I Can Fly, BUT That Cocoon Has To Go – Don Hanley’s blog #20

I love the saying: “You can fly, but that cocoon has to go.” If you’re a reader of my blog, you know I’m 90 years old, and I’ve been working on getting rid of my cocoon all these years. Yet, I’m not rid of the damn thing, and it is still protecting me from being hurt. Too often, I feel like I felt when I was a kid. It has been very helpful in keeping me alive and even thriving in some ways, but now I’m ready to let it go. I built my cocoon to be strong and tough so I would keep myself from being hurt.

I’m sure you have heard of, or maybe observed, the butterfly coming out of its cocoon and flying away. The butterfly comes into being, grows, and exits its cocoon as a beautiful bird-like being and flies away – all this in only a few weeks. We humans usually spend nine months in our cocoon, which we call our mother’s womb. While we are in the womb, we develop arms, legs, and everything else we need to survive as a human baby. Researchers state that while we are in the cocoon, we go through three states – zygote, fetus, and embryo – and then we begin to be able to grow as just a lovable baby. As I was number nine, the doctor said to Mom, “Here’s another mouth to feed.”

In our womb cocoon, we develop an invisible psychic cocoon that will help and protect us as we go through the birth canal. Of course, I don’t remember it, but my oldest sister Marie told me my birth was a tough slog for Mom and probably for me, too. My mom needed a tough cocoon to survive the process, and it helped her survive eight previous little brats slogging their way through her birth canal. No wonder she was worn out when I came along. And poor Mom had to endure one more, two and a half years after me. Wow, and I’m sure Mom is one very strong and loving miracle woman who managed to survive for seventy-three years. If you don’t believe in miracles, then you are a dunce.

Back to me and my cocoon and letting it go. It's a blessing and a curse. It is a blessing because my memory is working very well. I often recall moments when someone important, like Mom or my wife, said or did something many years ago (even 85 years ago) that made me feel bad, and then my cocoon drags me back inside and soothes my poor little psyche. I needed my cocoon to get through what is called Infancy, to survive, and even into my second stage of growth, called Childhood. I continued to need my cocoon to slog through the lengthy third stage and process called Adolescence. If I survive adolescence, I may enter my fourth stage of growth – Adulthood. If my invisible cocoon is too rigid and tough, I may remain in this stage for the remainder of my life. I will continue to define myself as a functionary who is a mother or father, farmer or teacher or manager or whatever I do for a living, rather than a person who is still growing and entering and/or living in the fifth stage of human development called Maturity, i.e., discovering new insights and meanings and wonders and enchantment.

To be a full “Thou,” as described in an earlier blog, I must be in or moving into the mature stage. My source for this stage theory was Professor Bernard Boelen at Loyola University. He declared that only a minority of humans reach or choose to live in this stage. Oh, and for maturity and its enchantment, we must find it within ourselves, not at Disneyland. So, I guess I will continue to need a ‘soft’ cocoon around me as I deal with my narcissistic “artificial intelligence” that prevents me from loving more fully.

So, when you see or hear me being a jerk, say to yourself, “Oh, that Don (or Dad) is just struggling with his cocoon again. He uses that as an excuse rather than owning his shit and changing.” And still, I will try to . . . 

Nurture my heart and not eat the menu. (Even if I created the menu.)