Reexamining the Idea of ‘Life is a Circle’
With every end comes a new beginning, and what goes around comes around because life is a circle. Hard times and sadness are always followed by easy times and happiness in the circle. Life is followed by death is followed by life is followed by death and so on in an endless loop. Highs and lows alternate and what goes up always comes down in this cyclical world. And successes and failures are forever linked because life is a circle.
The notion that life is a circle and that life is a cycle is an idea that has shaped much of the modern world. The widespread depiction of this idea is a complete circle where an onlooker is meant to visualize their life at any point in the circle with the past to one direction and the future to the other. This visualization incorporates all the cyclical aspects of life such as the ones I listed in the opening of this article through the shape that is the very root of the term ‘cyclical’. However, a circle implies perfect repetition, and yet no individual life is Groundhog Day with the same events and scenarios repeating endlessly and without differentiation.
My proposal is simply that life is not a perfect circle but is instead an imperfect one with a small gap near the top. This gap accounts and allows for the uncertainty of the future while still reinforcing the cyclical nature of life. Any major change in life occurs in the gap, and such events have the potential to increase or decrease the radius of the circle. Even with a new diameter, though, the cyclical nature still applies as a new circle forms. The current notion of life as a circle suggests that everyone goes through the same path in life over and over again, but adding a small gap can account for individuality through allowing for the possibility of different circles. Every life is a combination of different circles all continuously linked together, all similar and familiar and yet all distinctive and unique. Some lives may have few circles with thick lines as they cross back and forth between the same few paths, whereas others may look like a messy scribble of circles of all sizes and others still may resemble more of a spiral. These paths are all very different from each other, and yet they are all connected because they are all still circles.
The common image of life as a circle emphasizes the idea that any endpoint is a beginning point, but a complete circle also visually suggests that the exact same path is repeated over and over again. Reality doesn’t have the same events repeated in the exact same way endlessly, so reality is better suited to a broken circle — a circle with a small gap allowing for the existence of and connection to other circles and other paths in life. Life is cyclical but uncertainty and individuality are also omnipresent, and the notion of life as a circle should reflect these facets as well.
