The Butterfly Effect
A new theory
A few weeks ago, I was wandering the South Bank trying to fill the hours in my day, a relatively new concept after years of my pre-ordained nine to five structure.
After sitting at the café at The National and bashing out some words on sandcastles and capitalism (yes, that well-known pairing), I went to a gym class and wandered back along the river front where I was stopped and offered free pasta from a food truck. The freebie was in exchange for a short video recording of me eating the dish and commenting on the flavour. Floating around the internet somewhere, there’s an incriminating reel of content which features me, basil wedged between my two front teeth and face colour akin to the tomatoes in the dish, offering up some basic commentary along the line of: ‘fresh, light, but without compromising on flavour’ while forcing a smile through twitching insecurity. Go for your life and search for it but if you find it, I beg you to reserve judgement and remind yourself what you would be willing to do for a free lunch after a 1Rebel class which was eighty-six percent shoulder presses.
This is not the important part of this story. The part of note is this: while waiting in the queue for my free zucchini tortellini, one week ahead of embarking on an Italian adventure of my own, an enormous orange butterfly landed on me. It settled on my arm for a few seconds, bounced around my head, intertwined itself into my (still wet) hair, landing on my chest, before brushing past my cheek on exit to such a degree of proximity that I felt the full texture of its wings on my skin. Strange. Beautiful. Surreal. Delicate. The man with the microphone, waiting to record my five minutes of food fame was an onlooker to this interaction:
“Woah, I’ve never seen a butterfly land on anyone like that before.”
“It’s what they call The Butterfly Effect” I quipped back.
Strictly speaking, it’s nothing like what they call The Butterfly Effect. It sounded good in the moment but made next to no sense. Until now.
The Butterfly Effect, coined by Edward Norton Lorenz, a mathematician and meteorologist, is a chaos theory which states that random or unpredictable behaviour in systems is governed by deterministic laws. With this in mind, The Butterfly Theory suggests that a tornado in the United Kingdom could easily be caused by one flap of a creature’s wings in Brazil. Did you know, the butterfly element of this theory was added later? Initially the research quoted a seagull wing. Much less romantic; more befitting with any theory of chaos in my opinion. I might start a petition to bring this one back to its ornithological roots and leave the innocent insects alone. I’d happily accept that something unexpectedly negative is about to happen with The Seagull Effect. Tornado or otherwise, my suggestion would be to hold on tightly to your sandwich.
Modern day spiritual readings of The Butterfly Effect focus less on the notion of mathematical ‘chaos’ and more on the notion of interconnectivity. This, I am on board with.
I have seen butterflies everywhere since that fluttery terracotta friend visited me on the Southbank. Currently living in the mountains in Italy, I encounter up to twenty butterflies a day. Here, small in wingspan and extremely pale yellow in colour, they grace the rivers and the hillsides with their presence, bringing you a fleeting moment of joyous distraction. In any other creature, this colouring would look insipid, but here against the deep green of the mountain trees and with their dainty, dancing, elegant movements they float across your path as you drive down the single-track road, flashing their off-white smiles in front of the bonnet before fleeting their way to safety. On the banks of the river, they settle by the rocks where you sunbathe, rest for a while, then prance close to the surface, urging you with optimism to pluck up the courage to plunge into the clear, cold, flowing water. At dusk, as you sit staring out at the view, they will bathe with you in the gloam, settling briefly next to you to remind you that you are on the right path. And yet, when we look for them, they are nowhere to be seen. Just as I sat down to write this, I imagined a poetic landing of one next to me; a picture perfect capture for this moment but, no. Nature tries to tell us things regularly, it’s up to us if we listen or not.
The spiritual meaning and symbolisation of a butterfly visit is one of change, hope and transformation. On the day I first sat down to do my morning pages (the daily practice by which I hope to incept new creative habits) a tiny little green caterpillar was resting on the outdoor sofa cushion next to me. It doesn’t feel like a coincidence that since quitting my job to live in the mountains and focus on creative ventures, butterflies have quite literally followed me and now surround me.
Change does come with the flutters, indeed. I have felt moments of lightness and joy; I’ve been moved to tears by views of mountains that make you feel so insignificant you’re grateful you’re even alive to see such a thing. I’ve woken up late, wondered what I’m doing with my day, achieved little to no word count outside of this post and sent myself into a shame spiral before emerging again. It’s all part of the cocoon we build for ourselves.
Butterflies have a calming presence. How is it possible for an insect which moves so much to bring a level of stillness? A butterfly can guide you to notice flowers, rocks, paths you might not have seen before. It can bring lightness and life to an unsuspecting dull moment. A butterfly is a fleeting moment but it will mesmerise you for the duration it remains in your view.
The original Butterfly Effect theory assumes we are not in control of any outcome. Perhaps we are; perhaps we are not. There’s many different ways of seeing things depending on your philosophical or spiritual outlook. One thing is for certain: after seeing a butterfly, everything feels more positive; you become aware of the minutiae. When it comes to sensitive dependencies, I think we should be more sensitive to our own butterfly-like moments.
After a butterfly visit, you’ll relish in the ever-changing dappling of light as it refracts across the surface of the water. You’ll luxuriate in the slow glow of gold which hits roof tiles as the sun sets. You’ll take a sip of something cold and sweet on a hot day and feel the replenishing nectar drip down your throat. Watering the plants, you’ll see the full spectrum of colour of the thirsty petals; you’ll realise you have never absorbed their true beauty before now. Waiting for the kettle to boil, you’ll clock how the frequencies shift; the sound of the steam like race cars zooming round a track; how the final whistle through the metal body is an invitation to enjoy your morning ritual. You’ll start to see the birds and the bees in all their glory. You’ll notice the world around you in a new, hopeful, transformative way. The brief positive hyper-focus of a butterfly is infectious. That, is the true Butterfly Effect.
So I urge you, find at least one butterfly moment for yourself this weekend. No second is too small. No minute is too short. Stop zooming out; start zooming in. Get present. Hyper-focus on the positive minutiae. That way, nothing can feel too random or unpredictable. Perhaps, if we can all do that regularly, then, and only then, might we be free from chaos entirely.