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The Struggle

A man found a cocoon of a butterfly. One day a small opening appeared, he
sat and watched the butterfly for several hours as it struggled to force
its body through that little hole. Then it seemed to stop making any
progress.

It appeared as if it had gotten as far as it could and it could go no
farther. Then the man decided to help the butterfly, so he took a pair of
scissors and snipped off the remaining bit of the cocoon.

The butterfly then emerged easily. But it had a swollen body and small,
shriveled wings. The man continued to watch the butterfly because he
expected that, at any moment, the wings would enlarge and expand to be able
to support the body, which would contract in time. Neither happened! In
fact, the butterfly spent the rest of its life crawling around with a
swollen body and shriveled wings. It never was able to fly.

What the man in his kindness and haste did not understand was that the
restricting cocoon and the struggle required for the butterfly to get
through the tiny opening were God's way of forcing fluid from the body of
the butterfly into its wings so that it would be ready for flight once it
achieved its freedom from the cocoon. Sometimes struggles are exactly what
we need in our life.

If we went through our lives without any obstacles, it would cripple us.
We would not be as strong as what we could have been. And we could never fly.

(author unknown)