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#124 Practicing Self Compassion To Help You Gain Confidence In Your Pottery w/ Meg Jurbank
24 Plays3 years ago
What is up Shaping Nation on todays episode of Shaping Your Pottery I got to interview Meg Jurbank. Meg is a therapist. Meg uses pottery to spread the word about the adoption process you can learn more about Meg by checking out her Instagram @heybugceramics
Top 3 Value bombs:
1. Using pottery to spread a message
2. Taking your emotional experiences and adding them into your pottery
3. Using Self Compassion to help you gain confidence with yourself and your pottery
and so much more
The Questions we ask will determine how our pottery will look like that's why I created a Free 15 questions to help you discover your voice template go grab it here www.shapingyourpottery.com/questions
If you would like to learn more about making pottery and discovering your voice come support the Shaping Your Pottery podcast on patreon and get one to two bonus content each month about different pottery techniques and finding your voice click here to support the podcast patreon.com/ShapingYourPottery
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Transcript
Introduction and Nick Torres' Focus on Pottery
00:00:00
Speaker
real quick before we get started did you know that the questions that we asked are going to determine what our pottery is going to look like and it's going to determine what our voice is going to look like that's why i created 15 questions that you can use right now to start discovering your own unique voice go to shapingyourpottery.com forward slash questions to get this free booklet
00:00:22
Speaker
If you love pottery and want to take your skills to the next level, you're in the right place. Find your own pottery style right here on Shaping Your Pottery with Nick Torres. Let's get started.
Interview with Meg Gerbank: Adoption and Pottery
00:00:34
Speaker
What is up, Shaping Nation? This is Nick Torres here. And on this episode of Shaping Your Pottery, I got to interview Meg Gerbank. On this episode, you will learn how pottery has helped Meg with her adoptive process and spreading the word. You also learn about taking your experiences and your emotions and putting them into your pottery. Finally, you're going to learn a lot about self-compassion, how this is a really great way to help you gain confidence with your
00:01:02
Speaker
self with your pottery and help you find your voice. Meg, welcome to Shaping Your Pottery and share with me what is your hidden talent? Hello, I was talking about this with my husband after I had finished making up a little ditty about feeding my dogs and he reminded me that that might be my hidden talent is making up songs about daily activities.
00:01:27
Speaker
I love that. I do that too. Like when I'm making chicken nuggets, I have a chicken nugget song and I put them in the microwave. So you have been using pottery to help you with the adoptive process and spreading the word. Can you tell me the story about this?
Ethical Adoption and Pottery's Role
00:01:44
Speaker
Yeah, absolutely. So Pottery has done a couple things to help with our adoptive process. So it's offered a platform for me and my husband, Jake. He's very present in a lot of what I do on social media and everything. He just doesn't really like social media that much. So he's usually in the background.
00:02:05
Speaker
or we talk about it like in markets and stuff. So we talk very conscientiously about adoption and about the adoption industry because most of what we've all grown up with learning about adoption and understanding adoption has been told to us by people
00:02:23
Speaker
like me and Jake, honestly, adoptive parents or prospective adoptive parents. And the story is often really kind of vaguely similar. And a lot of times it has this kind of weird self-congratulatory flavor to it. And you see it a lot in movies and TV shows. You see it in the news all the time. And what's happening there is that they're leaving out other perspectives that are very much present in that
00:02:53
Speaker
in that constellation, that adoption constellation. You know, specifically thinking about adoptees and birth or first families. Their voices are often stifled in a way.
00:03:06
Speaker
And so Pottery has offered me a platform to first and foremost uplift other voices in the adoption constellation and to offer an alternative perspective to prospective adoptive parents that it's possible for adoption to be more than just one thing.
00:03:26
Speaker
we are a big feelings family. And so we embrace all of it, all of the feelings, even in especially the ones that might be a little bit uncomfortable. I'm pretty constantly questioning myself in a lot of areas in my life, but especially around this topic. You know, I'm asking like,
00:03:48
Speaker
are my values aligned with my choices and my voice? Or is it time for me to speak up? Or should I be quiet in this moment and let somebody else talk? And what
Spreading Adoption Awareness Through Pottery
00:04:01
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we want is
00:04:02
Speaker
to say that we did everything we possibly could to ensure that our adoption process was as ethical as possible. And so the other thing too that adoption has offered me, because there's a lot of big feelings involved in all of this, is that it's allowed me an opportunity to have an outlet for all of my nervous energy.
00:04:23
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So I love it. Yeah, that's that's really amazing. Thanks. So how exactly has pottery helped with like spreading the word and with the whole process itself? Yeah, so we
00:04:37
Speaker
I'll talk about it on Instagram. I'll share the profiles or posts of other adoptees of birth families and make sure that first and foremost those voices are uplifted. And then recently I did a kind of Q&A asking about what do you want to know about our adoption process. We tend to not do that as often again because
00:05:02
Speaker
We don't need more voices, more adoptive family voices so much as we need to be listening to adoptees and stuff. But it's really given us that opportunity to have conversations, candid conversations about all the big stuff that's involved. And adoption can be complicated. It can still be beautiful. So we talk about that. We'll talk about that at markets. We have signs that say, we're adopting, let's talk about it.
00:05:31
Speaker
A lot of times we have adoptees come up to us. We've had several adoptees approach us in markets and chat with us about adoption, about their experiences, or whether those are positive or not so positive. And that's felt really good to be able to create a space where adoptees feel comfortable to talk with us and we feel like we're heading in the right direction with where we're going. That is really amazing. I love that you are
00:05:59
Speaker
using pottery as like
The Emotional Story Behind 'Haybug Ceramics'
00:06:00
Speaker
way to like spread more awareness about this. I think that is really amazing. During your day job, you are a therapist. How do you balance being a therapist parent and a potter all in one? Yeah, so I'm not a parent just yet. But but in terms of balance, it all I mean, I think two things boundaries are really important. Making sure that I am aware of what
00:06:28
Speaker
you know, what I'm putting my energy towards and when, um, those boundaries are really important. I don't want to burn out in either part of my world, whether it's the therapy worlds or the, um, or the pottery world and potential, you know, future parent world as well. You know, I want to be really mindful about where we're putting, I'm putting energy, um, and how I'm doing that.
00:06:51
Speaker
And then the other really big component in terms of how I balance is having a really amazing support system. I have some of the most amazing friends and family that anyone could ask for. And I feel really lucky and very truly believe that I don't think I could do anything that I have done without them. That's amazing. I love that. So can you tell me the story how you came up with the name Haybug ceramics? Yeah, so when it came time for me to think about a business name, I had
00:07:22
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you know, kind of passively thought about it, but it was actually my husband's idea.
00:07:28
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So we had a cat named Lily. And if there were, if familiars are real, like if there's a cat who is meant to be with a person, Lily was my familiar. And she was very attached to me. She did not like anybody else. She just liked me. And I would call her Bug. She would walk into a room and she'd meow, meow, meow, meow, meow. And she wouldn't stop until I said, hey, Bug.
00:07:59
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And she very unexpectedly, she died. It was very unexpected. It was super sad. I still miss her very much. And a couple months later, Jake had been considering I think maybe a birthday gift or a holiday
Emotions in Pottery: Grief, Joy, and Personal Experiences
00:08:14
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gift or something. And he
00:08:17
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was going to buy me a stamp for my clay and was going to put hay bug on it. He didn't do that because he was like, I didn't know if that's what you wanted. But after he suggested it, I was like, oh, that is super cute. And then it just stuck. It came from there. I love that. Super cool. So you are inspired by experiences and emotion. How does this come back into your potter?
00:08:43
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Yeah, so like I mentioned earlier, we are big feelings people. And what I mean by that is that we just kind of embrace all of the big feelings that we have as just being a human and all that comes with. But I think I'm especially inspired by those big feelings like grief or joy or curiosity. And what that might look like in clay might look like a certain
00:09:13
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like experience that I had, you know, while I was creating it, creating, you know, the piece that I'm working on, you know, the piece itself, somebody might look at it and might not think, oh, wow, that reminds me of grief.
00:09:24
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But that might be what I got from that experience, from that emotion. And then in terms of how experiences show up in my work, it might look like we went to the beach and I was finding myself pressing all the different things we found on the beach into my clay to create some different texture. And so it might look just like texture to somebody else, but to me, I know that that's
00:09:47
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that series of clay pieces came from when we went to the beach last summer. And then sometimes the experience that I'm pulling from is just the experience of creating itself. I love that. Shaping Nation, if you're listening right now, how can you add experiences or emotions that you have maybe felt in your life or maybe while making pottery and add it into your pottery?
00:10:10
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What do you think that will do to your pottery if you start adding those experiences and emotions?
Creative Process and Embracing Uncertainty
00:10:14
Speaker
So can you walk me through how you think about what you're trying to create with your pottery? It kind of depends. I think the more I work with Clay, the more my process, even my thinking process has changed over time. You know, I feel like I'm
00:10:37
Speaker
At one point, I thought, okay, I'm going to learn as much as I can, and then that'll be it. And now I realize that's not how it works. You know, I'm constantly learning. And in a lot of ways, I hope that I never feel like I know all that I can know with clay. And I think that's possible. Every clay body that you use kind of has its own idiosyncrasies. And I think you can play around with that as like learning how to play with a specific clay body or
00:11:05
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you know, a glaze or a style or something like that. I think, you know, kind of depending on what I'm working on and what stage I'm at in the process, you know, I might be kind of going through the motions of like cutting a slab, right? And, you know, just doing that, that's part of the setup process as kind of sometimes it can feel like a little bit of like a means to an end in some ways.
00:11:28
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Or I might be trying a new process altogether and I'm thinking about what works versus what doesn't. Should I just bend the clay or should I create a joint? Should I use two separate pieces and smoosh it together? Or how will it work? How will it warp? How will it crack? That kind of stuff. So I think a lot of my process is let's try it out and see what happens.
00:11:52
Speaker
I love that shaped nation for listening right now. You don't need a full plan of what you're trying to make. Sometimes you just didn't say let's try it out and
Mindfulness and Self-Compassion in Pottery
00:12:00
Speaker
see what happens. That's a really great quote. So with your pottery, you practice self compassion through clay. Can you explain this to me further? Do you know what self compassion is?
00:12:12
Speaker
Could you explain that? I have, I have like an idea of what it is. Yeah. So it kind of is exactly what it sounds like. Um, so self compassion is the act of, you know, being kind to yourself in the way that you would be kind to a friend who's seeking comfort. Um, you know, it shows up in a couple of different ways, mindfulness, um, recognizing the,
00:12:38
Speaker
relatability of your experience, right? If you've done something wrong, you're probably not the first person in the whole world who's ever done that specific thing wrong. And comforting yourself in the way that you would comfort a friend, it's often easier to comfort other people, because we have a lot more practice with that. I think a lot of people, myself, absolutely 1000% included, I have a really critical inner voice. So I have a lot more practice of
00:13:08
Speaker
these negative spirals of saying, oh, you know, you're not good at this. Why are you even bothering? Those kinds of things. And it takes an active act to be kind to yourself, to recognize, oh, that was a mistake. What can I learn from it? Or is there anything to learn at all? If not, OK, let's move on. And it has to do with kind of where you're placing that emotional energy.
00:13:30
Speaker
Um, so what this might look like in working with clay could be the, um, you know, in one example, let's say I forgot to cover my clay. I come downstairs in the morning and it's dried. It's not usable. I'm going to have to, you know, reclaim it. It's going to be a whole thing, right? Adding in this whole other thing. There's a part of my brain that would absolutely go into that negative spiral. It'd definitely be.
00:13:54
Speaker
You know going into thinking i'm irresponsible and i might even lead to you know as that spiral goes down it might lead to. You know questioning my worth as a potter potentially bleeding into like the other facets of my life and it can get really really.
00:14:11
Speaker
foggy down there. So when you use self compassion, you know, those thoughts might still happen. And we're not saying, Oh, that was bad. I shouldn't have done that. That leads to a whole other separate kind of negative spiral. But instead, when you recognize that happening, you might use self compassion by saying, Okay, that's one
00:14:30
Speaker
inner critic's voice, that's one inner critic's opinion. And also, this is a common mistake, what can I do differently next time? I can reclaim this and now I can do something else, you know, that I, you know, maybe I didn't have, I don't get to plan exactly, I don't get to do exactly what I had planned, but now I have an opportunity to try something else. And, you know, just trying to normalize that, that mistake. When it's,
00:14:58
Speaker
you know, able to be normalized. And then trying to do something differently the next time. So bringing mindfulness into my wrap up for the day, you know, okay, I'm definitely covering my clay today and maybe laughing about it to myself. And another way that this might show up and thinking about mindfulness is a huge part of self compassion, being present and aware in the moment. And so
00:15:23
Speaker
You know, I mentioned earlier kind of cutting slabs, okay, sometimes it can feel like a little bit of a means to an end, like, okay, I'm just cutting slabs, cutting slabs. But it's really important to be present and aware in that moment too, in those moments.
00:15:37
Speaker
as well, because you have to be aware of your environment. Is it drafty in here? Is that going to dry out these slabs? Am I moving too quickly when I'm transferring things? Am I bending or potentially warping the clay as I'm moving it from one spot to another? And so the idea is to be present, be very aware of your body in any given moment, which I think just comes really hand in hand with pottery.
00:16:05
Speaker
you know, when you're throwing, you have to be very aware of your body or the clay goes everywhere. It doesn't do the things that you're trying to get it to do. If you know you're not braced, if you're not, oh, my elbows out here, so I have to bring that into, you know, stabilize those kinds of things. So I think in a lot of ways, self compassion, mindfulness and pottery all really mixed together really well. I love that explanation. For those that are listening,
00:16:32
Speaker
It's important to practice self compassion, because when you are making a mistake, or you aren't doing well, these are the times that you're going to learn something, then you're going to grow even more. And you're going to be able to practice that self compassion yourself to be better next time. And I think that is super really powerful. So this wasn't a question that was on that I sent you. But part of finding your voice is
00:16:58
Speaker
gaining confidence with your voice? And I think because you're practicing self compassion with your work, how does practicing self compassion help you with like building confidence with your pottery? That's a good question. Um, I think that when you practice self compassion, you start to recognize that mistakes are not the villain we've always sought them to be. Um,
00:17:23
Speaker
And in fact, they can be what brings you to the next step that changes everything the next time you try. And so I think in embracing self compassion, you're also embracing your failures and truly embracing like this, you're not wrong, right, for not getting it right the first time, you just learn something and now you can apply it the next time. So I think confidence comes from
00:17:49
Speaker
recognizing that just because you messed up doesn't mean it's the end of the world. You can try again or try something totally different.
Finding Your Pottery Voice
00:17:57
Speaker
That was an excellent, excellent advice right there. I love that. That was really great. So now let's continue talking about finding your voice. What do you think it means to find your voice in pottery? I have thought about this a lot. And
00:18:16
Speaker
think for some reason when I first started I was really really fixated on like trying to find an identifiable style. I really wanted some kind of descriptor words to describe my style and like to have some kind of consistency across all of my pieces and what I
00:18:41
Speaker
realize now is that I was probably coming from a place of like comparing myself to other makers, other creatives, and not realizing that I might be trying to skip over really important steps in the learning process. And now I'm not sure that I think
00:19:02
Speaker
finding your voice can be something that you actively take steps to do. This opinion could change over time. This is just kind of where I've been in the moment. I think that it's something that can only be done by continuing to show up and see where your creativity takes you. I absolutely agree. Shaping Nation, you may not know
00:19:31
Speaker
really what you want to make exactly. But if you continue showing up, your voice will just kind of naturally fall into your lap almost. You just have to keep on showing up and keep on building upon your skills so that you can find
Advice for New Potters
00:19:47
Speaker
your voice. You can do things that you maybe will help that process, but if you keep on showing up, you will find your voice eventually. What advice would you give to someone trying to find their own unique voice with their pottery?
00:19:59
Speaker
I think that would be my advice. Keep showing up. If you have the desire to create, that's step one, right? In order to do anything else, you have to want to create. And for whatever reason, for any number of circumstances you're in, you might not be able to create exactly what you want, when you want it, how you want it. But if you have that desire to create, then it also means that you have an opportunity to find all the different ways that you can get to where you want to be.
00:20:29
Speaker
Um, that means, you know, you might have to give yourself permission to allow yourself the space and the grace to create. And the grace comes in when, you know, you get something wrong or something doesn't turn out the way that you want it to. Or when you might have to say, Oh, you know what? I really, I want to hang out, but I've been trying to work on this project. And so, you know,
00:20:53
Speaker
I'm maybe I'm going to do that instead. Or do you want to do it with me? Do you want to do something creative together and kind of thinking outside of the box for how you can take those steps to create the space to create? Excellent piece of advice. So as we're coming to a close here, what is one thing you want to hammer home with our audience today?
00:21:12
Speaker
think just be kind to yourself really bringing in that that self compassion. It can come in so many different forms. I think a lot of new creatives or creatives who really want to be on that other side of creating are holding back because of that really loud inner self critic. And I think that if you balance it or
00:21:42
Speaker
you know, overshadow it with that kindness to yourself of reminding yourself, everybody has to start somewhere. We all have to figure out what works for us in the ways that it works for us, when it works for us. Um, then it will all eventually get figured out, but you have to show up and you have to be kind to yourself in the process of showing up.
Meg's Social Media Presence
00:22:04
Speaker
Definitely agree. Meg, it was really great chatting today. Where can my audience go and learn more about you?
00:22:09
Speaker
Yeah, so I'm on Instagram and newly on TikTok at haybugceramics. You can also go to my website at www.haybugceramics.com.
00:22:20
Speaker
Hey, I hope you enjoyed this episode of Shaping Your Pottery. If you would like to support the podcast and get bonus content every single month, then come support me on my Patreon where I will give you bonus content on about how to make pottery, how to find your voice, and a bunch of other things just around pottery.
00:22:44
Speaker
come support me on my my patreon just go to shapingyourpottery.com forward slash patreon to come support the podcast i would really appreciate it i'll see you guys next time