The Art of Being Remade: Leadership on the Potter’s Wheel
Leadership is less about perfection and more about how we respond amidst failure.
I’ve never met a leader whose plans have gone exactly as they imagined.
Not once.
Maybe you’ve experienced this yourself. You assemble a team, develop a vision, plan the steps, and move forward with enthusiasm. Then — something falls apart. The plan that seemed so foolproof on paper starts to crack under pressure. The strategy that appeared innovative ends up fizzling out. The people you relied on shift, change, or burn out.
It’s tempting to see those moments as failures. We observe the collapse and think, Well, that’s it. I must not be suited for this. We wasted our time. We blew it.
But what if those moments aren’t the end?
What if they’re part of the art of being remade?
Watching the Potter at Work
An old image has stayed with me — a potter sitting at a wheel with spinning clay under steady hands. The clay begins to take shape, rising into something beautiful, until suddenly, it collapses.
But the potter doesn’t throw it away. He presses it back down, gathers it into a lump, and starts again. His hands are patient. His vision remains focused. The clay isn’t wasted; it’s simply reshaped.
That image comes from scripture — the Book of Jeremiah. In chapter 18, the prophet is sent to the potter’s house to learn about God’s work with people. Jeremiah sees what every leader eventually learns: the work doesn’t always go as planned. The clay collapses. But the collapse is not the end — it’s a chance to be remade.
Whether or not you relate to Jeremiah’s story, the message is strong: life, leadership, and community are always evolving. We are works in progress — on the potter’s wheel.
And here’s the key: being on the potter’s wheel isn’t just about ownership. Yes, sometimes the idea or vision is ours — it begins in us, sparked by our creativity or conviction. But even then, leadership asks us to hold it with open hands. We don’t own people, and we don’t own outcomes. What we truly carry is stewardship: the responsibility to nurture, guide, and align our ideas with a larger purpose that outlives us.
Leadership on the Wheel
So, what does this mean for those of us who lead — whether it’s a company, a classroom, a nonprofit, a congregation, a family, or even our own lives?
The potter’s wheel offers three leadership insights I believe are worth adopting:
Failure isn’t a waste.
Leaders must remain pliable.
Healthy cultures normalize being remade.
Let’s take them one at a time.
1. Failure Isn’t Waste
Clay collapses. Plans collapse. People collapse. You know this is true if you’ve led anything for more than five minutes.
What matters is how we interpret the collapse. If we see it as a sign of failure — “I’m not good enough,” “We’ll never recover” — we disconnect from growth. But if we view collapse as part of the process, we open ourselves to new possibilities.
I’ve repeatedly observed this in leadership.
A ministry that declined in size but spawned a new community effort that reached more people in need.
A business venture that failed but taught the founder how to build a more sustainable second company.
A leader who experienced burnout, took a step back, and returned with healthier routines that transformed their life and the organization.
Failure is often the raw material of transformation. The question is not “Will things collapse?” but “What will we do when they do?”
The potter doesn’t waste the clay. Neither should we waste our failures.
Part of not wasting our failures is learning the lessons embedded in the “no’s” and the “can’t’s.” Too often, leaders resist the “no’s” and the “can’t’s,” as if they were enemies to be conquered. But the potter’s wheel teaches us otherwise: boundaries and setbacks are teachers. “No” can protect us from misalignment. “Can’t” can push us to collaborate, to listen, or to reimagine. Every limit holds wisdom if we allow it to reshape us.
2. Leaders Must Stay Pliable
There’s another truth about clay: it can only be reshaped when it’s soft. Once it hardens, it can’t be remade.
The same applies to leaders. The most effective leaders I know are not the ones who insist that their way is the only way and become rigid. Instead, they remain flexible — open enough — to continue learning.
That might mean:
Admitting they don’t have all the answers.
Listening to those on the margins of the conversation.
Changing direction when new information emerges.
Releasing ego to foster collaboration.
Rigid leaders break. Pliable leaders adjust.
And pliability doesn’t mean weakness. It means resilience. It’s about having the courage to stay flexible enough to be reshaped when needed, instead of pretending everything is fine while cracks grow beneath the surface.
This is where stewardship plays a role again. If I believe I own the outcome, I’ll hold onto it tightly. But if I see myself as a steward — entrusted with people, vision, and resources for a time — I can hold them loosely. I can align with a greater purpose, even if that requires reshaping my assumptions.
Part of staying pliable is listening well. Leaders who stop listening are leaders who begin to harden. Listening — to staff, to the quiet voices in the room, to the rhythms of a community — keeps us soft enough to be remade.
3. Cultures of being Remade
Finally, the potter’s wheel teaches us about culture.
When clay collapses, it isn’t punished; it’s remade. Imagine how our leadership cultures would change if they worked the same way.
Too often, we punish failure. We shame people for trying something that didn’t work. We push for perfection on the first try, and when someone stumbles, we quietly set them aside. The result? Fear. People stop taking risks. Innovation dies—growth stalls.
But what if we created cultures where being remade was normal? Where feedback wasn’t seen as a threat but as an invitation? Where leaders showed humility by admitting when they needed to be reshaped?
In those cultures, people take risks, speak up, and step into new roles. They learn and grow.
That’s stewardship in action: leaders viewing their role not as ownership over people’s performance but as caring for their growth and alignment with a shared purpose. At its core is love. Love is the glue that keeps people connected when things get chaotic. Love fosters belonging even as they are being remade.
The Hard Part: Trusting the Process
Of course, being remade isn’t easy. It feels like loss, uncertainty, and even failure.
Leaders don’t like being pressed back down on the potter’s wheel. We don’t enjoy starting over. We’d rather present a polished product, not a lump of clay being reshaped in public view.
But here’s the thing: our credibility as leaders doesn’t come from pretending we’re perfect. It comes from how we navigate imperfection.
When we can honestly name the collapse, stay pliable in the midst of it, listen carefully to those around us, and invite others into the process of being remade, we demonstrate something far more powerful than flawless perfection. We demonstrate resilience, stewardship, and hope.
Above all, we showcase love — the kind of love that keeps people connected even when everything else feels uncertain.
The Universal Invitation
Maybe you wouldn’t consider yourself a leader. That’s okay. This image is still meant for you.
Because leadership isn’t just about titles or positions — it’s about influence. It’s about how we shape the people, systems, and communities around us. And every one of us does that in some way.
The invitation remains the same:
Don’t let failure go to waste.
Stay pliable.
Learn from the “no’s” and the “can’t’s.”
Steward the vision you’ve been entrusted with instead of holding on to ownership.
Listen carefully.
And love, because love is what makes everything else possible.
And if you happen to be someone wrestling with faith — or even deconstructing it — the potter’s wheel provides another layer of comfort: your questions and your doubts are not wasted. They might be the very clay being reshaped into something new.
Conclusion: Leading on the Wheel
Leadership is never about knowing everything from the start. It’s not about creating perfect plans that never fail. It’s about what you do when plans do fail.
The art of being remade isn't about perfection but about resilience, humility, and hope. It’s about stewardship—caring for what’s entrusted to us without clinging to it as if we owned it. It’s about listening carefully, learning from the “no’s” and the “can’t’s,” and leading with love.
So here’s my question for you: where in your life — or your leadership — might you be in the process of being remade?
It won’t always feel good, and it rarely feels easy. But it might be where something new, something necessary, and something beautiful is starting to form.
Because the potter’s wheel is still turning, and the potter’s hands remain steady.