The Japanese tradition of wabi-sabi offers an inspiring new way to look at your home, and your whole life. (by Robyn Griggs Lawrence, from Natural Home September-October 2001)

"Wabi-sabi reminds us that we are all transient beings on this planet—that our bodies, as well as the material world around us, are in the process of returning to dust. Nature’s cycles of growth, decay, and erosion are embodied in frayed edges, rust, liver spots. Through wabi-sabi, we learn to embrace both the glory and the melancholy found in these marks of passing time."

http://www.utne.com/mind-and-body/wabi-sabi.aspx