There are so many reasons to pay attention to Dolly Parton.Her Q Score, a measure of celebrity-brand appeal, is one of the highest in theworld. She is adored. She wrote over 3000 songs and holds ten Guinness WorldRecords. Her Imagine Library Literacy Foundation gave 147 million books tochildren worldwide. She helped fund Moderna’s Covid vaccine research. She’s the subject of the excellent 9-episode podcast by Jad Abumrad and Shima Oliaee, Dolly Parton’s America and a delightful guest of Brene Brown on the Unlocking Us podcast. She is a national treasure.
My personal connection to Dolly
The reason I noticed Dolly as a six-year-old, was her vulnerable, captivating and intense song, “I Will Always Love You.” I listened from the record my parents bought after seeing her as Mona Strangely in The Best Little Whore House in Texas. I loved her outfit on the back cover almost as much as I loved hearing the song.
Her voice reached out to me like the gaudy, fabulous plume of feathers she held in this photo, touching me like the downy puff beneath a mother hen offering safety, wisdom and warmth. I felt like she understood something I was experiencing—even by age six—that life delivers experiences that are overwhelming and burdensome. Circumstances that ask us to stretch in unknowable ways. Her voice created a surreal sanctuary in me, one that was buoyed and comforting.
Dolly’s dream
I didn’t know then that Dolly wrote “I Will Always Love you "to resign from The Porter Wagner Show—a decade-long partnership. An experience she described as so “intermingled and so wadded up that you didn't even know what your real feelings were”. She said, “when he hired me as a singer, he was just hiring what he thought was a right pretty little girl, but I was a serious writer. He didn't know that. I was a serious entertainer. He didn't know that. He didn't know how many dreams I had.”
“I am my own self. I didn't come to Nashville to be justpart of a duet and to be a girl singer in somebody's group. I want my own band.I want my own show. I want my own dreams," she added.
Dreams come from transformation
Reflecting on the complexity and bravery of Dolly’s musicalfarewell as the catalyst for a monumental change in her life (and the millionsof us who love her music) inspires me to explore change with Dolly as a muse.
The foundation of What By When is helping people throughthese periods in life when you are reaching for something more – a dream, ideaor project – but might feel stuck or overwhelmed. As ICF Certified Coaches, weuse the renowned Martha Beck’s 4-Stage Change Cycle as a guide, which is basedon a caterpillar to butterfly metaphor. And in this blog, we look to Dolly forinspiration along the way.
What a perfect mash-up, Beck gives the framework and ofcourse Dolly provides the perfect soundtrack!
Martha Beck’s Stage 1 – Death and Rebirth
Did you know when caterpillars are inside a cocoon, theydon’t just grow wings? They completely dissolve down to cells and reform intosomething entirely new. In fact, the caterpillar’s immune cells attack theforming butterfly cells as a foreign object. This is how complete thetransformation is, cells from the old are literally at war with cells from thenew. The imagery is so helpful to preview what Stage 1 feels like—terrible.
Martha Beck’s Stage 1 begins after a catalytic event, like ajob loss, illness, vital disappointment, death, and other unpredictable eventsafter which life can’t continue as it was. It’s a scary time because a new selfis forming, but the old self cannot come along.
“I don’t know what the hell is going on and that’s Ok,” isMartha’s mantra for this phase.
Dolly’s soundtrack to Stage 1
Dolly’s Hard Candy Christmas is a welcome companionhere. She sings, “I’m barely getting through tomorrow, but still I won’tlet sorrow bring me way down”. She wanders through the helpful and distressingthoughts one has during Stage 1.
Hey, maybe I'll dye my hair
Maybe I'll move somewhere
Maybe I'll get a car
Maybe I'll drive so far they'll all lose track
Maybe I'll just lie low
Maybe I'll hit the bars
Maybe I'll count the stars until dawn
Me, I will go on
Martha Beck’s Stage 2 – Dreaming and Scheming
In Stage 2, the image of your future self begins to divergefrom your past identity. New traits and interests become appealing. This stagecan also be scary but also liberating. It's not crucial to have a precise understandingof present desires. It’s a time for daydreaming. After pondering your newvision, think of ways those ideas could come to life. That is the schemingpart. Explore your imagination of the future.
“There are no rules, and that’s ok,” is Martha’smantra for this phase.
Dolly’s soundtrack to Stage 2
I found Dolly’s cover of the song Shine to be veryinspirational for phase 2.
Gimme a word, gimme a sign
Show me where to look
And tell me whatwill I find
She sings about looking for a path to follow – she’sdreaming and scheming, without guidelines or instructions, and a wonderingimagination.
Martha Beck’s Stage 3 – The Hero’s Saga
Square 3 Martha named The Hero’s Saga. This is wherewe gain an understanding of the path we want to peruse. Experimenting with newthings leads to both successes and failures and that is what this stage is allabout. It can feel exciting and disappointing. Expect things not to goaccording to plan, that is how you discover where you really want to go. Inthis stage, our company, What by When can help you decipher what those stepsare.
“This is a lot harder than I expected and that’s ok,” isMartha’s Mantra for this phase.
Dolly’s soundtrack to Stage 3
You probably know Dolly’s famous song, 9 to 5. Butdid you know she rewrote a version called 5 to 9 further exploring herfollow-your-dreams theme? The original may have been a nod toward unionizing,but this new version feels to me like a phase-three anthem. Especially forthose of us building our own businesses.
“Working 5 to 9,
you’ve gotpassion and a vision
‘Cause it’shustlin’ time
a whole new way tomake a livin’“
In stage 3 we discover and explore goals, see nascentversions of our ideas come into focus and experience the inevitabledisappointment of working very hard to see what feels like too little progress.Dolly’s message, “Gonna change your life, do somethingthat gives it meaning” offers motivation to those of us striving for change.
Martha Beck’s Stage 4 – The Promised Land
Eventually, we finally fulfill the dream we’ve worked sohard to attain. We are now completely different than we wereat the beginning of the metamorphosis. I can’t think of a more profounddescription of this type of change than Teresa of Avila and her amazingmetaphor of the transforming silkworm.
“When the warm weather comes--and the silkworm eats themulberry leaves to the point of growth where it begins to spin a cocoon. Itstarts to spin its silk and to build the house in which it is to die.” The newreality is so unlike the former that commentor James Finely says, “the silkwormdies to itself, as a silkworm” Theres no going back, “for a butterfly is not acaterpillar with wings.” We are creatures who now take flight, no more walking!
Dolly’s soundtrack to Stage 4
Dolly gives us herfinal sendoff with her lyrics from Love is Like a Butterfly:
Love is like abutterfly
As soft and gentle as asigh
It flutters like softwings in flight
Love is like a butterfly, a rare andgentle thing
I like to imagine Dolly singing about thedream we’ve followed knowing what it cost her to follow her own dreams, and thegreat benefit so many of us experience as a result, compels me to express mygratitude.
Thanks for sharing so much ofyourself in your songs
Thanks helping so many kids learnto read
Thanks for funding one of theCovid vaccines
Thanks for responding to yourcreative self w/ over 3000 songs we all can enjoy
And thanks for giving us a littlemotivation in every part of the change cycle
Or, in your own words,“I Will Always Love You” too Dolly.
To learn more aboutyour own journey from dream to the promised land, contact us at …..
