The Ouroboros
For a long time, I didn’t understand why certain things kept repeating in my life. I just noticed that they did. The same kinds of situations. The same emotional reactions. The same feeling that life was asking me to look inward, even when I didn’t know how to do that yet.
During that time, the same symbol kept appearing.
The Ouroboros.
A serpent consuming its own tail.
I didn’t think much of it at first. It wasn’t dramatic or meaningful. It was just something I kept seeing. Sometimes in images. Sometimes in dreams. It showed up alongside the same inner work I didn’t yet have words for. Only later did I understand why.
The Ouroboros is one of the oldest symbols humanity has ever recorded. It appears in ancient cultures across the world, cultures that never spoke to each other, yet arrived at the same image. That kind of symbol doesn’t last unless it reflects something people keep noticing about life.
What it shows is simple. Life moves in cycles. What isn’t resolved doesn’t disappear. It comes back around.
Ancient people didn’t use symbols to explain ideas. They used them to show how things work. The Ouroboros wasn’t a belief. It was an observation. What keeps repeating is what is still active.
That’s when the symbol started to make sense to me.
In healing terms, nothing that truly changes us comes from outside of us. What we experience in our lives reflects what is happening within us. Our reactions. Our wounds. Our patterns. When something keeps showing up, it isn’t there to punish us. It’s there because something inside us hasn’t shifted yet.
This doesn’t mean we caused everything that happened to us. It means healing happens from the inside out.
Most people expect healing to mean moving on and leaving things behind. But healing doesn’t work that way. It circles. You come back to the same themes with more awareness each time. The situation may look different, but the feeling underneath is familiar.
The Ouroboros shows that clearly. The loop itself isn’t the problem. The loop continues until something changes within us.
When we grow, the pattern changes. When we respond differently, life responds differently. Not because the world suddenly becomes different, but because we do.
This is also why the Ouroboros can feel uncomfortable. It doesn’t point to an external savior. It doesn’t suggest that something outside of us will fix what hurts. It quietly reminds us that the work is internal, and that responsibility can feel heavy before it feels freeing.
But it is freeing.
Looking back, I can see that the Ouroboros wasn’t trying to get my attention. It was reflecting what was already happening. The repeating patterns. The inner healing. The realization that nothing changes until we do.
The symbol didn’t start the journey.
It mirrored it.
The Ouroboros isn’t about eternity.
It’s about healing.
It’s about understanding that life keeps reflecting us back to ourselves, and that patterns remain until we grow from them. It’s about becoming your own source of change by going within.
So now I’ll ask you the same question life eventually asked me.
Is this symbol showing up for you?
And if it is, what might it be reflecting back to you about what’s ready to heal?
Sending love, light & healing
Shawna ✨✨✨✨✨
@ 2025-2028. Shawna M.Romkey. All Rights Reserved.
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