I recently got a haircut. I am of a "certain age" and these days, haircuts are just a pain. I don't have anywhere I need to be most days and thus, I don't dress up much anymore. Honestly, most days, my hair is in a ponytail.
So, when I went in for the haircut I had a frank conversation with my hairdresser.
"I hate fighting it," I said. "And, we are coming up on the hot and humid season, so, I am thinking I will just start riding this horse in the direction it's already going."
She laughed and responded by grabbing her scissors and a large hank of my hair.
You see, I have naturally wavy hair but I really like it to be straight. Every time I go to do anything with it, I pull out my hair dryer and straightener and do battle with those waves. And after forty-something years of fighting it, I know all the tricks. I can make it do exactly what I want. When I turn off the straightener, it's shiny and smooth, curls in all the right places, and in that moment, I love my hair. But then, I go outside-- and mother nature puts those waves right back into my hair.
I have been thinking about this today after an email I received discussed a parable about a butterfly fighting the wind. Here's a summary.
Magnus the butterfly had a goal. It was time to find a mate. He had heard there were pretty female butterflies to the northeast. So he decided to fly that way. Goals are important, he nodded to himself. So, he flew and flew, but he didn’t seem to be going anywhere.
Unfortunately, Magnus faced a fierce headwind blowing from the northeast, and the harder he worked, the faster he exhausted himself. Finally, unable to continue, he decided to rest. He tried for days to achieve his goal but was getting nowhere. He had to fly to the northeast to meet a girl butterfly. Goals!
The next morning, he diligently checked his to-do list. It read, “Fly northeast. Meet girl butterfly.” He sighed, and took flight. Sure enough, he immediately started struggling against the punishing headwind. Huffing and puffing and flapping, he suddenly noticed something up ahead.
What was that? It was another butterfly! He watched as it soared high, hardly flapping its wings at all, calmly gliding to the southwest. And what was that beautiful sound? He heard a beautiful female butterfly voice floating to him on the wind.
What was wrong with her? She was going the wrong way!
“Ma’am! He yelled as loud as she could. Turn around, you're going the wrong way!”
“What’s that you say?” She responded, “You say you're going the wrong way?”
“No Ma'am, I said you're going the wrong way!”
“Me?” she chuckled. “How can I be going the wrong way? I’m always right where I’m supposed to be.”
“But, how do you know you're going the right way? We have to go northeast.” Magnus yelled back, puzzled.
“I must be flying the right way, because I’m going with the flow! Life knows where it wants me to go!” She giggled.
“Well, I’m flying northeast, that’s my goal.” Magnus said determinedly.
“How's that workin’ out for you, hon?” The girl butterfly responded coyly.
“Why don’t you try going my way for a while?” She called out and winked at him.
“I would love to, but I have to go to the northeast and meet a girl butterfly, that’s my goal,” Magnus responded.
“Meet a girl butterfly you say? You seem to have already met one, haven’t you?”
Magnus’ eyes widened and right there and then he abandoned his to-do list, and stopped thinking about it. His worries melted away, he turned and stopped flapping his wings.
And as the calm breeze carried him, next to his new friend, the girl butterfly, they sailed together toward the southwest.
So, I am thinking today about fighting the wind and the waves in my hair. Goals are important, aren't they? I just wonder how often I have flown right past the other butterfly in my hard-headed quest to reach my goal. All these years of fighting the waves in my hair, to just have them return the moment I walk outside.
I noticed this same issue in my studio. I really need to get another three paintings finished before a show next month and one of these paintings has been a challenge to get moving. I realized this particular painting felt off, it was not going in a direction I liked, at all. I had put hours of work into it and I did like, well, parts of it. However, the painting as a whole was annoying. I decided to re-paint the entire face. I took a deep breath and covered all that work with white paint, let it dry, then started over.
And, guess what? Now, that painting has me obsessed. I can't stop working on it. It's finally moving in the right direction. Seems to me I can learn a lot about stepping out of the fight and looking at which way the wind is actually blowing.
It's definitely something to think about.