Welcome to Tell it Proud, stories of courage too good to erase or ignore. I'm your host Christina Blacken. I'm a public speaker, performer, writer, and founder of The New Quo which helps every day people practice authentic leadership through daily acts of courage that improves trust and wellbeing in how we live and work together.

Today's episode is an essay I wrote titled "why imperfection is your greatest strength," which dives into the concept of wabi-sabi -- an aesthetic and philosophical practice from Japan that values and celebrates imperfection. Western culture is obsessed with perfectionism. We're ambushed by messages embedded in our institutions about striving for perfection. Whether it's education, or sports, our physical bodies, or careers, we're inundated with messages about how we're not thin enough, fast enough, light skinned enough, smart enough, talented enough, rich enough – it sounds like a bad rap song about how we need to be different to deserve love and safety. Wabi-sabi is an antidote to this detrimental perfectionism and different approach worth exploring.