The story of the butterfly

A man found a cocoon of a butterfly.
        One day a small opening appeared.
        He sat and watched the butterfly for several hours
        as it struggled to squeeze its body through the tiny hole.
        Then it stopped, as if it couldn't go further.
        So the man decided to help the butterfly.
        He took a pair of scissors and
        snipped off the remaining bits of cocoon.
        The butterfly emerged easily, but
        it had a swollen body and shriveled wings.
        The man continued to watch it,
        expecting that any minute the wings would enlarge
        and expand enough to support the body,
        Neither happened!
        In fact the butterfly spent the rest of its life
        crawling around.
        It was never able to fly.
        What the man in his kindness
        and haste did not understand:
        The restricting cocoon and the struggle
        required by the butterfly to get through the opening
        was a way of forcing the fluid from the body
        into the wings so that it would be ready
        for flight once that was achieved.
        Sometimes struggles are exactly
        what we need in our lives.
        Going through life with no obstacles would cripple us.
        We will not be as strong as we could have been
        and we would never fly.

Listening - at Christmas and always

A few years after I left my secondary school in Manchester, I was invited to help out with the school's Christmas Fair and I decided to have a go at being Father Christmas. I had recently grown my first full beard and thought that I would enter into the role by rubbing flour into my growth. Though I say it myself, I looked rather splendid and certainly I attracted lots of custom.

I was enjoying myself enormously, bringing a sense of magic to so many young children, but I was mystified by one young boy who paid for a second visit and then astonishingly for a third. The presents on offer were really pretty pitiful, so I asked him why he was coming to see me so often. He answered simply: "I just love talking to you".

It was then that I realised that, in many households, parents do not encourage their children to talk and really listen to them. This was a lesson that I have taken with me throughout my life. So, at home, at work, socially, always encourage family, friends, colleagues to talk about themselves and their feelings - and really listen.

Author: Roger Darlington

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