I’m not a butterfly scientist but a philosopher. Somehow, the chrysalis image made the incredible leap to my mind and explained my current stage of life more accurately than all my logic could deduce. Part of me wonders how the mind sees patterns and contracts images for its purposes. Hello to the mystery of perspective. . . . What makes this a "mystery" is that the image of the chrysalis helps me understand something that I've not yet fully experienced. It explains the unexplainable.

No plant exists without the seed because the seed is an essential but rudimentary form of the plant. It is the thing-that-will-be-a-plant. Here is some hope. When I wear this metaphor, it allows me to see that my destination is only possible because of my beginning. Those early stages hold within the DNA of my destination, of who I will become. The seed is not a false self. It's a true beginning.

If all this is true—the violently transformative experience within the chrysalis—the butterfly is a dangerous creature. It's responded to violence with greater violence; to force, with greater force; to strength, with greater strength. It hasn't looked back at the hungry days of summer when it crawled from leaf to leaf, grass blade to grass blade, eating because its life depended on it. It hasn't regretted creating its own grave. It hasn't cried about losing its lumpy worminess. It hasn't bemoaned its existence. It has shown itself worthy of its calling by boning up under the deliquescing power of nature and fighting free in order to fly. It submitted to its fate willingly. It emerged victoriously. 

I'm less a "I'm gonna make discomfort my bitch" and more of an Epictetus' "Bring it on, God," believing—and here's my faith—that the power that upholds this universe is upholding me, sustaining me with resources that the heat of the present struggle is pulling to the top. I'm being refined, to use a non-sailing metaphor. The dross is being separated from the gold. The process is far from comfortable, but I'm becoming comfortable with the discomfort within the language of adventure.

It's a funny word, isn't it? Two Latin words disconnected within one word: dis + orient. "Orient" comes from oriens, orientis meaning “rising” or “east”; “dis” from “rich,” perhaps as a direct translation of the Greek Πλοῦτον (Pluto) but really referring to the deity from the underworld. "Underworld East" is the transliteration. There's no sun with which to "orient" yourself in the underworld. No north star to fix your heading. Just Dis-information, Dis-traction, Dis-topia. Dis-connection at its most dangerous.

A meditation on returning to the classroom after beginning a business

Balance as a metaphor is best understood as a dynamic space between extremes just like walking is.

Exercise is a great way of transitioning from one activity to another.

A meditation on the etymology of “authenticity” and its implications in my life.

A meditation on Epictetus 1.6.1

A meditation on Wendell Berry’s poem, “VI,” from “Sabbaths 2001” in Given.