In a quiet village by the edge of a forest, there lived a boy named Alex. He was imaginative and brave, always dreaming up stories and ideas. But people often told him:
– "Alex, you need to be serious! Stop dreaming so much!"
Sometimes, Alex started to believe them. He thought, “Maybe I shouldn’t be who I am.”
One day, Alex went into the forest to clear his mind. There, he heard a strange sound. It was a bird trapped in a net, its wings struggling to break free.
Alex approached carefully and began to untie the knots.
“Why were you struggling so much?” he asked.
The bird looked at him and said:
“Because I can’t be who I am if I’m not free.”
Alex paused, deep in thought.
“But who trapped you here?”
The bird replied:
“It doesn’t matter who. What matters is that when others trap you, they try to turn you into something you’re not. I am a bird, and birds are meant to fly. If I can’t fly, I’m not myself anymore.”
Alex finished untying the net, and the bird hopped onto a branch. Before flying away, it turned to Alex and said:
“Alex, remember this: you are free to be who you are. Don’t let anyone stop you or tell you that you need to be someone else. Live your life your way, because no one else can be you.”
As the bird disappeared into the sky, Alex felt something change within him. He realized he didn’t have to live by others’ expectations. From that day on, Alex chose to be himself—a boy who dreamed, created, and lived freely, just as he was meant to.