Liminal Space
I am a soup of grief, joy, excitement, pain, discovery, big love, and all of the other emotions required to jump off the cliff at the end of the old world to explore the Unknown.
Early one morning a couple of weeks ago, I discovered a massive golden moth on my friend’s second floor balcony. We deduced from the thin spikes on her antennae that she was a girl of the Polyphemus moth variety. One of the largest moths in the world, she was named after the Cyclops in the Odyssey, which makes no sense to me as the markings on her wings appear more like four eyes than one. She had a solid furry little body that looked nearly mammalian and I had the instinct to pet her. She gave no response when I prodded her gently with my finger. She had made her final flight to us.
I learned there are approximately 160,000 species of moth compared to 17,500 species of butterflies, one site referred to her as “the butterfly’s diverse and darker sister.”
“Her nocturnal nature suggests we embrace darkness to find light just as she does during her nighttime flights. Moths are attracted to light, and this is interpreted as a spiritual message to seek clarity, truth, and guidance during difficult periods,” read the spiritual interpretation.
I’ve heard the caterpillar turning into goo before becoming a butterfly metaphor approximately 1 million times in recent months, but this moth was special. It felt as if she had come in the night with a message just for me. The liminal space between homes, between marriage and separation, between dissolving my old business and forming a new one feels like my life has been thrown in the blender. I am a soup of grief, joy, excitement, pain, discovery, big love, and all of the other emotions required to jump off the cliff at the end of the old world to explore the Unknown.
After a team meeting this week, Lauren, one of my amazing new admins, gave me my marching orders for July. Here’s your homework, she said. Write it down. Number One: Find the eye in the storm. Number Two: Find the light of your potential in the darkness.
Liminal space requires night vision. Even as I dissolve into the goo in the cocoon, all of my eyes are open.
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Saturday July 19, 1-8 PM
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This is so beautiful. It is poetry. I love all of the gorgeous words and the picture they paint with emotion and hope. Much love.