During one of my ‘I have been to the edge’ pivot points, our family took a sabbatical year and travelled Australia with our 3 young children in a camping trailer. While in Cairns QLD, we went to a Butterfly Sanctuary. As soon as we walked into the enclosure, the butterflies flitted so close you felt drawn to reaching out your fingers in the hope that one of these seemingly fragile, winged creatures will alight on your hand.
Whilst there, I learned some butterfly wisdom that continues to sustain me. Inside the caterpillar are several sets of dormant cells that are called ‘imaginal disks.’ After the caterpillar sheds its skin on average 5 times; the fifth skin-change hardens to become the chrysalis. The pupa excretes digestive juices, which turns the caterpillar into a rich soup of cells in the bottom of the chrysalis. The ‘imaginal disks,’ are suddenly activated and literally the entire internal contents of the caterpillar is dismantled and totally rebuilt into a butterfly. The butterfly cells completely replace the caterpillar cells. The butterfly is a completely new creature to the caterpillar. The old life is gone and the new life replaces it.
When the butterfly emerges from its chrysalis is has new strengths and a new perspective but the potential to be a butterfly was always within.
If you’d like a new perspective, a glimpse of your strengths that are within you, if you’d like to explore the transition for caterpillar to butterfly, my new workshop is for you.
It’s called Butterfly Heart. This therapeutic workshop for women uses art processes to explore your strengths and fragility and will have you reorientated, rested and feeling restored through the metaphor of a butterfly.
Absolutely no artistic ability necessary.
$50 per person, all inclusive. Morning tea is provided.
More details can be found on Facebook here or sign up for our VIP newsletter which will allow you to become connected with all Kaleidoscope Art Therapy programs and news.