Centering clay on a potters wheel as a metaphor for the soul:
The words freedom, peace, single focussed and serenity come to mind when I look at centering metaphorically.
Freedom to play: safety in the absence of fear, and free from our own internal limitations and external tyrannies. In order to play, we must be nimble and imaginative and able to feel enjoyment. Sometimes long periods of suffering or limitation makes us numb and sluggish. Paradoxically there are disciplines like pottery that can create in us capacities which allows us to seek out our freedom. We can get rid of repressed anxieties.
Peaceful enough to be mindful of the present: In the absence of distracting voices/noises and opinions and a single focus, one can bring all once’s capabilities into a unity and into unity with what is authentic and true.
For me to handle the medium in its full range of transformations, we need to dig up the clay out of the earth bed. Here I experience the forces of time that has transmuted rock into plastic dust. I process, I wait, wedge, center and form…mindful of every movement, sensing the will of the clay beneath my fingers. I change the surface and fire it, turning it into its stoneware form. This form speaks of ‘wholeness’. Pots speak of an ‘innerness’ and the pressure from the inside gets the most attention while throwing the pot. The outer shape is an expansion of its center. Each moment bears life forward. Pottery is earth derived, center-orientated, container for nourishment or water carrier or can even become beggars bowl.
When the clay is not centered on the wheel there is a there is a disease, a conflict, a frustration. This is like the state is disunity and struggle that so often exists within our psyche, things contradict and the dissatisfaction with what is and what is longed for. Is it possible for all these thoughts, experiences and memories to come into a quiet unity? To feel centered within?