Metamorphosis 101 ("Everything is okay.")

A couple weeks ago, I found out Fall Out Boy has a new single and their new album is coming out in May, and the giddy little fangirl inside me started freaking out. Immediately, I hopped over to YouTube to check out their new single, "My Songs Know What You Did in the Dark (Light Em Up)." Here's the video if you haven't seen it yet. (You don't have to watch it; I know it's Fall Out Boy.)

The video basically makes a big production of the whole process of lighting Fall Out Boy's old music on fire. The fire is obviously a symbol of purification and new life, sending the message that the band wants to reignite their career without being tied down to any of their past work. They want us to know they've changed.

Here's another band that used fire as a symbol of change, and you have to watch this video because it's my favorite band and because it's not just a music video.

This one is a little bit more intricate, even if it is a couple years older. Here we see others getting excited about the change, saying things like, "I can't wait to leave here," and, "It's going to be so much better there." They're excited about what's going to happen, but some of them are unsure of what to take with them and what to leave behind.

And then they face some obstacles on the way out of town, and one of those is a wall of fire. Brendon and Spencer quickly realize they can't continue with their baggage weighing them down, but the others can't find the strength to let go. Only Brendon and Spencer have the courage to leave it all behind and face the fires of change.

I think we can relate to the others in the video. Change sounds exciting at first, but you really want me to leave my whole life behind? "It's easy, just drop it," says Brendon. But it isn't easy.

There's a movie I recently fell in love with called Liberal Arts and it contains a scene that really sums up the experience of change. Zac Efron's character shows up and offers some philosophical insight in the form of a parable about caterpillars. To paraphrase, what happens is that suddenly these cells appear in the caterpillar, called imaginal cells, and they start to tell the caterpillar it's butterfly time. Because these cells are different, the caterpillar's immune system attacks. But they keep showing up, and the caterpillar's immune system can't fight them off. They take over, and the coolest thing happens: the caterpillar becomes a butterfly. And isn't that so much better than being a caterpillar forever? "Everything is okay," says Efron.

The story about the caterpillar has stuck with me for the last couple of weeks because I'm in a season of change. I'm a senior in college, and that means something big is coming, but I don't know what that is. I'll probably do what I can to fight this change, like the caterpillar fights the imaginal cells, like the characters in "The Overture" fight to keep their things. But the caterpillar has no way of knowing it's going to become something as amazing as a butterfly, and I don't know who or what I'm going to become.

All I know is, fire can be destructive, but it makes way for new life. All I know is, change is scary, but it works out for caterpillars. So for the next couple months, I have to keep telling myself, "Everything is okay." I can't see what's ahead, but that doesn't mean it isn't beautiful.