August 16, 2026: Learning to Embrace Change

Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray

Change is rarely easy, but it is also unavoidable. Learning to embrace change is an important skill in learning to navigate our lives with hope and courage.

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Sermon Text

Learning to Embrace Change

Rev. Susan Frederick-Gray

UU Church of Bloomington

August 16, 2026

SERMON Learning to Embrace Change

Throughout this year, we are exploring what it means to be Seeds of Change - how we foster positive change in our lives and in our world. This month we begin with the theme of Embracing Change. For if the only lasting truth is change, then learning to navigate it and find our way through it is a much needed life skill.

One of the best metaphors in nature for change is that of the caterpillar’s transformation to a butterfly. Did you know that this metamorphosis is not just one change, but that the caterpillar goes through a series of losses and growth again and again before it becomes a butterfly?

In her book Trusting Change, Unitarian Universalist minister Karen Hering describes the process. She explains how that very hungry caterpillar eats and eats and eats, as much as a hundred times its weight in a day, and four or five times during this period it outgrows and sheds its skin entirely. To grow, it has to let go of its old skin, again and again. And then in preparing for the big change, it forms a new shell under its final layer of skin. And when it curls upside down, that final layer of skin sheds again - or maybe more accurately that new shell breaks through the old skin and forms a cocoon - a chrysalis to contain the incredible transformation to a butterfly.

Inside that chrysalis, Hering explains, “the caterpillar digests itself, releasing enzymes that break down all shape and form...becoming a mass of goo,” to feed what comes next.

And something not noticed before in the caterpillar, but which have been there from the beginning, are something called the imaginal discs (what a great name). These imaginal discs which are “coded for metamorphosis” begin to thrum, and vibrate and multiply rapidly. They multiply again and again, connecting to each other, grouping to form wings and eyes, and legs - all that is needed for the butterfly. And when all is ready, the butterfly emerges from that chrysalis and takes flight.

The butterfly is a powerful reminder that change is possible in life, that transformation is possible, and that even when change is painful and difficult - even when we feel like we have lost all that we know - that something else - something beautiful - can still be ahead for us.

It’s a good thing we have a whole year to reflect on change - because there are so many kinds of change - personal change that we seek, unwanted change like illness and loss, change in our families, change in our identity, in the dreams we have for ourselves, and then there are the political changes around us - changes in our world, oppressive changes that target and divide, and the changes we want to make in our communities and our world to nurture more justice, equity, compassion. Change is all around us - it impacts all aspects of our lives.

But, we can’t talk about this all in one service. So today, let’s focus on how we navigate personal changes in our lives and relationships. That alone is a wide spectrum for as Octavia Butler notes, “hidden within change is surprise, delight, confusion, pain, discovery, loss, opportunity, and growth.”

Change may be the only constant, but that doesn’t make it easy. Change is difficult. Even when it is a change we want and choose for ourselves, it doesn’t make it necessarily easy. So how do we navigate change in ways that can lead us toward growth, wisdom, courage, and even sometimes, maybe, transformation?

Let’s look to the butterfly - there are lessons in this process. First, the necessity of letting go and acceptance; second, the practice of listening, patience, presence; and third - making a way, sometimes out of no way.

Letting go and acceptance - this may be the hardest part. Change, even when it is change we want, almost always involves loss. And one of the biggest obstacles navigating change is holding onto the past - perhaps denying the change, or being stuck wishing we could go back or undo something to stop the change.

The youth group during one of my ministries would sometimes use the check in question, “If you could have any superpower, what would it be and why?” The first time I was asked this question, the immediate answer that popped in my head was, I wish I could time travel. It must have come to mind because at that moment I was dwelling on a mistake I made, wishing I could have a do over, wishing I could go back and undo the mistake.

But as the group went around sharing, and I thought about the gift of being able to go back in time, I realized that I’d probably always want to go back to fix things, little things, little mistakes, stuff I wish I had done better or handled better. I struggle with perfectionism - and so as I imagined using this superpower, I realized I would just get stuck - always going back - never moving forward. I realized that it would be the worst super power for me. It would be the worst super power for me precisely because of how I struggle to let go.

Let’s not underplay it. adrienne maree brown says, “Change is constant (Be like water).” Water flows, it rushes, it changes, it shifts and moves as its environment changes. To be that free, to move through life smoothly, swiftly, confidently - what a gift! But we don’t all possess that gift.

Some of us are not great at going with the flow. And you know, sometimes we shouldn’t. And to be clear, that is not what adrenne maree brown is actually saying - but we’ll get back to that.

The process of letting go sometimes means being, for a time, in the goo, as Karen Hering calls it. And honestly, haven’t we all found ourselves in the goo - the goo of uncertainty, of grief and loss and change that unravels us, the goo of such significant change we are not sure how we can get through it, or who we will be on the other side.

Sure, sometimes, we can ride the waves of change that bring delight and opportunity - flowing with it all open hearted, but other times, we need the space of a chrysalis time, to experience the grief, the fear, the uncertainty that can come with changes - to be in the goo - and to let our bodies and spirits and minds process change. This is a form of acceptance. For this letting go, as the caterpillar must let go of all it has been, is a way of trusting change, accepting change - even as we cannot know how we will emerge or how this change will change us.

Which brings us to the next skill of embracing change - listening and presence.

Water doesn’t just flow. It also pools. It can be still, peaceful, and patient. I think of the famous words of poet Wendell Berry:

“When despair for the world grows in me

and I wake in the night at the least sound

in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,

I go and lie down where the wood drake

rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.

I come into the peace of wild things

who do not tax their lives with forethought

of grief. I come into the presence of still water.

And I feel above me the day-blind stars

waiting with their light. For a time

I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.”

In the midst of change, one of the most important practices we can cultivate is stillness, is deep listening - not just with our ears, but with our hearts and bodies and our spirits.

Resisting change can take a lot of forms - including trying to avoid facing change by keeping ourselves busy. We are too busy to deal with a needed change - running too fast to pay attention to what is changing right before us. Maybe we hide or deflect or simply deny the reality of change. We might just dig deeper where we are, hoping that will prevent the change that is already happening. Maybe this is a part of denying the climate crisis. Maybe it shows up when we refuse to recognize and accept changes in our children - who they are and how they identify.

I think about this as a parent. How the realities of the world my kid is growing up in are in some ways so different than the ones I knew. He and his cohort - their experiences of relationships, gender, dating, communication - it is quite different from my own - and so beautiful and complicated (like all of growing up is). And it is full of opportunity and also, in what I witness, unbelievable care and compassion. It is amazing.

Change - especially change that we may not fully understand - it can be scary. Especially if we don’t have the skills to be open to change or we don’t realize that change is all there is - it’s always happening. This is where the skills of listening and presence; patience, stillness are so powerful.

My favorite piece of wisdom from our Mother’s Day service last May was from Susan Carson’s reflection about parenting. Susan, you wrote this line, “I don’t have to understand, but I do have to accept.” How important this is for all of us, not just as parents, but as people.

It’s okay not to understand something. It’s not a bad thing. It’s not something we always have to fix. Not knowing is actually a powerful place of being present and open. It invites us to just listen more deeply - not demand or ask in order to understand - but just to be open, present, caring.

In the story Stephanie Kimball shared, we don’t know why the young girl has to move to her grandmother’s house. That’s okay - and maybe she doesn’t fully understand either. But in that change - that major change - her grandma invites her to pay attention - to be present to what is around and to the beauty around her. In that change - the wisdom is to be present, attentive, listening to our heart's experience of the world around us.

Some of us have had to navigate changes in our own lives that we can’t fully understand. Trying to understand it may not be what is most important. Instead, practicing deep listening with our whole selves - so that we can be present fully to ourselves and our loved ones may be what is most needed. In this, we just might find courage for our journey, and beauty along the way.

And this brings us to the third lesson in embracing change: making a way.

In the goo of that chrysalis where all that the caterpillar has been previously breaks down, a humming begins. Imaginal discs that carry the code for the butterfly begin humming, multiplying, creating something new. Karen Hering explains that the imaginal discs are present even in the caterpillar, though they don’t begin to hum and go to work until the cocoon phase.

Change is constant (Be like water), adrienne maree brown says. Water finds a way - it spreads out, it seeps down, it moves into every crevice - it can even wear down rocks, smooth stones, carve canyons. It finds a way. It keeps going. And for us, embracing change is also about finding a way - even when it seems there is no way. Be like water - keep searching for a way through, a way to live, to find beauty in the midst of change and loss. Keep showing up for yourself, for each other.

Deep down in all of us is a humming of life - a reminder of our connection to one another - our connection to life, to earth, to the stars. When we pause and listen for that humming, perhaps we hear our own imaginal discs that encode in us our capacity for creativity, imagination, and possibility. In listening for that vibration of life and connection within us, perhaps we find a way - as they say out of no way. It doesn’t mean we get what we hope for or that all is just going okay, but it can lead us to keep honoring what is precious in us and precious to us. It can help us keep making our way - not giving up despite the obstacles but finding ways to shape the lives we live.

In Octavia Butler’s wisdom in Earthseed, she reminds us that change doesn’t just happen to us, we also are agents of change. We create change in our lives, in our communities, and in our world. We are not objects of a changing world - but actors, subjects, and protagonists in it too.

As she writes:

“All that you touch

You Change.

All that you Change

Changes you.

The only lasting truth

Is Change.”

Let us develop the skills that help us navigate change and create change in ourselves and in this ever-changing world.