T here are two ways to translate a sentence between English and Japanese. One is chokuyaku – a direct translation of the actual words; the other is iyaku , a contextual translation of the meaning. The literal chokuyaku may be considered more ‘perfect’, in terms of translating every piece of the sentence, but it doesn’t take into account the context of its reception, just as an idea of a ‘perfect life’ doesn’t take into account the context of our own complex and challenging reality. It’s often the iyaku – the seemingly ‘imperfect’ version – that is infinitely more powerful, graceful and valuable, giving the more authentic translation, just as the ‘imperfect life’ is the authentic way of living.

One of the core teachings of wabi sabi is the acceptance of the true nature of life: everything is impermanent, imperfect and incomplete.

In this chapter, we are going to look at that acceptance in relation to ourselves, and in relation to our past, present and future. By the end, I hope you will feel a shift, having experienced the release of tension and surge in personal power that comes with letting go of ‘perfect’ and accepting what is, standing on fresh ground with this new perspective.

Things change. That’s life.

Every time I come to Kyōto, it is familiar yet different. Buildings have gone up, buildings have come down. New shops have appeared, others have vanished. One favourite café has given way to another. Over the years, this city has been altered by war and earthquakes, fires and tourism. And, of course, the changing seasons are part of daily life here, a visual and emotional reminder of the passage of time.

Recently, I met up with an old friend in Tōkyō, who I hadn’t seen in more than a decade. On seeing each other we both squealed, ‘You haven’t changed a bit!’ although, in truth, of course we have both changed in so many ways. Since we last got together I have got married, had two children, built a business and moved house more times than I care to remember. She has spent time abroad, switched careers, battled an illness, lost a parent, learned a new language … Each of these formative experiences has shaped us, sometimes a little, sometimes a lot.

Our lives, relationships, careers, health, finances, attitudes, interests, capabilities, responsibilities and opportunities are changing all the time. Sometimes the change is significant or fast, and you feel it as clearly as a rushing wind. Other times the change will be minor or slow, like a daffodil raising its head to the sun, and you have to pay close attention to see it.

Nowhere ever stays completely still. And neither do we. Wabi sabi teaches us that dynamic transience is the natural state of all things. And as change is inevitable, trying to hold on to the past or the present is pointless and stressful.

Over the many years I have spent supporting people through major life transitions, I have noticed how vastly different our attitudes towards change can be. At one end of the spectrum are those who are terrified of it, and will do absolutely anything within their power to hold on to the status quo, even when they don’t actually like it. At the other end are those who embrace change as an escape mechanism, often habitually, so that as soon as things start to get difficult, they jump to something else, often later chastising themselves for never sticking at anything. And there are many in the middle who recognise the need to change, and genuinely want to embrace it, but are stalled by fear. I wonder where you sit on that continuum?

I was talking to a friend about the idea of transience over red rice and niimono (simmered vegetables) at his home in a rural suburb of Tōkyō. He gestured towards his garden, where a small bamboo forest stood and said:

You can see change happening right there. The bamboo is growing all the time, and is also sensitive to its dynamic environment. It’s firmly rooted but flexible. When the wind blows the bamboo doesn’t resist; it lets go and moves with it. And still the forest grows. Think of the buildings in this earthquake-prone country. The ones that survive the shaking are those that can move when the trembling begins.

Stability can make us feel safe, but it is a precarious stability that is built on the misguided assumption that things won’t change, because everything does. When a sudden change comes from an external source – redundancy, a loss, an affair, an illness for example – the shock is considerable. Rigidity actually makes us vulnerable to that. If it hits us when we are desperately trying to hang on to what we know, it can knock us flat. But if we are accepting of what is happening (not necessarily happy about it, or condoning it, but realistic about the fact that it is going on), we may be blown about but not completely knocked off balance, and we can recover sooner.

It is so easy to spend time caught up in the past, lost in nostalgia, heavy with regret, chastising yourself for not having made different choices or blaming someone else. Back then, you didn’t know all you know now. You didn’t have the same resources, environment or responsibilities. Perhaps you didn’t have the same outlook, self-awareness, courage or support. Or maybe you look back on the past as the golden years, when things were easier, you were more this or more that. But here’s the thing: the past is no longer here. Whatever happened, the good and the bad, it is gone.

Whatever it is that keeps pulling you back, take a moment to make peace with it, then let it go. This sounds hard, but it can be as simple as deciding to do it. Write it out. Speak to a professional if you need to, or talk to a friend. Then pick a day – like your birthday, or the turn of a season, or new year, or next Tuesday – and make it the day you leave that particular thing in the past. It is only you that keeps paying it attention.

Wabi sabi teaches us to accept that the past was then, and it was what it was. This is now, and it is what it is. Your life is happening right here, and every day is the beginning of the rest of it.

Acceptance is alignment with the truth of the present moment. In this present moment, what is true about your life? You are holding this book in your hands, opening yourself up to ideas from another culture. Perhaps you are drinking a cup of your favourite tea, or you keep getting distracted by a fly buzzing around the room.

Maybe your window is open and you can hear cars going past. Or the sun is casting shadows across your desk. Perhaps you are at the hairdresser’s, getting ready for a special night out. Or you have just come back to this page after an inspiring conversation, or a big argument, or some surprising news. Maybe you are reading this on the bus, or in your kitchen with half an eye on the oven to see if your pie is cooked.

I wonder if you are hot, or cold or just right? If you can smell cooking, or the garden or the impending rain. Do you have music playing? Is the clock ticking? Are you soaking in the bath listening to the sound of your own breathing?

Take a moment to think about the facts of your life in this exact moment. This moment is the one you are living right now. You cannot extend it for ever. At some point the pie will be done, the bathwater will go cold, the night will close in. Accepting that we cannot hold on to or control the status quo is a powerful teaching from wabi sabi , reminding us to treasure the good we have right now, and know that the bad will pass.

Any time you feel stressed or worried, upset, lost or lonely, anchor yourself in the facts of now. Notice what’s going on in your body, and what’s going on around you. Feel what you are feeling. Know that this is just a moment, and soon it will give way to another.

Any time you are feeling overwhelmed, try to accept that what is possible in the present is limited. You can only do what you can do. This is not a shutting off of possibilities, but rather a recognition of your own capacity, so you can stop expecting impossible things of yourself and give yourself a break.

Any time you recognise a moment of true joy, soak it all up. Anchor yourself to the sights, sounds and smells of right there and then, so they can transform into a precious memory when the moment has passed, which it will.

I distinctly remember the day I first saw the famous stone tsukubai (washbasin) in the grounds of Ryōan-ji temple in Kyōto.

I am nineteen years old, and I have stopped off at this temple on my way home from language school. Round the back of the main building from the famous raked sand garden lies an unassuming tsukubai , tucked into an enclave of mossy rocks and greenery. But I can tell by the attention it is attracting that this is no ordinary washbasin. Each of the temple visitors stops to look, crouch down to pick up the bamboo ladle, scoop up some water and wash their hands. One at a time they pause for thought. Many take photos. It is clearly more than a ritual cleansing and I want to know what all the fuss is about.

Up close, I see four characters set around a central square section, which holds the water. Still quite new to the language, I am proud that I can recognise the character at the top, which represents the number five. But I cannot read the others, and am puzzled by what is drawing the visitors in. Summing up courage, I approach one of the monks, point to the tsukubai and ask what it means.

He says, ‘Ware tada taru o shiru’. None of these words means ‘five’ so I am still none the wiser. I draw a picture of it and go home to consult my dictionary and my host mother.

Eventually, I figure out that the four characters don’t mean much individually, but when you combine each with the central square

, they become the four characters

, which is the ‘ ware tada taru o shiru’ the monk mentioned. A direct translation would be something like, ‘I only know plenty.’ A more poetic rendition might be, ‘Rich is the person who is content with what they have’ or, ‘I have everything I need.’

The message has been there all along. This is wisdom we carry inside us. Recognition of what we already have is the key to contentment. We just have to accept it, trust it and embrace it.

The ‘perfect life’ that we are sold over and over is the one we see in adverts – a predictable, stylised version of the human experience that eliminates the dimension of difficult emotion and hard-earned experience. It’s often a shiny-haired, perfectly manicured, wrinkle-free picture of bliss, running on a beach, sitting in a beautiful home or laughing with a bunch of equally shiny-haired, perfectly manicured, wrinkle-free friends. Or it is the Instagram feed of the perfectly styled home, perfectly behaved children or perfectly honed body.

If only we owned the latest handbag, or car or gym membership, our lives would be perfect too. What we forget is that the ads are showing manufactured moments in a movie-set life, and the stylised social-media streams are carefully curated brand stories, not real life itself.

Either that, or the marketing professionals cleverly remind us why our lives are hard, in a way that makes us feel like things being hard is somehow wrong. Like we are doing life wrong.

We all know this. Yet, even so, we rack up the debt and fill up our homes and schedules and minds in the pursuit of the perfect version that has sucked us in, instead of taking the time to figure out what really matters to us. It’s like trying to get instant nourishment from the plastic bowl of rāmen in the window of a noodle shop instead of finding the courage to step inside, take a seat at the bar, order in our best Japanese accent and show a little patience while the chef works their magic, so we can partake of the real thing.

Living is suffering. Getting sick is suffering. Growing old is suffering. Dying is suffering. We cannot avoid any of these things. When we try to resist them, we just compound the suffering, and delay our ability to respond. If, instead, you can embrace the actuality of what is going on, then you can flow with life. People think Zen is all about calmness and tranquillity, and living in some blissed-out state of good vibes. But actually, it’s about how you face your challenges: unhappiness, loneliness, worry, difficult emotions. It’s about learning to deal with what life throws at you, and acceptance of actuality is central to that.

Acceptance is not about giving up or giving in. It’s about surrendering to the truth of what is happening, and then playing an active role in deciding what happens next. For example, if you are sick, it’s about recognising that you are sick, accepting that you are not at full capacity, giving yourself permission to slow down in order to heal and asking for help when you need it, rather than powering on through.

Surrendering to the truth of suffering in any area of your life allows you to proactively decide your next steps, with clarity, compassion and a degree of ease. This teaching is many centuries old. And yet, we still resist it.

There are many ways in which we inadvertently use perfection – and perfectionism – to stop us embracing life:

How many of these do you recognise? Did you realise the idea of perfection could be so harmful?

The ‘imperfection’ that wabi sabi teaches us is based in the rules of nature. If everything is always changing, nothing can ever be absolutely complete. Therefore, nothing can ever be perfect, as perfection is a state of completeness.

We often use the word ‘imperfection’ to describe a state that falls short of a perfection we have come to perceive as ideal, whether that is in objects or in ourselves, in looks, bank balance, achievements or elsewhere in our lives. Any thesaurus will readily offer you a host of antonyms for ‘perfect’, including flawed, corrupt, inferior, second-rate, inept, unsophisticated, broken and bad. No wonder we see the opposite of perfect as a negative.

In order to eliminate the negativity around imperfection, we have to reject its use as the opposite of this fictional ideal state, and instead adopt imperfection as the ideal itself: imperfection is not a compromise.

Imperfection is not somewhere on the road to perfection, where we have to stop because we’ve run out of gas. Imperfection is a snapshot of our journeys of growth and living at a particular moment in time. We’ve been so busy trying to get the car up the hill that we have forgotten to turn around and look out over the beauty of all that lies all around us right now.

We need to trust and accept and be willing to say, I don’t know it all, but I don’t need to know it all. I know enough. I don’t have it all, but I don’t need to have it all. I have enough. And I am not all things to all people, but I don’t need to be all things to all people. I am doing my best to be all I can be to those who really matter. I am enough.

This does not mean having no goals or ambition and giving up, nor is it to suggest that striving for something is a bad thing. It’s about getting really clear on why we want what we really want, outside of materialistic desires for the accumulation of stuff and the pressure of expectation from others. Let go of the push and the fight, the uphill battle to a place you don’t need to get to. You can take all that energy you have been putting into the pursuit of perfection and pour it into living fully now. And once you start experiencing the world in this way, it looks and feels like a completely different place.

Accepting imperfection is one thing. Allowing others to see it is another. Yet that’s often where we find common ground. Revealing our vulnerabilities, challenges, as-yet-unrealised dreams and quirky joys opens a window onto our hearts. People can see who we really are, and they are drawn to connect.

Have you ever noticed how, when you find yourself in the presence of true beauty, your heart responds? It could be when you experience a person sharing their essence by speaking a gentle truth, or a love poem whispered on the wind, a tiny hand in yours or a moment of deep connection.

When we are tuned in, our intuitive response comes faster than the logical analytical response, so we can feel something in our hearts before we have time to judge, criticise, compare or get distracted. We can teach ourselves to experience others in this way too. To meet someone with our hearts, instead of just our minds, allowing our instinct and intuition to guide us beyond the judgement the mind creates based on what we see on the surface. And when we reveal our imperfections to others, we invite them to see us in a similar way.

I once cried on stage. Only once, but it happened. I was mortified. But the response from the audience was incredible. People didn’t expect it. They could obviously sense that it was genuine feeling, although I wouldn’t recommend it as a public-speaking technique. It does all sorts of strange things to your voice. But it allowed them to see my imperfections and to know that I was real. With nowhere to hide, I just let go and kept talking. The energy in the room shifted, as people opened their hearts to me, as I had opened mine to them. Afterwards, the book-signing queue was around the block, with many of those in the queue crying too, wanting to share their stories with me.

There is a tendency among self-help gurus to say things along these lines: ‘My life was a mess. One day I woke up to it. Now my life is amazing and perfect. You there, with your messed up life, you can be like me and have an amazing, perfect life if you just read my book/take my course/join my workshop.’ But I don’t buy it. We are all works in progress. Some of us happen to have had the opportunity to reflect, and perhaps have a platform from which to share what we are discovering as we go but, in truth, we are all learning from each other. No one is in charge here. No one has all the answers. And anyone who pretends they do is either selling a false version of their story, or is heading for a wake-up call.

We can’t possibly have it all together when we don’t even know what all the pieces look like. And the sooner we realise this, the sooner we can start honouring ourselves and each other for the imperfect treasures that we are. We just have to trust that sometimes, when the head cannot find the answer, the heart knows the way.

I cannot imagine taking a bath in a public place in England, but visiting the sento is still a regular evening pastime for many people in Japan.

One snowy evening in Hida-Takayama, I venture around the corner from my rented place to Yutopia, paying ¥420 (about £3) for the privilege of an hour or two soaking in a large shared tub. After leaving all my clothes in a locker in the changing room, I head to the heat, naked, but for a pair of plastic slippers.

It’s steamy inside, and there are washing stations on two sides of the room. You have to crouch down and sit on a low stool, while you shower and wash your body with the aid of a plastic bucket. Someone thought it would be a good idea to put mirrors there. Still carrying 15lb of baby weight I would like to have released a couple of years ago, I’m not sure I agree.

As I wash my hair, I can’t help catching sight of some of the other women in the room. None of them is looking at me. They are all walking around straight-backed, with an air of quiet confidence, regardless of body shape, age or any other defining factor that would render others among us self-conscious. There is an elderly lady soaking her aching limbs luxuriously in the jacuzzi section. Two friends gossiping. A mother with her young child. I wonder what a difference it will make to that little girl’s body confidence, having been brought up bathing in a public place like this.

For many years, girls in the West have been sold images of ‘perfection’ that all look the same. Thankfully, this is starting to change, but we still have a long way to go. We are all heavily influenced by what we see, hear and experience growing up, and we notice what our parents and other adults value, through what they say, how they interact with others and how they make decisions.

Suddenly, I notice how at ease I feel without my clothes, which is an unusual experience for this reserved Englishwoman. When those around me aren’t paying my ‘flaws’ any attention, neither am I. This evening in the bathhouse has taught me something important: my appreciation of my own imperfections is as much a gift to my daughters as it is to myself.

The better we get at what we do, the more exposure we get to people who have done more, are ‘further ahead’, have more ‘success’. But as soon as we take our eyes off our own path and get lost in theirs, we miss the very experience of our own journey. It’s like being on a train, travelling through a foreign country you have always wanted to visit, and then spending the whole trip watching a film on your laptop. You miss the point, and you miss the adventure.

There will always be some people who know more, have done more or have more experience or knowledge than us in a particular field at a particular moment in time. We can choose to look at this as a reflection of lack in ourselves, or an opportunity for inspiration from them.

When the very people we admire and follow are the people who trigger a feeling of insufficiency in us, it is often because we are projecting an unrealistic ideal of perfection onto them. When that happens, we either have to change our outlook, or change who we follow.

We have to keep bringing our attention back to the lives we already have, tethering ourselves to what is here and what is real: love, laughter, kind words, quiet beauty. The tiny details that make up the texture of our lives.

When a potter makes a series of hand-crafted pots, they are not aiming for perfection in terms of symmetry and uniformity, or else they would use a machine. They aim for natural beauty, the mark of the hand and the infusion of the heart.

We are not supposed to be flawless and uniform, as if we have come out of a people factory. What if you imagined yourself as a beautiful hand-crafted pot, lovingly shaped and appreciated because of, not in spite of, your imperfections? What if you acknowledged that texture, character and depth are what underlie your natural beauty, inside and out? And what if you recognised how all that has shaped you along the way has made you who you are today?

Over the years, we paste layers over our natural beauty in our endless pursuit of perfection – with anti-ageing creams, accumulated stuff, job titles and projected images that we think might make other people like us better. But all that is heavy, and it masks what lies within. It’s only when you strip back the layers that you let your inner beauty shine.

It is our imperfections that make us unique, and our uniqueness that makes each of us beautiful.

What if we were to agree that our ideal state is actually perfect imperfection, and that we are already there? There would be no more struggle or exhausting hustle. Rather, a relaxing into the knowledge that we are just fine, just as we are.

Going one step further, we might see that those imperfections could actually be the doorways to new learning opportunities, experiences, conversations and connections. Suddenly, perfect would not seem so desirable, after all, and we would realise we are capable of more than we have ever imagined.

Let’s cast our minds back to what the monk said in Chapter 3 . ‘Wabi sabi is about things in their natural, most authentic state.’ What does your ‘natural, most authentic state’ look like? Is that how you walk through the world? Is that the version you take with you to work? Or the version you show to your friends and family? If not, what do you need to strip away to get back to that state?

Frank Ostaseski, Founding Director of the Zen Hospice Project in San Francisco once said: ‘Wholeness does not mean perfection. It means no part left out.’²

I am writing this at my kitchen counter, glass of wine in hand, dinner dishes stacked high in the sink, waiting for some attention. A voice in my head keeps reminding me that my large travel bag is still lying on my bedroom floor, in the exact spot I left it there on Sunday after my latest trip away. At my feet are strewn children’s toys – an open jewellery box with a sleepy ballerina done with pirouetting for the day; a little teapot ready to serve a teddy bear’s picnic, a balloon from a long-forgotten party slowly wrinkling up …

To begin with, I found so much about parenting not just challenging but confusing. To at once feel so blessed, yet so frustrated. So deeply grateful for their presence, yet stressed out by their demands. So utterly in love, yet out of control. And then I realised, it’s not just the children who are growing, but us parents too. We need space to grow into the parents we are becoming. The discomfort is growth. That’s why it’s scary, difficult and chaotic, but look what it leads to.

Now I look around at the chaos on my living-room floor – the half-dressed doll and rabble of Duplo blocks, the pile of books and scattering of abandoned crayons – and I see something else. I see their incessant curiosity, boundless energy and burning desire to learn more about the world around them. I see joy. Un-adult-erated child’s play. There’s medicine in their laughter and wonder in the air.

I have done my best to make our home soulfully simple and quietly beautiful. But I am not going to kid myself that I should be some kind of perfect homemaker, or that my house is going to be tidy all the time.

I think about how I want my daughters to remember their childhood. Is the most important thing for them to say, ‘We always had a perfectly tidy house’? No. I’m not judging you if you do have a tidy house. I am secretly jealous of it. But what I am saying is that we have to make choices, and right now this is mine. I want them to say, ‘Our house was a lovely happy house, where we felt safe and comfortable. We were always loved and looked after, and we were taught how to love and look after each other. We learned to treasure what we had, and even more than that, to treasure our time together.’

‘Don’t worry. It won’t last,’ they say. But that’s also the sad thing, and the reason for seeking the gift in among it all. Because it won’t last. My girls will soon be interested in different things, different people. They won’t want to snuggle in close, play for hours or chatter with me all day long. And so now, while it lasts, I’m going to be grateful for all of it. Even the wrinkly balloon bobbing around my feet.

Everything in nature is changing, and so is your story. Acceptance doesn’t mean this is how it’s going to end. It’s an acknowledgement that this is where it begins. We are all works in progress. To be alive is to evolve. You can play an active role in that evolution, but first you need to recognise that it is happening. Wabi sabi helps you do that in a gentle and nourishing way.

Wabi sabi teaches perspective – seeing things for how big or small they really are, whether they really matter and whether to nourish them or let them go. When something hard is happening, acceptance can be a real friend. It’s not about handing over your power, or allowing inappropriate behaviour. It’s not passive, it’s active.

3. This is the beginning of all that is to come, and this is what I am going to do next.

It’s saying, this is where I am. This is where we are. The vase is smashed. The marriage is broken. The business is struggling. I am lonely. My child is upset. I just got rejected, again. Whatever is going on, this is what is, right now. We mustn’t ignore what’s happening, but we also don’t need to dramatise it. We need to live and acknowledge it, and then let go of the attachment to it. The truth is, we can’t hold on, and we can’t just push on past; when we learn to surrender to difficulty, accepting that it will come and it will go, life shifts from a battle to a dance.

Not long ago I spent time in the home of Mineyo Kanie, a wonderful ninety-four-year-old woman you will meet in Chapter 8 . When prompted for her secret to a happy life, she said she believed the root of all unhappiness was not being content with what you have, and spending too much time looking outside your life, instead of spending time inside it. This doesn’t mean we cannot have dreams, but rather that happiness begins with gratitude. Kanie-san has clearly seen the tsukubai at Ryōan-ji too (see p. 90 ).

Hope is not the same as expectation. You can plan for and invite a particular future, but you cannot determine or control it. Visualise what you want, but then let it go. Release your attachment to the timeline, and then come back to being present in your life right now.

This week, I challenge you to get clear on what you are grateful for, and then let go of all expectation about anything that has not yet happened. Open your mind and heart to whatever might unfold. Try to go a whole seven days without having to control everything, without stressing when things don’t work out as you thought they would or should. As you do this, any time you feel the need to take charge, try to relax out of it, just to see what happens. Look for the good that happened precisely because things didn’t work out the way you thought they would or should.

And take your time. There really is no desperate hurry. When we constantly pursue perfection, our life speeds up. We make hasty decisions and snap judgements. Wabi sabi offers an opportunity to pause, reflect, check in with yourself and move from there. You’ll likely feel relieved, and make better choices.

• Change is inevitable, so trying to hold on to the past or present is pointless. Be open. Your life is happening right here, right now.

• When your head cannot find the answers, remember your heart may know the way.

TRY IT: PRACTISING ACCEPTANCE

Acceptance is a decision (I am not going to be caught up in a whirlwind of thoughts pulling me away from being here), a recognition (this is what has just happened, or what is happening right now) and a new beginning (by realising where I am, I can move forward from here, with this as my new starting point).

Whatever is going on for you right now, consider trying to accept it in this moment, and see what difference it makes to your perspective. Use the exercise below to help you do this:

1. The decision: I am not going to get caught up in a whirlwind of thoughts, pulling me away. Right now, in this moment I am:

(Describe where you are, what you can see/hear/taste/ smell/feel with your body, such as your feet on the floor or the feel of the seat you are sitting on.)

2. The recognition: this is what has just happened, or what is happening right now. The facts in this moment are:

3. The new beginning: this is a new beginning. (This doesn’t have to be a dramatic new beginning, although it can be.) With this starting point I can/I will:

Acceptance isn’t always easy. Things happen that feel unfair, uninvited, badly timed, painful. It’s not a way to numb your emotions, but rather a way to get some clarity to allow you to feel what you need to feel. At a time like this, self-care is paramount. Make a commitment to yourself.

Ways in which I am going to take care of myself as I go through this:

Mind: (e.g. share my worries with a friend, say no to additional commitments this week, etc.)

Body: (e.g. go for a long walk in nature, nourish my body with fresh and wholesome food, etc.)

Spirit: (e.g. meditate first thing in the morning, keep a gratitude list, etc.)