Just Another Plank in The Wall
What makes us whole is made from what almost tore us apart.
What if the parts of your story you’ve tried to discard … shame, addiction, betrayal, grief … aren’t your disqualifications, but your foundation? When I record these videos I do so standing in front of a wall I built from discarded pallet wood. It’s jagged and imperfect, and that’s what makes it holy. In this video and post, we explore what it means to stay human by reclaiming the pieces we were told to throw away, both in our selves and our society. This is a call to welcome home the outcasts, in you and around you, and to build something sacred from what others saw as waste.
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The Whole Story
When you look at the wall behind me, perhaps you see something beautiful. Warm tones. Grit. Texture. A bit of soul. But get up close? You'll see splinters. Nail scars. Knots and splits. Dirt and grime. Wood that's been battered, salvaged, broken. And you know what, it's not just beautiful, it's perfect. Not because it fits a certain standard of style or quality of construction, but because it wasn't thrown away.
Origins of the Wall
These planks used to be parts of pallets, like the kind you find in warehouses across the country. More specifically, they were pallets from Xero Shoes, where I used to work. Where we were pushing against convention. Selling something raw and true.
When changes in leadership brought my time there to an end, I brought the leftovers home. The ones deemed broken. The scraps. The ones no one wanted.
Just as my experiences there echo in the stories I now tell, it was with those pallets I built something I could stand in front of as I tell these stories. Something that could hold me this space we are creating. Because I needed a wall that didn't just look good, I needed a wall that told the truth about being and staying human.
A wall that's organic.
A wall that's gritty.
A wall that's imperfect.
A wall that's reclaimed.
A wall that says: You are not just another brick. You are a unique and valuable plank.
Breaking Free from the Mold
I grew up as Another Brick in the Wall continued to echo through the culture. My first exposure to Pink Floyd's anthem of defiance came a few years after its released. I was in third grade, walking home from school and a kid I can see but not name sang on repeat, "We don't need no education… teachers, leave them kids alone."
Now, I'm pretty sure the substance of to song failed to connect, that his vocal was more about not liking school, but none the less, the seeds were planted in my psyche, and as the years continued, I came to understand that this wasn't about learning—it was about control.
About training kids to be just another cog in the industrial system. Another faceless unit stacked into a cold and perfect wall. A wall that imprisons.
But this wall? The one behind me. This wall liberates. Because this wall holds story. This wall holds scars. This wall embodies the very movements that allow us to stay human, and in doing so, it invites you to be human. Organic. Gritty. Beautifully imperfect. Perpetually reclaiming experiences and moving forward from them. At least that's what we do when we treat not just our selves but the elements of our psyches as unique and valuable planks.
We Are Parts
Family Systems Theory teaches us that we are made of parts. Some we celebrate. Some we exile. The performer. The addict. The ashamed little boy. The angry protector. The erotic self. The terrified child. We board them up like condemned buildings and say: That's not me. But the wall of our psyche's are only complete when all of our planks come home.
But what happens when we don't reclaim? What happens when we deem parts of ourselves unworthy and seek to cast them aside?
The Pain of Exclusion
When I was a kid, I didn't get picked. Not for the team. Not for the party. Not even for friendship. I wasn't walking with the kid who introduced me to Pink Floyd because we were friends, we just shared proximity on the walk home, although, eventually, he too would bully both me and my younger brother … enough so that, eventually, parents got involved.
On the rare occasion when someone started to notice me, when a kid finally began to treat me like I mattered, the "cool kids" would swoop in and claim that friend for themselves. Just to make sure I stayed on the outside.
That's a particular kind of pain. The pain of being noticed only to be erased. Of being unchosen. Of being invisible and too visible all at once.
You learn to ache for acceptance while distrusting it. You learn to perform. To become who they want you to be. To hide the parts of you that never get invited in. To play with the Pink Floyd metaphor, you replace the planks of authentic you with the bricks of performance.
But those parts, those planks you replaced with bricks, they're an essential part of you. I spent decades trying to leave them behind. I cast them out into the junk pile of shame. But they still called my name.
The Sacred Ecology of the Soul
Jungian Eco-Psychologist Bill Plotkin, who takes Family Systems Theory to a whole new level, calls these pieces, pieces of our psyche we've attempted to throw away, outcasts. Then he goes on to remind us that these outcasts are not debris discarded by a careless universe. They are holy exiles, travelers carrying fragments of our wholeness across the desert of our denial.
You see, in the sacred ecology of the soul, nothing is waste but only displaced, waiting for the courageous moment of homecoming. The parts we've banished: the fierce child with their unfiltered rage, the addict with their desperate hunger, the mystic whose visions threaten our carefully constructed reality. These aren't obstacles to our journey, they are the journey itself. They form the very roots from which authentic identity grows in soil too rich for sanitized living.
You see, just as actual compost is a blend of greens and browns, nitrogen and carbon, so our outcasts need care in order to become the black gold of our soul formation. A compost pile that's all green, one that's overloaded with nitrogen, is a compost pile that gets slimy and stinks. So an outcast who remains unloved finds ways to bring a diabolical stench into our lives.
How Outcasts Transform in Exile
Outcasts living in banishment don't simply disappear. They transform. Like water diverted from its natural course, they find new pathways through our lives. The body becomes their first language: chronic tension settling into shoulders, mysterious illnesses that confound doctors, immune systems turning against themselves, anxiety that arrives without invitation, fatigue that no amount of sleep can touch. Our throats tighten, jaws clench, stomachs knot. The body keeping score of what the mind refuses to acknowledge.
When stress cracks our carefully constructed facades, these exiles seize their moment. The performer rushes to the stage, desperate to please, protect, or prove our worth. The addict reaches for whatever numbs the pain: work, food, screens, substances. Anything to avoid the wilderness of feeling. The angry protector either lashes out or withdraws completely, mistaking isolation for safety. And our erotic self, that primal life force, either seduces or shuts down entirely, having learned it's either too dangerous or too shameful to exist as it is.
At night, when consciousness loosens its grip, they visit our dreams. They come as animals wild with instinct, as monsters carrying our power, as forgotten rooms in houses we thought we knew, as strangers calling our names. These aren't random neural firings. They're the soul's attempt to reconcile what daylight consciousness rejects.
Perhaps most painfully, our exiles choreograph our relationships. We project them onto others, judging someone for being "too much" when really we've disowned our own vastness. We find ourselves trapped in the same story with different characters, choosing partners who mirror our unhealed wounds, who reject us in ways that feel hauntingly familiar.
And in our most vulnerable moments, when love approaches or creativity flows, they sabotage what we most desire. Just as we open to receive tenderness, the voice of unworthiness rises. When we create something true, a saboteur whispers we're frauds. These are not random thoughts but exiled parts protecting us from the risk of being seen, being hurt, being real.
Sometimes our outcasts hide in plain sight, disguised as virtue. We become the responsible one, the spiritual one, the eternal caregiver. Roles that look noble but actually protect our exiled chaos, rage, or desire. And when all else fails, they speak through addiction and numbness. Because if we don't create space for these outcasts consciously, we will seek unconscious ways to keep them quiet. Never realizing that what we're trying to silence is actually trying to save us.
This is what Jung called "the shadow," the parts of ourselves we've disowned. And the more we push them away, the more power they gain.
Our Selves, Our Society
These individual processes mirror what happens in our broader systems. Our economic structures discard those deemed not productive enough. The disabled, the elderly, the neurodivergent. Our healthcare systems exile those who can't afford their services. Our political apparatus silences voices that challenge the status quo. Our digital world discards yesterday's technology as obsolete, creating islands of electronic waste in developing nations. All around us, systems of planned obsolescence and disposability teach us that when something or someone breaks or becomes inconvenient, the solution is replacement, not repair.
Just as we push away parts of ourselves, our collective systems banish entire communities to the margins. The Capital(ism) Punishment that is killing us all, it's only possible because we live in a society that depends on us not bringing our outcasts home. So our healing isn't just personal, but communal. Reclaiming our outcasts is also about creating communities that welcome those our systems have rejected.
The Story of My Outcasts
It was my outcasts, ones partially formed in those years of not being picked, fighting for recognition, that enabled that season of my life where I lived in public as one person and acted in private like someone else.
Some of it you've heard in previous stories: Desperate for soothing, I hurt the people closest to me. My kid. The women who trusted me. The people whose hearts I was supposed to protect.
In the end, it didn't matter how hard I worked to suppress these harmful impulses, what barriers I set up to keep me from acting out, how much accountability I put in place, the number of times I swore off the behavior, nothing was going to change until I welcomed those outcasts home and allowed these inner parts of me that I rejected to become the very root of my healing.
Welcoming Outcasts Home
I say that rather tritely to introduce the idea, but welcoming them home is challenging. It requires not self-help techniques but soul tasks: tracking them through dreams and body symptoms, greeting them with the reverence due to lost kin, creating rituals of reintegration in wild places where the veil between worlds thins. This isn't cognitive restructuring. It's a rite of passage. Because true maturity begins when we stop amputating what hurts and instead descend into the underworld of what we've refused to feel.
Welcoming home our exiled parts begins not with fixing, but with reverence. This homecoming isn't a linear self-improvement project but ongoing soul work, a ritual of reclamation that honors what we've cast away.
The path of reintegration begins with naming without shame: "I have a part that's angry," "I have a part that craves attention". This naming breaks the spell of secrecy, requiring not approval but honesty. Then we listen deeply, asking our exiles: "What do you need that you never got?" "What are you protecting?" Wants may be chaotic, but needs are sacred clues.
Give these parts a voice through journaling or art, but don't hand them the wheel. This is dialog, not possession. Locate them in your body. Tight jaw? Numb chest? Create movement that honors their presence. Because outcasts don't just want airtime; they want embodiment.
Invite them into ritual: draw them as animals, create altars for their longing, or stand at threshold places like forest edges and riversides to name what you're reclaiming. This isn't performance; it's initiation. Then let them be witnessed by just one safe person, because shame dies in presence.
Finally, build with the timber of what you've rejected. Take your most disowned part and create from it. This is not about overcoming, but about incorporating. Because the wall of your humanity only stands when all the planks come home.
Practical Guidance
Not sure how? In the bonus section of this post I include guidance on developing a ritual for welcoming the outcasts home. And when you do that, just like when you add a load of carbon, the brown of compost, to a rancid pile of nitrogen laden green material, it not only works to magically eliminate the stink, but invites in the essential microbes that turn it all into nutrient intense material that gives everything else life. Welcoming home the outcasts with love and care allows them to reintegrate into our psyche, an act that both brings an end to their harmful behaviors but becomes an essential piece in our own self-discovery. It is here where the primal wound becomes sacred, the place where we were once most hurt becomes our gift to the world.
And this work is not meant to be done alone. Create or join communities of practice where members commit to witnessing each other's wholeness. Form "plank circles" where people gather to name their exiled parts and be seen without judgment. Organize neighborhood repair cafés that honor the value of mending what's broken instead of discarding it. Advocate for economic systems that recognize the inherent worth of all people, not just the productive ones. Push for healthcare models that treat the whole person, not just their symptoms. Support art that celebrates the beauty of what's been broken and reclaimed.
Because individual healing and collective transformation are inseparable. The same systems that teach us to reject parts of ourselves also condition us to reject parts of our human family. When we learn to welcome home our own outcasts, we develop the capacity to create communities where no one is disposable.
The Rejected Cornerstone
It's an image that cuts to the heart of the earliest forms of the Christian faith, although it's one you'll rarely hear in American churches today, church that are far more interested in sin management or covert hypocrisy than actual healing. The image originates in Psalm 118 where the Hebrew poet writes:
"The stone the builders rejected has become the cornerstone."
They're words that Jesus used, warning the religious leaders of his day that what they planned to discard was foundational to God's plan for all of creation. The disciple Peter, who led the early movement of Jews who followed the way of Jesus then used it both when explaining Jesus to the religious leadership but also to the early Christian community as he invited themselves to think of themselves as "living stones" being built into a spiritual house.
Wisdom Across Traditions
But it's a truth that echos beyond the pages of the Christian Bible. In Buddhism, they speak of embracing all feelings with compassion. The Dalai Lama teaches: "In dealing with those who offend, treat them as a precious treasure." What if we treated our own offending parts this way?
In Sufism, Rumi writes: "The wound is the place where the Light enters you." In Jewish mysticism, there's the concept of "tikkun olam", repairing the world by gathering divine sparks hidden in the darkness. The Bhagavad Gita teaches us about the shadow self, the parts we reject, and calls us to integration. Indigenous wisdom reminds us that the medicine often grows beside the poison. Different languages. Same truth: The parts we cast out hold our healing.
It's not about what we deem special or unique or attractive. It's about taking that which was once discarded and discovering that it not only belongs, but holds a place of honor.
It's about a divine wisdom that builds something new out of the pieces others said didn't fit. This is the mystery. The wall that holds me together, is made from the moments that almost tore me apart.
Beyond the Redemption Arc
But there's another lesson that the wall is holding for us. And this is the part that both wrecks me but undergirds so much of my life today. You see, while I've learned from my outcasts, while I've changed, while I've brought the planks home and incorporated them into the wall, that doesn't make any of it okay.
You see, we tend to tell these stories, especially in faith spaces, where people hit bottom, learn the lesson, and get the redemption arc. No sooner is this done then we cue the soundtrack and roll the credits. Soon we're calling it the feel good story of the season.
But there's a problem. Real life doesn't tie itself up in three acts. Real life leaves bruises. And just because I've changed, doesn't mean the people I hurt while living a duplicitous life are ok. Yes, they played an integral role in helping me discover my outcasts, some were even among the first voices to suggest I invite them home, but they are more than just props in my story, more than tools to facilitate my healing, learning, and growing. While grace might be real, grace for me doesn't erase the harmful impact on them. My path to grace and the welcoming home of my outcasts, could have very well created outcasts for them. And if you don't carry the weight of that, you're not changed, you're just manipulative, continuing to use them for your own gain.
Which is why the planks aren't clean. Why they haven't been sanded down. This is the wall isn't smooth. That dirt, the grit, it serves as a reminder of where you've been. It is there so you tell their story too, foster grief for the pain you caused, and stir empathy as you move forward in a way that does less harm.
There is no way for you to undo that damage done. The best you can do is recognize it and confess it, which might help in the healing process, but sadly, if new outcasts formed, the person you harmed is the only one who can invite them home.
The Journey of Integrity
While those we've hurt may never fully trust us again, and that's their right, we can still model what integration looks like. When we walk the path of wholeness openly, without using it as a performance or redemption arc, we silently invite others to consider their own outcasts. Not through prescription or advice, but through humble example. The greatest act of service may be showing what it looks like to live without shame while still acknowledging the weight of our impact.
Most importantly, we must recognize when our "help" could cause further harm. The people we've hurt aren't responsible for validating our growth or witnessing our transformation. Sometimes the most healing thing we can offer is distance, giving them space to do their own work without the burden of our presence. True amends sometimes means stepping back rather than trying to fix.
This delicate balance, holding both our own healing and the harm we've caused, is perhaps the most challenging part of welcoming our outcasts home. It requires us to live in paradox: changed but not entitled to forgiveness, healed but still bearing witness to the wounds we inflicted, integrated but forever marked by the consequences of our actions.
And yet, this is precisely where the beauty emerges.
The Wall as Symbol
This wall behind me? It's beautiful, because it's a symbol not only of the parts I once cast out, but their journey home. They're all here, and now hold space, visually telling the story of how we move from shame to embrace, from performance to authenticity, from exploitation to solidarity, and from consumption to re-creation. This wall is my story, but it's also the story of how we stay human.
So look around at your life, at the pieces that feel scattered and broken. Those aren't just mistakes or failures, they're the very materials from which your authentic self is built. The splinters that once cut you can become the foundation that holds you.
You were never meant to be a smooth, identical brick in someone else's wall. You are a complex, weathered plank with your own unique grain and character. Your imperfections aren't flaws to be hidden, they're the features that make you irreplaceable.
When you welcome home every part of yourself, especially those you've tried to discard, you don't just heal. You become whole in a way that was impossible before the breaking. You stay human.
Practices For Welcoming Outcasts Home
Here are three practices to help you welcoming outcasts home, whether your day only allows for a 60-second reclamation reflection, your week a one-hour resistance ritual, or you find yourself ready for a full on rebellion against a world that assaults your humanity, I have something for you.