Mastery of Skills
I remember making pottery. Sometimes, I would make a piece and when it came out of the kiln, I didn’t like it. So I had to think about why I didn’t like it, and try again to produce the exact piece I’d had in mind – the form, the weight, the glaze, everything. And it takes a lot of time and trials, to get to know exactly what you have to do, to produce a certain result. You have to try again and again, shifting things just a little bit each time.
But six months later, maybe I looked again at that “disappointing” piece and maybe I kind of liked it. Maybe it hadn’t come out exactly the way I’d wanted, but when I was able to look at it with un-biased eyes, I could see it as something that was just itself, not as a project for which I’d had a specific vision that had to be met. Six months later I could appreciate the craftsmanship and beauty of that specific object, and not see it only as an effort that hadn’t met its mark.
Doing that, time after time, until you get to the level of both having the skills to consistently produce the effect that you want, and of being able to look at a piece you’ve made as a thing unto itself and not just as a piece that did or did not match your vision of it, that is the mark of truly mature artisan.