A year ago I celebrated my 50th birthday, and with the help of my dear friends, threw myself an enormous party. Fifty felt like a big number to me, a milestone. I felt it crucial that I arrive on that date with a sense of having landed right where I wanted to be in life, or at least with a sense that I was creating the landing place, and from that point I wanted to launch myself into the world as a woman who was stepping up to her true life’s purpose and gloriously thriving! My loving Women’s Circle even created a beautiful rite-of-passage for me, and charged me with the task of accepting my self-chosen assignment. I felt reborn! It was amazing!

As part of that rebirth I created this blog with great vision, excitement and enthusiasm! When I wrote my first post, “Emerging from the Cocoon,” I felt just like that, like I had been reborn into what I have always been meant to be! I was finally ready to fully step into my divine purpose and take brilliant flight! Amazing things were about to happen and I was ready, and I was going to tell the world about it!

The year that followed didn’t quite turn out like that. Instead, there was frustration, loss, self-implosion, and reevaluation, and while there was plenty of writing and many colorful tales to tell, there were no blog posts.

Hmmm…

Apparently it takes a butterfly a long time to come out of its chrysalis, and emergence is quite a struggle. For the butterfly, that struggle is necessary in order to develop the strength that it will need for flight. I now realize that last summer I had just begun to poke through my chrysalis, and had committed myself to fighting my way out. Since I accepted that assignment and purposefully began that transformational journey, so many of my personal demons have risen up, grabbed me by the throat, and tried to put me in a head-lock. I have struggled and wrestled with things I didn’t even know I still possessed, or didn’t realize were confining me, things like self-doubt, envy, resentment, lack of self-worth, lack of self-love, victim consciousness…

There is a story all over the internet about the butterfly’s emergence from the cocoon, and the danger of taking shortcuts. It goes something like this:

“A man watched for hours as a butterfly struggled to emerge from its cocoon. It managed to make a small hole, but its body was too large to get through it. After a long struggle, it appeared to be exhausted and remained absolutely still. In an attempt to help the butterfly, the man took a pair of scissors and opened the cocoon, allowing the butterfly to emerge easily. Strangely, the butterfly fell from the cocoon with a withered body and tiny, crumpled wings.  The man continued to watch, expecting that the butterfly would soon expand its wings and fly away, but nothing happened. In fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its short life crawling around, and was never able to fly.

What the man had failed to understand was that the restriction of the cocoon and the struggle required for the butterfly to be free of it are part of nature’s incredible design.  A butterfly gains necessary strength through its early efforts, as this forces fluid from its body into its wings. It is because of this struggle that the butterfly is able to fly at all!”

It’s beautiful the way life works, we commit ourselves to growth, and opportunities to grow show up!  People, circumstances and events challenge us and put us under the squeeze, and we have a choice as to how we are going to respond. I think the real trick is being able, or maybe willing to look at life’s bumps as just that, as opportunities to grow beyond our current selves. I’m not saying it was pretty or even remotely easy, but I can honestly say that because of the challenges of the past year and how I chose to respond to them, so much old, unhealthy garbage that had been holding me hostage has now been dumped. I thought I was ready for flight, but little did I know just how much old crap was still shackled around my feet, holding me to the ground. I may write about those experiences in other posts, but for now suffice it to say that “Life Itself” is my guru, my teacher, and I willingly accept every lesson that it brings! Even though I hated it at the time, I am so grateful now! I would’t trade this last year for anything!

It’s a year later and I’m about to turn 51. I can honestly say that I have a completely new way of seeing the world and myself in it. I have a tremendous sense of freedom and lightness of being that I never even dreamt was possible. I have never been happier! I think that now I am in the place where I’m finally ready to pump up my wings! We’ll see!

Great Spirit, Grant me the patience to allow life to unfold
in its own time and its own wisdom.
Grant me the insight to let go and surrender to life’s flow,
knowing that everything that comes is on my behalf.
Grant me the strength to see the truth,
and the persistence, passion, and flexibility
to never give up on the journey.
Help me to remember to be inherently grateful
for all that life brings! – Freyja Wild