The Potter’s Hands

There’s a story about a potter’s wheel. As the potter spins the wheel, she lays her hand into the clay to hold it steady while with the other hand she slaps and shapes the outside of the clay into the vessel she chooses. This analogy is to our lives. We are the clay on the potter’s wheel. And on the outside, we are tempered in ways we cannot imagine. Yet it is the firm and steadfast grip that holds us from within that is as important to the shaping of our lives.

Fear these days is palpable. Governments are struggling and militarism and violence have become the human go-to. Systems that we have relied upon, however ill equipped, are proving unworthy of our trust. And fledgling testaments to the possibility of human greatness, such as the United Nation’s Geneva Conventions of War, and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, are being challenged and sidelined by power grabs and our collective inability to change course.

In this chaotic moment, the distinction of what is happening to us on the outside versus the strength and sureness of the inside is worthy of our attention. We may not be able to stop the downward spiral that seems to be gripping humanity, but we can begin to slow it down. We can lean into the internal hand that holds us and recognize it as universal. We can remember our interconnectedness to all of life and begin again to remake our world from the inside, out. We can allow the outside to reflect the strength and vision of that internal hand. We can allow the wisdom of the potter lead, not the fates of ill-will and inhumanity.

It’s our choice.