Parable of the Week: The Story of the Butterfly

A man found a cocoon of a butterfly.

One day a small opening appeared.

He sat and watched the butterfly for several hours

as it struggled to squeeze its body through the tiny hole.

Then it stopped, as if it couldn't go further.

So the man decided to help the butterfly.

He took a pair of scissors and

snipped off the remaining bits of cocoon.

The butterfly emerged easily but

it had a swollen body and shriveled wings.

The man continued to watch it,

expecting that any minute the wings would enlarge

and expand enough to support the body,

Neither happened!

In fact the butterfly spent the rest of its life

crawling around.

It was never able to fly.

What the man in his kindness

and haste did not understand:

The restricting cocoon and the struggle

required by the butterfly to get through the opening

was a way of forcing the fluid from the body

into the wings so that it would be ready

for flight once that was achieved.

Sometimes struggles are exactly  what we need in our lives.  Going through life with no obstacles would cripple us.  We will not be as strong as we could have been and we would never fly.  As mothers and fathers, we want to do so much for our children, and there is nothing wrong with that. It's when we do 'everything' for them that it becomes an issue, for they stagnate and become unable to grow. 

There is no one who can say they have sailed through life with no problems at all.  It just doesn't  happen.  A life without problems would be a life without growth. Earth is a school, and they say we all come to here  to encounter the lessons we need in order to return to the source.  Life as a human is all about these lessons. Yet, what are lessons besides problems that need to be solved? Indeed, they are our lessons to learn, the ones that are a part of our divine plan,and we've agreed to carry them out. I conclude with a quote from one of my favorite people.

We all have to go through the tumbler a few times before we can emerge as a crystal. 
 
--Elizabeth Kubler Ross--

What lesson is life teaching you today?