Transformation

Most of us would love to change from being a caterpillar into being a butterfly. The journey from the dense creepy little bug (but let's not forget the awesome book by Eric Carle: The Very Hungry Caterpillar...maybe not so creepy up close in technicolor.) The journey from one to the next requires a total metamorphosis. The caterpillar must shed it's skin five times before the journey inward. I am sure that I have shed my skin multiple times. (This reminds me of my itching attacks, when I have literally become so incredibly uncomfortable in my own skin that my skin issues have caused me to examine and re-examine my self-care habits and what I must refine.) Eventually, the caterpillar enters the chrysalis stage when it becomes more of a nebulous mass. A pupa...this is the most private. I certainly know what it feels like to be in that stage. I call it being under construction. It's not the sexiest place to be. It doesn't look like much from the outside; it requires going inward and letting go of the structure of the former self, and it's done privately. The chrysalis phase is when all the magic happens. When the final skin is shed, the chrysalis is so soft, but hardens very quickly and protects this transformation. This magical period of time brings with it the alchemy that cause the caterpillar to become the butterfly.

I remember myself in this phase. The life span of a butterfly is 28 days, so the process is much quicker than my human form. I felt that I was in the chrysalis stage for a decade. During that period of time, it really looked as if nothing was happening. The final time I shed my skin and got very soft at that stage was after a physical assault. This attack softened me and created a vulnerability that brought me deeply inward. The shell around me hardened, I was no longer inspired to do what I had been doing for 10 years. I had been an actor. That role was already a skin that had shed if anyone was paying attention. There was, however, much more I needed to shed: my self-critical nature, my yo-yoing diet (alternatively binge eating and then starving my body), the belief system that I was "not enough" or that I had to earn love. I needed to be unsheathed of these uncomfortable costumes. And soon, I no longer knew who I was. I was "under construction".

When I emerged, I had found the voices of self-love from within, the need to help others and the commitment that it took to practice my self-loving and helping others on a daily basis. This was the gift I brought with me, and began to share with my students...and now with all of you.

It's no wonder that my Yogalosophy logo is a butterfly.

This very delicate and light way of being emerged from going deep and accepting the transformation. What appears light is just the bubbles rising to the surface....Yes. Yes. Yes.

A tip of the hat to treating the dark with light.
Happy Halloween