In Iceland, I asked life to happen without trying to curate the form.

Apparently, life heard me.

I did not realize the form it planned to stop curating was mine.

Rude.

Zero bedside manner.

Also–

Did you know that, before a caterpillar becomes a butterfly, it nearly dissolves?

Not metaphorically.

I mean, it becomes soup.

Technically, not every part of the caterpillar liquefies. Some structures remain while much of its larval tissue breaks down.

But “partially intact soup” does not make me feel significantly better.

I learned this while watching a woman explain metamorphosis to Mel Robbins.

“When you’re going through a very hard time,” she began, “one thing that’s very helpful–”

Debatable.

She explained that the caterpillar enters its cocoon and becomes mush.

“Like evaporates?” Mel asked. “Like literally?”

“Like literally.”

“That’s disgusting.”

Thank you, Mel.

This was apparently news to her, too. She had always imagined that the caterpillar simply grew wings out of its existing body.

Honestly, same.

That is more or less how the metaphor has always been presented to us:

Caterpillar → Cocoon → Butterfly

So neat.
So directional.
So graceful.

There are plenty of phrases meant to capture the unpleasant middle:

“It’s always darkest before the dawn.”

“The breakdown comes before the breakthrough.”

“Sometimes things have to fall apart so better things can fall together.”

“Trust the process.”

But I find it slightly mischievous that one of our most beloved metaphors for transformation conveniently left out the part where the caterpillar loses its entire recognizable shape.

Nobody mentioned the soup.

The entire ungraceful part was left for me to discover years later.

---

I’ve been thinking about my life recently–and about how, right before a transformation, the shape of the life we built can begin to dissolve.

Everything liquefies.

Mush.

Not attractive.
Not directional.

Just…there.

I wonder if this happens to other people, too.

If, right before we become something we have never been, we have to spend some time being nothing we recognize.

Being mush is scary.

From inside the cocoon, there is no butterfly yet.

There is only the loss of the caterpillar.

And yet, inside the caterpillar are clusters of cells that were there before it ever entered the cocoon.

Imaginal cells.

They are literally called imaginal cells.

Imagine that.

More precisely, scientists refer to imaginal discs or imaginal primordia–clusters of cells involved in forming the adult insect.

As much of the caterpillar’s old tissue breaks down, these cells begin developing into structures belonging to the butterfly.

Wings.
Legs.
Eyes.

All the pieces of a butterfly, apparently just hanging out inside a caterpillar.

Which feels a little unhinged.

The woman told Mel that these cells carry the roadmap–the blueprint–for becoming a butterfly.

Then she started talking about letting go.

Sigh.

About allowing yourself to be where you are.

I began to regret transcribing the conversation.

I do not enjoy discovering that a metaphor may be relevant to my life, especially when the metaphor requires me to:

• surrender;
• become soup;
• and trust microscopic cells with an inspirational name.

But one thing she said stayed with me:

The story overlay is different.

Maybe the story is not:

“I am being completely demolished.”

Maybe it is:

“I am in a state of transformation.”

The experience might feel exactly the same from inside the cocoon.

But the story changes what we believe is happening.

---

And then, while writing this, I found an old video of myself.

The Universe, apparently, has lost all regard for subtlety.

The woman in the video had a crown on her head and a purpose she could explain.

She talked for fourteen uninterrupted minutes about:

• loving the world;
• changing one life;
• and coming back softer.

She seemed to know who she was.

Bless.

A few months ago, I might have watched that video and built a case for myself.

Look at her.

Look at everything she survived.

Look at everything she accomplished.

Look at all the evidence that she mattered.

I don’t want to do that today.

I don’t want to turn my former selves into exhibits presented in defense of my existence.

I don’t want to prove that the mush was once impressive.

Because I don’t think the blueprint has ever been for a particular version of my life.

It wasn’t directing me toward a crown. Or a classroom. Or a book. Or a butterfly.

Those were forms.

Caterpillar.
Cocoon.
Butterfly.

Random alligator that no one asked for.

The form keeps changing.

But I have a feeling that, underneath every version of me, the blueprint has always been orienting me toward the same thing.

Love.

As a child, I said I wanted to love the whole world.

As a teacher, I wanted one child to know they mattered.

In a crown, I took it off and placed it on somebody else’s head.

And now, as mush, I am beginning to wonder whether I need a recognizable shape at all to keep moving in the same direction.

Maybe the imaginal cells do not carry an image of what I am supposed to look like.

Maybe they carry an orientation.

Maybe I don’t need to know whether I am becoming a butterfly, a moth, or some deeply concerning winged creature that immediately flies into a porch light.

For once, I don’t want transformation to become another assignment.

I don’t want to rush out of the mush.

I don’t want to demand that the new form introduce herself before she is ready.

I just want to be…mush.

Maybe with glitter.

The imaginal cells can do whatever they are doing.

The form can change.

The blueprint will keep pointing in the same direction.

Love.

That way leads Home.

❤