seven: happy.

you know, there's a quote out there that goes like this: 

"i don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody."

for many years now, even up until today, right this moment, i still find myself battling with this saying. i have had friends warning me to not be so kind to everyone otherwise i'd be taken advantage of; to not try and make everyone happy because it's impossible, and it'll only leave me in a bad place. in conclusion, the world thinks trying to make everyone happy is a stupid, unrealistic thing to do. 

and today, i finally realize why it has been so hard for me to compromise with this saying. as a self-proclaimed artist, i haven often drawn pictures to please myself. i imagine myself as the characters i create, i imagine myself living impossible lives, looking impossibly different and behaving completely unlike myself. i have fallen in love with drawing people since a long time ago, not because i fall in love with the characters themselves, but because i fall in love with their entire lives, their existences, and picturing myself living in between these dimensions. drawing gave me that space of impossibility.

as of late, however, i have found myself drawing to please others. my primary reason to draw, to make art, is no longer to just please my own imaginations, my own stories, but to convey others' thoughts, others' stories, others' voices. that and to project my own voice into someone else's soul directly, through art. i draw to encourage. i draw to give. i make art to make people happy. and it feels good. not because i get a thank you afterward or because i get flooded with compliments. those are good, yes, but the very main reason is when i make someone's day a little better. i feel important. and it feels like i've made a change, an impact, on someone else's life, even for just a little bit.

it is as though i have realized my true purpose, and as ironic and cliche as it may sound, it is, to make others happy. with my art. it is the smile on their faces when i pass them a hand-drawn card; it is the quiet expression of amazement and disbelief when they accept my art; it is the happiness that somehow, pours through their eyes, their lips, their hands, their entire bodies and souls. it is when i make someone feel a little better on a not-so-good day, that i feel the best. not because i feel like i have authority over their lives, to be able to change the course of their lives so easily, but knowing that i am able to change someone's day so easily, and doing it, executing such a simple idea of making someone's day. it is such a simple gesture, to make art that makes people happy. i believe, that is the purpose that i have this God-given talent.

then, their happiness becomes a part of mine, and mine a part of theirs.

and so, this is why i find it hard to not please everybody. 

i think it could be embedded in my soul, wanting to make people happy.

it's annoying, i know.

but i do it anyways.

recklessly.