I recently watched a wise and beautiful movie called Perfect Days, and it has stayed with me, gotten into my head in the way that art often does. The film ends with a vocabulary lesson, one that’s worth knowing and worth passing along to you here.
Komorebi is a Japanese word that does not have a direct counterpart in English. It refers to the dappled pattern of light and shadow, created by sunlight filtering through trees. This contrast between darkness and light, the random play between light and shadow, is not only exquisitely beautiful, but also a metaphor that can alleviate much of our suffering.
In this human life there is komorebi all around us: the interplay of light and darkness. Despite all our best efforts, so much of what’s happening around us is out of our control, beyond our grasp. Perhaps most terrifying of all is the randomness of the darkness: our inability to explain it or predict it. Life can change in an instant… and the more we love, the more we care about, the more vulnerable we are to life’s precariousness.
We navigate this unpredictable, chaotic world with a human brain whose autopilot mode constantly seeks safety, order, satisfaction. It’s a match made in hell, and often creates a kind of hell in our inner world, as we repeatedly attempt to impose order wherever we can. We overthink, seek power, feel overly responsible, judge ourselves and others. Despite all our illusions of control, life continues to be what it is: a mixture of light and shadow, beauty and wreckage; the full catastrophe.
When I can step back and witness my thoughts instead of remaining hostage to them, I often notice how much of my mental energy is spent resisting: arguing with reality, spinning my wheels about how things should be. The spin, the spiral, comes not from what has happened outside of me – but from my mind’s attempts to solve for it, to impose my will on it.
When I can drop my end of the rope in the tug-of-war with life, I’m not so exhausted by my circumstances. When I can drop my resistance to what is, and move toward acceptance, I not only feel better – I also don’t feel so helpless. I save my energy for the things I can influence. And I can be present to moments of happiness. I’m available to the flashes of glorious sunlight when it does filter through.
Radical acceptance, a concept derived from Buddhist teachings, is the practice of allowing all of what life offers: the darkness, the light…and every crazymaking shade in between. The contrast of positive and negative is inherent to our world itself, and it is only in contrast that we can experience anything. Happiness, if it encompassed every minute of every day, would cease to be anything positive at all.
There is komorebi inside of us, too. We aren’t built to experience only positive emotions all the time. Yet somehow, we expect that this steady state of satisfaction is available, if we can just get everyone to read the memo and get with the program.
When we can allow ourselves this inner komorebi, a mixture of positive and negative emotions, we can treat all emotions as honored guests, as Rumi advised.
How do you treat an emotion as an honored guest? First, avoid our default inclinations with negative emotions, which is to ignore them, barricade against them, or try to outrun them with buffering or busy-ness. Look them in the eye, say their name. Invite them in. Attend to them with curiosity and compassion; listen to what they have to say.
Honored guests, when allowed their visit, given their airtime: what do they do? They leave. Paradoxically, we save ourselves so many added layers of pain by simply allowing the pain in the first place.
As Rilke said in his poem, Go To the Limits of Your Longing:
Let everything happen to you: beauty and terror.
Just keep going. No feeling is final.
My wish for you, in your busy days: whenever you can, look up at the trees. Catch the sunlight as it filters through, the sweet alchemy of light and shadow. Let yourself be awake to all of it, to the komorebi. Life is short, and no feeling is final.
