Episode 2: Healing, Wholeness, and
the Beauty of Scars
Full Transcript: English
Episode Two: Healing, Wholeness, and the Beauty of Scars
Intro
Welcome back to Languages of Healing, and to this second episode.
In the first one, I focused on language itself — why English became my language of healing, and why I chose it for this podcast. And I realized afterwards that I was also speaking about the first part of the podcast’s title:
Languages.
Because for me, English — spoken or written — is one of those healing tools. A way of reaching inward. A way of finding form for things that are hard to hold.
So today, it feels natural to me, to turn to the second part of the title: Healing.
We use the word all the time these days. We talk about healing ourselves, healing others, healing the world, the planet… But so often what’s meant is a kind of quick fix — a band-aid, a patch, a way to make the pain less visible – less annoying one might even think….
We rarely stop to feel into the word itself. What does it mean — to heal?
And what might it mean beneath the surface, on a deeper, more metaphorical level?
Let’s begin there. A short détour into language.
The English word heal comes from Old English hælan – I do hope I pronounce it more or less correctly - which meant:
“to make whole.”
There’s something in me that settles when I retúrn to that root. Because when we’re suffering — overwhelmed, depressed, fragmented by painful memories or by the weight of our own history — the very idea of wholeness can feel impossible. We feel scattered. Like shattered glass. There’s often even a sound to it, isn’t there? That sharp crash when something hits the floor and breaks.
And when something breaks, it doesn’t just disappear. It leaves behind sharp edges, missing pieces.
The act of healing, then, isn’t about going back to how things were, it’s impossible anyway…. It’s about learning how to gather what’s broken — and hold it differently. So it doesn’t cut you when you do — and the old wound has a chance to seal.
The word whole — as in entire, unhurt, sound, genuine — shares the same root. And so does holy. Not in a strictly religious sense, but in the sense of something sacred. Something that invites reverence.
In German, there’s heilen. In Norwegian, helbrede — meaning to bring health, not just to remove illness. All these words trace back to a Proto-Germanic root meaning uninjured, whole — even of good omen. And… I find that striking. Because it reminds me that true healing isn’t just about treating illness — it’s about strengthening everything that supports our individual vitality. And that’s different for each of us. What restores one person might not restore another — it might even break them. I’ve felt that myself, when well-meant advice or insights from others left me feeling more lost than held. So healing isn’t only about fixing what’s broken — it’s about creating the conditions in which we can truly live. Because even well-meant care can wound, if it misses who we really are in a given moment. That shift in focus — toward life, toward wholeness — feels essential to me.
So no, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that heal, whole, and holy are related. To be healed is to be restored to ourselves. And that, to me, is something quietly sacred — yes, even holy.
Now, some might say that exploring word origins is just a distraction — that it’s not “real” work, real therapy. But for me, it’s always been a form of therapy. Even back when I was studying Ancient Greek. I’d spend hours with a single word — tracing its meanings, diving into its roots — and it would calm me. It slowed my racing mind. It anchored me.
Because when I look closely at words, I often find my own thoughts and emotions mirrored back to me. As if language were not only a way to communicate, but to recognize — to understand — something in myself I hadn’t named yet. Because communication doesn’t always lead to understanding. But sometimes, etymology does.
And honestly? I sometimes wonder if this habit — this way of burrowing into words — was also a form of self-protection. A way of shutting out the chaos that was often around me growing up. I didn’t have noise-cancelling headphones back then — but I had language. I had words. And they gave me something to hold onto. Something steady.
So today, I invite you not just to listen, but to feel into these meanings.
Let them sit with you. Let them stir something.
Because to heal isn’t necessarily to become someone new. Sometimes it’s about returning — not to who we once were, but to a version of ourselves that we’ve never fully lived yet. Something more whole. More real.
And that, too -as I’ve already mentioned above, can be holy.
There’s something I love in those long vowels — heal, whole, holy — like a deep open breath, the opposite of a crack. The long, low vowel sound versus the sharp, brittle sound of something breaking — both sound like spoken language, but from two emotionally opposite directions.
When I think of healing as making whole, another image comes to mind — actually, it pops out immediately: Kintsugi — the Japanese art of golden joinery.
You may have heard of it. It’s the practice of repairing broken ceramics using lacquer mixed with gold powder. Instead of hiding the cracks, it highlights them. The fractures become part of the design — something to notice, even admire.
And what I also find striking is that they’re filled with gold — not just any repair material.
Gold, which in so many cultures symbolizes wealth, status, even divinity. Here, it’s used to honor what was broken. Not to cover it, but to give it visible value. It’s quietly radical to use something as symbolically grand as gold not to glorify power or beauty, but to honor wounding — to say: this crack matters too. The history of the object is not erased. It’s woven into its new form.
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Kintsugi grows out of wabi-sabi - this Japanese way of seeing that finds beauty in what's imperfect, transient, incomplete. There's something in that philosophy about giving ourselves permission to be exactly who we are - not who we think we should be.
But that's territory rich enough for another conversation entirely...
And I find that deeply beautiful. Because healing doesn’t mean we forget. It doesn’t mean we smooth over the pain until it disappears. It means integrating it — carrying it in a way that adds meaning, depth, even beauty.
Kintsugi reminds me of something else, too — a resin I use in aromatherapy called styrax tonkinensis. It’s a type of benzoin — a natural plant resin with powerful healing properties. In the plant, it seals and protects a wound. And on the skin, it soothes and restores the tissue. It’s one of the most effective oils I know for supporting scar repair when blended into healing balms. Its warm, golden-brown color even resembles the lacquer used in Kintsugi.
And its scent? It has a language of its own. One that doesn’t need translation. One that can restore a quiet sense of being cared for.
That, too, is a kind of healing language. And maybe one day I’ll speak more about that in another episode.:-))
This idea of making repair visible - of honoring what's been broken - it keeps pulling me back to something about our culture, about the way we handle our own scars.
In Kintsugi, the repair is not hidden. The gold invites you to look. It says: this cup has been through something. And yet --- it holds. But there’s something else I want to touch on.
But in Western culture, we often hide our scars, right? Have you noticed?
We cover them. We pretend they’re not there. Smoothness is mistaken for wholeness. And behind that is often shame — about how we look, about what we’ve endured, about how our pain might make others uncomfortable.
But why should we have to hide in order to feel worthy? Why must we erase something in order to feel whole?
Showing our scars — both physical and emotional — requires self-acceptance. And a kind of quiet courage. It means letting others see the truth of survival — the real price of survival. Even if it unsettles them.
Maybe especially then.
And sometimes I wonder why that discomfort exists at all — why we are so afraid of visible pain, in ourselves and in others. Maybe that’s also a question for another time. But it’s worth sitting with.
There are some English expressions I’ve always loved:
to heal the rift, to heal the breach, a healing touch.
They feel so tactile — like you’re mending something not just with words, but with hands. With care. With presence.
And that’s exactly what healing often is. Whether it’s a therapist with their words, a physiotherapist with their touch, or someone simply being there — listening, staying. Sometimes, even the scent of a balm — if we love it — can help the healing along. Because that, too, speaks to the body. To the nervous system, especially to the limbic, emotional area in our brain.
To something deeper.
And isn’t that image of the broken cup there again? The rift, the breach — not only in ceramic, but in us. We’re sometimes like fragile cups, too. Hairline fractures beneath the surface. The healing touch is what steadies us. Holds us together.
So I’ll leave you with this:
What does healing mean to you? And what might it feel like to see your own scars — not as flaws to hide — but as golden seams in the story of your life?
Valuable threads, weaving your broken pieces into a kind of imperfect — but truly authentic — wholeness. Because those broken parts are still part of you. And they deserve to be seen, embraced — and healed, by you.
Outro