Life is not measured by the number of breaths we take, but by the moments that take our breath away.
Maya Angelou
There is a yearly tradition where friends and friends of friends come together for a weekend to connect, engage, and inspire. For lack of a better word, it’s a form of a retreat. This past weekend was the 6th edition of this now yearly tradition and I feel rejuvenated, energetic, and with a desire to do more of these amazing get togethers!
At the event each attendee must lead a session where they guide the group on whatever topic they like. This past weekend we had everything from learning how to negotiate multi-million dollar real estate deals, singing, the secret to happiness, guessing which is the cheapest wine, disc golf, tarot reading, mental health discussions, personal development, making the worst greeting cards, and others. While the topics were diverse, conversations gravitated towards three areas: mental health (similar to last year but deeper), connections (a common one year over year), and the importance of wabi-sabi (including making the world’s worst greeting card).
On Mental Health
I was surprised to see that out of the group ~40% of people are going through hardships and are seeing a therapist while another ~40% had a significant other or close friend/family member seeking help. It was refreshing to see the vulnerability of the group and the willingness to share – while this sometimes can be thought of as a taboo, I think that we are getting better at talking about and treating mental health as a sickness that must be taken care of just like a fever must be taken care of rather than add a stigma.
What fascinated me was how the weekend taught us tactics on how to cope with mental health even if the sessions were not directly focused on the topic of mental health. We discussed 7 ways to practice gratitude (guest post?) which was specific on increasing happiness but we also had sessions on creating the worst greeting card, disc golf, beach soccer, wine tasting, and singing —> I realized that after each of those sessions, my level of happiness increased just as it did on the focused exercise of gratitude. My take is that focusing on exercise, creativity, and connecting with others help with reducing depression and anxiety.
In one of the sessions someone presented Hegelian thinking and discussed how the strength of something is also its weakness. He highlighted a book titled “Enlightenment Now” written by cognitive scientist Steven Pinker. It argues that the Enlightenment values of reason, science, and humanism have brought progress and explains why this progress should be appreciated. However, at the same time, we’re at a time where depression and anxiety rates have increased and people are appreciating the progress even less. We used Hegelian thinking to reframe bad situations: understand that suffering and pain are necessary for growth and empathy … which led us to the discussion of wabi-sabi.
On Wabi-sabi
In traditional Japanese aesthetics, wabi-sabi (侘寂) is a world view centered on the acceptance of transience and imperfection. We live in a society of social media where the point of view we portray (for the most part) is that of the perfect and happy life. However, as we all know but seem to forget, the perfect life does not exist and all of us have challenges we go through that makes us imperfect. Yet, we are afraid of accepting and showing our imperfections. The fear is that of being judged, of not being accepted, of being the only one with an imperfection. I noticed this even more in a session not related to mental health or wabi-sabi but when we did an exercise on building the worst greeting card. Some of us unconsciously built a beautiful card (while not a normal card, it was definitely not the worst). Either we were too artistic and our worst is beautiful or we are afraid to show our worst even when that’s the goal. Or maybe, I started appreciating wabi-sabi and seeing the beauty in the worst. Hopefully it’s the latter.
On Connections
Nothing is more obvious to me from these retreats than knowing that people need people to ____ (fill in the blank: survive, be happy, succeed, etc). We live in a society that has evolved people to become individualistic and families to become nuclear (only spending time with immediate family members). One of the sessions we had was each participant sharing our childhood memories of the Christmas, End of The Year Holidays. As we went around the table, one of the thing that was common among the group of Jewish, Catholic, Muslim, European, Latin American, Asian backgrounds was that celebrations were always with other people – and as people were sharing their stories, there was a smile in their face.
As a society, we need to go back to being tribal. Humans are social animals and ill-equipped to live on their own. “Belonging,” our capacity and need for empathy, compassion and communication, is in our DNA. An article in Psychology Today says: “Studies show that a sense of Belonging is related to feelings of well-being and better health. Conversely, loneliness is known to be detrimental to one’s physical and mental health.”
This is why I think this retreat hits home with so many people. In our day to day most of us lack the time and space to be able to connect with others and have a sense of belonging. Investing the time to spend time with others, to be vulnerable, generous, and caring with others, is important for a healthier and more fulfilling life. The goal then is not to wait for this event to happen once a year to connect but to recreate these moments in our everyday life by being generous and willing to listen, share, give, but also by being vulnerable by knowing how to ask and receive for help.
What a lovely post Giovanni! I have been pondering on this and I think we need to teach our daughters about wabi-sabi.