Toward the end of last year, I got called as an FHE group leader. This means that I actually have to attend FHE. Yesterday, we did a Bob Ross night. I’m horrible at art. I wouldn’t say that I was dreading the activity, but there were definitely a lot of people who were way more enthusiastic about it than me.
The Bob Ross Painting Experience
I knew that my painting would not be great. I assumed it would look nothing like what Bob Ross painted. I’d say my expectations were pretty low. My only hope was that it wouldn’t look like an artistically challenged preschooler painted it. I was shooting more for an artistically challenged third grader. Guess what. I failed miserably on all accounts. It looks a lot worse than I expected.
Of course, that’s at least partly my own fault. I didn’t grab any white paint, so the clouds ended up black, and the snow on the mountains ended up being yellow. I could have grabbed some white paint when I realized it was important, but I chose not to. I’ve only got myself to blame for that.
I don’t think I realized just how horrible my painting was until I started looking at what other people had painted. Sure, there were a few that were far from what Bob Ross painted, but I’m pretty sure I’d win first prize if they gave out prizes for the painting that looked the least like what Bob Ross painted.
Below is my version of the Bob Ross painting. If you want to see the actual painting, here’s the video. You don’t have to watch the whole thing. Just skip to the end, and you’ll see what it was supposed to look like.
More Thoughts and the Potential Takeaways
This was meant mostly as an opportunity to laugh at myself. It’s a random post about a funny experience in my life. If you have to have a lesson learned from the experience, though, I can give you two.
If You Put in the Effort, You Get the Results
I knew my painting was not going to look great. I’ll admit it. I put in minimal effort. Even trying hard, it wasn’t going to look great. Some people grabbed multiple paintbrushes. I had one paintbrush and then a sponge. I used the brush on most of it and the sponge on the background. Honestly, though, I wouldn’t have known when to switch brushes even if I’d grabbed several.
I also didn’t put in the effort to grab the right colors. Really, though, I think the mountains are the only thing I need to be concerned about when it comes to using the wrong color. There are dark clouds, so those are fine. Right?
I also didn’t take the time to make sure my painting looked its best. In my own defense, I actually did try to put forth effort in the beginning. It just didn’t work, so I gave up.
There were other people who really put in the time and effort. I think we were stopping the video about every two minutes for people to catch up. Let’s just say that the video is slightly under half an hour long, and it took us about an hour and a half to get through the video. Isn’t part of the appeal of Bob Ross, though, that he’s a quick painter, and you can get your painting done in about half an hour?
Those who spent the time using the correct brushes, picking the right colors, and taking their time with the brushstrokes ended up with the best paintings. In all honesty, though, I don’t have the painting patience for that. Plus, while my painting might have looked slightly better, even with extra effort, it wouldn’t have looked great.
Not Everyone Has the Same Talents
That leads into the second lesson. Not everyone has the same talents. I’m just not great at pretty much anything that requires artistic skills (painting, drawing, sculpting, sewing, or anything related to that sort of stuff). Sure, I can work on those things and be better at them than I am now, but I’m never going to have Bob Ross’ artistic skills.
That’s okay. I’m sure there were people looking at my painting, wondering how I could have messed up so badly. They might be wondering about my trees or the brownish section that was meant to be bushes. They might think that while theirs didn’t look exactly like how Bob Ross did his, at least people can tell what they were painting.
In life, we are each given different talents. We can improve upon our talents. We can even make things that were once hard into a talent with effort. Yet, we are not all the same. As I was thinking about this, a section out of “Ye Are My Friends” by David L. Buckner, a 70, came to mind. He gave this talk in the October 2024 General Conference. He essentially says that we need each other because we don’t all do the same things. If we all had the same talents, we wouldn’t need each other. Plus, and this is just my own thoughts, the world would be a very boring place if we were all the same.
So while I may never have the artistic talent of someone like Bob Ross, there are things that I can do better than him or others who have amazing artistic talents. At least I hope there are…
