Kintsugi (Episode 2) - Healing | I Mended My Broken Life with This Japanese Principle

Hi friends, welcome back to Keen Sugi. This is episode number two, titled Broken. We know that we all come from different broken places and I know so many of us feel like we're struggling, we're stuck, we're depressed, we're anxious. We're comparing our lives very deeply to one another, more than we ever have before. And not only are more young individuals unhappy with their lives because of social media, I think it's important for us as an older generation to reach back out and say, I got you, I'm here for you. And it's why we created episode number two, Broken. What you'll find in this episode is Mio, the Keen Sugi artist from Kyoto, helps me to put back together an object that was once broken from my collection. You'll also meet a reverend, Takafumi-san, who's one of my favorite people to learn from, who works through his family's temple in Kyoto. We'll talk about tools that can help you with depression or anxiety. And you'll also see through the years a lot of my own imperfections. I think it is fair to say that all of us are imperfect and Keen Sugi serves as a symbol, it serves as a metaphor to all of our lives. So let's pick up the pieces and learn on our journey together in episode two, Broken. One of my favorite parts about shooting across Japan are the people that we meet and their stories that intertwine with our own. That helps us to relate and to bond no matter how far apart we all are. We learn from the monks, from artists, from a reverend, and all the while we learn that we all come from broken places and we can choose to take those broken pieces and make them into something truly beautiful. While developing this series from New York City and LA to Tokyo, I felt very broken many times. Emotionally, physically, financially, I had collapsed and I wanted to fold my cards many, many times. This little glimmer of light though just kept helping me to keep going. It was a spirit inside of my heart that would not let up. I was determined to share stories that could help others to better understand Japanese history, culture, and growth no matter how deep and how heavy the struggle. I didn't realize what a huge undertaking creating this documentary actually was. It took us a devotional total of about three years to write Keen Sugi Wellness and then to begin developing the series that you're watching right now, which was inspired by the book. In working on this series, I discovered that my vulnerability, my compassion that I practiced in being broken was what you really wanted to see. It took every ounce of my personal, emotional, and work-related life and over 24 international flights and still counting. It took sleepless nights and being Japanese, it was hard to talk about what was going on. In Japanese culture, we don't speak of our struggles, nor do we complain. We only choose to keep going and to always do our best. This is the anthem of Ganbatte. It was hard for me to share with others that my devotion to my lineage and my work and my family was the legacy that I wanted to share with Japan. And I had felt like maybe others could not understand or relate. Because I was this mixed child growing up who came from different places, I kind of felt like I always just didn't belong. You were too Japanese, or you were too American, or you weren't Japanese enough, or you weren't American enough. This is something that so many of us experienced, being mixed kids or kids with immigrant parents from different places. Japan was really the only place I ever knew to come back to to learn and to grow, to heal and to mend. Kyoto was one of those places where mom and dad introduced the temples, prayers, and hanami, the art of Japanese flower viewing, to me when I was just five years old. Three decades later, I returned to meet up with Mio, the kintsugi artist whose family legacy led her to her calling of creating objects into kintsugi art. Ji-Chan was an artist, and your father was too. I feel like it's important to carry on the legacy of what we do. I have a chawan from Kyoto I broke while moving during my chaotic life in New York City. This is almost like a reflection of my life. Like, the reason why I wrote this book was I wanted more people to feel like they were human and that everybody could understand that we all come from broken places. Arigatou gozaimasu. Was it your natural calling to want to carry on the tradition of kintsugi? I didn't choose the kintsugi myself. I had someone else do it for me. Just a little bit? Yes, just a little bit. Like this. Little by little. Ah, okay. Like little dots. Yes. And stretch it out. Oh, amazing. It looks like even better now that it has cracks, which is the weird part. I really can't wait to see this when it's done. Arigatou gozaimasu. Arigatou gozaimashita. Kintsugi is this anthem of being broken and bringing things back together with gold. It's the most beautiful metaphor that I found throughout my studies and my own struggles. I believe that amazing stories usually come from the grittiest, the most traumatic, and the hardest, most broken places. My uncle John, my dad's baby brother, once shared with me this beautiful love story I'd never really be able to forget. This story begins with war and ends in love. We're talking about a war-torn world at the end of World War II and then moving along much after into Vietnam. And the young boy who just turned 20 years old, who was suddenly drafted into the military just off the coast of Connecticut. This young guy traveled far and wide with the Navy and the military, and he was eventually stationed with the US Navy in Yokosuka, just a few miles, not too far, outside of Tokyo. And while visiting a temple one day in Kamakura, he saw this beautiful woman from afar. She was a student with long, gorgeous, black, stunning hair. She was studying in Tokyo, and she happened to cross paths with this US Navy sailor. Two people from completely different places in the world just falling in love. Those were my parents. Their story is almost something from a movie. Mom was a Buddhist. Dad was raised Catholic. Mom was from Southern Japan, and Dad, a small farm boy from Poland who immigrated to the US when he was very young, they both came from broken places during the war, then later made beautiful. Their love story is virtually kintsugi, and it is a constant reminder to me that anything, anywhere, at any time can happen, even love during war. How long have you been coming to this place? I don't know, maybe 20, 30 years? Whoa. Long time. Really? Yeah. Oh my gosh, it's a husband and wife, then? So it's like the mom and pop? Yeah, mom and pop shop. And then Yanagiya ramen. Hai, arigatou gozaimasu. Domo. Wow, oishii. Oishisou. Oh my god, that looks amazing. Ah, gyoza. Oh my god. Mom, smile. Oh my god, you're so cute. Hai, itadakimasu. Itadakimasu. Oishii. This place is just so nice, too. Like, they treat us like it's home. Yeah. Remember when we were growing up in San Diego? Right. It just felt like nobody understood who we were and where we came from, and I think I'm really grateful that you kept the traditions of our family in Japanese and have respect for the culture that you come from. Yes. Don't forget where you are from, okay? It's very important. So when you first moved to the U.S., did you think that you were crazy or you made a mistake at all? No. That was quite good. We just help each other. Yeah, all you have is each other. Exactly. That's what you needed. All you needed. Yeah, and Dad's a good guy. You're kind of man. You said it again. Okay. No regrets about dating a gaijin man? You take whichever way you take it, there's always regret there, but some direction is more regret than the other kind of things, and what if it was your own choice? You can deal with it, really. You're right. Society keeps telling me that I should do this or that. The choice that I made, I feel like it's not perfect, but I think that we're helping so many people. I'm just more grateful that I pursued my dreams and I didn't let anybody tell me what to do, and you and Dad were really lenient about that. You guys have your own character. We cannot really change you, but let you guys do whatever you like, kind of basic. Kind of, yeah. Well, we argue a lot, but... Yeah, I remember. Well, this is the thing. You choose your own life and then you choose your own way. That's the way it is. We cannot really force you. Are you okay with what Jenny and I do? I think so. You made a choice, so it is it. I really prize this kind of life's journey of overcoming the obstacles, and I finally feel like I know who I am and I'm calling myself out. I'm not perfect. I'm not happy all the time. It's better to share that nobody's alone. The more I opened up about my problems and my vulnerabilities in my writing, the more people thanked me because they said they didn't feel alone anymore. Well, you find your calling working quite well this moment, yeah. Yeah, you think? Mm-hmm. You're doing very good. It was really nice to open up to my mom about my own struggles. There is a place to write about real stories and real trauma and real healing. I've always learned by example, and that's what my mother and father and all of my grandparents, whether they were from Poland or Japan, my parents never actually told my sister and I much about being a good person, being compassionate, empathetic, filling your soul or your heart with love. They only humbly showed and shared their cultures and devotion to humanity through civil service and humble action. It did not matter where they came from or that their relationship began during the Vietnam War, a very broken place. What mattered was that they worked on their love. They grew together and they mended their way into becoming one. But it wasn't without struggle. But it was, though, the most beautiful love story I've ever witnessed. My sister and I were devotionally always taught to love others, to be of better service, whether it was to write books or for the top magazines in the US or all over the world now. Each year I've committed to invest back into Japan to study my ancestors' traditions. We should explore more of our heritage and where we come from. I want you to meet my friend, Reverend Takafumi. He has taught me so much about our emotions and how we can better use them. I really love your bridging of the gaps between American culture and the Japanese. You're very unique in the fact that you went to study Buddhism in the US, even though your family runs a temple in Kyoto. Growing that temple like this and a family being here over a hundred years, Kyoto's a really kind of small place. Everybody knows everybody if you are here more than three generations. Going to the US was like, oh yeah, you know, I'm nobody here. That's great. You know, I can do whatever I want. What made you come back to Japan? Because you could have easily stayed there. Well, partially because I kind of felt like I was losing my heritage. At one point I felt like I was no roots. So that really made me nervous in a way. But also at the same time, it made me interested about my own culture. Interesting that you have the same problems that we do on the other side of the world. There are so many of us also that are struggling with identities. I think a lot of us have constant internal struggle and negative self-dialogue. How can we be more centered? How can we be better? I think that, you know, acceptance, I think that's a really important part. We have a vision of, oh, I wanted the people to see me like this way. This is a perfect version of me. This Instagram, Facebook, all the social media, basically, you know, people post positive thing only. And also they want to get approved by somebody. I love that we bring up social because I think it's been a destructive part of culture where we're not nurturing our young girls and boys anymore, but we're rather poisoning people with the fact that life has to be perfect. I constantly have like negative self-talk about I'm not doing good enough. I don't want to post on social because it triggers anxiety and depression when I do. We're just human. We have weakness and also vulnerable part. We have to accept that. Yes, I get anxious or I get sad. The ups and downs are part of life. Every emotion is a tool. So you have a toolbox, right? But right now, what we're talking commonly in a society is we try to dump the half of the tools in a toolbox like because sadness is bad, anger is bad, you know. Depression is bad. But you know, being anxious in a certain moment is actually better than being optimistic. Like if you feel anxious, that's why you kind of think about all the scenarios so you prepare yourself. Well, of course there's a limit, but it can be a good thing. And we shouldn't be so hard on ourselves when we feel things that aren't accepted in Western culture. Or any culture, I think. It's really okay to have anxiety. It happens to everyone. Sometimes we just need to see it through and then we can learn and share from one another. Around the issue you find everywhere, you have to be happy, you have to be positive, but people look at themselves and say, I'm not happy, I'm not satisfied, I'm not comfortable. Why only me, why only me? But sometimes the important thing is we share our weakness so people can actually say, oh, it's not only me, I'm not alone. Kintsugi, it is a metaphor for so many of us to see when there are cracks, we are able to let the light in and over time we can heal and seal with acceptance by doing the work. I'm sure that many people try to hide their difficulty. They wanna cover it, you know, hey, nothing happened, I'm doing great. But Kintsugi pot is showing the damages. It still hurts, it's still there, yet because of that you develop certain personality or develop your life as the way it is right now. So once again, it's acceptance happen. That brings us to the peace. Somebody who's overcome an obstacle, struggled and come back a more beautiful person. I think that Kintsugi have a two-faction. One is making your life story more beautiful and more unique. At the same time, unique yet something you share with other people, commonness, that help more people. There is something beautiful in being broken. And when you start sharing your story about falling apart and putting the pieces back together, that is when you can start to see the growth and the change in one's heart. Now that you know my story behind the scenes and how much I struggled in writing this new book along with putting together this documentary, I hope you can find a place in your heart to remember that. We all come from broken places. And the one thing that I know that can help us all to thrive in hard times is compassion and love for one another and open up and share our stories. We do have a lot more in common than we do different. When you travel and explore and open your heart and learn to love selflessly and give to others through compassion and empathy, that is when you will start to heal and seal and mend and become even more beautiful. I hope you all loved this episode number two and you can continue to follow my work at CandiceKumai on social media, Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, wherever you can find me. On my website at CandiceKumai, you can sign up for my newsletter for hot tips. And you can also follow my podcast Wabi Sabi and subscribe now.