As someone who works with clay, I can confidently say that learning how to wheel-throw was a humbling experience. I was sitting in a classroom surrounded by other nervous students, all sitting at the wheel, our professor having just finished effortlessly throwing a cylinder. Needless to say, none of ours went as smoothly. At the end of the class, I had a wobbly clay-thing that sort of resembled a deflated bowl. Covered in clay, my arms and back aching, I saw the challenge in front of me — I was supposed to make 40 cylinders, each 15 centimetres tall. That felt quite impossible at the time.
I spent hours in the studio each week, making cylinder after cylinder until finally the day came when I presented what I had accomplished to my professor. They weren’t perfect, some of them weren’t tall enough or didn’t have even walls, but all I saw was my progress. At the end of that project, I chose my best attempts, fired and glazed them, and proudly displayed them on my shelf. As for the rest, I had the cathartic experience of smashing them into pieces to reclaim them as clay and begin again.
It was a whirlwind of learning, with long days and more failures. Some days I wanted to quit, other days I felt so much triumph in having a single completed work to show. It is a humbling experience to dedicate an immense amount of time to learning something, to commit to being a beginner.
As I progressed, my own standards became harsher. I no longer felt pride at merely the completion of a competent work — instead I felt as though it was an expectation. On the days of continuous failure, I felt the aches from my long hours hunched over the wheel even sharper. I had lost the charming feeling of being a beginner, and I scoffed at my early attempts.
This was until one day, my professor talked about how she still had her first pieces of pottery. Suddenly, it clicked. If someone at her level still spoke about her first works with pride, why didn’t I? If I had never been a beginner, I would never have gotten to where I am now. Those early attempts mark the start of my journey — they are stepping stones, they show my levels of experience.
This is why I now embrace each new challenge with open arms. If it takes me days or weeks to master a new technique, I know that the eventual success will be even sweeter. I stand atop a mountain of failures and proudly add more to my collection.
Each day comes with its own hardships. Often, I have to remind myself after a difficult day that trying makes me better than yesterday, and that there’s nothing wrong with having another go tomorrow. I may never be the beginner pottery artist with wobbly cylinders that I was, but I will always cherish the fact that I was her, and that she committed to not giving up.
