Metamorphosis - I am the Pupa, "goo goo g'joob."
"Life is either a daring adventure or nothing.
Security does not exist in nature, nor do the children of men as a whole
experience it. Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than exposure." Helen
Keller
There are stages in the development
of every living being, however, at the moment I tend to identify with that of
an insect, in particular the butterfly: egg, larva, pupa, adult. In
order to explain why, I must go back to the beginning of my pupa stage... the
stage I’m still in.
I awoke abruptly in the middle of
night, on a hard wooden platform surrounded by over twenty twelve-year-old
girls and lying close to my best friend Stephanie Matthews. I knew.
He was dead. My father was gone and here I was lying in the middle of the
forest in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. I got up and
called my mother to confirm what my soul had already known and then I walked
ever so slowly back to my cabin, numb and completely aware of the reality of
what had happened, and then I lay back down on the bed in my cabin and slept
until I was ready to face the world again. I was not a larva any
more…I couldn’t be.
This is what I do, I love the
chrysalis that surrounds me – I love the pupa stage – it creates walls and the
boundaries that protect me. The rules and guidelines I have set for myself since the day my father died have allowed me to remain focused and
successful as an Architect, as a designer. Career-wise I am exactly where I want to be if I'm only assessing against the confines of my own construct.
“The pupa stage is
one of the coolest stages of a butterfly’s life. As soon as a caterpillar
is done growing and they have reached their full length/weight, they form
themselves into a pupa, also known as a chrysalis. From the outside of
the pupa, it looks as if the caterpillar may just be resting, but the inside is
where all of the action is. Inside of the pupa, the caterpillar is
rapidly changing” (https://www.thebutterflysite.com/life-cycle.shtml Copyright
Learn About Nature. All Rights Reserved).
If I assess with my heart and my soul, and the things that I am impassioned by, I am falling short. I have been changing rapidly for
years, preparing, getting ready for the Adult stage of my career, but always
hesitating to break out.
Two years ago, I had the opportunity
to move into the adult stage of my career and I didn’t take it. I
wasn’t ready, I told myself. But I’m pretty sure as the chrysalis breaks
down at the end of the pupa stage the butterfly isn’t ready to fly either. Once
I had decided I wasn’t going to take on the co-management position in Broome, I
looked laterally and applied to a position in Darwin and also an 18 month
position in Burma with AUSAID. I was successful in both applications
and in consideration for people in my life at the time alongside the burden of
student loan debt, I decided on Darwin. Again, choosing to stay
safe within the confines of the chrysalis.
And now, while I still sit in the
pupa stage some 17 years later, I have decided to make a tear in my encasement. I am going to India for
4-6 months with The Anganwadi Project (https://anganwadiproject.com/). This will be the longest I’ve worked in a developing
country as an Architect.
I’m ready to start coming into a new
stage of my career however challenging and isolating it will be!
Bring
on December 2018.
Bring on adversity and feeling completely out of my depth.
Bring on life and living it without a chrysalis jacket on!
Bring on the AWOL Architect!
Bring on life and living it without a chrysalis jacket on!
Bring on the AWOL Architect!
If you'd like to donate to The Anganwadi Project please do so here:
METAMORPHOSIS
"Life
is either a daring adventure or nothing. Security does not exist in nature, nor
do the children of men as a whole e
Looking forward to following you on your journey lovely. I'm excited for the challenges you'll face and for the personal growth you'll experience. Life can be short...live it.
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