Not to say that raising my kids isn't contributing. I think that season staying home was soooo important. But all of my creative energy is splattered over the inside of these house walls. Literally... , I cant seem to own a home without painting a mural somewhere. I have poured my energy into over the top birthday parties with homemade everything, and adventures and crafts and activities. And all of that was magical and good and life giving, but now I want to put myself out there and see what else I can do.
I had an image come to me, when I was in the shower. (perfect place for inspiration) It was of a Chrysalis, my home, All painted on the inside, and a butterfly coming out of it and stretching its wings, ready to fly out into the world to go bring color and vibrance to the marketplace! So I painted it, and I have been painting butterflies and researching them, and making chrysalis jewelry (for a special sneak peek click here!) I am exploring it with abandon to search it out.
Butterflies have often been symbols of transformation, as a Christian we were taught that when you become a believer you are transformed into a new creation. But it is not until now that I have discovered something, turning into a butterfly is not something weird for the caterpillar, he is just becoming more of who he was created to be. We are all created to search for God and find Him. To surrender to His transforming power, to follow His grand design into transformation. So as I follow God into this mystery and adventure ahead, I want to become more of who I was made to be. I want to blossom and fly, because I was made to fly.
I saw a video that showed the process of a caterpillar turning into a butterfly. It was amazing! A caterpillar spends most of his life eating and exploring, looking for food, avoiding being eaten! It has these hormones in its body that are like inhibitors, that keep it from changing. Then when it is time (like puberty) it attaches to a leaf and the old hormones decrease, and the new ones activate the change cells. They secrete these chemicals that turn into hard shells and form a chrysalis. Then their whole body turns to mush and the little cells start building all the parts that they were programmed to build a butterfly! They are totally vulnerable in the mush stage but their chrysalis camoflage them and as long as they hold tight and allow Gods miracle to happen, they come out totally awesome! So I thought about how I need to hold tight to God and be patient and trust Him while He prepares me for flight!
These last few years of stay at home parenting have been hard for me. I wanted so badly to get out and serve God is some amazing way, but I felt benched. I realized that I was too wounded to get into any new ministries, and I needed time to heal. I had quite a few battles to fight and conversations to have in these last few years. But now I finally feel like I am in a good place to jump in to something new.
Follow my journey here on this blog site, and we will see what God does with this!