Back on the Pottery Wheel
I spent the last few days at the shore visiting my parents where I dusted off my pottery wheel for the first time since high school twenty-three years ago.
I wasn’t sure how this would all work. I mean, it was just me. In my parents basement. With one-hundred pounds of fresh clay. And a wheel I wasn’t sure would actually work.
But it was fabulous.
I opened the rusty bilco basement doors to let in the crisp Autumn air and warmth of the sunshine as I sat down with one intention: to make bowls. It’s what I love creating. All shapes and sizes.
I sat myself down at the wheel twice. Once on Sunday. Once on Monday. In a few hours I threw two beautiful bowls. This is a snapshot of one taken a few minutes after I popped it off the wheel and stepped out of the basement onto my parents deck.
I can’t really describe the feelings that floated around inside me after I threw these pieces. It was my first time throwing on my own (outside of a studio with lots of people shuffling around) and I felt even more relaxed and at peace. While I loved my time at various pottery studios in NYC, I started to feel a bit of an itch this past spring to throw alone in silence. And when I get an itch (my intuition), I listen. This past weekend felt even more glorious and soothing than I anticipated – something I tend to feel every time I take the time to listen to myself.
It’s taken me 40 plus years to truly tune into myself, listen to and trust myself fully. The more I listen, the more at peace I feel and the more joy I experience. Listening closely has helped pull me out of the anxious extrovert I thought I was for most of my life and led me further into deeper creativity and the joy of being an introvert.
It’s a beautiful feeling.
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