As I’ve seen Monarch butterflies in nature recently, I’ve been filled with wonder and joy as I watch them move about from flower to flower. Over the past couple years, I’ve been fascinated to learn about their different characteristics. This has led me to create several mosaics of them, wanting to capture a bit of their beauty. Here are a few of my reflections and ways I see their story as it relates to us.
Monarchs look very delicate when we see them fluttering among flowers, but they are strong enough to migrate hundreds of miles each year, sometimes traveling 50 miles in a day. Outwardly they look delicate, but they are built with inner strength that allows them to fly long distances. Like the Monarch, we have much more strength than we know. We are capable of many accomplishments and successes – big and small.
There is also great strength in numbers. Even with so little individual weight, when many of the butterflies have clustered together in trees in Mexico, they have caused a large branch to break. Sometimes the individual hopes and dreams we have on our heart for the world around us seem impossible because of how we view our individual voice or strength. But if we choose to work together and pull the same direction, what seems impossible can truly happen.
As the monarch caterpillar grows, its sole source of food is the milkweed plant, which is poisonous. Ingesting this poison does not harm them, but protects them from predators. Once they transform into a butterfly, their diet changes to only drinking sweet nectar from a variety of flowers. In a similar way, we are invited to move from living defensively, with self-protection as our main objective, to lifting our eyes and taking in the beauty around us, feeding on kindness, joy, goodness and peace.
The world has plenty of people who continually doubt their strength, feel powerless to act for good, and limit their ability to live forward-looking by embracing hope and seeing beauty in the people and situations they find themselves in, even the most challenging ones. Instead, we get to choose to live from a different perspective, believing that we are strong and powerful, that our collective voice and efforts can change the world, and make ongoing decisions to live for people instead of against people and situations. This outlook will fill our lives and the world around us with sweetness, joy and goodness.
May you be filled with wonder and hope as you reflect on the life and beauty of the Monarch.
Great resource about the Monarch – http://www.flightofthebutterflies.com/