Today, I was going to write a post about an observation I had in my butterfly garden. After I took some pictures, I scribbled some notes on a sticky pad. Just as I was going to sit and write this evening, my puppy, Maya, had grabbed it from my desk. She chewed it up and now laid on my sofa in shambles.
As I unraveled the paper, the ideas that came to my mind were more visible: cleaning the weeds, caterpillars are flexible, hanging upside down and another random note about some colorful rocks that I saw the other day.
My work life has been kind of like that sticky paper. It got torn apart and now with new ideas, I am attempting to unravel it. Yet, there are some missing pieces. I can’t see how the whole picture will play out.
As I was observing the lump of paper next to Maya, I saw a tweet from @chrisbrogan linking this site called Dark Matter Matters. I said to myself, “Forget about my sticky note.” As I was reading Chris Gram’s “About page”, I thought there could be a connection to my random thoughts and dark matter.
According to Wikipedia: Only about 4% of the total energy density in the universe can be seen directly.About 96% is thought to be composed of dark matter or dark energy.
When my security rug was pulled away from me last year, I had no inkling of how my life would be one year later. I could barely see straight. It was like a dark cloud looming over me. Fear tried to take control. Anxiety set in and sometimes despair. Not much fun. But I was able to use my vision and mind to plan, keep moving and manuever through the dark waters with the confidence and faith that I hold within me.
It is kind of like this picture I took the other night from the balcony of my mom’s apartment. What I could mainly see was the nighttime sky illuminated by the stars and city lights. Yet in the daylight, there exists a vibrant city filled with millions of people, structures and many places, events and opportunities to experience.
So how does this relate to my caterpillars, weeds and the colorful rocks I found? What I was observing today about the caterpillars is how flexible they are. Their structure can bend completely into a U position. They also naturally hang upside down without falling. They are completely focused on eating the milkweed for sustenance. When not eating, they sit on a leaf with barely a movement. They survive the rain, lightning and thunderstorms.
Once ready, they transform into a chrysalis or cocoon for about a week and lay hidden in what I assume is without light. They must know that they soon will become a butterfly. They can’t become that without retreating in their cocoon. They instinctively know their potential.
I’ll use dark matter as an analogy to the unknown potential that lies hidden within us – the unused talent that lies dormant, quiet waiting to become something. Our instincts, minds and hearts know that we can. The question is: Will we?
Maybe sometimes, we are caught up in many entangled situations, like the weeds. It is just a matter of cleaning them up. Or the weeds can be our limiting and distorted thoughts which keep us from our true potential.
As for the colorful rocks, I will leave it for the next post. For now, think of them like the opportunities that abound around us. The question then is: Which will we choose?
Note below, the empty shell from where it once lay hidden in its chrysalis, awaiting its natural potential as a beautiful butterfly.
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