Everything precious is fragile.

Recently I visited the 60th Biennale in Venice. It was my first time there and my visit came after a difficult year with many changes and stressful events. I found it truly inspiring and comforting being there, watching pieces of art that had as a reference point the personal story of each artist. There is a powerful connection to art when it is personal, maybe because at the same time it becomes universal. Most of the artists were sharing stories, practices and experiences connected to their communities and their cultures. Of course this journey through the story of every community, land or even country included also traumatic events, events that had a major significance to the life of the people and the life of the artist. Those events were being processed through the piece of art and transformed into a common experience for all of us, who were there in interaction with the artwork.  

Reading the book guide, I found this phrase written Everything Precious Is Fragile, followed by the question If being fragile is a strength or a weakness.

This is something I am often asked in the therapeutic space from my clients. We are afraid of fragility, often we cannot embrace it or accept it. It is like this acceptance will open the door to a vulnerability that we don’t know how to handle.  But in the end of the day there is potential in everything ending, including relationships, agreements, and ways of being. Fragility exists into all the aspects of our life.

I believe that there is a crucial connection that we need to make concerning fragility, which is that most of the times is the fragility of things that makes them the most precious.

Moreover fragility is an important element of connection and establishment of relationships. You cannot connect or fall in love only through your strong aspects, you can connect deeply through what we therapists call strong vulnerability. Because strength and vulnerability coexist and they can not exist without each other.

What made me really connect with some of those art pieces in the Biennale was the fragility that was shared in each of them and at the same time the strength that was depicted into this expression. Most of the shared stories were stories of vulnerability but at the same time stories of resistance and resilience. You cannot really experience strength without experiencing fragility and vice versa.

In the end, being able to make peace with the fact that everything in life can fall apart and accepting your fragility, is one of the strongest ways to affirm life.