Birth of a butterfly
The other day, I sat for hours watching two chrysalises.
I had a number of other things this world told me I should be doing, but the universe nudged me to put those aside and trust that this was something I needed to do. I wasn’t expecting how deeply moving, enlightening, evolving it would be.
I watched. Observing and contemplating birth.
And I began to wonder how many obstetricians and other birth workers have watched butterflies birth themselves. Could they be that patient?
I pondered why women choose to invite people to their birth space who have no desire really to watch birth unfold beautifully, with a mother in deep communion with herself, her baby, Mother Earth, Source? I’ve been that girl. The answer. Conditioning. Fear. Obligation. None of which should be taken into motherhood. Earth doesn’t care for those. She doesn’t speak that language.
I observed this butterfly expanding inside the cocoon, gently meeting her own resistance. But, more importantly, I observed my urges… to move her, to put her somewhere where I could watch more easily, to keep her “safe”, to capture this. Ego masquerading as “care”.
When none of it was mine.
Butterflies don’t ask for you to help them birth. Perhaps they know the desire to control any of it, really, is an insult to the greatest wisdom. Interference would certainly result in the death of something or cosmic ripples beyond our narrow-minded comprehension.
What bombastic egoism to tell anyone or anything else how to birth themselves or how to live.
There was no part of it that was more or less significant. Not the still moments where nothing seemed to be happening. Not the moments where the tail flicked, dancing in preparation. Not the moments where the colours subtly changed. Not the moments as they emerged and sat with wings slowly drying.
But something in me shifted as I expected lift-off. They waited. What were they waiting for? The air was still with anticipation, and then it happened. Both times, it wasn’t until a gentle breeze turned the air, like a divine breath of life, that they took flight. I could only sit in wonder at what it must feel like to live each moment this deeply in tune with the cosmic pulse.
Copyright: Colwyn Murphy
“One day it simply says: “Enough”… and it goes inwards. It’s a space where it sheds its doubts, sheds all beliefs of what the world has told it to be and do. Sheds all illusions. Any interference would not teach it what it needs to learn… the lesson that it already knows how. This is birth.”