My Butterfly Creative Cycle

I’ve noticed that my creativity doesn’t work in straight lines.
It moves in cycles… and I’m happiest when I let myself flit between them.

I have a lot of interests, and I rarely stay engaged in one mode for very long. For years I called the first phase Sponge Mode.

I always have questions. I’m forever following breadcrumbs… which inevitably land me in all sorts of places, both in my thoughts and on the internet… lol.

This Sponge Mode is my Caterpillar phase.
The Larval stage.
The eat-everything buffet.
Pure intake. Curiosity without restraint.

These phases can last a few days, or sometimes months.

Then comes Cocoon phase.

I go quiet. Nothing much seems to be happening. From the outside it can look like stagnation, but internally things are dissolving, restructuring, reassembling… sometimes all at once. I don’t do this consciously. It just happens. I’ve learned to let it be.

This is where the magic actually happens.

Eventually, I pop out into Butterfly phase.

That’s when I create up a storm. An article. A single image. A whole Oracle Card Deck. Sometimes one thing… sometimes a hundred… lol. This phase can last a week or two, or stretch into months until whatever emerged feels complete.

Then the cycle begins again.

This is the framework where most of my best ideas have come from. It’s rarely confined to one thing. Ideas often appear in clusters and get filed away for later. I genuinely don’t have enough years to work through everything I’ve made notes about lol… so hopefully I’ll never run out of ideas.

I’ve also realised that what people often call writer’s block isn’t always a lack of ideas. Sometimes it’s Cocoon phase, where things need time to simmer. If you force yourself to create while you’re still transforming, you can damage the structure of the emerging Butterfly.

And sometimes the problem is simpler… the Larvae was never fed.

Artist dates, like Julia Cameron writes about in The Artist’s Way, are vital. Skip that phase and you starve your Creative Self… literally.

So...follow the breadcrumbs...
Dive into whatever fascinates you in the moment.
Keep notes...
Take screenshots...
Save images that spark something.

Just remember to file them somewhere you can find them again… lol.

Pinterest is a haven for visual collecting for me, and I’ve finally streamlined my note-keeping into two apps… one for daily journaling and one for research and writing. I used to save things everywhere and all over, but I’ve learned the value of having things organised & simpler. Getting organised is definitely one of my recurring breadcrumb rabbit holes… haha.

So…this is how I flow:

Caterpillar phase… consuming everything.
Cocoon phase… dissolving, assembling, recomposing.
Butterfly phase… reappearing, creating, cross-pollinating.

With rest and recharge phases woven in as needed.

None of these phases are mistakes.
They’re all part of the same flow.

I’d love to hear if you’ve noticed anything similar in your own creative cycles… or if this has helped you make a little more peace with where you are right now.

You can read more about Animals in my life and my Oracle Card deck below: