Mush inside a cocoon
Imagine a caterpillar feeling the mysterious urge to make a cocoon and then turning almost completely into mush, having no idea what the fuck is going on, because it basically just turned into nutrient-rich soup. And then imagine some fellow caterpillar friends coming along and asking the cocooned mush “heyyyy what’s up, what’s new?”
How the fuck does the caterpillar answer that in a way that doesn’t sound insane?
That is what I’m going through. I feel like mush.
It feels selfish to basically turn all my energy inward to focus on this metamorphosis I feel happening, but it’s necessary for the process. A caterpillar can’t half-ass their transformation. Despite having “transformed” many times in varying degrees of intensity, this is the one that feels—though not as emotionally intense as the one I went through in 2020—like I cannot spare any energy for anything else during this time.
But it’s weird because I accidentally created a bit of a “life coach” dynamic with a lot of my friends last year, where I held a lot more space for them than I expected in return, out of fears of being rejected for being “too much” (a common occurrence among autistic females). I spent a lot of energy last year maintaining my long distance friendships, and basically collapsed from the imbalance of being leaned upon but barely being able to lean. So going from very involved supportive friend to basically ghosting everyone might have been a bit of a shock to them.
But still, they ask after me, because they’re not assholes and they care about me.
I told one friend “spiritual journey.” I told another “I can’t really explain what happening to me but I’m changing a lot.” Many of the conversations I’ve had are uncomfortable, because I’m no longer the “self” they’re used to, but I can’t articulate who I’m becoming or what’s even happening to me right now.
I was venting about this to my sister today, and she’s actually the one who brought up the cocoon metaphor. I’d had the metaphor in my head for a bit, but hadn’t verbalized it to anyone as a way to describe my current condition.
My sister said, “It makes me sad that your friends can’t understand that you’re in a cocoon right now, going through all these changes, becoming the person you’re supposed to be.”
I was momentarily shocked that she was able to so easily see and verbalize what I’ve been going through. I seriously underestimated her. It feels so good to be seen like that.
One of my hopes for this blog of mine is that it’ll help me better articulate the changes I’m going through, the evolution, the ascension, whatever the fuck it is. I have a vague inner knowing and I’ve seen a few random pieces of writing on the internet from “spiritual” people or whatever they are, who talk about this kind of thing—but I think I’m not going to understand this until I reach the other side, however long that’s going to take.
The friend who I told “I can’t really explain what happening to me but I’m changing a lot” asked me if they were good changes, if I was happy.
Yes, they’re very good changes. Yes, I’m very happy.
Confused and mushy, but happy and good.