Tessa Thompson Quotes

I became the butterfly. I got out of the cocoon, and I flew.

So I departed and was free from imprisonment.

He built a small house, called a cocoon, around himself. He stayed inside for more than two weeks. Then he nibbled a hole in the cocoon, pushed his way out and... he was a beautiful butterfly!

Ever make mistakes in life? Let's make them birds. Yeah, they're birds now.

Who says I can't be free from all of the things that I used to be?

Leaving America is like losing twenty pounds and finding a new girlfriend.

I wouldn't mind turning into a vermilion goldfish.

I have been desperate to escape for so many years now, it is routine for me to try to escape.

Everybody knows what a caterpillar is, and it doesn't look anything like a butterfly.

I escaped one time. In 1971 I was in the free world for six weeks.

There is nothing in a caterpillar that tells you it's going to be a butterfly.

The only certain freedom's in departure.

It felt like I'd been living underground, and for a moment, I'd been given this glimpse of the sky. Once you've seen that, how can you go back where you came from?

You know the day destroys the night, Night divides the day, Tried to run, Tried to hide, Break on through to the other side...

To a new generation of butterflies, hopefully less stupid than last. Maybe they were burgeoning even now in fat little cocoons. Or maybe not.

It's only when caterpillarness is done that one becomes a butterfly. That again is part of this paradox. You cannot rip away caterpillarness. The whole trip occurs in an unfolding process of which we have no control.

We're all in prison. All of us are in prison, but some of us have a key.

Let me go, let me go.

The shell must break before the bird can fly.

Although we have the potential to experience the freedom of a butterfly, we mysteriously prefer the small and fearful cocoon of ego.

I feel a frantic desire to free myself. To start all over again and in another way.

I believe one has to escape oneself to discover oneself.

Sometimes, running away means you're headed in the exact right direction.

The butterfly lures us not only because he is beautiful, but because he is transitory. The caterpillar is uglier, but in him we can regard the better joy of becoming.