Thoughts on Circles

Recently I watched our 8 week old puppy, Prudence chase her own tail round and round, thoroughly enjoying this simple game. Then when she had enough, she ran off to jump in a pile of leaves. I commented to my husband about her pure joy. And he said, "It's because she has puppy mind, it's completely empty of anything else but what she's doing at the time." That same day, I was working on a design where I needed to create a circle representing the sun. I started researching Japanese calligraphy and came across the term "enso".

An enso is a circle traditionally painted with calligraphy brush and sumi ink. A Zen practice, each circle reflects the state of mind of the artist at the time. I don't think there can be a good or a bad one—they are what they are. Each enso represents that moment. Just like the circle Prudence made when she chased her tail.

As a symbol, in simplest terms, the enso represents both being full and empty—a perfect meditative state.

In WIkipedia, the concept of enso then led me to "ouroboros" which is the image of a serpent or dragon creating a circle by swallowing it's own tail. According to the Wikipedia entry, the Jungian psychologist Erich Neuman,"writes of it as a representation of the pre-ego "dawn state", depicting the undifferentiated infancy experience of both mankind and the individual child." I think maybe he meant having a "puppy-like" state of mind?

By now, my mind was spinning with all the ideas of emptiness, wholeness. Everything circles. With the image of Prudence going round in circles still in mind, I remembered the whirling dervish I had seen the week before. A man, spinning on stage, singing a prayer. Whirling Dervishes spin and pray to get closer to God. Instead of going on physical journeys collecting stamps in passports, aren't the greatest journeys the ones we take within? Whirling Dervishes take their journeys from a single spot on the ground. Again, just like Prudence chasing her tail.

What's the point to all this? I don't know. I've just been speaking in circles. And while I spin, sending out prayers to the people in Japan. xoxo