Several things to consider here.
First - are you turning a face grain bowl or an end grain bowl (or Natural Edge)?
Second - are you shaping the inside or the outside of the bowl?
Third - how is your turning mounted? Faceplate, Glue Block? Something else?
Forth - what type of bowl gouge are you using? Standard grind bowl gouge or modified bowl gouge with drastically swept wings?
I'll make some assumptions here:
Face Grain bowl, mounted on a face plate and later in a 4 jaw chuck, turning the outside of the bowl: I start by creating a flat face where the foot will be. The opening of the bowl will be against the face plate attached with screws. I'm standing so I'm facing the ways of the lathe slightly behind the spinning piece. To create the flat that will be the foot of my bowl, the flute is pointed towards me but at a slight angle so that it is not perfectly horizontal (perhaps 5-15 degrees off horizontal?). The handle of my tool is in my right hand and is far away from me on the opposite side of the lathe. My left arm is bent at the elbow and the left hand is holding the shaft of the tool down on the tool rest. My left hand also creates a fulcrum - this is important, because I use the lever action to start my cut. I begin by rubbing the bevel of the tool against the spinning work. I use the lever action by pulling my right arm slowly back towards me to start the cut. As soon as I get the cut started, I lower my right hand and twist the tool so the flute is closer to 25-30 degrees from horizontal. I then pull my whole body towards me slowly as the cut is made using my hips and legs. I do not use my arms to make the cut and I try not to twist my body. Lather rinse repeat as necessary - this is called a pull cut.
Once the foot is flat, I begin to shape the bowl by using the same motions only, I pull my right hand closer to me as I work out from the center (sometimes back out again as I get to the tips of the squared bowl blank - these will eventually be gone). This begins to shape the bowl. As a beginner, I strongly recommend you simply get the shape round at this point. You can move your tool rest according to the area you need to cut. I don't have a curved tool rest, so this is the method I use.
Once the bowl is round (or dome shaped) - you can begin refining your details. I plan for about a 2 1/2" foot bottom (that fits nicely in my chuck) so I guestimate 2 1/2". I'm now standing so that if i put my hands straight out in front of me one(left) would be on the bowl. I'm holding the tool the same way as described above. the flute should be pointed in still and the tip of the tool is going to enter the wood. As it does, slightly twist again but push the handle with your right hand away from you using your left hand as a fulcrum again. This will create the foot. You can use a spindle gouge to further refine this feature, which I do. I also use a skew, but only to create lines nothing more.
Using this same cut, I shape the entire outside of the bowl.
For the inside: after I have shaped the outside and finished the foot, I dismount the bowl from the faceplate, attach my chuck, and put the foot of the bowl in the chuck (the bowl is now completely inverted from the way it was).
To begin, I true up the face of the bowl like I described in the first step. Now I twist the
tool so the flute is facing away from me, but still 5-15 degrees from true horizontal. In the center of the bowl or say 1/2" from true center, I enter the wood, twist the tool back towards me slightly (25-30 degrees from horizontal now), and pull the handle towards me and down a bit (say 6-9" in each direction) - this creates a small shallow in the bowl. Lather rinse repeat moving out about 1" each time and going deeper each time until I reach my outside diameter. As I start shaping the walls of my bowl, I'll twist the tool further so that it is closer to 60 degrees from horizontal, however as I reach the bottom of my bowl, as my hips move back and my right arm moves back towards me, I need to twist it back down to 5-15" to do the bottom. Its like rev'ing a motor cycle. Lather rinse repeat until you get your bowl. You will need to sand quite a bit because you're not producing a good shear cut, but this is how I started and provides a good basis for beginning. Just remember that as you turn the walls of your bowl, you want the tip of the tool to be entering squarely into the bowl. Think of it as scooping out the wood you don't want - almost like using an ice-cream scoop. Also don't be afraid to turn your lathe off and practice the motions without the machine running. This will begin to teach your body the movements involved - muscle memory, which is funny, because as I write this, I can feel the motions in my body (my legs, hips, arms, shoulders, hands, etc.).
If you have more questions or my assumptions are incorrect, PM me...(everyone else, sorry for the novel - but when I first started turning bowls it took forever for me to learn)
Oh and DO NOT USE A ROUGHING GOUGE to do this - if it catches badly, you could have a serious problem on your hands, or your spouse could.
