Butterflies
& Blazes
The Cocoon & the Butterfly
Journey of Hearts 
A Healing Place in CyberSpaceTM
The following story originally found
it's way to the website under the title, The Moth and
the Coccoon, but I had seen this version and decided to create an update
re-edited it for clarity.
I find this story very inspirational,
when I am trying to make sense of life's many struggles. Particularly lately,
it seems at times that life seems pretty unfair. Every where we turn, we
meet obstacles. It is difficult in the midst of struggling to remember
that there is a reason for the struggling, often it is a time of growth,
of finding purpose, of discovering a new direction. The hard part is remembering
that you do get past the obstacles. I try to revisit this story and the
following thought, and somehow it helps it to make sense.
We are a product of what we
have survived.
Kirsti A. Dyer, MD, MS
Or as Booker T. Washington stated:
I have
learned that success is to be measured
not so much by the position
that one has reached in life
as by the obstacles
which he has overcome in trying
to suceed.
The Cocoon & the Butterfly
A
man found a cocoon of a butterfly, that he brought home.
One day a small opening appeared
in the cocoon. He sat and watched the coccon for several hours as the butterfly
struggled to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to
stop making progress. It appeared as if the butterfly had gotten
as far as it could, and it could go no further. The man decided to help
the butterfly in it's struggle. He took a pair of scissors and snipped
off the remaining bit of the cocoon...
and the butterfly emerged easily.
As the butterfly emerged, the man
was surprised. It had a swollen body and small, shriveled wings. He continued
to watch the butterfly expecting that, at any moment, the wings would dry
out, enlarge and expand to support the swollen body. He knew that in time
the body which would contract and the butterfly would be able to fly.
In fact, the butterfly spent the
rest of its life crawling around with a swollen body and shriveled
wings.
It never was able to fly.
What the man, in his kindness
and haste, did not understand was that the restricting cocoon and the struggle
were required for the butterfly to be able to fly. The butterfly must push
it's way through the tiny opening to force the fluid from its body and
wings. Only by struggling through the opening, can the butterfly's wings
be ready for flight once it emerges from the cocoon.
Sometimes struggles are exactly
what we need in our life. If God allowed us to go through our
life without any obstacles, it would cripple us. We would not be as strong
as what we could have been.
And we could never fly.
Original Author Unknown
When you wonder about
life's obstacles, remember the struggles are needed so that we can emerge
ready to fly.....
Spread
your wings and prepare to fly,
For you have become a butterfly
Fly abandonedly into the
sun.
Spread
your wings and fly
Butterfly.
Mariah Carey
Last updated December 1, 1998
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