The Rhythm of Spinning

What began as a lesson in technique slowly became a lesson in balance.

When I first learned to spin, my instructor offered a piece of advice that seemed almost too simple.

"Spin for ten minutes every day."

Not an hour. Not an afternoon. Just ten minutes.

I took her advice to heart. Every day I sat down at my wheel, even if only for a few minutes, and over the course of the first month something remarkable happened. My drafting became smoother. My singles became more consistent. The wheel began to feel like an old friend instead of a puzzle I was trying to solve. Those ten minutes quietly accumulated until one day I realized I wasn't simply making yarn anymore. I was becoming a spinner.

For as long as I can remember, I've had a habit of jumping into new passions with both feet.

It's one of my favorite things about myself, and one of the reasons I occasionally find myself in over my head.

When something captures my imagination, I want to learn everything I can about it. I throw myself into it wholeheartedly. I don't dabble very well. For a long time, I believed I didn't have to choose. Surely I could keep all of my interests alive while adding one more. In reality, though, every new passion quietly asked for my time and attention, and before long something else would be left waiting.

“Some passions move to the foreground while others rest quietly in the background, waiting patiently for their turn to bloom again. That doesn’t mean they’re gone. It simply means they’re waiting for me to return.”

Over the past few years, I've been trying to practice something different. For a long time, I quietly believed that giving something up meant I had somehow failed. If I couldn't keep every interest, every hobby, and every new passion alive all at once, I felt as though I simply wasn't trying hard enough.

It has taken me a while to realize that balance isn't about giving things up. It's about accepting that every part of life has its own season. Some passions move to the foreground while others rest quietly in the background, waiting patiently for their turn to bloom again. That doesn't mean they're gone. It simply means they're waiting for me to return.

Starting The Forager's Fleece became the ultimate stress test of that practice.

Running a small business has a way of filling every available corner of the day. There is always another batch of wool to dye, another product to photograph, another order to pack, another idea to explore. I love every bit of it, but somewhere along the way I caught myself thinking about "when I used to spin."

“It bloomed from my soul’s longing to create for the sake of creating.”

When I heard those words in my own mind, I knew something had drifted out of balance.

I didn't want spinning to become something I used to do.

When Tour de Fleece came around this summer, I found myself returning to my instructor's advice from years earlier. I committed to spinning for ten minutes each day. Not because I needed more yarn. Not because I had a project to finish. It bloomed from my soul's longing to create for the sake of creating. It was a quiet reminder that not every hour spent with wool needed to become inventory. Some moments simply needed to belong to me.

Those ten minutes became something I looked forward to every day. As the wheel turned and the fiber drifted through my fingers, I found myself settling into a rhythm that asked nothing more of me than to be present. The yarn wasn't the goal anymore. The rhythm was.

Looking back, I find it fascinating that the same advice served two very different purposes in my life. Years ago, those ten minutes taught me how to become a better spinner. They improved my technique, strengthened my confidence, and helped me develop the skills I still rely on today.

This summer, those same ten minutes taught me something entirely different.

They reminded me how to remain a spinner.

There is a quiet difference between making something because it is your work and making something because it feeds your soul. The two can certainly overlap, but one should never completely replace the other. If we're not careful, the business of creating can slowly crowd out the simple joy that inspired us to begin in the first place.

Perhaps that is the rhythm I want to protect.

Not a rhythm measured by productivity or finished projects, but one that makes room for curiosity, play, and quiet moments at the wheel. A rhythm that leaves space to wander without a plan, to create without an agenda, and to remember that some of our most meaningful work never finds its way onto a shop shelf.

Sometimes it only takes ten quiet minutes for a part of ourselves to remember what it has been missing.

For me, those ten minutes brought me back to the spinner I had almost forgotten.

And I think that's a rhythm worth returning to.