Why You Might Be Walking in Circles (and not even know it)

Ever feel like you are stuck in the same old rut? Maybe you keep making the same mistake over and over again, even though you keep telling yourself to stop. Perhaps you keep finding yourself in the same state of frustration, anger, or stress, despite your best efforts to the contrary.

You keep trying to hit reset, start fresh, begin again, and take a different path. Nevertheless, you find yourself right back where you started. It feels like, maybe, you are walking (or living) in circles.

The good news is, that despite what you may feel, you aren’t crazy, and you aren’t alone. This is actually a real thing. People really do walk in circles. A group of scientists conducted an experiment to prove this reality. You can read more about it here.

A group of scientists put together an experiment to test the popular notion that when we are lost we often end up walking in circles. Volunteers were taken to one of two locations; the Sahara Desert or the Bienwald Forest in Germany. They were equipped with tracking devices and then their paths were monitored. While the sun or moon was up, and the volunteers had something to use as a guide, they generally maintained a fairly straight path. As soon as they lost sight of these landmark guides, they would begin to walk in circles, most of the time without even realizing it was happening.

The participants in the study didn’t start wandering around in any particular pattern, or measurable “circle”. Instead, they would drift a little to the left, and then a little to the right, but with complete uncertainty about which way was straight. Before they knew it, they had veered significantly off course.

Scientifically speaking:

“Small random errors in the various sensory signals that provide information about walking direction add up over time, making what a person perceives to be straight ahead drift away from the true straight ahead direction.” -Jan Souman

In layman’s terms:

Losing our way, even just a little bit, can add up over time, which can alter our desired trajectory significantly.

“(People) shouldn’t necessarily rely on their subjective senses as to whether they’re walking in a straight line,” says Souman. “If you’re just relying on your senses, you might be fooled.”

The challenge then, is for us to maintain our sense of direction over the course of a long journey. And in order to do so, we have to have something to focus on for the duration of the trip. It’s not a map, it’s more like a compass. This won’t tell us every turn to make, or provide a key to tell us how long it will take to get there, but it will help us recognize if whether or not we are staying on track, or wandering around in circles.

So we have to figure out what that thing (or things) is (are) for us. We have to determine what it is that will be constant and remain relevant, no matter what, so we can maintain our desired course, regardless of the terrain, challenges, stresses or frustrations.

For me, that involves asking and answering a few big questions:

Who Am I?

Where Am I?

What Do I Want?

This can help us stop the circle walking, and provide us with some important reminders about why we started down this path in the first place, where we are headed, and what truths we know that will help us navigate the path to getting there.

And deeper than that, are our roots. When we have determined and declared what it is that will be true about us, who we are, who we hope to become, and what really matters, it makes it much easier to free ourselves from the circle walking, and maintain a proper sense of direction, even when it is hard.

If you’d like to receive a free sample from the W3 framework that addresses these concepts (Roots, and Matter for What Matters), please email me at bryan@bryanhendley.com, and I’ll send one over.

Much Love,

Bryan