Years ago, after a visit to a butterfly house, my sister gave me a small butterfly magnet. Over the years, it has become one of my most cherished possessions. A butterfly is a bit of an enigma. Walking into a gift store, artistic renditions of butterflies are always grouped with a category of things that include daisies, hearts and happy little trinkets that sit pretty on a shelf, but do not inspire a sense of strength. However, the elegant fragility of a butterfly is deceptive. If the hand of God reached down from the sky and scooped you up, you might be squished like a bug, too. The nature of a butterfly is change, and this is where its true power lies.
Before a butterfly becomes the beautiful, colorful creature that it is, it must live the life of a humble caterpillar. Some caterpillars are cute and fuzzy, and can survive on these characteristics, but many are chubby and intrusive, and risk being pulled apart by curious little boys who want to examine their insides. With no wings, and slow feet, escape is impossible. They spend their days inching along plant stalks, eating leaves. An architect named Richard Buckminster Fuller once commented that “there is nothing in a caterpillar that tells you it’s going to be a butterfly”. A caterpillar appears to have no ambition beyond its next meal. There is no sense of elegance, no sense of beauty, and no sense of mystery to indicate that, deep within, it is something more.
At the end of its time as a caterpillar, a cocoon is formed. In this shelter, the caterpillar makes a silent and private transformation. It requires no self-help books, twelve step support groups, or Twitter remarks regarding its progress. The caterpillar just quietly does what it was always meant to do. Metamorphosis slowly alters the creature: old skin is shed, slow moving feet are dissolved, and exquisite wings are formed. At the very moment when the butterfly is ready to make a spectacular and brilliant entrance into the world, it cannot. At the height of its transformation, when victory seems assured, it faces its most difficult challenge: it must break free from its cocoon.
A butterfly cannot be removed from its cocoon by hand. Many sympathetic onlookers, eager to assist this now magnificent creature, might be tempted to relieve its burden now that it has come so far. That assistance is fatal. Inside the cocoon, a butterfly’s wings are covered with slimy goo. The struggle to escape the cocoon removes the slime from its wings; without that effort, the slime remains, burdening the delicate wings. Without freedom of flight, a butterfly will die. The challenge of leaving its cocoon is required before a butterfly can cross the threshold of actualization, triumphant.
Butterflies have become symbolic of another type of change, as well. Mathematician Edward Lorenze once questioned, “Does the flap of a butterfly’s wings in Brazil set off a tornado in Texas?” While this is unlikely, the underlying point is not as outrageous as it seems. Small and subtle actions can result in significant and extraordinary changes, removing the actual outcome of events far from the predicted outcome. In terms of life’s challenges, sometimes an obstacle in our path does not need to be attacked with a hammer to be removed. Often, smaller changes will remove it more effectively, like the trickle of rain water eroding a muddy hillside. Over time, delicate actions yield dramatic results.
When I see a Hallmark style rendition of a butterfly - drawn up in weak, pastel hues - I feel that an unjust departure has been made from the true beauty of this creature. When I picture a butterfly, I picture the enduring colors of a regal Monarch: rich ebony, brilliant white and flaming orange. A butterfly is a symbol of perseverance and personal evolution; proof that the being within, and the being without, can exceed expectations.
(An essay written for my current English class, which focuses on the hero archetype. The topic given was "A heroic place or thing".)
