups. Without another thought, he put them in the trash can in his room.

At the end of his stay, his host presented him with a going-away present: the same four cups, now reassembled and mended with silver. His host said, "Now, even better than when you brought them!"

The artist learned of the Japanese art of Kintsugi, meaning to artfully rejoin something damaged, or Kintsukuroi, golden repair. To the Japanese, repairing something that has a history and has suffered damage makes it even more beautiful. They draw attention to the cracks with a resin that is colored gold, or may even contain real gold. They "cherish the imperfection of a broken pot repaired in this way….seeing it as a creative addition and/or re-birth to the pot’s life story."  (See original story at this blog).

To reclaim and reassemble these broken pottery pieces is probably not easy. So many cultures would see the broken pieces simply as garbage--once shattered, there is no value left. But through Kintsugi the original piece is not just put back together, but enhanced, embellished, and given more worth than it originally had. Some Japanese stories tell of collectors purposely breaking their valuable pottery just so it could be repaired in this way!

In a trendy twist, many artists are taking broken china and "upcycling" it for a mosaic. This artist shows how she took a dish of her mother's that she had accidentally broken, and combined it with other broken pieces to make a new piece of art (and to preserve the look and sentiment attached to the original dish).

Why am I talking about broken dishes? The idea came to me as my husband and I discussed several events from our lives over the past years. We were on a long 3-hour drive, so we had a lot of time to remember the good, bad and ugly. :) We talked about how certain events, relationships, and resulting spiritual crises had left us feeling "broken." He had read about Kintsugi before, and likened himself to the broken pottery. I compared it to the mosaic from a broken dish. Together, we discussed how the healing process of putting our lives back together was actually quite painful. It was slow. It was hard to see any beauty during the formation of healing bonds. But in the end, we could see that, like in Kintsugi or mosaics, the beauty of our lives was actually enhanced by the process of "being broken," then being put back together by The Healer, Jesus Christ.

Do you ever feel like a broken vessel? Maybe the weightier matters of life have left stress fractures. Maybe the load of procrastinated repentance is cracking the surface. Maybe storms completely outside of your control have nonetheless crushed you beyond your ability to endure. And maybe, you just feel broken.

But broken does not mean lost. Broken does not mean garbage. Broken does not mean irreparable.

Broken means ready to become new again.

When we feel like a broken vessel, we can know that we are in the hands of the Divine Potter. Isaiah 64:8 says, "O Lord, thou art our father; we are the clay, and thou our potter; and we all are the work of thy hand." This scripture tells me that there is a master plan for our lives, and the Divine Potter sees the best form we can become. We are promised: "Behold, as the clay is in the potter's hand, so are ye in mine hand, O house of Israel" (Jeremiah 18:6).

But, if we have already been hardened, formed, fired into a certain shape--and that shape is not the final form we were meant to be--how else can we be reformed? The clay will not return to its soft, malleable state. The clay will have to be broken. "Thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel" (Psalm 2:9).

The Broken Vase, by Harry Watrous

The thing about being broken is we all ask, why? Why break me? What was wrong with how I was before? Sure, I might have had a few flaws. Maybe I was looking tarnished. But was it so bad?

Remember this: Broken is the sacrifice that has been asked of us. When the Savior spoke to the Nephites just prior to his appearance, he said, "Ye shall offer for a sacrifice unto me a broken heart and a contrite spirit." Moroni 6:2 reads, "Neither did they receive any unto baptism save they came forth with a broken heart and a contrite spirit, and witnessed unto the church that they truly repented of all their sins."

We can rationalize that our few flaws or tarnished spots are not grievous sins. We'll change those, eventually. But our Divine Potter may know that now, sooner than we thought we were ready, we need to sacrifice those things and give him a broken heart.

President Ezra Taft Benson called it godly sorrow. It is "a deep realization that our actions have offended our Father and our God. It is the sharp and keen awareness that our behavior caused the Savior, He who knew no sin, even the greatest of all, to endure agony and suffering. Our sins caused Him to bleed at every pore. This very real mental and spiritual anguish is what the scriptures refer to as having 'a broken heart and a contrite spirit.' Such a spirit is the absolute prerequisite for true repentance" (Ensign, Oct. 1989, p. 4).

I know that in my life some of those times when I felt most broken through betrayal, pain, loneliness, and deprivation, I felt real "mental and spiritual anguish." And even then, I didn't always look for healing from the source that could heal. I was still stubborn, independent--wounded, but not willing to soften and give in, ask for help and be willing to change.

To be truly brokenhearted requires the second element of our sacrifice: contrition. Elder Bruce D. Porter said, "The sacrifice so entailed is a sacrifice of pride in all its forms. Like malleable clay in the hands of a skilled potter, the brokenhearted can be molded and shaped in the hands of the Master. ... Those who have a broken heart and a contrite spirit are willing to do anything and everything that God asks of them, without resistance or resentment. We cease doing things our way and learn to do them God's way instead" (Ensign, Nov. 2007, p. 32).

That's the hard part. Resistance and resentment are the stubborn burrs that attach to us when we are going through trials. It is the hardest trait to rid ourselves of--yet being broken will be futile until we quit resisting, quit resenting, and allow a reformation or a "re-formation" into the pattern the Lord would like to see in us.

For, "As we make the sacrifice to Him of all that we have and all that we are, the Lord will fill our hearts with peace. He will 'bind up the brokenhearted' (Isaiah 61:1) and grace our lives with the love of God." (Bruce D. Porter, ibid.).

I am still in the process of "reforming." I am still learning to be contrite and quit asking, "Why?" I am learning gratitude for the changes. I am just beginning to see a glimmer of the gold veins that fill the cracks in the vessel, making what was broken actually more beautiful. With patience I may yet learn to fully offer my broken heart to Him, the Master Potter, who can do so much more with it than I.

Almost Homemade Ravioli Soup

I don't claim to have much culinary genius, but I do enjoy making a meal that tastes good yet costs little. Sometimes my creations turn out good, sometimes not so good. Tonight I think I came up with a good one.

It was soup night (mostly because 50% of my family is sick) and I wanted a soup that was quick and tasty. I took a poll of the kids and Italian soup won. I had a recipe for a tortellini soup, but decided to adapt it to what I had on hand. Here is my final creation. It had a lovely, thick tomato base and a homemade touch thanks to the sauteed veggies.

Yummy soup, full of good tomato sauce and ravioli. 

Almost Homemade Ravioli Soup

2 T. butter
1/2 c. onion, chopped
3 ribs celery, chopped
1 T. crushed garlic
2 carrots, grated
1 can tomato sauce
2 c. water
1 can red kidney beans
1 can Chef Boyardee Beef Ravioli
Oregano, Italian seasoning, salt and pepper, to taste

Melt butter in skillet. Saute onion, celery, garlic and carrot until softened. Meanwhile, combine tomato sauce, water and kidney beans in a saucepan. Heat to boiling. Add vegetables and mix well. Reduce to a simmer; add can of ravioli with the sauce. Season to taste. Cook until pasta is heated through. Serves 4-6.

Notes: I love the aromatic smell of sauteed onion and celery, and I think taking the time to cook them and add them to the soup gives it the homemade flavor that's well worth the effort. However, if you didn't want to take the time to do this, you could add dried chopped onion and some frozen mixed veggies to the tomato/water mix instead.

I added the kidney beans to boost the protein in the soup and still keep it an almost-meatless main dish. It's a healthy and inexpensive way to "beef up" the soup!

Approximate cost: $2.75 (one can ravioli, $.88 on sale, one can kidney beans, $.88, one can tomato sauce, $.25, onion and other veggies and spices, approx. $.75.)

I served the soup with cheese sandwiches: wheat bread slices, cheddar cheese, grilled under the oven broiler for 2 minutes or less. My kids love them and they are so easy. Growing up, our family would eat cheese sandwiches almost every Sunday night for a quick dinner after our big Sunday after-church feast.

Another way to round-out the meal is to make homemade biscuits. Cut the biscuits extra-thick and serve hot with butter--nothing could be more delicious and still inexpensive!

A batch of homemade biscuits takes about 20 minutes to mix and bake. 

If you try out this recipe, leave a comment and let me know how your family likes it!

Insanity

It's 10:47 on a Saturday morning. I'm still in my pajamas. I did have a healthy breakfast of just hot chocolate... because there were no clean bowls from which to eat my cereal. My big plans for today include folding that basket of laundry that has been sitting there since last Saturday, and maybe getting dressed.

That's when I think, "This is insanity."

This thought has plagued me several times since the beginning of the year when it was time to make New Year's resolutions, and I didn't make any. I thought about making some, but couldn't settle on how, exactly, I wanted to change my life.

Insanity.

This one word keeps coming to mind--as defined by Einstein (or not... see an interesting discussion of this quote at Psychology Today... http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/in-therapy/200907/the-definition-insanity-is). "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results."

So if I want my home to be clean and to have a bowl ready to eat my cereal in the morning, I have to do something different. Like not leave the dishes piled in the sink at night.

If I want to feel like my Saturday has a purpose, I need to treat this day differently from last Saturday.

My real goal in life, one I've had since at least fifth grade, is to become a published author. I tried--I wrote a book and sent it out for publication--and was not successful. But I do want to succeed, to try again. I want different results this time.

I read a blog from another author today which reminded me of my deep internal desire to be among the published authors of the world. She's going on tour for her new book in a week, and wrote about her dedication to her genre and the number of other authors she has researched and read in the past year. She's doing it! She's living her dream! And I am so jealous. I want to be that person.

And what's stopping me? Only my own insanity of thinking it'll happen someday... and then waiting. I know I need to put in the effort to make it happen. To make it a living, breathing, demanding part of my life... like a fifth child. Ugh... that sounds like so much work! And that's when I stop.

I dream a lot, but work so little. Somehow this equation needs to balance better.

I admire my husband, who is going back to college now. It's super hard! College is so much more demanding than I remember it being when I was 20. He is only a couple of weeks into the semester but he's a changed person--a better person, I think. So admirable. So NOT insane. :)

So I think I'll take a few minutes today to do something different. Maybe I'll start with getting dressed. And loading the dishwasher. And I can tell myself I did some writing today. And I can rethink what goals I have for the rest of the new year... and then actually make some goals and write them down and put them in front of my face each day... and then actually get up and do them.

Maybe I won't be so insane after all.