I’ve stood in this workshop for countless hours, breathing in the cedar and oak dust that floats like golden motes in a shaft of light. The wood is a part of me. Each block I cradle in my hands feels like a promise—an opportunity to coax life and grace out of something solid and still.

Yet, over the years, I’ve heard a chorus of dismissals: “Your animals don’t look real,” they say. “No one’s going to buy carvings of peacocks,” they insist. When I spent months perfecting the arc of a swan’s neck, people just shook their heads and muttered that the details were wasted on such a piece. It hurts more than I’d like to admit, though I try to mask it behind a quiet nod.

Do you think it’s worthless for me to spend my days carving feathers, smoothing down the tail, focusing on each tiny groove that marks the wood like a hidden story? I tell myself this peacock or that giraffe is more than just a statue.

To me, it’s a dream I had as a little boy, staring into lush forests and imagining bright birds strolling under the canopy. It’s the gentle memory of my father teaching me to sand down rough edges, telling me to “listen” to the wood.

Sometimes, when I hold a nearly finished carving in my hands, the shape of an animal that once only existed in my mind, I feel a spark in my chest—a quiet pride that maybe I’ve managed to share a piece of that dream with the world. And then someone comes around and scoffs.

They say the tail is too extravagant, or the eyes don’t seem quite right. They tell me no one will ever appreciate this. I try to remember the warmth inside me when the work is going well, but doubt creeps in like a shadow in the corner of my workshop.

I wonder if I should just stop pouring so much of myself into these wooden creatures. Maybe I should settle for simpler shapes, minimal details, and hide my passion where no one can criticize it.

But somehow, I can’t. Something in me won’t allow me to carve anything less than my heart demands. The swirl of every feather in this peacock’s tail is a testament to the awe I feel when I see birds in flight—or when I remember how my grandfather once marveled at a flock drifting across the evening sky.

So I turn to you, whoever’s reading this. Do you think I should keep going? When you look at my work, does it tell you a story? Does it spark a memory or a feeling deep inside? Or do you agree with them—that it’s not worth the time or the splinters that lodge under my nails?

I’m not looking for empty praise—I’ve never needed that. But I do want to know, with honesty, if these carvings are worth sharing with the world. If you see in them what I see: devotion, patience, and the hope that one day, someone might look at a wooden animal and feel a little less alone, a little more alive.

Tell me, do you see it too? Or shall I leave my chisels to gather dust? Please tell me your honest thoughts with a comment here.

Is My Work Any Good?

Sawshub Team