Let’s talk about that pivotal moment when someone you haven’t spoken with a quite some time asks you, “How are you doing?” and in response you smile in kind and honestly say, “Just fine, thank you for asking”. Never for a moment forgetting about the car that needs a fixing, the bill that needs to be paid, the kids that need a feeding, and the overall uncertainty of tomorrow, you realize “just fine” flows smoothly from your lips and you mean every word of it. I call it hope. Hope in a better tomorrow, hope that the bad times will fade away, hope that the universe repays you for the good karma you sent its way.
I’m reminded of a cute story someone passed along to me it was an excerpt from Hope for the Flowers I thought I’d pass it along to you enjoy…
Yellow, a very special caterpillar, searches for more in life. She knows the pain of the climb. She knows that this is not for her. She knows the pain of the end of a relationship, but she will not let the pull of Stripe, her partner, make her do something that she knows is wrong for her. Still she does not know what is right for her. She trusts in herself that there must be something more in life. She wanders. And she meets a grey caterpillar spinning a cocoon. Thinking that he must be in trouble to be doing something so peculiar, she offers to help him. He signals that he is doing what he needs to do to be a butterfly. Yellow is excited. And when she asks what a butterfly is, she is told that this, a butterfly, is what she truly is. Puzzled, she questions how such a transformation is possible. “How can I believe there’s a butterfly inside…when all I see is a fuzzy worm?” “You must want to fly so much that you are willing to give up being a caterpillar.” “You mean to die?” “…What’s really you will still live. Life is changed, not taken away.”
Flickr Credit: sunset_for_you