Raise the Stakes
And see through the eyes of a butterfly
I’m going to be honest. Sometimes I feel constrained by Substack, like there’s a certain tone to write to and also a lack of intimacy because I don’t know who’s come through the front door and if we have a connection. I therefore haven’t allowed myself to be fully authentic with you as I would naturally write to my inner sanctum.
But today, as I’ve contemplated how to turn my writing inside out to be more palatable for Substack, my body simply won’t let me. I don’t want to ‘formalise’ or ‘intellectualise’ something that is very precious, and something that I really want to share with you, because you never know what this writing will catalyse.
And if this isn’t for you, and we don’t have a connection, may we part ways with respect.
Allow me to give you context.
At 4pm yesterday I learnt that a client who’d been diagnosed with Stage 4 breast cancer received her PET scan results revealing total resolution. When she was diagnosed three months ago her oncologist told her that ‘whilst there are treatments, this cancer is largely incurable’. She then asked her oncologist had they had any patients who experienced radical remission to which the oncologist said ‘I’ve had one lady’. My client responded with ‘I’ll be your next’.
And so she was. There are many reasons for that.
She believed in herself and in the power of her spiritual relationship with life, rather than blindly believing in what the doctor told her
She followed her intuition all the way leading her to the right and perfect support that included integrative oncology with Dr Carol Haddad, EFT tapping, hypnosis, neurophysics, acupuncture, meditation and coaching
She took responsibility to clean up her control, perfectionist, A-Type personality
She stepped away from her previous career (and identity) to allow this time of healing
And she followed her joy of writing poetry
Directly after I completed my call with her, I jumped in the car and went to a sound healing/meditation session. This had been in my diary for a month, and couldn't have been more perfectly timed because it allowed me to ‘be with’ the experience I just had hearing L’s news of radical remission.
Again I need to give you more context that will allow you to make sense of my writing below.
In my meditations in the last two weeks I’ve been hearing the words ‘Raise the stakes, raise the stakes’. I’ve written personal notes to self to this theme. I’ve brought the messaging into my coaching, and I’ve even changed the intro to my podcast The Intuitive Pull speaking this theme.
This morning I took myself to the beach, and whilst I sat in the car, I wrote this note to self below. These are personal musings of which I have about 62,000 words. They are real, raw, intimate and authentic and ones that I share with my inner sanctum. Sometimes I mould them into a tone here for Substack, but as I said, my body won’t allow me to do that today.
So here they are. I feel like saying God Speed to these words, as I let go and allow them to work their magic that is beyond my control.
“I wanted to dance around Michael’s room last night like Troy did around the fire on Saturday. I wanted to dance around exclaiming ‘raise the stakes, raise the stakes, we are here to create new realities, raise the stakes, raise the stakes!’.
This was just after I’d spoken with L who told me that her PET scan showed total resolution from cancer - in 3 months since her diagnosis of stage 4 breast cancer. Three months ago she asked her oncologist had any of his patients experienced radical remission to which he replied only one. And she then proceeded to tell him that she’d be his next.
I am overwhelmed with emotion as I write. Why is that?
I feel that our sense of innocence is being pointed to here; an innocence that does not believe in the assumptions of how life needs to be and is for many others who deem that ‘circumstances’ are more powerful than who they are.
Again I am overwhelmed with emotion as I write that. I need a tissue!
Innocence is not naïveté as some would believe.
Innocence is being free from the stickiness of assumptions based on fear, finality and absoluteness. When we locate ourselves in this sense of innocence we do not play in the stickiness of that web of fear.
Let us honour that innocence that sees and believes in the good nature of Life and each other.
Let us honour that innocence that sees through the eyes of the butterfly.
‘See through the eyes of the butterfly’ are the words that came to me in Michael’s session last night. What does that mean? It elicited a playful curiosity.
A butterfly does not know it will become a butterfly when it is in the chrysalis. In the chrysalis it is dark, seemingly absent of light. Yet, its absence of light is an illusion because growth and transformation is occurring. And there is a moment of contraction that is necessary for the butterfly to finally appear. Without the tension of that contraction the emerging butterfly would in fact die and not come to life.
In moments of darkness we cannot always see who we are becoming, but as I heard in breath-work on Sunday, ‘when we project our desires into the quantum field we will be shown dreams we never knew we had’. I can’t imagine that the butterfly knew of its impending colours and wings when it was the caterpillar, or when it was in the chrysalis.
So what does ‘see through the eyes of the butterfly’ then mean?
It means to have faith in the process of becoming.
To see through the eyes of the butterfly is to have faith in the process of becoming, even though who and what is emerging can’t be seen through the eyes of our former selves nor in the darkness.
I also asked ChatGPT what seeing through the eye of the butterfly means. In addition to what I intuitively sensed above I also learnt that butterflies have compound eyes which means they see the world as a mosaic of many small images, giving them a broad field of vision. Seeing through the eyes of a butterfly therefore implies a perspective that is perceptive and different from the usual human viewpoint. The butterfly can see the bigger picture.
Yes yes, exactly.
How beautiful is that?
Raise the stakes, raise the stakes and bend reality! I feel like dancing around and singing to this today! Honour this sense of innocence that does not get stuck in the sticky web of fear and its finite and absolute assumptions. See though the eyes of the butterfly, allow her wings to tickle you with faith of your becoming, and know in no uncertain terms and conviction that we are bending reality through our innocence, devoted to love rather than fear, and thus nothing but miracles, whatever they may be, is our only absolute reality.
And allow the quantum field to show us dreams we never knew we had.”
L also told me that their family business from which she walked away from in the last two months had an increase of revenue from $16M to $22M during this time. This in itself is another demonstration of the creative power of aligned decision making rather than a fear based belief system that would say that the business would be negatively impacted through her absence.
Cancer and money. Two very earthly subject matters to show in tangible form that we are more powerful than our circumstances when we believe in and locate ourselves in our innocence, when we diligently follow the intuitive pull and give ourselves the right support, when we are brave enough to let go of who we’ve known ourselves to be and when we allow ourselves to see through the eyes of the butterfly.
Thank you L for allowing me to share your story and for what you catalysed in me since we exited Zoom at 5pm yesterday afternoon. 🙏🏼