I never imagined this newsletter to feel as if it’s becoming a crisis management tool, but I have a knack for interesting timing. I apologize to anyone who was expecting 10 easy steps to carve your own spoon. You can find that all over the internet, and I’m happy to recommend great books on the topic, but I’ve always thought of my practice; carving and living with different priorities as a convenient metaphor for self-growth. I try to spend very little time on social media, but I’d have to be living under a rock to not notice how anxious everyone is. We’re like little exposed nerve endings all frayed and burnt. Recognizing that, I’d like to keep steering in the direction that seems relevant. I’m so grateful for the opportunity to share my thoughts and my grammatical mistakes with such kind readers.
-With infinite love and gratitude-
Several months ago I let it slip in conversation that I believed handcraft has a new meaning; one in which making things by hand is intimately connected to making sanctuary for ourselves. It’s a hard won revelation for me, because so much institutional focus is on the object that’s made and the concept behind the work. But I’d venture to guess that, like me, the vast majority of makers are doing it because it makes them feel good. Our stories about hand craft and its importance are always shifting and changing, of course, especially when you delve into any academic interpretation of what it means to be a craftsperson. The meaning behind craft and its implications has been interpreted through many lenses. If you think of yourself as an activist, craft is “craftivism”, if you are mostly concerned with the economic system, it’s about changing the current paradigm. The meaning behind why we make things is in the eye of the beholder, it seems.
As someone who speaks regularly with a wide variety of other makers at all stages of their careers, I often ask why they choose craft at all? It’s an intentionally vague question, but the responses are remarkably similar. Some makers come to craft because of a crisis in their lives. This can be related to anything: health, finances, or family. When those events are taking place, often the person comes to a cross-roads and they make a choice to allow transformation into their lives, like learning from the raucous coyote pack in the last essay. Something dangerous and potentially awakening is in the belly of a decision that is contrary to safety and convenience.
When choosing to make craft a career, there are many external risks involved; no one here makes things because it’s an easy path, but the reward of making outweighs the uncertainty. During one interview on the podcast, Danielle Chutinthranond (a potter from Chicago) responded by sharing,“I feel like I’m fixing something in myself. It feels healing.” I’ll make a special effort to highlight what’s missing in that statement. She didn’t say: “I’m doing it for money and fame”, or “I’m doing it for an ideology”, or “I’m trying to change the economy.” It’s not for those reasons, it’s for the deeply personal, emotionally felt space between the external and the internal. She occupies the sanctuary of making. It compels her into a healing space.
In light of current events, I was reminded of the coping strategy my Dad shared with me in a very stressful time in my life. As I’ve mentioned in previous essays, most of my insights come from direct experience, so this is no exception. When I was stuck in my mind, overwhelmed by my own thoughts or circular logic, the best thing for me to do was to transfer thinking to my hands. When I felt like a catatonic shell with my mind on overdrive, a good reset was offered by my Dad, “Get up! Let’s go to the shop.”
When I got down there, I was given instructions, “Here, take this brush and varnish these cabinets for me.” Grateful to not think anymore, I took the brush and spent all day immersing myself in the job. It was a relief to not have to make a decision. I’d notice a little bubble in the varnish and work to clear it up, or, turn my head and notice a streak. Thinking to myself, “Yes. Yes…fix that.” My mind quieted. I relaxed. The only things that existed were varnish bubbles and the long slow brush strokes. Back and forth, back and forth. I could see the material world changing right in front of me. It was a blessing to see tangible results in the sanctuary of the workshop.
Healing is something that is done most easily if you have sanctuary. For some, it’s made in meditation, dance, family or the comforts of home. We all find this refuge in different locations, and even animals find sanctuary. A wide-eyed rabbit, in the exhaustion of escaping relentless pursuit, will often retreat to the softest, most intimate burrows in order to heal what’s exhausted within itself. It’s a retreat to safety; an intentional space made for the body and soul to knit together wounds. It often allows us to confront the marrow of ourselves as we fumble in the darkness. It is not for the faint of heart. We bump up against our beliefs about ourselves, others, and how these things fit together. We face healing toe to toe in the space in-between brush strokes; in sanctuary.
The parent word of sanctuary is the latin sancuarium. It has roots in “sanctus”, meaning holy and “arium” meaning to relate to the root word. “Related to holiness” might be a good definition. We use sanctuary to part the sacred and the profane, but it’s also used to describe safe haven, or areas where “nature” is set aside for animals to live their lives undisturbed. (There are a whole set of problematic cultural biases included in the “nature vs. man” distinction which I will visit in later essays) If like me, you grew up going to church, you are familiar with how often this word is used to denote a holy area in the church building itself. In the Sanctuary, you are more aware of your actions and presence. You sing and come together as a community within a space set aside for holy endeavors. In the Christian tradition, you are in the place when God meets humans. The Holy Place.
Regardless of what you may call the Great Mystery, God or The Universal Animate Energy, we need holiness. We need to meet and make sanctuary for it no matter the cloak it wears. Madmen have retreated to wild caves to fall blind to the dazzling Great Mystery or to recognize It dwelling within their hearts or perhaps in the echo of limestone walls. Wherever It is found, the spark of the divine is never tame. It dwells in clods of earth trod into floor boards, the whiskers of mice, and a froe set deep in oak. We’ve created sanctuaries both external and internal for thousands of years and will go on doing so even as we find new realms where holiness dwells. For the craftsperson, sanctuary can be found in the repetitive whoosh of the axe as she hews a piece of wood. It is rhythmic and musical; the drumbeat of a maker. There is sanctuary in the movement itself. The rhythm becomes the pattern, becomes the consistency, becomes the life of the process as the craftsperson navigates risk and develops skill.
Illuminated in this way, sanctuary requires a simultaneous focus and release. The space occupied is like that of the space of meditation, as I mentioned previously. The well worn path of practice allows for the somatic embodiment of skill, muscle memory and repetitive movement. It allows our ego mind to rest and for healing apply its restorative poultice.
I recently had a conversation with a family member during which I shared my complicated obsession with woodcarving. I realized, after 10 years of carving that it was (at times) quite literally the only thing keeping me going emotionally. I would do it whether or not there was financial reward involved (although that is always welcome!). But for a long time, I couldn’t figure out why I loved it so much. In recent years it’s become more clear that I was much more invested in handcrafts’ transformative power in my own life than its transformative power in economics or battling environmental catastrophes. The change was starting internally. Through my sanctuary of handcraft, I was hopping into the ocean of flow.
Flow state is something that Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi (a psychologist who interviewed athletes, craftspeople, and professionals of all sorts) named to describe the process that comes from practicing a skill that has an attainable but difficult goal. Dr. Kelly Lambert Ph.D. calls this “effort-driven rewards” and has neurobiological research surrounding the importance of the healing power of handwork. Flow state requires focused attention on an activity which causes you to slip into a state where you don’t notice the passage of time, thinking stops, and you are in the moment. As a craftsperson you sink deeply into making. Sanctuary makes space for flow, but it all requires the courage to step into risk and uncertainty. You may think it is a matter of simply learning a new set of rules, but handcraft is an endless pursuit. As a beginner, one is baptized into the new world of autonomy craft provides. But as you bob up after the initial plunge the real work is in finding the next step and pushing yourself forward. As someone who focuses almost exclusively on handwork, I confront my relationship with risk and uncertainty every time I grasp my carving knife. As I negotiate and grow in skill, I gingerly step into uncertainty and risk. That entire dynamic would vanish if I were to rely on a jig or computer to navigate making. When continually practicing and looking difficult circumstances in the eye, what might have felt unsurmountable 6 months ago, can become so effortless that you are unaware of the tectonic shift that occurred underfoot. This is what handcraft can do; help you go deeper within the autonomy of making and to simply allow yourself to grow.
When changes occur internally they naturally flow outward, like a the circular ripples on a still pond. Suddenly, since your center for understanding has changed, the way you see things around you has also changed. The healing that takes place in the sanctuary of making has the capacity to shift your perceptions. Your self-confidence emerges and you are new; glimmering like the sun on the expanse of the ocean.
Amy - this is one of the most beautifully stated essays on craft & healing I have ever read. As a person of Catholic background & faith (Liturgical musician for 40 years) it resonates very deeply. However, it is stated so beautifully (and even poetically) such that a person who comes from a non religious or a differing spiritual background can (I think) feel the truth of these thoughts resonate within their own being. One thing that strikes me in the wake of recent thoughts regarding those pursuing craft for economic gain (trying to make it a living) - is that it can put the beauty of ‘craft as sanctuary’ at risk for them. It can taint (?) the healing soul fulfilling aspect of craft - with feelings of anxiety, worry, pressure, drudgery etc - by turning it into a ‘job’. Maybe feelings of regret or even shame at attempting it and ‘failing’ if they can’t make a go of it as a career choice. It is always a danger to be aware of I think in trying to turn your ‘passion’ or your hobby into a career. Thanks for sharing these thoughts.
🙏 Thank you for this. I very much appreciated your writing for reminding me of what exists in the background behind making spoons, or stools or whatever I’m trying in the early days of quiet, hand tool work. Sanctuary for sure.