I’ve been alive quite some time now. I’ve seen fire and I’ve seen rain, I’ve looked at life from both sides now—are you youngsters getting these song references? The point is, I’ve been an avid observer of humanity for several decades. But I’ve never felt the sense of portent, of things-about-to-happen, I’m feeling now.

You may feel that way too. Maybe you find yourself getting tired in a way rest doesn’t fix. Confused about whether it’s wise, or even possible, to plan for the future. Braced for the collapse of a thousand familiar things, things we thought would hold forever.

Under these circumstances, I’m not going to waste your time with jaunty self-help jargon. I have nothing against it, but I think this moment calls for something deeper. So here’s what I think, straight up, no editing to sound “normal,” no catchy slogans.

Something beautiful is waking up. And you are part of it.

What you see around you may be terrifying, but it isn’t mindless chaos. In Wayfinder coaching and in my books, I compare transformational periods to the time when a caterpillar melts in its chrysalis, breaking down, breaking down, breaking down, until it’s nothing but goo.

And then, from that goo, nature makes something the caterpillar could never have imagined. 

Right now, what’s breaking down is the architecture of a human society based on domination, shame, greed, and separation. Not because nature or some higher power is angry at us. Just because the way we’ve been living was always deeply flawed, and it’s no longer functional.

Those structures of our society can’t continue. I said can’t. Not “won’t.” They can’t go on because they’re based on lies. Like the one that says every one of us is meant to go it alone. Or the ones that tell us power means control, love is a transaction, and pain is weakness.

These ideas are built into our economies, laws, religions, family systems, personal identities. They have caused unimaginable suffering. They’ll cause more as they collapse. 

What we can’t see yet is the creation of different forms from the same materials. 

We’re in the chrysalis, closed in, falling apart. A butterfly? That’s the opposite of everything we’re experiencing. Nice metaphor. But what’s the reality we’re actually facing right now?

What is it that’s waking up? 

Well, you are. But not your small self. Not the you that hurts and worries and cringes and feels inadequate. Not the part that suffers. Oh, no; that part has been up and active your whole life.

What’s waking up is something you may only have seen in glimpses. Find the moments in your life, any that you can remember, when you forgot to be afraid. When you were so startled by beauty, or laughter, or delight, that your whole body felt lighter and freer, if only for one breath.

Assemble those moments. Align them. Combine them. Imagine a life made of them. Start with five minutes of material if it’s all you’ve got. Or one minute. The duration doesn’t matter. Focus on the quality of the joy. That’s what will tell you what you are becoming.

I’ve talked many people through versions of the little thought exercise above, and noticed some interesting themes that may help you understand where I think we’re all going. For example:

• The truly joyful experiences people remember almost always cost nothing. They have to do with beauty, fun, laughter, movement, creativity, and simple loving connection between us and others (human or animal). 
• When I ask for descriptions of the emotions related to these moments, everyone is looking for a remarkably short list of sensation. These include an inner sense of security, love, joy, peace. That’s about it.
• All these sensations—the things we ultimately want most—occur inside us. We may believe they come from external situations. But If we are inwardly aligned with what we feel at the deepest level, we can access them even in very difficult circumstances.

What’s waking up in you is a direct line to this feeling, this inner fulfillment. A part of you that has continuous connection to the feeling states that make life delicious and meaningful. Call this part your higher self, the universe, the divine, or any other word that pings for you.

Whatever you call it, it’s stirring now. 

New patterns and experiences, perhaps locked in ancient genetic code, are reassembling you. These patterns predate the few thousand years of history we know. They’ve been latent, but they’re still here. They may have been in hiding, so you could obey the forces of domination and fear that have ruled most of us all our lives. So as this latent self awakens, you may feel that you’re burning out or breaking down—but at the same time, falling strangely in love with things you haven’t been focused on before. 

For some of us, the new passion is growing their own food. For others, it’s motorcycle maintenance. For many (I’m in this group), listening to certain music has suddenly become as necessary as breathing.

This is the process by which nature is turning you into an unprecedented thing, the “butterfly” coded into your cells. And even when it feels bewildering, I believe it’s taking us into a wholeness we’ve never known. So let yourself be steered into whatever fascinates you, whatever you love. Let it change the pattern of your days, your brain, your schedule, your body.

The alternative to this metamorphosis is to pretend nothing is happening, or to start tiny inner wars against changes within ourselves that have already happened. To let fear make us rigid, to run back to what’s familiar rather than let ourselves be drawn by love or curiosity, is like shoving a chrysalis into a freezer. It locks us into the point of maximum suffering, where we can’t continue being what we once were, but won’t allow ourselves to become what we’re meant to be.

So, as things continue to get even weirder and scarier—because they will, for quite a while—remember that we can’t access genuine hope by pretending everything’s fine. Hope, real hope, is allowing ourselves to sense that a deep wisdom is moving within all this chaos, building something beautiful from what looks like nothing but rubble.

We don’t make it through this portentous, frightening time by being stoical, or waiting until we know what to do, or by struggling against what appalls us until we’re so burnt out we can’t function.

We make it through by connecting with one another. By talking about what’s happening, sharing our thoughts and feelings. By letting ourselves rest in every experience of joy we’ve ever had. By trusting what we feel to guide us—especially when we feel that some ancient but unprecedented way of being and doing is carrying us forward. That this power, whatever it is, has our backs.

Yes, the sense of something-about-to-happen is stronger than it’s ever been. Yes, some of these are horrifying. There are dark stormclouds gathering. I see them too.

But below our feet, in the web of life that holds ecosystems together, and above the clouds, where the light is always shining, are things-about-to-happen that will take everything broken by the storm and turn it—turn us—into entirely new creatures. What the mind calls the end of the world, the soul calls a butterfly.

I see you, out there in the gathering dark.

And I’ll see you in the light.