When I went to the national training in 2014, I had no idea how central The Daring Way would become in my life—how it shapes my beliefs, my values, and my work.   Helping people access and utilize their courage is one of the most remarkable transformations to witness, imho.   

I recently discovered the phenomenon of the Japanese pottery Kintsukuroi, where they used gold to repair the cracks in broken pottery.  After being pieced back together, the pottery is considered more beautiful and valuable.  

Why can't we apply this metaphor to ourselves?  If you know me or read any of my emails, you know you can't read more than a few sentences without stumbling over a metaphor.  Kintsukuroi is probably my favorite metaphor.  We view the things that happened to us as scars to hide or be ashamed of.  We let the stories that caused them rule our lives while pretending we're unbroken and perfect.  

Living a wholehearted life means that we have to embrace our imperfections and accept that we're enough as we are.  This is quite hard in a society that thrives on scarcity or "not enough-itis," and you feel like your life might end if you don't get x product to fix y problem.  Watch five minutes of QVC and you will see this front and center. 

When I got that person's feedback, I said to myself, "well, this is an opportunity to embrace my imperfection, right here, right now. People can either my understand mistakes, or they will judge me for them. I really can't control what people think anyway...  Maybe they will see and understand that I'm human too, I make mistakes, and see the larger perspective that I wanted to send some helpful content."