6 Signs you need to explore your creative side by making ceramics with us at Matèria
01
You feel mental noise
It doesn’t matter what you’re doing; your mind is chattering about various topics—and none at all—simultaneously. On top of that, you add to the noise with multiple screens: you have a show playing in the background while scrolling through Instagram or TikTok over and over. When you’re in this state, which is common these days, you may experience restless sleep and little rest at night. Ceramics is a balm for these states: its sensory diversity engages the nervous system, allowing it to meld into the sensations registered by your hands’ skin. This way, by being “very busy,” your system gradually relaxes. By the end of the class, the mental loop eases and becomes much more manageable.
02
You find it difficult to reconcile your ideal visions with practical reality
Ceramics directly confronts this contradiction and can be an unexpectedly affordable therapy to address it. In ceramics, the process is step-by-step: first, you define the general shape of the piece, then refine it, clean edges and lines, establish a solid base, develop a cohesive texture, and so on. In this way, your desires, often contradictory and varied, find their place within the possibilities and limitations of the tangible world, marked by physics, time, and reality itself.
03
You feel disconnected from your body
Ceramic practice inevitably involves a deep connection with the body: it’s your hands, guided from the center of your belly button (drawing strength directly from the earth or ground), that knead. It’s the skin of your fingers that senses if there’s too much or too little moisture and if more or less pressure is needed in each movement. It’s your body temperature that gradually draws moisture out of the clay. The size of the cups you create, for example, depends on the amount of liquid you need at different times of the day, and it’s the sensitivity of your lips, skin, and sight that will guide you in each design. That’s why making ceramics weaves a bond with yourself that you can bring to other areas of your life.
04
You feel disconnected from pleasure
Clay is soft, flexible, and cool to the touch; it welcomes water and, being such a sensory material, it can even stimulate your sensuality if you’re open to it. Sometimes, the simplest constructive gestures—cutting, creating openings, smoothing surfaces, or creating textures—generate tiny moments of pleasure, small and subtle, offering you a thread you can grasp to reconnect with yourself. It’s an invitation to explore your always-developing and expandable capacity to feel pleasure and enjoy.
05
You feel time slipping through your fingers
Nothing is more effective for slowing down this feeling than inhabiting the present moment. There are many ways to reach the “now,” but one of the most beautiful is to create small rituals in your daily life that keep you mindful. For example: taking five minutes (set a timer if needed) to savor your morning coffee while feeling the warmth of the cup you molded here at Matèria in your hands. Or looking at the little plate where you inscribed a word that, every dinner, brings you back to yourself.
06
There’s a little voice inside you (yes, that’s YOU!) that’s begging to be heard
To transform a shapeless piece of clay into a defined ceramic piece, you have to make many decisions, and you’ll be making them all. Listening to your own opinion, desires, and needs at the ceramics workshop table is a great first step.
