It is Sprint. An opportunity for letting go of what no longer serves and for experiencing new beginnings and rebirth.

I begin with a story based in scientific fact.

…the caterpillar, like us has a regular cellular structure as well as a cellular overlay composed of isolated imaginal cells.  Gradually, as the caterpillar naturally grows and evolves, the imaginal cells become greater in number and threaten to override the old structure.  The caterpillar interprets this as an attack on its immune system.  It tries to rid itself of these imaginal cells, and it is able to do so as long as the imaginal cells remain isolated units.  But when they band together, as they do as part of the growth process, they become too strong for the immune system to break down; their collective power is too great.  As they gather momentum by forming cell clusters and exchanging information, they become the dominant growth paradigm of the organism, until pretty soon there is no stopping them, and they gloriously morph into the new structure that is the beautiful butterfly.

                                                            Linda Star Wolf:  Visionary Shamanism

You might wonder why I am sharing this story.  I am focused on these imaginal cells.  For the caterpillar, these imaginal cells are seeds for what is to come.  Without these imaginal seeds there would be no butterfly.  As creatures of the earth, I want to believe that we, too, have these imaginal seeds.  Unlike the caterpillar, we cannot metamorphosize into an entirely different being.  No, we remain our human self and I believe our imaginal cells hold our full human potential – our ability to become fully human, fully realized while clothed in this physical body.  What do we need to do to make full use of these imaginal cells?

For the caterpillar, once inside the chrysalis the body secretes a liquid which turns the body into a mushy substance.  Within this goo, the imaginal cells become the foundation of what will emerge – a completely formed, exquisite butterfly ready to take flight.  How do you and I use our imaginal cells to become the human metaphor of the butterfly?  How do you and I get to fly?

To tune into my imaginal cells, I must bring increasing consciousness into my everyday life.  I want to live with conscious intention.  How easy it is to settle, to live with routine, to not welcome change, to not ask myself hard questions, to offer pat answers to myself or others to avoid active engagement, or to not speak my truth in an open and non-judgmental way.  In so doing I create a tomb for myself by locking me into a dark chrysalis rather than seeing the chrysalis as a womb for rebirthing myself.  If I want to fly, I must latch onto those imaginal cells within me that hold all that I can be.

Unlike the butterfly, my imaginal cells will not automatically trigger change in me.  I must act to nurture these imaginal cells.  I must remember at some deep level that my divinity waits and its awakening relies on me.

Having to energize my own imaginal cells is not the only way in which I am different from the butterfly.  Once it spreads its wings and takes flight, the butterfly has a lifespan of two weeks – poof, dead.  I, however, get to live many years.  In one way my chrysalis is each and every experience I have.  Each experience offers the opportunity for a metaphoric death or a letting go of something that no longer serves me while also offering an opportunity for a metaphoric birth into a new and different me.  Just imagine that – every experience is a chrysalis, an opportunity to birth into the light!

To deepen this thought further, I want to share a story I came upon years ago.  I do not recall the source but the story touched me deeply and I have never forgotten it.

       A family with young children had found a chrysalis attached to a twig.  Cutting the twig, they placed the twig and chrysalis into a small jar, punched holes in the top, and waited.  When the time came, they watched in excited awe as the butterfly emerged and then the family went on with their lives.  When they returned, they found the butterfly with its wings clasped tightly against its body.  The jar was too small to allow its wings to spread.  They rushed the jar outside, opened it and released the butterfly onto the sidewalk.  The butterfly could stumble forward but it was too late for it to spread its wings – they were glued tightly to its body.  The butterfly died right there without ever flying – poof, gone!

My sadness in reading this story was palpable for I knew those times when my wings were glued tightly to my body and I could not fly.  Unlike the butterfly you and I have  multiple opportunities for spreading our wings and flying.  And because we have free will, we can choose whether to stay tightly curled up, holding our wings close in or we can choose to look at each opportunity as the womb that will give birth to flight!  Because we are each still here incarnated in this particular lifetime, we have already learned to do that.  Yet there is always the opportunity to fly higher, to come closer and closer to our divine being.  I want to fly higher and I invite you to do likewise.  What is there to lose?  I am not willing to have my wings stuck close to my body again.  Are you?

If you want to join me in flying higher, I pose two questions for us.  The first is, “What false beliefs must you/I sacrifice in order to fly higher?”  And my second question is, “What must you/I surrender into?”

First, what are the false beliefs we must let go of?  False beliefs are ones that hold us back.  Beliefs we use to talk ourselves into not showing up in all our finery.  You may have one’s particular to you but generally they go something like this:

• I am not good enough to qualify for higher levels of flying.
• It takes too much effort.
• I will not be good at this and will probably fail.
• What difference can I make in the world?
• Who cares?
• How I live my life has no impact on anyone else.
• All that effort for what purpose?  You live and then you die.
• No one will like my ideas so why try?
• My ideas don’t count because no one sees me.
• Change is too difficult.

You and I can clearly see the games we play with ourselves when fear shows up.  Behind every one of these false beliefs lies the fear of moving into our full being.  Instead we let our fear define us.  When in fear, it is difficult to see how our fear helps us to keep our wings glued to our bodies.  We fear others judgments, their laughter, their anger.  To experience what we most fear is like facing death.  Yet, unlike the butterfly who has but one life, the metaphoric deaths we experience are nothing more than portals to rebirth.  In that death we learn to let go of what no longer serves so as to make space for growing something new about us.

If you and I can let go of these false beliefs that keep us from nurturing our imaginal cells, what new understandings can we surrender into?

• Each of us has free will.  We can choose to define ourselves or allow others to define us.  That is a choice.  Which will we choose?
• Each of us has an oversoul – a BIG self that is beyond the little egoic self.  That oversoul is the chrysalis of our wholeness, our divinity.
• Life and death are complementary with the outcome being rebirth.  With every metaphoric death we let go of something that no longer serves us so that we have space for something new that brings us closer to our oversoul.
• We are responsible for learning from every experience in a conscious way and without judgment.  Judgment holds us back.  It is a form of self-violence.  If we focus on the negative, we lose sight of the positive.  We want to spread our wings not keep them glued to our bodies.
• We can meet our fears.  We are still here.  We have faced many fears already.  Why not push forward and find that niche for meeting another fear that has held you back.
• Each of us is enough in this moment.  And in the next moment, can we be brave enough to find that space that will allow us to fly higher?

These few statements sound quite simple.  Yet in embracing them we are committing ourselves to more conscious living in all aspects including one’s relationship with the self, one’s relationship with others, one’s relationship in community, one’s relationship with all with whom we share this planet.  It is not easy work yet to be free of the fears and beliefs that hold us back means that we can come closer and closer to being in touch with our divine self.  And to me, flying is worth that.  And I hope you are willing to risk that as well.  I encourage all to spread your wings and fly!

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