The Beauty of Brokenness

In our quest for perfection, whether it is in work performance, or looks, or lifestyle, we sometimes overlook the beauty of brokenness.

I have spent much of this year "broken" physically (while last year I was a veritable paragon of health and wellness.) How quickly things change!  Two out of the three of the maladies I've endured this year are at the top of the pain chart: frozen shoulder and its equally painful treatment, and something that tops even that: shingles.  (The other ailment was a two month long stretch of an allergy attack and sinus infection out of control.)

In spite of my brokenness this year, I have managed to do a lot of wonderful things! That came as a surprise to me when I realized it.  The year was not a complete loss because I wasn't in good shape.  I still travelled (between medical disasters), I managed most of my workload,  I got involved in new projects.  So illness or not, I managed to keep my eye on the ball of joy as much as possible.

But that's not really what this blog is about.  I was speaking the other day to someone who has been going through a hard time and told me feels "broken".  He has had to rely on friends for help, and is embarrassed about that.  For those of us who value independence and self-reliance, this lesson in brokenness comes hard.  We think it is a failure to have to call on others for help.  But we are missing an incredibly beautiful spiritual lesson here if we can only see it through those eyes.

Think how wonderful you have felt when someone called on you in a time of crisis.  For the most part we feel needed and thrilled to provide a kind of sacred service to another.  Giving to others is a gift to us as well.  So, when we are broken, we are allowing others to feel good about what they can do for us.  Brokenness allows us to rediscover that we are indeed not an island, and reminds us of the incredible value of community, something that frequently gets lost in modern times.

There is a verse in the bible that says something like "we are made perfect in weakness."  That sounds absurd on the face of it, but perhaps what it means is we come into the full experience of our humanity when we find ourselves on our knees or on the ground, when life wallops us with a big bat. 

I read once that some antiques are more valuable when they have "distress" marks in them, in other words, when they are not perfect.  Perhaps we should see ourselves in the same way.  Our distress marks make us more valuable, more beautiful, not less.  Individualism, perfection and self-reliance have their place, but falling into the arms of our fellow human beings is an experience that only brokenness can offer.

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