We are all vessels. I’ll bet you didn’t know that, and neither did I. Until yesterday.
Yesterday was plant day. I was watering my houseplants and noticed that a glass bowl that I made years ago needed dusting. I realize it’s made to hold things, but I’d rather it hold something more meaningful than dust. Still, dust would settle inside it anyway.
This reminded me of life. Throughout our years, we collect all sorts of things. I guess that we, too, are vessels.
My maternal grandmother collected antique tea sets. She loved wondering who enjoyed tea in her previously owned floral tea cups. Were they housewives finding time in between chores to share recipes, talk about their children’s latest endeavors, wax nostalgic about the passage of time?  I have some of her tea cups and saucers in my garden; they’re perched on poles to hold water for thirsty birds to drink.
When you think about it, vessels serve so many other purposes, even when they are cracked. For I am a cracked vessel. So too, are you.
I was created whole, intact, and intentionally empty with so much room for lessons, love, and all the things that come with living life. While this was my beginning, years of escalating emotional abuse set the scene for stress fractures that turned to cracks. Fortunately, in my case, I was also born with a spark inside my soul. Feelings of unworthiness translated to fissures, widening with blows that were words. Words telling me I didn’t matter. I was inadequate, imperfect, and inferior.
Still, my soul-spark flickered enough that I found reasons to smile. While my happiness and hope spilled out through the breach in this beaker, light found its way through. You see, while water can spill out through gaps in glass, light can fill it too. Those cracks don’t diminish the vessel's intense, lovely color when filled with light. I see them as the lines we earn that come with age. Like wisdom from years of growing, giving, and even grieving.
In looking back, I clearly see that while we are all different kinds of vessels, life will toss and turn us, sandpapering our souls, leaving little and sometimes big breaks that glue cannot repair.
I no longer grieve the sweet childhood I never had. I have learned to cherish the tenacity that a once tethered soul now claims. I champion how my cracks allow me the insight to see the beauty in imperfection!
When one of my grandmother’s tea cups fell and shattered, I knew this broken vessel had an even better purpose. I decided to gather all the pieces and turn them into a mosaic tray. This former teacup now holds so much more in a retooled form. We weren’t born with all we will ever need in our toolbox, and not everyone has mortar to make mosaics out of cracked china- but I want you to know that sometimes we don’t need repair! When we feel we are falling apart, we are simply shedding what we no longer need!
Now I know that it was never me. My cracks grew from early childhood; as I grew, so did they. My breached boundaries still render me naive and oversensitive, but I embrace these gaps. While I neither chose nor deserved my abuse, I’m left with an insatiable lust for letting in light and living to share it. I so hope I am sharing it with you!
We are all beautiful, fragile vessels. Glass expands and contracts, and often ultimately cracks.  Always meet yourself where you are. Allow rejection to become redirection! Feel stress and know it can be an impetus for growth, even if it chips away at your hope along the way. Whether you hold daisies or dust, you are a purposed vessel. Darkness of night always leads to morning light. Let your cracks become proof that we are capable despite them! I celebrate you, because you are real, you feel, and your soul gives and takes through those very gaps!
We are all beautiful vessels…