Why do people always think life goes in cuycles when in fact we are constantly moving forward?

[Therealog]

I keep hearing this idea of “history repeating” or life being in cycles but in my life I have just moved forward and changed in new and unexpected ways.

Similarly, in 2020 when Covid happened, lots of people were saying it was “exactly” the same as 1920. Actually, apart from coincidentally having an outbreak, NOTHING is the same. We have progressed, moved forward, we do different things, handle things differently etc. Far from there being a “roaring twenties” there seems to be a “frugal twenties”.

Does it make life easier to believe it goes in cycles even when this is clearly not the case?

Another example- being told I am “exactly” like xxx relative due to hair colour. We gave very different personalities, beliefs, tastes and even religion!!! People just feel more comfortable pretending we are the same. Why???

Surely people are referring to the fact that we are born, we live and then we die? Our descendants carry on doing the same if we have any.

Well things are generally cyclical. Economies rise and fall, the troughs and peaks are different, the trigger is different but they rise, they fall and they rise again. Again, the pandemic is cyclical in that every 100 or so years there is an illness that affects a large percentage of the population and changes our way of life. The illness is different (because hopefully we learn and can develop a vaccine), the way we react is different but the rise and fall of an illness is the same. The same can be said for the rise and fall of right wing politics.

You individually continue on but the world moves in its own cycles around you.

I do take this on board, but the truth is often “some similarities but mostly different”.

It’s the same with relationships:- we were constantly told that patterns repeat or “they don’t change”. All of my relationships have been very different to each other and I have been a different person in each of them because I have learnt and changed. I wouldn’t go back to any ex unless they took the time to learn who I am today, instead of expecting the same relationship. It would never work.