“I’m mushroom foraging in the Amazon rainforest right now and have been thinking about the paradox of the law of impermanence. I’ve seen it everywhere out here, good and bad, and it’s weighing on my heart. How do you practice accepting change without minimizing real loss or telling yourself a story that makes suffering feel morally necessary?”

—Reader submission

Long before I had language for it, change came like a calling. There’s a common narrative that all trans people feel as if we were born in the “wrong body.” Elements of this resonate with me; I always felt uncomfortable with masculinity, always drawn to femininity. Without words for why, I grew detached and depressed in the confines of society’s rigid gender expectations. But an insistent itch remained under my skin, one that only intensified no matter how I tried to numb it—until I accepted that I couldn’t go on living this way. 

So I dared to change. I metamorphosed in order to express myself fully, and found kinship with creatures that do the same. I wrestled and roiled, and eventually settled into my chrysalis, finding comfort in the hope that one day my wings would unfurl. It happened slowly, imperfectly: tears in the membrane, splashes of color and light and air. On most days, I feel like I have emerged. Life is richer, more vivid than I can ever remember. On other days, I still feel unfinished.

The truth is, a butterfly’s story neither begins nor ends with its emergence from the chrysalis. Most species spend the majority of their lives in those earlier forms, only to live for a few fleeting weeks as the dazzling adults we know and love. Some even seem to retain traces of memory from their caterpillar days. And their transformations will continue after death as their bodies break down and their matter is rearranged. In a wider view, metamorphosis never ends.

Are butterflies born in the wrong bodies then, or are caterpillars just a stage in their becoming? I used to shy away from any remnants of my life before. All I could see was lost time. Now, I can regard my younger self with gratitude for getting me here. Transitioning is, at its essence, an act of love. It’s also my greatest teacher. It has taught me that change is possible, and that everything really does pass. It doesn’t erase the grief, but it has helped me navigate life’s many other metamorphoses: healing from heartache, becoming partnered, growing older.

I don’t know whether butterflies grieve, or if caterpillars suffer in the chrysalis. All I know is that they change. Buddhism teaches that all things arise and pass away, that suffering deepens when we cling to them. I don’t think that’s a directive to allow needless pain to persist or to minimize loss. Buddhism also emphasizes compassion and reducing harm. Our world is in transition. It is itching for us to change. Denial is taking us down a perilous path, but as humans, we have the gift of being able to choose another one.

It is both heartening and harrowing to understand that nothing lasts forever. Empires rise and fall, trees tower and topple. Hope soars and plummets, pain comes and goes. The cells in your body are constantly dying and being born, people the same. Not so long ago, the water flowing within you was a wave lapping on a distant shore. Traces of stardust, elements once fired in supernovas, still coat your soul. To deny impermanence is to deny the very magic that makes us.

What if impermanence is a love story? What if that’s the story you tell yourself, rather than a moral imperative? What if transition and all its soupiness are the verses of an epic without end? You are here, in this fluttering form, for only a moment—a fraction of a second in the memory of the universe. Rather than let that anesthetize you to the fleeting phenomena around you, let it enliven you. Let the ephemeral nature of existence break your heart. And then love it deeper.