Sunday, December 4, 2011

Everything Goes, Everything Returns

Source of picture: phildesignart
"Everything goes, everything returns; eternally rolls on the wheel of existence.  Everything dies, everything blossoms forth again; eternally runs on the year of existence.  Everything breaks; everything is integrated anew; eternally builds itself the same house of existence.  
All things separate, all things again greet one another; eternally true to itself remains the ring of existence. Every moment begins existence, around every ‘here’ rolls the ball ‘there.  
The middle is everywhere. Crooked is the path of eternity.
- Friedrich Nietzsche
Life is a series of entanglements of our dreams, hopes, experiences and failures, so I thought this poem from Friedrich Nietzsche seemed fitting. The simplicity in his words reminds me of how each of our encounters within our lives serves some sort of purpose - whether we realise it or not at the time. I am a staunch believer in the philosophy that what we expel, we receive in kind. And not to get all 'The Secret' on you, but there is some relevance that that book has with this poem; what we put out, we attract. For me, this is what keeps me going whenever I have days that aren't filled with as much light as the others.

It is sad to think that everything ultimately has an expiry date. The things that we have become accustomed to (and, in some cases, may have even loved) should, one day, be no more. And in this sense, nothing can last or be forever. But life is a ring of existence - a circle that ties us to our experiences. It is this process itself that is eternal. There's something beautiful in his phrasing that suggests what we give out will be returned to us in one form or another.  And that for every end, there will be a new beginning. 

I couldn't have said it better myself, Nietzsche.

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