Going Round in Circles

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“While the world is full of wondrous sights, inner peace comes from staying home.” – The Tao Teh Ching

I live next to a little lake in Seattle. A lake that is about 2.8 miles in circumference. In the morning, I take Miss O to school on the north end of the lake, Mr. D to daycare on the east side of the lake and then home to work on the west side of the lake.

And then most afternoons I do the circuit again and pick up my little family.

I’ve been trying to put my finger on why sometimes it just seems like I’m going in circles and others it feels like a beautiful rhythm.

When I feel like I’m just going in circles, it’s when I’m in a rut or really impatient for what comes next. In those moments, what I’m doing just feels like something rote especially because I’ve lived somewhere around this lake in one place or another ever since I graduated from college 30 years ago.

The cure I’ve found for this is to slow down and notice what I’m seeing – the ducks, the water, the runners, the sky. Anything to tether me more closely to the sensation of today instead of the culmination of all that I’ve seen in the yesterdays.

And when I’m in the space to appreciate the rhythm of my trip around the lake, I have this beautiful sensation of knowing what’s important to me. It’s an exceptionally warm sense of gathering my family and the idea that we’ll all be together again and bundled in close.

So I’m growing to appreciate the metaphor of this full circle trip. The letting go and then collecting. It reminds me of all the other cycles: being fully open but then needing to shut down, time of great productivity and then needing to relax. Or, as I wrote about in the When I Write post, the mystical, depth of my mood in the morning contrasted with the state of the evening when I’m a shallow as a muddy puddle and just as unclear.

For all of these contrasts, there is always one that I prefer – being open, greatly productive and deep. Or in the bigger cycles of life like birth and death, or seasons of light and dark, I’d choose birth and light every time.

But unless I’m resisting, I always learn from the less favored part of the cycle. Usually that’s when I get to see the connections and meanings. When I can lean in to what I don’t like, I find the heart of the matter.

So round and round the lake I go, dropping off and picking up which allows me to honor all the other cycles and hold my little ones more dear.

(featured photo is a picture of the lake that I took from the plane on my return from my trip about 6 weeks ago)

36 thoughts on “Going Round in Circles”

  1. Lovely photo, Wynne. Your preference for birth over death puts you in the largest club on earth. Not fully on the other side were the Stoics and Existentialists among others, who used the expression, “Amor Fati”– love your fate. My next blog post will expand on the life affirming aspect of that strange saying.

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  2. In the Screwtape Letters by CS Lewis, he says something that struck me as interesting, how we humans love change, yet love permanence, so the seasons delight us. I enjoy seeing the changes of the seasons as I go through my weekly routines of school pick ups or groceries.

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  3. What a wonderful blessing to live in a place where you have a lake to go around. That is surely a beautiful visual! sometimes we can forget these little blessings.

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  4. I like when you say that you always learn from the less favored part of the cycle (I realized I wrote circle before and then corrected it, maybe it has a meaning?). Thank you for the deep post Wynne!

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  5. “I’ve been trying to put my finger on why sometimes it just seems like I’m going in circles and others it feels like a beautiful rhythm.” Love this, Wynne. Perspective changes everything…and wow…what a beautiful photo of your lake. Stunning! Thank you for sharing – both your wisdom and the pic. 😘

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  6. I believe historically and spiritually circles play various and often highly important roles in the lives of many cultures. My reading is showing me the immediacy of that circular cycle within families over generations. I like using that visual, circular image to remind myself that even while we may be on a familiar cycle I have the power to add my own bits and pieces along the way. The circle isn’t broken by those additions but is allowed to grow broader for those coming around the curve behind me.

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    1. Wow, Deb – this is such a powerful comment. “The circle isn’t broken by those additions but is allowed to grow broader for those coming around the curve behind me.” And I love how you relate the circular to the cycle. Thank you for sharing that to help me with my thinking!

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  7. You definitely bring new meaning to going in circles, (around your little lake). And I love your strategy for staying grounded Wynne. Slowing down to notice the little details and the gifts of nature’s beauty helps us immerse ourselves in the present moment.

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  9. That is a beautiful birds eye view of your lake and community, Wynne!

    I hear ya on that feeling of going around endlessly in a circle – a feeling all too familiar on many days.

    But you have a wonderful strategy to tether and to ground yourself to something that breaks you out of that lull and appreciate all the goodness in your life.

    Happy weekend!

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    1. Ah, the grounding coming in to play too. I wonder if it’s a seasonal thing that makes it more necessary.

      I’m sure you can relate to the feeling – and then all of a sudden they’ve grown so much and you can’t believe it. It’s like bouncing between two true but different realities, isn’t it? Thanks for weighing and adding your wonderful perspective, Ab. Hope you have a great weekend!

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