If one were to tell you:
“Time is a flat circle,”
you may rightfully say: “What is that, Niezsche? Shut the f**k up.”
Perhaps the phrase, “Time is a flat circle” means that the universe is cyclical—
that time loops back on itself over and over and over again,
like a snake swallowing its own tail.
Or perhaps it refers to Nietzsche’s concept of eternal recurrence, which, contrary to
how it may sound, is not a theory on the nature of the universe at all.
Rather, eternal recurrence is a thought experiment that asks: what if every moment,
every minute detail of your life is destined to endlessly return exactly as it is now?
Referred to by Nietzsche as the “formula for human greatness,” the eternal return is a test of one’s strength of character.
Allow me to explain.
Nearly blind and tormented by constant migraines— Nietzsche thought that existence was endless suffering,
like dropping onto deadly spikes,
plummeting to your doom,
or being pressed to death.
Not only is the world brutal—the universe is radically indifferent to human existence—
and that means, for Nietzsche, that our suffering is utterly meaningless.
When faced with the harshness of reality, people tend to be dejected or angry—
and delude themselves into thinking they can evade their own suffering,
or they blame someone else for their fate and seek revenge for their lot in life.
To Nietzsche this hatred of existence is called "Ressentiment."
But no amount of revenge changes the reality of the inevitability of suffering and death.
Given this, the eternal return can be understood as a test of a person’s strength in the face of a nihilistic world.
To see if they can aspire to the heights of what Nietzsche calls the Übermensh-
A person strong enough to revel in tragedy and suffering and love life for its beauty and its ugliness.
It's a sort of Dionysian principal that affirms life as it is.
Nietzsche asks: What if in your loneliest of... lone-lies a little demon flew up to you and
told you that this world as it exists— this lonely moment... would return for eternity.
If your reaction is to curse the thought— you have succumbed to ressentiment.
However, if instead, for you, nothing would be more divine—then you exhibit the qualities of the highest type person:
The Übermensh
Trust me, this is not what Nietzsche intended.
So now the question becomes, how would you have to live in order to desire repeating every moment endlessly?