Leo loved to draw, but sometimes, drawing made him feel…sad. He wanted his pictures to look exactly like the things he saw – a perfect red apple, a fluffy yellow chick, a soaring blue bird. But when he tried, his apples looked wobbly, his chicks looked like blobs, and his birds…well, they looked like something else entirely!
He’d crumple up the paper and toss it in the bin, sighing. “It’s no good,” he’d mutter. “I can’t draw.” His bedroom floor was often covered in little balls of crumpled paper, evidence of his frustrated attempts.
One sunny afternoon, Leo’s mom took him to a local art fair. Booths lined the street, filled with paintings, sculptures, and all sorts of colorful creations. Leo wandered around, feeling a little glum, until he stopped in front of a booth with a kind-looking artist named Ms. Anya.
Ms. Anya was painting a beautiful garden scene, but her style wasn’t about perfect copies. Her flowers were bright and bold, with swirling petals and unexpected colors. Leo watched, fascinated. “Your flowers are…different,” he said quietly.
Ms. Anya smiled. “Different is good! I don’t try to make my flowers look exactly like the ones in a photograph. I try to paint how they *feel* – happy, bright, and full of life.” She handed Leo a piece of paper and a box of crayons. “Here, why don’t you try?”
Leo hesitated. “But what if it doesn’t look right?”
Ms. Anya chuckled. “There’s no ‘right’ or ‘wrong’ in drawing, Leo. It’s about having fun and letting your imagination run wild. Don’t worry about making it perfect. Just make it *yours*.”
Leo took a deep breath and started to draw. He didn’t try to copy anything. He just let his hand move, swirling colors and shapes on the paper. He drew a purple sun, a green tree with orange leaves, and a little blue creature with polka dots.
When he was finished, he looked at his drawing. It wasn’t perfect. It wasn’t realistic. But it was…fun! And it made him smile. He showed it to Ms. Anya.
Ms. Anya’s eyes twinkled. “Wonderful! Look at all those amazing colors and shapes. You’ve created a whole new world, Leo!”
Leo felt a warm glow inside. He realized Ms. Anya was right. Drawing wasn’t about making perfect pictures; it was about expressing himself and enjoying the process. He didn’t need to worry about wobbly apples or blobby chicks. He could just draw whatever made him happy.
From that day on, Leo’s bedroom floor wasn’t covered in crumpled paper anymore. It was covered in colorful drawings – silly monsters, fantastical landscapes, and everything in between. He learned to love his scribbles, his swirls, and his own unique way of seeing the world. And every night, before bed, he’d draw a picture, not to make it perfect, but to make it *him*.
He understood that the joy wasn't in the finished product, but in the journey of creating. And that, he knew, was a wonderful feeling to drift off to sleep with.