Do Not Help the Butterfly

Here is something most people do not know. If you find a butterfly fighting its way out of the cocoon and you gently help it, opening things up to spare it the struggle, the butterfly will not survive. The same is true of a chick pushing out of its shell.

The struggle is not a cruelty. It is the design. The hard work of pushing against the cocoon forces fluid into the wings. Squeezing through the narrow opening builds the strength the creature needs to fly and to live. Take away the struggle, and you take away the strength.

I think about this often, because so many of us secretly wish someone would just open the cocoon for us. We want the growth without the pushing, the new life without the squeeze. And when people love us, they often try to spare us, to smooth every hard thing away. It comes from love. It also, quietly, keeps us weak.

Your struggle right now might be the exact thing strengthening your wings. The discomfort of pushing past who you used to be is not a sign you are failing. It is the feeling of becoming strong enough for what comes next.

I will not open the cocoon for you. But I will sit beside it, and remind you that the pushing is working, even when it does not feel like it.