If I had a penny for every time someone told me to “look at the bigger picture,” I’d drop out of high school pronto and buy a mansion. No, really—I hear it. Every. Single. Day. And these people who try to give me “advice” just don’t understand me at all. Whenever I go to vent to my grandparents, they smile at me, saying, “You’ll work through it. But in the meantime, do eat more. You’ve gotten so skinny.” It’s cute that they think that an extra mouthful of bread will get me into Harvard—they don’t understand the crushing pressure of the Sisyphean SAT or the grueling GPA. That’s why, to become the successful six-figure-making woman everyone expects me to be in ten years, I have to focus on every little detail I can catch. 

But one of my friends recently gave me another piece of advice that wasn’t just to “look at the bigger picture.” (Thank god, or I might have exploded out of frustration). “Think of your life as a canvas,” she told me. “You can’t focus on just one detail of the painting. It might not be in harmony with everything else.” 

That hit different. Our lives are a canvas: people’s lives are blank slates when they’re born. Then, slowly but surely, their experiences become brushstrokes, alive on the canvas. Little by little, a picture starts to form from the choices they make.

I know that if I were to look at the canvas of my life thus far, I might not be satisfied. After all, I’ve made so many mistakes: from calling my 4th grade teacher “Mom” to getting rejected by my crush just last week, I’m definitely not a perfect person. I don’t even want to  begin thinking about the blots that those might have left on my painting. The painting of my life is starting to look less like Starry Night and more like Staying Up All Night, and it’s definitely leaving a mark under my eyes as well. 

Even more stressful are the blots I can’t see yet: I’m worried about everything. Does my friend really like me? Why did she roll her eyes—I bet she hates me. Is it because I’m ugly? Maybe I should dye my hair. Would people like me better then? Wait, do I really look ugly? Should I just give up? I wonder how incessant worry looks on paper: is it as plaguing as I imagine? 

But in reality, what I’ve realized is that my life is fairly blank. I’m only 16 years old—even if my back hurts after a long day and my bones crack like I’m 70—my “canvas of life” is mostly a blank white canvas with some color starting to form in the corners. I’ve been worrying too much about the little mistakes I make every day, hyperfixating on every little detail of my life. And if I keep worrying, my face might get stuck as The Scream. Talk about a literal canvas of life.

I’m sure that overthinking imperfections isn’t just a me problem. And I’ve realized that if I were to continue hyperfixating on every single little mistake, I’d lose the meaning of the “bigger picture.” (Yeah, sue me, I’m starting to sound like the people telling you to look at the bigger picture). 

But the reality is, we can always paint over parts of our painting we’ve already painted. That’s the beauty of life—we can always start afresh. We don’t have to let the choices we fixate on dictate the course of our lives. And even if we don’t like what we have so far, we can still find the beauty in the chaos of our painting. After all, every messy brushstroke, every semi-chaotic smear of paint is also the symbol of the unique beauty our individual lives can portray.

Imperfections make a painting real. And our imperfections make our lives real.

So, maybe you’re not satisfied with your canvas of life. And that’s fine. But take this as your sign to start changing it. You can’t change the painting until you pick up the paintbrush. So, just start something. Anything. Pick up the paintbrush. Even if you mess up again, and your hand slips, you can always paint over that again. Or maybe, don’t—find the mesmerizing wonder in just messing up and not worrying about it.

It’ll be hard. But it’ll be worth it.