Anyone who knows me knows that I tend to be a perfectionist.  (Those who really know me would snicker, “*Tends* to be???“)  I acknowledge that, and am working toward making my expectations more realistic.  I struggle with what is versus what should be.  I worry about mediocrity.

Recently during a church sermon, I had a lightbulb moment.  The speaker talked about Romans 12 & one of the points he made was “being transformed.” He said that the Greek word for this was the same word from which we get “metamorphosis.”

Which got me to thinking about the metamorphosis of a butterfly. At no point during the metamorphosis process is the caterpiller/pupa/butterfly imperfect or insufficient or “not enough“. It is exactly as it is supposed to be at that point in the process. At no point can anyone say, “Well, you‘re not a butterfly, so you‘re no good.” It is on the continuum to becoming a butterfly; it will reach its ultimate state. And in the meantime, the state that it’s in is exactly what it’s supposed to be.

I suppose you can also compare this to childhood development. You can’t expect a child to be as reasonable, coordinated, physically & intellectually developed as an adult. At certain point during the child’s growth, they reach certain milestones; sometimes early, sometimes late. But the milestones are reached; the child is developing. Eventually, the child becomes an adult.

But has the adult “arrived“? No, there are still many areas of growth. There are studies that show that the middle-aged brain goes through as much synaptic/learning growth as a teenage brain—kind of like a 2nd growth spurt mentally, if you will. That says something!

We are the caterpiller.  We are the pupa.  We are the butterfly.  We are what we should be and where we should be at this moment in time.  That is perfect.