The cycles of life between abundance and scarcity

Life goes through cycles of expansion and contraction. We go through health and sickness, strength and of weakness, happiness and sadness, bliss and hardships.
When we get carried away and we forcibly try to push through our existence, then life slows us down by placing "speed bumps" on our way. 

These bumps take the form of failures, diseases or any kind of hardship.
There are lessons to be learned at each of these setbacks. Sometimes these "speed bumps" are signals to our body or our brain urging us to stop and take a much needed rest.
We have been around for a relatively long time, cycling through war and peace or swinging between famine and abundance.
Cycles are everywhere. The synchronized dance between light and darkness gives us night and day, the untiring succession of waves gives us  ebb and flow and the contrast between the falling dry leaves and the burgeoning flowers gives us seasons.
We are developing at a rapid pace, discovering new technologies all the time. We could say that we are in a cycle of thriving. 

Access to food and water is easier than before and people live longer to enjoy a more satisfying and fulfilling life than their progenitors.
When reading about history, we could safely assume that prior to our time, there existed technological development, that maybe, superseded ours.
Advancement is almost always followed by periods where people go back to more basic lifestyles, tilling the land, breeding cattle, or even going back to a nomadic lifestyle.
Civilizations much like symphonies, after an epic crescendo, implode into the void and come down to stripped down version of themselves before flourishing again.