Full Circle
L’arc, August 2025
“There is nothing like a dream to create the future” writes Victor Hugo in his 1862 novel Les Misérables. As the introduction to my journey in France, it is only fitting to reflect on this novel after having moved back to France once again, 10 years later. A journey that began with a minor in French literature, culminated into a dream worth chasing, and returned full circle by the grace of an answered prayer.
At one particular moment of Les Misérables, Victor Hugo describes a crossroads for the main antagonist, Inspector Javert. He saw before him two roads, both equally straight. The fact that he saw two terrified Javert. He, who had never known anything but a single straight line. The weight of choosing which road to travel upon, and the lasting consequences of that one straight shot versus turn. Many of us have contended with a crossroads, whether it be between countries or careers, desires or duties. To continue straight or veer toward unknown territory. Proceed or pivot. Modern coaching encourages the pivot - jump, and the net shall appear, as they say. Do it scared, do it uncertain, but do it nevertheless.
The power of optimism and the ability to hack one’s life by believing earnestly in one’s vision, no matter how distant or lofty, how veered or straight. The trend today is to put it on manifestation and the new-age mantra of mind over matter. 19th century French Literature spoken through Hugo gives us another framework: “the future has several names. For the weak, it is impossible; for the fainthearted, it is unknown; but for the valiant, it is ideal.” Mastering the power of positivity, putting that belief into action, leaving a bit of surrender to the universe, and saying a little prayer that good things come.
Sometimes this surrender comes easily, such as through connections with others that facilitate it unknowingly. We see this in the quiet understanding shared between Cosette and Marius in Les Misérables. At one point in the plot, Marius appears in Cosette’s garden. It does not occur to her to ask him how he was appearing before her. She did not consider where or through what means he had managed to enter. It was just so natural to her that he should be there.
Paris is a place that has always felt like a quiet understanding. The twilight reflecting on the banks of the Seine. The lit up Eiffel Tower and Notre Dame. The beds of flowers weaving the perimeter of the Jardin du Luxembourg. The rays of sunset setting on the Haussmanian architecture anchoring the city. These sights all quintessential to life in Paris, serving as guiding forces to navigate the city and all the while unlocking an elevated level of happiness for its dwellers. Victor Hugo understood this sentiment well when he wrote - “a garden to walk in and immensity to dream in — what more could he ask? A few flowers at his feet and above him, the stars.”
Full circle moments such as a return to a beloved city require acknowledgment of the cosmic energy that brought them along. The quiet prayers of parents and grandmothers. The energetic force of a bloodline that survived and fueled us forward. The limitless love within the gaze of our siblings. The voices of friends cheering us on all along the way. That when we take a moment to reflect, we realize that this steadfast love has been the driving force behind most of the good in our lives. And certainly, the full circle moments.
Victor Hugo was himself taken by the concept of love and spent a great deal of his life pondering it. He believed “love is the foolishness of men, and the wisdom of God.” Foolish to us, but wise to a higher element. Because to love is the most intuitive thing to a human being, and yet, the riskiest. To love is to put one’s heart on the line, going against our instinctive wiring to repel anything that could bring risk. To love is to remove one’s armor and stand vulnerable without shielding. To go against our core instinct for self-preservation. But our proclivities as humans are not limited to our mere survival instincts. Love defies the odds. A force indescribable to most who feel it. Breathed into us and forming our essence, beyond the physical reflexes that resist exposure. “To love is to see the face of God” as Hugo puts it. To tap into divinity. The closest truth we have access to in this realm. Comforting. Elevating. And in its purest form - transcending. The love experienced between a parent and child. One sibling to another. Or, perhaps uniquely electrifying for the very reason that it did not come to us intrinsically just from merely existing: the love we find through the development of our own lives. That meets us while we are on our path. Their finding us despite the odds of ever meeting within this world of 8 billion. Surely not just sheer luck, but cosmically driven. Guided by a divine hand, an invisible string, gently nudging us to the other. A love that mimics in its purity the love that has accompanied us since the very beginning of our journey through life. Though it came later and missed the beginning, it intends to catch up and be there through to the ending.
Another full circle, if you will.
One that takes us by surprise, like most full circles, but equally feels like the most natural thing. An inevitability, even. Adding to the list of full circles that form the tapestry of our lives. Like a kaleidoscope depicting a plethora of patterns weaving in and out, but we notice that a few continually reappear. Because they were written for us, and us for them. To borrow from Victor Hugo, “when love has fused and mingled two beings in a sacred and angelic unity, the secret of life has been discovered so far as they are concerned. They are no longer anything more than the two boundaries of the same destiny; they are no longer anything but the two wings of the same spirit. Love, soar.”
