“Would the ‘Light’ please hurry the @#$*! up?!” - Wisdom I Have Learnt From My Broken Bits
- By Jane Martino, Kinsugi Way (June 25, 2025)
Being human is messy, beautiful, and endlessly surprising. At Ponti Health, we believe in seeing the whole picture—the contradictions, the breakthroughs, the perfectly imperfect journey of it all.
That's why we're excited to share these stories from some remarkable humans who've become dear friends along the way. Each journal captures something we couldn't quite put into words until we read it. We have a feeling you'll experience that same moment of recognition—that quiet "yes, exactly" that reminds us we're all figuring this out together. Ponti Health.
I used to avoid mistakes, acknowledging painful emotions or any form of perceived failure at all costs. Surely no one would respect a leader that doesn’t have all the answers, a parent that loses her temper, a partner that decides the ‘forever’ that she committed to in fact had a use by date?
That theory worked perfectly until the year I was CEO of a company with some of the world’s highest profile investors that went into administration instead of listing on the Australian Stock Exchange for $250 million as planned. The very same year that, after 14 years of marriage and three children together, my husband and I decided to part ways instead of our ‘happily ever after ‘as planned.
Enter zero ability to avoid mistakes, painful emotions or perceived failure.
No business, no marriage and subsequently, no identity = the new and unimproved me.
Based on the construct society and I had worked tirelessly to create; I had little left. To say I was broken was an understatement. I found myself constantly consumed by shame and not knowing what the future would hold while assuming the very worst in terms of how people would view me post business and relationship bust up.
At the time I remember clinging to Rumi’s wisdom; “the wound is the place where the Light enters you”.
Does it? How soon? When exactly will the light come? I wish it would hurry the @#$*! up.
Today, almost ten years later, I see the brilliance of not only what I needed to experience but where it has led me since.
The Light that entered me was the realisation it was not people’s view of me that I needed to work on changing, it was the view I held of myself. In fact, people’s view didn’t really change the way I thought it did. Sure, they recognised the experiences (in some people’s eyes, failures) but I was still me to them. The reality was I had to like the me I was, regardless of the empires that I built or those that I was complicit in crumbling.
I was basing my worth on my career, business accolades, hours worked, awards won, recognition given and society’s view of what determined a ‘successful’ family and life more broadly.
I have since experienced Rumi’s beautiful concept first-hand. Day by day, week by week and year by year rebuilding who I am outside of my extrinsic goals and achievements and things that society determines as success.
Rebuilding my worthiness outside of productivity and being the one known to ‘get shit done’. Instead getting the shit done that I truly care about. Working out who I am, what really matters, and what success means to me – from the inside out.
“ It is our responsibility to gently and graciously use what is broken to create something better. ”
It is this process, and the gifts it has afforded me since, that led me to deeply appreciate the Japanese philosophy of Kintsugi. The artform of broken things perceived as more beautiful once repaired and brought back to life as the beholder is provided a new way to view the rough edges or chips now adorned with gold and sparling anew. A metaphor that urges us forward into self-discovery – that rather than avoiding or hiding from our broken pieces, wounds and difficulties, we consider staying present with them, so instead they can become the very places where understanding, compassion, and enlightenment enter our lives.
The very places where we can transform a wounded, old way of behaving or viewing things into a more positive outlook, habit or way of interacting with the world and people in it.
It is where my view on true success in life became understanding I am valuable without doing a thing. Understanding sitting alongside another human or providing support and insight lights me up. Understanding I would rather miss a Board meeting than a basketball game. Understanding the conversation with the teenager alongside me in the car might just be the difference that day, and for many more to come. Understanding my extra hours working and ‘doing’ while maybe provided financial gains.
So accept the breaks. Allow the mistakes. Embrace the flaws. Feel the burn. Take the hard thing on. Risk the heartbreak.
Because now I realise the Light was there waiting for me the whole @#$*! time.
About Jane Martino
Jane Martino is a serial entrepreneur who has built and successfully exited multiple companies across media, fintech, and digital health sectors. She's best known as Chair and Co-Founder of Smiling Mind, the globally recognized mental health non-profit with over 9 million app downloads. A sought-after investor and advisor in Australia's start-up ecosystem, she launched coaching business Kintsugi Way in 2024, focusing on helping individuals reach their maximum potential through her people-first leadership approach.