More on Circles

I know I've written about circles here before...I think they're pretty amazing shapes.

Well, imagine my delight and surprise upon discovering that Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote an entire essay on....(drumroll, please)...circles!!

The eye is the first circle; the horizon which it forms is the second; and throughout nature this primary figure is repeated without end. It is the highest emblem in the cipher of the world.

-R.W. Emerson-

(You can click on the title of this post to read the entire essay.)

How cool is that?

Circles are wonderful, magical shapes. Here's a list of some of my favorites:

*atoms

*solar systems

*whirlpools

*planets

*sun

*moon

*wheels

*orbits

*rainbows (rainbows are actually complete circles, even though we only see half.)

*life cycles

*cells

*storms/tornadoes/hurricanes

*biospheres

*eyeballs

*galaxies

*currents

*wood rings in trees

*flowers

*food chain

*bubbles

*water cycles

Concentric circles are amazing, too. All waves (water waves, sound waves, light waves) move outward in a series of concentric circles, like a pebble dropped into a pond.

Circles are beautiful. No matter where you start, you always end up at the beginning. Eternal.

But, as Emerson pointed out in his essay, circles can be hard to escape from. The only way to move out of the orbit of a circle in which you are stuck is to make a sudden, dramatic leap into the next orbit beyond.

Electrons do this.

There is no gentle, easing out. You must be committed. And then, in one abrupt, powerful leap of faith, you burst through.

And suddenly, you find yourself deliriously, wondrously flying around in a new, previously unknown orbit. A wider, broader, more expansive orbit, encompassing all the other orbits you lived in before.

Each time you move into a new orbit, you do not abandon the orbits that came before. You're simply enlarging upon and encompassing all previous circles. Circles are about growth, expansion, and inclusion.

The thing that usually precipitates movement into a new orbit (for electrons and for people, too) is that life is out of balance. There is an emptiness, a lacking.

At some point, you realize that the only way to restore balance is to shift into a new and unknown orbit.

When electrons do this, a new element is often created. When we do it, we are changed too.

Expanding beyond old orbits changes who we are, down to our very core and composition.

We just have to be willing to take that leap.

"There is no object so soft but it makes a hub for the wheel'd universe."

-Walt Whitman-