A quiet Sunday, few people, almost no noise, a sky half gray, half blue, mild temperature. From my balcony, I peer at an almost deserted street. Here and there, a dog laments, cries with longing for its owners. It is a holiday.

A word, rebirth, wanders through my thoughts. It is associated with the Christian celebration of Easter. It is a word repeated, suggested, philosophized: many short videos suggest, in different languages, that it is time to be reborn, to start over, to build a new self.

These are complex proposals, because they are difficult (impossible!) to carry out. I can understand, comprehend and even give new meanings to my life experiences, but they will remain there, pillars of my self, nourishing my thoughts, driving my actions and coloring my feelings.

Very early on, I begin storing, without an organized project, scraps of these events in my memory. The proposal to be reborn throws me into fictional scenarios, some familiar, since I have fantasized stories of fresh starts... Remembering some, I connect with my little self, who sketched possibilities, many of them on other planets.

I was (or still am) a very imaginative girl. At some moments in life, I badly wanted to flee to another dimension. Books and angels saved me.

So, in saying that rebirth is impossible, I do not do so without having reflected, imagined and fantasized a great deal about it.

Alternatively, I have tried the action contained in other words: repairing, updating, qualifying, forgiving, understanding... All of them contemplate small rebirths, invigorating ones, which vitalize keeping direction and sustain hope so as not to give up.

Many moments of life look like broken glass, thousands of shards that recall pain, goodbyes, the ruin of loyalty, the death of trust... Bringing them to memory, to organize the chaos, I borrow from the Japanese the art of restoring broken porcelain, kintsugi. The artists reassemble the original piece not to hide the scars but to honor them, using gold in the process.

In our human kintsugi, each set of shards examined and reassembled makes sense: it tells a story. Restoring them allows us to understand characters and contexts. The distance that time offers can generate wisdom that leads to relief and learning. Many characters can be rescued through restoration; others, after a convenient farewell, go into the collection of that extraordinary museum that is our memory, duly labeled with an “I learned, I don’t want it anymore.”

This delicate work of finding the pieces and connecting them, even knowing we will never find them all, gives us the chance to look at the story with an eye updated by all the experiences from then to now. Many times people say to me: “Ah, how I wish I had your way of acting when...” And there is something we still cannot do: travel back to the past.

It is time to look at that past self with the serenity and compassion we devote to our most beloved little ones. We did the best we could with what we knew and with the tools we had.

The first to receive forgiveness: our past self. And an affectionate forgiveness, with a lap and all, lest guilt take away our spirit to qualify our strategies as successful. After all, if we are gathering the shards, we are alive and awake, eyes wide open!

Forgiving does not mean forgetting. These are precious lessons: things we will no longer do, people we will no longer trust, thoughts we will protect ourselves from, considered decisions we can now make. However, not forgetting cannot mean dragging resentment that, like iron balls, slows our steps.

I know we are still going through dark times: violence, infamy, injustice, absurdities, suffering of unimaginable dimensions. To keep my emotional health, I need to understand, restore and choose lucidly at each step.

The most fundamental of steps for me to keep this purpose of sowing hope is to restore my selves, who bring from the journey scars of abrasive terrain. Support comes when, seeking healing, we find the references of unconditional love: people who, along the road, had time and attention to listen, validate, value, caress and encourage.

That is the gold of our human kintsugi. Angels of the past, angels of the present, who are there asking nothing in return, reach out a hand, look us in the eye, see, perceive, love. Each gesture is a movement toward restoration. With each small territory strengthened, possibilities awaken. Seen this way, those whom lack of love had erased are reborn. Each gesture, each softened scar, gives strength to the militancy of hope.