letting myself be seen

my process of metamorphosis

Metamorphosis Phase 2 by Marissa Strickland

I had a plan to write about something else today, but as I sit down to the keyboard and consider what feels genuinely alive in me, what wants to be expressed is this. The story of my personal metamorphosis: a slow, gradual process of becoming that has transpired over the last two years and seems to finally be culminating in its final phases. I seem to have recently transcended an inner block that was so deeply lodged in my psyche that I thought its presence there was normal. Now that it is gone though, I feel like I can see clearly. I feel lighter. Like I can move with ease. Like I can be at ease. I feel like I can… fly.

And perhaps most importantly, I feel like I can finally zoom out with true clarity and provide an honest a recap of my journey, going all the way from ‘I think I may want to explore this creative pull’ to where I am, in this moment, writing to you.

being the caterpillar

Ah, being the caterpillar. I look back on this phase and just wish I could give my past self a big hug and say: it’s all going to be okay. This was a phase of unease, confusion and inwards itchiness. It felt like I was growing, but I it wasn’t clear to me what I was growing towards. I no longer felt at home in the life I was building—one that seemed perfectly reasonable to the version of myself that had created it.

In hindsight, I was unconsciously rebelling against choices I had made that were not in alignment with who I wanted to become. Even though the aesthetics of my life ‘looked right’ (good job, solid path, healthy relationships and ‘balance’ overall), it didn’t feel right: I wasn’t excited about what I was doing, I didn’t feel driven, motivated or energized. I felt more sluggish and resentful, irritable and simply disengaged with where I was. I sensed that I had something new to uncover within myself but I didn’t know what that meant, where to look, or how to go about that process.

In this state of uncertainty and unease, instead of putting my energy into change, I initially chose avoidance. I would try to ignore these feelings or convince myself they would go away if I just distracted myself consistently enough with things like consumerism, always being busy, travelling, staying away from solitude and doing whatever I could to not fully feel these feelings that came up whenever I left just enough space in my life for myself to feel them.

In short: I spent a lot longer than I needed to caterpillar-ing around, because I was scared of the change I sensed was coming and didn’t know how to approach it. I had no idea the cocoon was waiting for me to crawl into it whenever I was ready!

being the cocoon

Eventually, I couldn’t take the itchiness anymore and did a somewhat radical move at the time: I quit my job without a real plan to focus on writing and going inwards. It was the only way I could fathom exploring this feeling fully and allowing my inner-unfolding to occur. In hindsight, I could have probably experimented with introducing a liiiitle more safety, stability and gentleness as I found my way to tbe next phase, but I didn’t have guidance, insight and perhaps most importantly: hindsight. My skin said shed, and I listened.

I decided to face myself, but avoided the world. I retreated. I didn’t know how to explain what I was doing (my choices felt illegible to even me), so I avoided having to explain them by staying away from interactions as much as I could. I remember this getting to such an extreme point that after a few months of focusing on ‘writing-question-mark’, I heard myself talking at a social function, and my entire way of speaking had changed. I had spent so much time alone that I had essentially updated the ‘software’ of my mind in my solitude—my speech patterns, word choices, thoughts, ideas had entirely reset. And because I was rarely hearing myself speak out loud, it happened without me knowing! As I said: I was avoiding the world. I wanted to stay away from people, questions, everything. I didn’t know what being in the cocoon meant (I’m not sure I even knew I was in one) and I didn’t know what was next. The only thing that felt clear was that I didn’t want to be perceived. So I hid.

Of course, I can understand why I did this now, but it didn’t need to be this way. I could have been more open with others about how much confusion I had, about how much of a mystery I still was to myself. I didn’t need to self-isolate and avoid the world to honour my process; I just needed someone (or several someones) to see what I was going through, validate it and acknowledge that it was okay that I didn’t have all of the answers. I just wanted to feel seen. But I didn’t even know how to see myself. You can see through my pieces growing pains, dissonance, on being selective, or becoming yourself is a process of reduction that I was just trying to figure out all of this live—trying to understand what I didn’t know how to explain yet. Writing helped a lot. But even then, I couldn’t quite put my finger on what I was experiencing. Probably because I was simply in the cocoon! I was transforming. I felt raw. Exposed. Vulnerable. Illegible. And above all: I felt unwilling to be seen.

being the butterfly

Fortunately, this phase slowly came to an end. I became more willing to poke out of my cocoon, to let the world see me, to reveal the changes I had made, the parts of myself that I had shed. I became more comfortable being seen, even if it meant I would be misunderstood. Because I saw myself, and I didn’t need others to see what I saw. I felt safe in my own skin, comfortable there. And perhaps most importantly: I felt beautiful again. I was proud of who I had become, of the self I had revealed. I had released the aesthetic signals that were there to serve others and didn’t serve me. I had found my stride; my way of being that felt natural and energizing. I felt like I finally knew who I was! A butterfly: a creature that was finally ready to stop hiding and be seen. 🦋

Of course, the process was not as well-punctuated and clean as I have described it here. It was messy, confusing and it felt like I was constantly stumbling around, doing it wrong, looking like I had no idea what I was doing (because I didn’t). But the more I surrendered to it and allowed the process to unfold, the better I felt. Somehow, embracing the confusion made everything feel… less confusing.

But metamorphosis is hard to do alone! You need to do the shedding, the becoming, the reflecting, the mirroring, the growing, the self-analyzing, the doing, the being, and then eventually: you need to make yourself legible enough to the world that you can re-enter it gracefully. Fortunately, I seem to have more or less figured at least some of it out, as you are reading this and I am doing what I love, and I feel extraordinarily blessed for both of those things. But part of my current mission is to make this whole process a little less convoluted and a little more seamless for the other itchy caterpillars out there that have the most beautiful wings underneath their skin, just waiting to break free.

I want to help people shed. To release what no longer feels right, explore what lies underneath and then emerge with their beauty and gifts on full display, for everyone (but mostly themselves!) to see.

pollinating the world

I always tell people that the most instructive force they can follow is what they think should exist in the world but doesn’t yet. People always come to me and say: this thing is clearly so important and valuable, why doesn’t everyone know about it? Why is no one teaching this, talking about it, making it, devoting their lives to it? And I would always say: I have no idea — but if you feel that way, maybe you should make the thing you think should exist in the world, because who else is going to do it? This is also the advice I had to finally swallow myself that lead to me creating what I think should exist in the world.

I needed to be clear with myself about what I felt was missing from the world that I could uniquely create. I ultimately arrived at the decision to create what I wish I had access to when I started my own journey of creative blossoming. What I wish I had as the caterpillar, when my skin was just starting to get itchy and I felt like I had ideas to nurture and changes to make, but I didn’t know how to approach them.

As I described to you already, I fumbled rather messily through the phases of metamorphosis, without any guidance or direction. Some phases dragged on longer than they needed to, and my avoidance monopolized my attention more often than I would have liked. I was always looking around to see if I was doing it right, to see if I was on track. I wish I had some structure to follow, some learnings to draw from. I wish I had a mirror—someone who could give me a thumbs up and say: hey, I can see where you’re headed and you’re doing great! I’m proud of you! Keep going! I wish I had community—people I knew that were thinking through similar questions. I wish I could have felt more seen close-up, even when I wasn’t ready to be seen by everyone.

These reflections are what produced Creative Liberation—a 6-week course designed to guide you from avoidance to expression. The course is designed to help you walk your own path of inner-metamorphosis—of self-transformation (if this resonates, you can sign up to learn more about the course here).

You will be surrounded by a juicy, potent, aligned community of individuals on their own versions of a similar path: a process of unblocking themselves, exploring their gifts and allowing themselves to be seen.

I am grateful to be on the other side (of this iteration at least) and to now feel comfortable being seen. But there’s lots I would do differently if I could do it over. I feel called to share what I’ve learned in more ways than just the writing, to help those who feel called to change do it wisely, thoughtfully, gently, consciously.

This is what I will be guiding the Creative Liberation group through over the next 6 weeks. I created this course because I wanted to offer others the the information, guidance, mirroring, community, reflection, affirmation, comfort and safety that I once craved when I was still in the cocoon. Most of all: I just want the people who resonate with these words right now to feel ready to liberate their gifts. To experiment, learn, try and do the things that scare them. To be seen! Because you deserve to be seen. Because being seen feels so, so, so good. But you just don’t know that when you’re crawling around in itchy caterpillar skin or melting into your cocoon, feeling like you have dissolved your entire persona into nothingness. But when you can see the light, and sink deeper into the process, guided by a butterfly reminding you where you are headed, well, maybe it doesn’t have to feel so lonely in there! Or confusing. Or hopeless. Maybe it can feel… kind of nice?

If this resonates and your skin is getting a little itchy, perhaps you want to join us in moving from caterpillar to butterfly, conquering your avoidance and liberating your creativity, together. Enrolment for this cohort is now closed, but you can sign up for future course updates here. Details are below:

course details

The course will guide you through three key stages of creative growth:

1. Unblocking yourself (week 1 & 2) — resistance. The focus is on identifying the nature of your resistance and resolving it through integration and action.

2. Creating for yourself (week 3 & 4) — creation. The focus is on making the space to create your ideas, executing on your inspiration and bringing your ideas to life.

3. Expressing publicly (week 5 & 6) — sharing. The focus is on letting your ideas be seen, putting what you have created into the world, and expressing yourself freely.

• The breakdown of the engagement:

  • Two weekly live sessions:

    • Teaching sessions Monday 7-8:30pm ET

    • Q&A sessions Friday 12-1pm ET

  • Weekly integration practices (implementing the ideas into your life practically)

  • Community: communication and accountability throughout — the course group will also act as a safe container to share ideas and get feedback

• All live sessions will be recorded and shared to accommodate all time zones

I am deeply looking forward to helping you see yourselves more clearly, unblock your natural gifts, act on your ideas and let yourselves be seen. You can also check out this Twitter thread about the course to learn more. And you can get updates about the next time I run this course by signing up here!

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PS - If you want to get a taste of what the course will be like, I’m running a free virtual workshop on unblocking yourself and getting in touch with your natural gifts tomorrow/today (Friday May 31st) at 12pm ET // 9am PT, where you will also get to ask any questions you have about the course. This workshop has now passed, but you can sign up for future workshop updates here.

If you have any questions or want to explore 1-1 inner clarity coaching with me, email me at isabel@mindmine.school.