Living a Groundhog Day: A Curse or Blessing?

                
                
As people always say: we have only one lifetime. It is said, most often than not, with a tint of regret. But what would life be like if it’s not only once, but a repetition again and again? This is what the movie Groundhog Day tries to explore.
Phil Conners was a weathermen who was cynical about life. Apart from broadcasting the weather day to day, he had an annual task – to go to a little town broadcasting the Groundhog Day, forecasting how far the spring was yet. It started as any other day, but ended very differently – it didn’t end. Phil was trapped into a circle where he got up and slept into the same day again and again. So what would you do if you were living the same day again and again? Well, Phil tried everything. Without tomorrow, there was no consequences. He stole money, mocked people, cheated to have sex. He also set up the woman he loved to get close to her. But at the end of the day, nothing changed. He was still the lonely, bitter, cynical man he used to be. And then another day came, he just had to start it all over again feeling lonelier than ever. So he tried to kill himself, many times, but that didn’t work, either. No matter what happened, he still woke up into today. All right, since it was impossible to die, you might want to live it in some other ways. So he started to practice piano, run around to save lives, and act really nicely with people around him. It’s one of those “if you cannot change life, change yourself to adjust to it”. So he adjusted himself to pick up all these things we deemed worthwhile, probably because, if drawn from the movie, these things requires time and therefore the happiness and sense of success from it is long lasting and totally belongs to oneself. Now our Phil is a new man. He offered help to everyone in this little town, he played piano wonderfully, and he quoted poems in his broadcasting, and eventually appreciated by everyone, including the woman he loved and thought would never love him back. Everything was still the same, except Phil himself, and then the next day became different – he woke up into a tomorrow.
We cannot choose how long our life would be, but we can choose how to live it. It is human nature choosing the easier way, and most often than not, the less right way. But the habit of following the easier call might be what leads you into the pits and makes you regret on your deathbed. Only by setting such an extreme situation as everyday is today, can Phil start to look at his life and really think about how to make it differently. Luckily, we are not Phil, and we don’t live today again and again. Oh, wait… give it a second thought, don’t we really? Are you sure the differences between your yesterday and today have exceeds the scope of the food you eat? If not, think about it and do something to change it. A curse or blessing? Luckily, we are the ones to make that call.