The monarch butterfly is a curious creature. As a caterpillar, it eats only milkweed — a plant that’s poisonous to just about every other animal on the planet, but which forms the sole diet of the monarch caterpillar. They’re completely dependent on this toxic plant.
Once it emerges from its chrysalis as a beautiful monarch butterfly, it no longer needs the poisonous milkweed. Not only that, but it has stored and channeled the poison into its wings — the very things that give it flight.
That’s why the monarch is so successful. It’s learned to not only ignore the poison and be unaffected by it, but to store it up and use it against its own predators.
We can take a lot of lessons from the monarch butterfly. It’s a beautiful, delicate creature. It flutters silently through our gardens, not
