Potter at the wheel.
From centering to finished pot,
Form increases as options decrease;
Softness goes to hardness.
When a potter begins to throw a pot, she picks up a lump of clay, shapes it into a rough sphere, and throws it onto the spinning potter’s wheel. It may land off-center, and she must carefully begin to shape it until it is a smooth cylinder. Then she works the clay, stretching and compressing it as it turns. First it is a tower, then it is like a squat mushroom. Only after bringing it up and down several times does she slowly squeeze the revolving clay until its walls rise from the wheel. She cannot go on too long, for the clay will begin to “tire” and then sag. She gives it the form she imagines, then sets it aside.
The next day, the clay will be leather hard, and she can turn it over to shape the foot. Some decoration may be scratched into the surface. Eventually, the bowl will be fired, and then the only options are the colors applied to it; its shape cannot be changed.
This is how we shape all the situations in our lives. We must give them rough shape and then throw them down into the center of our lives. We must stretch and compress, testing the nature of things. As we shape the situation, we must be aware of what form we want things to take. The closer something comes to completion, the harder and more definite it becomes. Our options become fewer, until the full impact of our creation is all that there is. Beauty or ugliness, utility or failure, comes from the process of shaping.
Then if you drop it on the floor, it cracks into a bunch of pieces.
I don’t know that most people really think much about shaping their lives. They more or less allow their lives to happen. We might plan something like going to college or getting married, but really, most things just sort of happen in our lives. And there are more than a few of us who certainly look like sagged pots. Lots of us forget about securing our footings, too, so we tend to tip over or wobble around a lot.
I guess I just don’t see my life as this whole pottery thing, except for the few terms that would apply, like “crackpot”. I see life as a far more evolving thing, and certainly we can reshape our lives time after time, they aren’t hardened into fired clay after all.
Maybe more appropriate is to think about how we would like to reshape our lives, how to become centered again, and shape our lives the way we would like them to be. Then I think the potter’s analogy applies. First, try to center yourself – think about what you want as the center of your life. For me, I guess that’s principles and family. Those are the things I come back to time after time. Then, how you want your life to look, what shape you want it to take. I tend to think of myself as a pitcher, for carrying things and pouring them out where they are needed. I like having lots of empty space that can be filled with all kinds of stuff.
I’ve had enough firings in my life to be pretty well hardened and very colorful. And I think my footings are pretty solid. But really, I think I’m more like that metal pitcher that sits on my cabinet now rather than the pottery one, as pretty as it is – if you dropped me, I certainly wouldn’t shatter. Not again. I might dent, but I don’t break anymore.
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