We are big fans of colouring in this house.  In my office there is a large wicker basket quite literally full to the brim with piles and piles of colouring books.  I’ve spent many a happy hour with my girls over the years, contentedly adding colour to the muddle of lines on a page.

(Confession: I’ve even been found colouring-in by myself long after the girls have got distracted by some new imaginative play idea.)

Last Friday, whilst sitting round the table (and on the floor) after breakfast on the last day of the first week back at school after the Easter holidays, my girls were quietly engrossed in scribbling away, each lost in their own little world.

Inevitably, one by one they shyly shuffled up to me, holding up their page to show me their picture.

I know full well they are seeking approval and reassurance that their colouring is ‘good’.  I’m working on this with them, albeit covertly, trying to get them to understand and recognise that they don’t need anyone else’s approval of their colouring (or anything else in life), and that whatever they do with the colours and the page it is good enough.  I also want them to know that it doesn’t matter what anybody else thinks – all that is important is that they are pleased and proud of what they have created.

Keeping this in mind, and always trying to be present with them rather than give a distracted “That’s nice”, I stop typing the email I’m responding to, turn around to face them and studiously let my eyes take in their pictures.  To Ella:  “I love the detail you’ve added to your picture.  Are you proud of it?”.  She nods.  To Lola:  “You’ve used lovely bright colours on yours.  It makes me feel happy when I’m looking at it.  Are you pleased with it?”.  She grins and skips off to do some more.  To Mimi:  “The patterns on your picture are very creative.  Did you enjoy making it?”.  She smiles and gives me a spontaneous hug.  I turn back to my email.

Seconds later, all hell has broken loose – Mimi is sobbing, raw emotion pouring out of her.  Lola is crying and clutching her forehead.  And Ella has tears in her eyes and a wobbly bottom lip.  I look questioningly at her, knowing that out of the three of them she’ll give me the most accurate outline of what happened.

“Lola asked me if I like her picture and all I did was say yes because she’d coloured it in really neatly!  Then Mimi started crying and threw her pencil across the table and it hit Lola in the face.  So she started crying too.”.

I turned to Mimi, who shrieked with the volume of a banshee, “She said she likes Lola’s because it’s neat but I’m not very good at staying in the lines and that means it’s not neat and that means she doesn’t like mine and that means I’m no good at ANYTHING!”.

My heart broke.

I know that when Mimi is like this she can’t listen to logic and rational explanations, so (after checking that Lola was ok) I cuddled her and helped her to calm down by deliberately slowing my breathing, feeling her following suit a couple of seconds later.

She eventually stopped crying and gazed up at me with tear-stained cheeks and red-rimmed eyes.  “I can’t stay in the lines Mummy” she whispered sadly.

My heart shattered a tiny bit more.  This was important.

Really important.

I took a deep breath, looked straight into her eyes and told her that it didn’t matter.  That her pictures are fantastic just as they are because SHE created them.  Because she does things her way.  Because things don’t have to be neat or perfect to be good.  Because if she likes it that way then that’s all that matters.

She relaxed a little, tightened her grip around my neck for a split-second hug and then tentatively went back to her picture.  Ella watched her carefully for a moment or two, then quietly said “I do like your picture Mimi.  It’s different to mine and it’s different to Lola’s and that’s good, because everyone is different aren’t they?”.  Mimi looked solemnly at her, then nodded.

Whatever passed between them in that moment seemed to satisfy them both, because the rest of the morning continued uneventfully (until it was time to get ready to go to school, when World War Three broke out at the mere suggestion that they might need to put on their shoes and coats and brush their teeth…).

My girls teach me lessons every day.  As I was telling Mimi that things don’t have to be perfect or neat to be good, and that it doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks, and that she doesn’t have to do things the way everyone else does, I was also talking to myself.  I often find myself caught up in seeking approval or reassurance from others that what I’m doing is ok.  If the house is messy I feel a bit stressed, even though I am fully aware that three small people (and my husband, who is just as untidy as they are!) occupy the house as well as me.  I worry that the way I’m doing things isn’t the ‘right’ way.

Perhaps ‘colouring outside the lines’ as a metaphor is something we could all try in life, whatever it is we’re doing.  In my therapy work with clients I regularly say things to challenge them or set them tasks that aren’t what one might expect from a therapist.  In my photography work I enjoy trying new compositions and angles and viewpoints.  In my relationship with my husband we certainly haven’t stayed in the lines dictated to us by what society says is the right order to do things in.

Take a look at something you’re involved in now – a project at work or a personal goal for example.  Maybe even look at the bigger picture and think about how you’re living your life as a whole.  At you staying safely inside the box?  Are you worrying about what other people think?  Are you following the crowd?  Or are you going beyond the limits, colouring outside the lines and doing things your way because you feel secure and confident enough in yourself to know that it’s what you need and want to do?

As with anything in life, it doesn’t have to be an either/or.  Staying in the lines and colouring outside the lines is a continuum,  with the extremes at either end and most people settling somewhere in the middle.  Each end of that continuum has it’s place (and it’s uses) in the world.  One isn’t better than the other, and it’s absolutely ok to switch from one to the other and back again.  Just be aware of what’s driving you to stay in the lines or colour outside the limits.  Understanding the reasons behind why we do what we do is so important, and it’s only by experimenting and trying different things that we learn what works best for us.

I hope this little lesson has been useful for you.  It certainly has been for me!  I’d love to find out your thoughts and experiences of colouring outside the lines, so please do feel free to leave a comment below.

Thanks for reading.

(PS:  My friend Judy Clement Wall is a superb doodler.  She received so many online demands for her doodles as colouring sheets that she created some – you can download them for free here.  I’ve printed them all out and can’t wait to get started on them.  Just as soon as a sharpen all the colouring pencils.)