Konpeito Dreams

Hey guys! (`･ω･´)

Just finished another stress relief piece I did with color pencils. I haven't touched color pencils for a really long time and well since this is meant to be a stress relief piece, I didn't dwell myself with the technicalities of it all. Over all I was pretty happy how it turned out.

Though the scanner didn't do it justice though D; it's really hard adjusting it since even here the softer colors completely disappear. ┐('～`；)┌ oh well. If you guys happen to meet me face to face I'd show you the original haha. It's definitely less choppy than the scanned version lawl!

This is one of my few symbolic pieces as I wanted something that would reflect what I was thinking at the moment ( ﾟヮﾟ) For this piece, I was going through a huge moment of self doubt so I wanted to get it out of my system and drew this piece.

The konpeito (if it looks like them at all), represents other people and their potential, mainly it's to represent the people around me whom I admire always for their abilities in their personal and professional lives. Hence them being all in pretty colors and all. I wanted to also portray how much I adore them.

The boy (my OC, Leo), represents my views upon the world. He's at that age where he's old enough but still naive and influential towards others comments thus he decides to stay in the bottle and "grow up" a little more before he becomes a full fledged konpeito himself. Whilst he awaits for the time he's ready, he gazes at the other floating konpeitos longingly, awaiting the day that he too can join them.

The bottle represents the state I think I'm in now. And the red string that holds the bottle jar's cap represents fate. And the kanji sentence 「私の番はいつかな？」　means "When's my turn?".

I've always felt that I'm the last in the race against others so I don't like putting myself in that situation. I always like to focus on the race I have with myself more than anything since I believe that different people have different growth rates. I for one, am a definite late bloomer so I often think of myself as a living proof of that fact. So whenever I do compare or put myself in a race against others, it takes a toll on my self-esteem.

But lately, a friend on mine expressed his views on this subject. He mentions that if you're not winning the race against others, it doesn't matter since you'll miss alot of the jest in things and someone else would've achieved it first. But does that make achieving success redundant? I've been taught that success is success no matter how long it takes you to achieve them. He simply is stating his beliefs I know, but since I respect and look up to him alot I can't help but wonder if that is true? Would I always end up being the "loser" if I were to be in a race against my peers?

But I'm just holding it in until I know my potential for sure. I believe this year will be an opportunity for me to really test my abilities and see if I do or do not have what it takes to even compete with them. But sometimes I just can't help but wonder, as I put in the extra load of effort in, "When's my turn to shine?"

Hopefully that time will be soon ('A`) Hopefully I'll become a konpeito myself soon.

Anyways!! I hope you like it as much as I had fun doing this piece :D

Bai bai!