Allow me to reintroduce myself…
Selling Pots & Pieces at local Atlanta market - Sun Market.
If you read the origins story of Pots & Pieces, you already have a good sense of how my relationship with pottery began. If you haven’t yet, take a moment to read it here.
In the origins story, I passively mention the “deep shit” and my journey of patience and acceptance. While my introduction to pottery began selfishly, over time I have fallen in love with it and have learned just how therapeutic pottery can be.
Several years ago, I experienced some mental health issues that required me to take some time off work. The concept of mental health was foreign to me.
After much therapy, it became apparent that one of the things I struggle with is this notion of perfection. According to American standards, I had taken all the “right” steps to be successful — went to a school of high performers, graduated from a top 20 university, had a job in the field I wanted. So, when I had to take time away from work because of mental health reasons, I felt like a FAILURE and that was extremely difficult for me to process.
Later that year, still in much denial and not having resolved my issues in therapy, I decided to move up north to be closer to my partner. Things didn’t work out and I ended up coming back south for a job and to be closer to my family. Everything was great — I had a dream job and felt invincible. And then a year into my job, my world came crashing down again, and I was back at square one.
Now, this is where the pottery comes back into play. The entire time I was going through these bouts of mental health issues, I didn’t have pottery in my life. I was consumed by work, and I tied being a successful person to having a good job and excelling at it, and when one of those things didn’t exist, l didn’t know who Alisha was.
And so began my journey of patience and acceptance. I brought pottery back into my life and began taking classes at a local studio. And let me tell you, I was back like I’d never left. Through pottery, I began to accept what I considered ‘failure’ and was given the space to fail, and fail fast, and sometimes those perceived failures turned into happy accidents. Pottery has given me perspective. It’s taught me to embrace imperfections and accept “failure,” whatever that means.
So, allow me to reintroduce myself. My name is Alisha, and I’m a perfectly imperfect human who loves pottery.
