Just look!

I was five when I remember truly seeing something for the first time.

I had just recovered from a long month of illness, the kind that keeps a child quiet and still. When I was finally getting better, my mother decided a change of scenery would help me recover fully — fresh air, new sights, a little freedom. It was late spring, the weather was gentle, and everything around us felt awake and alive again.

I thought we were simply going out so I could breathe and move again. But now, looking back, I realize she had another plan. She quietly packed color pencils and a drawing album into her bag — just in case, she said.

When we reached the park, I remember the warm sunlight filtering through the trees. My mother pointed at a young maple sapling — four leaves, glowing with sunlight. She asked me to draw it.

I was taken aback: “I can’t".

She smiled as if she already knew something I didn’t.

“Of course you can. Just look — really look at it.”

I still don’t know what changed in that moment — perhaps something shifted inside me. I looked again, this time with different eyes. The leaves weren’t just green — they had light and shadow, veins and edges, movement and shape. I saw that the sun touched each leaf differently. Suddenly, the impossible felt… possible.

That afternoon, I didn’t just draw. I learned to observe. I started to see the world not as objects, but as living shapes. I began to listen to light.

And without realizing it — I became an artist.

Sometimes I wonder if that was her gentle plan all along. Not just healing my body… but awakening my eyes.

Even today, I still see that sunlit sapling — hiding in the tall grass, stretching eagerly toward the sun. I hear a bee flying past me. I feel the soft breeze on my face, and I feel my mother’s presence beside me. That small moment lives in me still. It continues to guide my hand, my eye, and every painting I create with whispers from within: “You can ... just look”

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