Have you ever heard about ambergris? I only recently discovered it… this odd, ocean-drifting substance that begins its life deep inside a sperm whale’s digestive system. Not exactly the origin story you’d expect for something perfumers covet.

It forms as the whale protects itself from what it can’t digest, then eventually releases it back into the world. Fresh ambergris is unpleasant, almost aggressively so. But give it time, give it distance, let the ocean do what only the ocean can… and it matures into one of the most prized ingredients in perfumery. It’s used as a fixative to make scents last longer and as a complex, subtle enhancer.

Ambergris, basically whale poo but often called “floating gold,” can cost anywhere from $10 to over $35 USD per gram, or up to $40,000 per kilogram, depending heavily on its quality and age.

Transformation, while you’re in the throes of it, rarely looks valuable.

It’s not pleasant, and if you were honest, takes so much work you’d much prefer to stay as you are.

I thought about how much in our lives mirrors this quiet alchemy. How many ideas we discard because they don’t present well at first. How many parts of ourselves we rush to hide because they aren’t fragrant yet, because they haven’t weathered enough time to reveal what they’re becoming. How many experiences feel like irritants when they’re actually the beginning of something rare, something that needs distance and movement and exposure before it can even be recognized.

Alignment is often less about solving and
more about perceiving.

Less about forcing clarity and more about allowing the process that doesn’t look like a process. There are things that cannot be hurried. There are identities still floating in their own oceanic in-between, softening, curing, maturing into their purpose. There are chapters that feel useless until you look back and see what they made possible.

And so the question that keeps returning is simple but unsettling…

…what are we prematurely dismissing because it has not yet finished becoming?

What gifts are still in their unflattering phase, waiting for time to season them into what they’re meant to be? What are we trying to judge before the ocean has done its work?

Sometimes the most valuable things in our lives arrive first as irritation. Sometimes they smell wrong. Sometimes they push us into discomfort. But give them distance… give them time… give them the space to be transformed beyond your immediate interpretation… and they may turn out to be the quiet fixatives that give everything else its staying power.

Strategic Reflection Prompt

What in your life or work might still be in its “unflattering phase”… something you’ve been tempted to discard, overlook, or judge too early? And what would shift if you gave it the time and distance to reveal what it’s becoming?

About Giselle

I’m Giselle Hudson — writer, possibility thinker, musician, Organization & People Development Sensemaker™, and MCODE Legacy Coach. I help leaders and soul-driven professionals decode the deeper patterns shaping their business, work, identities, and results especially when it look like a performance issue but it’s really misalignment in disguise.

If something in your life or business feels off and you can’t quite name it, message me. Sometimes one conversation is all it takes to see what’s really going on.