Turning: A Human Experience

24° · The cosmos

You are turning right now

Even sitting still, you are moving. Earth spins at up to 1,000 miles an hour. It also circles the Sun at about 67,000 miles an hour. And the Sun carries us all around the center of our galaxy, the Milky Way, about once every 230 million years.

Everything you have ever done, you have done while turning.

پس حکیمان گفته‌اند این لحنهااز دوار چرخ بگرفتیم مابانگ گردشهای چرخست این که خلقمی‌سرایندش به تنبور و به حلق

The sages said: we learned these melodies from the turning heavens.What people sing with voice and strings echoes the turning of the sky.

NASA ↗

Illustration: the points of light swirl into a spiral galaxy. A small marker, about halfway out, shows where the Sun sits. The Milky Way is about 100,000 light-years across.

48° · The cell

Turning happens inside you

Nearly every kind of cell in your body holds tiny power plants called mitochondria. Inside them are real motors, called ATP synthase. Each one has a ring of eight parts that spins as it makes ATP, the fuel your cells run on.

Tiny motors are turning inside many of your cells right now.

PNAS ↗

Illustration: a cell with a glowing nucleus. A magnified inset shows an eight-part ring spinning. A human cell is about 0.02 mm across.

72° · Before birth

We are born turning

Before birth, a baby stretches, rolls, and turns. Near the end, most settle head-down. Birth itself is a series of turns. To pass through the mother’s pelvis, the baby’s head and shoulders rotate step by step. These turns are part of what midwives and doctors call the cardinal movements.

The inner-ear structures that help you sense turning and balance begin forming very early in pregnancy.

NCBI ↗

Illustration: a small figure of light, curled and slowly turning inside a soft, warm circle. A baby at birth is about 50 cm long.

96° · Play

Before skill, we turn for joy

No one has to explain the fun of spinning to a child. Arms out, around and around, until the room tilts and everyone falls down laughing. Playgrounds are full of turns: merry-go-rounds, swings, cartwheels, rolling down a hill.

That dizzy delight is your inner ear at work.

Illustration: the figure of light stands up, arms wide, and spins, its hands tracing circles of light. A child, arms out, is about 1.2 m across.

120° · Skill

Turning becomes skill

With practice, the same motion becomes strategy, beauty, and power. Almost every sport, dance, and martial art has its turns. Choose one:

Physics you can feel. Pull your arms in during a spin and you speed up. Figure skaters use this on every spin. Scientists call it conservation of angular momentum.

Illustration: the figure of light takes the pose of the chosen move and turns with it: a soccer pivot, a pirouette, a spinning kick, a discus throw in a wide stance with the disc held back (a slower turn), or a figure-skating spin with arms pulled in (the fastest turn, with rings drawn close to the body). Rings of light circle the feet, hips, and hands, and small icons of the five moves sit below the figure. An athlete mid-turn is about 1.7 m tall.

144° · Inward

Not every turn moves the body

We turn our attention.We turn toward someone.We turn away from old habits.We return to things we forgot.

Sometimes the most important turn happens where no one else can see it.

Sometimes we turn back toward what matters.

A word: tawba

In Arabic, tawba carries the sense of turning or returning. In Islam, it means turning back toward God.

What does it mean, for you, to return?

What would it mean to turn without moving at all?

Illustration: the figure stands still with arms crossed over the chest. A line of light runs through it from crown to floor while a ring circles slowly at heart height.

168° · Why turn?

Body. Mind. Spirit.

There can be stillness inside movement. The body keeps turning while the mind grows quiet. For some people, turning becomes meditation. For others, prayer. Explore three: body, mind, spirit.

Illustration: three rings of light around a small figure, the outer ring for body, the middle for mind, the inner for spirit. The chosen ring glows.

192° · The Sufi Sema

Turning becomes remembrance

اگر چرخ وجود من از این گردش فروماندبگرداند مرا آن کس که گردون را بگرداند

If the wheel of my being should stop in this turning,the One who turns the heavens will turn me.

Sufi traditions grew within Islam around remembrance, love, and the inner life. Different Sufi paths practice it in different ways. Some Sufis turn in dhikr (“remembrance”) of Love and God.

The Mevlevi Sema is one distinctive form of remembrance, from Rumi’s tradition. After Rumi’s death in 1273, his son Sultan Walad and later followers shaped his circle into the Mevlevi order. Over time, the Sema (the Turkish form of the Arabic sama, “listening”) became a formal ceremony of music, poetry, prayer, and turning.

Reading the Sema

The ceremony follows a set order:

• It begins with the Na‘t, a song praising the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh).
• After a slow opening walk, the turners take off their black cloaks and begin to turn.
• The turning unfolds in four parts, called selams.
• While they turn, they silently repeat the name of God, so the remembrance continues through every turn.
• It ends with a reading from the Qur’an and a prayer. The reading often begins with the verse “Wherever you turn, there is the face of God” (2:115).

In traditional Mevlevi interpretation:

• The turners, called semazens, begin with arms crossed over the chest, a sign of God’s oneness.
• As the arms open, the right palm faces up to receive and the left palm faces down to pass the gift on.
• They turn right to left, around the heart, pivoting on the left foot.
• The tall felt hat (sikke) stands for the tombstone of the ego, the black cloak for the grave, and the white skirt (tennure) for the shroud.
• Each semazen turns on their own axis while the whole circle revolves together, an image often compared to planets around the sun.

About this practice

This page introduces the Sufi Sema; it does not teach it. I am not an authorized teacher of Sema. I learn and practice dhikr within a Rifa‘i circle, and I share this as a learner rather than as a representative of any tradition.

UNESCO ↗

Illustration: the figure of light turns with the right hand raised and the left lowered, a wide bell-shaped skirt of light spinning around it, while smaller points of light circle the floor.

216° · Turning for strength

Charkh in the Iranian zurkhaneh

اگر چرخ گردان کشد زین توسرانجام خاکست بالین تو

Though the turning heavens raise you high,in the end, the earth will be your pillow.

Zurkhaneh means “house of strength.” Athletes train together in a sunken pit called the gowd, while the morshed (“guide”) leads the room with drum, poetry, and rhythm. Its tradition, Pahlavani (from pahlavan, “champion”), joins physical strength with javanmardi — humility, courage, generosity, service, and devotion. Imam Ali is honored as its model of strength used in service of others. A pahlavan is not only a champion or hero; the ideal is strength joined to character and chivalry. The low doorway asks everyone to bow before entering.

Ancient roots, later institution

Iran had traditions of wrestling, warrior training, and the pahlavan — the hero-champion of epic poetry — long before the zurkhaneh took the form we know today. Rostam, the great hero of Ferdowsi’s Shahnameh (completed around 1010), became one of the pahlavan’s lasting models. The word pahlav is tied to Parthia, and some accounts trace the martial lineage of Pahlavani back to the Parthian era (about 247 BC–AD 224).

Over centuries, older Iranian heroic traditions mixed with javanmardi, Islamic devotion, Sufi culture, poetry, music, and older Persian beliefs. The zurkhaneh itself is documented much later and is clearly established by the Safavid era.

A story about strength

Pahlavan Mahmud of Khwarazm, remembered as Pouriya-ye Vali, was a 14th-century wrestler and poet. Many zurkhanehs are named for him. A popular legend says that before a great match he heard his young opponent’s mother praying for her son, and chose to lose. The story is still told to show that a champion’s strength is meant to serve others.

UNESCO ↗

Illustration: the figure of light spins fast with arms out above an eight-sided floor pattern, while rings pulse outward like drumbeats.

240° · Meaning

A turn is never just a turn.

The same movement can mean play, competition, prayer, discipline, celebration, or devotion. Meaning comes from everything around it.

Around a center

In Mecca, Muslim pilgrims circle the Kaaba seven times in an act of worship called tawaf.

Tawaf is not dance, and it is not Sema. But both invite a question: what happens when movement is organized around a center?

Illustration: four clusters of light around a small figure, labeled space, rhythm, people, and intention. The chosen one glows brightest.

264° · Everyone turns

How do you turn?

You’ve been turning your whole life.

Maybe it’s a move from a sport, a dance you love, or a game from childhood. Maybe it’s a turn from a family celebration, or just the way you spin a chair while you think. Find it, and try a small, slow version of it on your own.

Then ask yourself: where did you learn it? What does it mean to you? Ask the people around you for theirs. Put a few side by side and you’ll see what this page has been saying: turning is everywhere.

If moving isn’t right for you today, or if you have a balance or inner-ear condition, have had a recent concussion, or have been told to avoid spinning, picture your turn or trace it with your hands. That counts too. Before you try anything that spins, read Turn with care.

Need an idea?

Illustration: a small figure of light stands with open arms inside a circle of twelve lights that brighten one after another, like people taking turns around a circle. Six of the lights carry the names of the ideas: play, sport, martial arts, performance, ritual and celebration, and everyday.

288° · Find your axis

Your turn

One slow turn, in about a minute. You can stand or sit. If you sit, turn your head and shoulders only as far as feels comfortable. Nothing here asks you to spin. With sound on, a soft tone marks each breath and each quarter turn.

Illustration: a figure of light stands on a vertical line of light inside a circle of light that fills a quarter at a time as the figure turns, then settles into a single still point.

312° · Care

Turn with care

Stopping is part of turning.

Build up slowly, in short rounds, with time to rest in between. Do not push through dizziness.

• Start slow and small.Short turns first; let your body adjust.
• Breathe normally.Don’t hold your breath.
• Keep your head upright.Chin level or slightly lifted, gaze soft.
• Stop early.Stop before dizziness gets strong, not after.
• Land on purpose.Feet planted, hands to heart, breathe. Touch the floor if it helps.
• Every choice counts.Walking, swaying, watching, or stepping out are always welcome.

If you feel faint, sick to your stomach, very disoriented, or unsteady, stop right away, sit or lie down somewhere safe, and wait until you feel steady again.

Before you turn, clear some space away from furniture, keep water nearby, and wear clothes you can move in. If you have a balance or inner-ear condition, are recovering from a concussion, or have been told to avoid spinning, try imagining the movement, tracing it with your hands, walking, swaying, observing, or stepping out.

Illustration: a figure of light stands calmly with one hand on the heart and one on the belly, feet planted on a softly glowing floor.