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Proverb: History repeats itself
Estimated reading time: 3 minutes
When you live to be as old as I am, you realize that most proverbs from our ancestors are not necessarily words of wisdom but simply observations made over time.
History repeats itself is one of those wise phrases that anyone over forty has witnessed.
Let me tell you a secret. Living through history doesn’t make you feel wise. It makes you feel old.
Nothing that is occurring now is new.
Everything that has happened before will happen again and again and again.
I’m not into fashion, but I am a guy, and like all guys, I notice miniskirts.
I wasn’t around in 1963 when British designer Mary Quant first introduced them.
Hey, I’m not into fashion, but I love history.
Since then, every generation of women has worn one.
Your grandmother, mother and wife have worn one, and unfortunately for you, your daughter will wear one as well.
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History repeats itself is not only for fashion.
It pertains to pandemics too.
We all feel as if we are living through a unique event.
In a way, I suppose it is unusual for anyone alive today, but it is not a special event in human history.
Like the miniskirt, pandemics come and go.
Some are shorter than others, but just as sure, as rain falls and the sun rises in the east, there will be another pandemic once this one is finished.
Hopefully, the next major one will not be for another 100 years.
Study the past, and you will learn history repeats itself.
Learn the lessons of the past, and you will be as prepared as you can for the next time it does.
Flesch-Kincaid Readability Test
This post is understandable by someone with at least a 7th-grade education (age 12).
On the Flesch-Kincaid reading-ease test, this post scores 73.
The easier a passage is to read, the higher the score on a scale of 0 – 100.