From The Twelve Steps of Adult Children

The caterpillar is not sure it is going to be a butterfly. Each part of its death and rebirth in the cocoon must be experienced.

The story is told of a man who noticed a cocoon on a bush in his yard. As he started to remove it from the bush and throw it away, he noticed the end was opening and a butterfly was struggling to escape. In an effort to help the emerging butterfly, he took it inside and carefully cut the cocoon away with a razor blade. The butterfly feebly crawled away from the open cocoon and within a few hours, died. It needed the strength it would have gained from the struggle to free itself in order to survive in the outside world.

Nobody can do the recovery work for us, its up to us to live through pain and discovery to become stronger in the end. By working the steps, having patience and doing the work we need to do in recovery, no matter how long it takes and with understanding and realization there are set backs, we will create better lives for ourselves and we will fly. Our wings will be strong and will take us to heights we only dreamed of reaching before.We just have to trust the process.