Are You Ready to Be Fired?

Do you have a hobby? For many years, if asked, I would say that my hobby was reading. While that may be a favorite activity, it didn't qualify as a hobby. Somehow, I knew it wasn't quite right, but it just wasn't on my "this is important to figure out" list until 2015. I knew then I wanted something more.

When I found it, it was love at first sight. A hobby that appealed to my creative juices, highly satisfying and beyond all of that – challenging! What was this marvelous new activity? Pottery.

It's not just the pottery itself that I love; it's all the lessons hidden there and how much I've grown personally from those insights. It's also the people. One day I realized that I was working alongside a professional clown, a high school art teacher, and an anesthesiologist. Each of us sharing the moment and our art.

While the lessons continue, here are four that continue even now:

• To continue to love learning, we must be willing to be a beginner.

• Everything, even mud, holds the potential for creating beauty.

• Real strength and transformation are born from pressure and heat.

• Nothing meaningful happens without taking some risks.

There are always risks when making pottery. If the piece hasn't dried out enough before it goes into the kiln, you'll end up with a melted mess or even exploded clay! If you haven't addressed air pockets or weak spots in the clay, you can end up with cracks and imperfections that may make the piece unusable. And if the kiln itself doesn't heat up and cool off with the right timing, well, that's not good either. Risk. It's always there.

But without putting your piece in the kiln, there is no chance for the miracle. The clay will remain soft and unusable for anything lasting. The reward far outweighs the risk. I also came to understand that there is always another next. Always. Whether it's another piece of clay or something in life, we keep creating and pushing our work into the fire to watch the miracles happen.

Another lesson that fascinated and continues to teach me is that you don't just go into the fire once. Sometimes the lessons are progressive. The first time it's about getting the clay mature enough to accept the glaze. Without the heat, it can't hold on to what's coming next and let it do its work. How often in life do we need the first lesson to be ready for the next?

In pottery, we create pieces and then put them into the fire to strengthen them and, ultimately, create a unique version of "next" from clay.

Our lives and work are no different. When we're willing to risk the fire, we experience the miracles.

As Paulo Coelho has taught us: "You have to take risks. We will understand the miracle of life fully when we allow the unexpected to happen."

How about it? Are you ready to be fired?