Persistence and the butterfly cocoon

A conspicuous mail was recently sent to me over the Internet stressing the importance of perseverance. While emphasising on the need to keep on fighting to achieve one's objectives, it referred to a parable of a man who found a cocoon of a butterfly.

One day this man noted a small opening appeared on the cocoon and he sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to force its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any progress. It appeared as if it had got as far as it could and it could go no further. Then the man decided to help the butterfly, so he took a pair of scissors and snipped  off the remaining bit of the cocoon.

The butterfly then emerged easily. But it had a swollen body and small, shrunk wings. The man continued to watch the butterfly because he expected that, at any moment, the wings would enlarge and expand to be able to support the body, which would  contract in time. Neither happened! In fact, the butterfly spent the rest  of its life crawling around with a swollen body and shrunk wings. It never was able to fly.

What the man in his kindness and haste did not understand was that the restricting cocoon and the struggle required for the butterfly to get through the tiny opening were God's way of forcing fluid from the body of the butterfly into its wings so that it would be ready for flight once it achieved its freedom from the cocoon.

Sometimes struggles are exactly what we need in our life. If God allowed us to go through our life without any obstacles, it would cripple us. We would not be as strong as what we could have been. And we could never fly. In our struggles we need to keep on fighting like the butterfly.

Nothing in this world can take the place of persistence. Talent will not-nothing is more common than unsuccessful people with a lot of talent. Genius will not ---unrewarded genius is almost a proverb. Education will not---the world is full of educated derelicts. Persistence and determination alone are omnipotent. The slogan "press on" has solved and always will solve one's problems as it always does for the newly born butterfly.