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A review by lauradoesnothing
Wabi Sabi: Japanese Wisdom for a Perfectly Imperfect Life by Beth Kempton
3.0
I'd buy a memoir or travelogue from Kempton in a heartbeat - her anecdotes, though brief, are evocative and wonderful, perfect examples of the feeling she's trying to explain to us - but ultimately this was just another self-help book. It didn't tell me anything I hadn't already learned from Cognitive Behavioural Therapy or a previous self-help book, and I found the pace of the book, ironically, a bit anxiety-inducing; each beautiful story of a perfect fleeting moment in an imperfect world is immediately followed by a reminder that we're all too consumed by our busy worker-bee lifestyles, or living up to the standards set by social media influencers, or (the author's favourite) those darned smartphones.
I'm also not a fan of the way it exoticises, romanticises, almost fetishises, Japanese culture - whilst it makes sense for a book about a uniquely Japanese notion to want to uplift the culture as a whole, it presents this idea that Japan is a nation of exquisite perpetual calm (even in corporate Tokyo, we're told, everyone takes time to be still and marvel at the wonder of nature every day) and everyone in the West is a workaholic with a head full of ADHD and eyes permanently glued to a phone screen.
I would have liked to see more examples of wabi-sabi moments, more of all the fascinating people Kempton interviewed explaining what wabi-sabi means to them in their own words (as opposed to "I spoke to an old woman who said X") and more leading by example - it's hard to fully absorb the lesson of slowing down and being content in the small moments when the book barrels from one point to another at breakneck pace with AWKWARDLY LARGE pull quotes on every page.
I did really enjoy the question sections (of which there are only a handful scattered throughout) as these actually provided some insight and practical guidance on slowing down and figuring out what holds meaning in your life for you to focus on. I feel the book could be great as a series of guided journalling exercises, or a collection of haikuesque short stories illustrating the concept of wabi-sabi, but its incredible potential is mostly squandered on trying to appeal to the "logical, rational-thinking Westerner... [who wants] step-by-steps, how-tos and exact translations". Maybe this was an editing choice, or a requirement of the self-help format, but it left me feeling infantilised and a little insulted.
I'm also not a fan of the way it exoticises, romanticises, almost fetishises, Japanese culture - whilst it makes sense for a book about a uniquely Japanese notion to want to uplift the culture as a whole, it presents this idea that Japan is a nation of exquisite perpetual calm (even in corporate Tokyo, we're told, everyone takes time to be still and marvel at the wonder of nature every day) and everyone in the West is a workaholic with a head full of ADHD and eyes permanently glued to a phone screen.
I would have liked to see more examples of wabi-sabi moments, more of all the fascinating people Kempton interviewed explaining what wabi-sabi means to them in their own words (as opposed to "I spoke to an old woman who said X") and more leading by example - it's hard to fully absorb the lesson of slowing down and being content in the small moments when the book barrels from one point to another at breakneck pace with AWKWARDLY LARGE pull quotes on every page.
I did really enjoy the question sections (of which there are only a handful scattered throughout) as these actually provided some insight and practical guidance on slowing down and figuring out what holds meaning in your life for you to focus on. I feel the book could be great as a series of guided journalling exercises, or a collection of haikuesque short stories illustrating the concept of wabi-sabi, but its incredible potential is mostly squandered on trying to appeal to the "logical, rational-thinking Westerner... [who wants] step-by-steps, how-tos and exact translations". Maybe this was an editing choice, or a requirement of the self-help format, but it left me feeling infantilised and a little insulted.