Synchronicity - The Universe's Way of Saying You're Getting Warmer

"Synchronicity is the Universe saying you're getting warmer."

- Michelle Risi

You may be familiar with the term "synchronicity" but if not, it is a concept first explained by psychoanalyst, Carl Jung (1875-1961), and refers to events that are "meaningful coincidences" i.e. they occur with no causal relationship yet seem to be meaningfully related.

I have experienced an awful lot of meaningful coincidences in my life, especially around the time of my husband's sudden death when we were both 32.

Mind you, I was probably more open to the strangeness of the seemingly unrelated - yet somehow connected - events because of the shock of his sudden death and the immense impact that had on my heart and soul.

In fact, according to Charlene Belitz and Meg Lundstrom in their book, The Power of Flow:

Practical Ways to Transform Your Life With Meaningful Coincidence, synchronicity is more likely to occur when we are in a highly-charged state of emotional and mental awareness.

And yet, as Jung points out: "Synchronicity is an ever-present reality for those who have the eyes to see it."

In other words, we don't have to be in the throes of an intense emotional and/or psychological trauma in order to experience synchronicity - which is a good thing!

In her essay, Synchronicity and the Soul, writer Nancy Seifer explains how "Jung recognized that synchronicity... had the effect of breaking through the rationalistic shell of the modern scientific mind. It is a form of coincidence powerful enough to shatter the notion that material science has discovered all there is to know about the universe. To the person having an experience of synchronicity, the realization dawns that a mysterious force is at play in the world - a kind of cosmic clock whose gears operate on a more subtle plane."

But to what end? Are we to be taking something from these synchronistic experiences?

I think so. So does Seifer. "As the soul awakens," she explains, "it turns to the task of uncovering the meaning of life experiences, attempting to discern what each new circumstance may be trying to teach us."

Seifer goes on to explain that, "Because the experience has particular meaning to the individual involved, it has the power to open a portal to the world of meaning... the world of the soul."

So why are we often so quick to chalk up a series of unusual incidents - that deep down, we suspect may be trying to tell us something - as mere "coincidence"?

Because, as Belitz and Lundstrom explain: "Our scientific worldview is built on the concept of cause and effect. As a culture, we tend to doubt and deny aspects of experience that aren't measurable and verifiable."

Aha!

That explains why, when I once told a room full of police officers trying to plan my husband's funeral that I thought there was a correlation between the Disneyland Parade we were in the week before and his funeral procession the next week, I was met with wide-eyed looks of concern. Clearly, I was off my rocker.

Maybe. But maybe not.

This much I know: connecting those two unrelated events would only make sense to me. And now that seventeen years have passed since that uncomfortable moment in my living room, I can safely say that enough strange "coincidences" have happened that it is only by NOT paying to attention them that I would have gone off my rocker.

To me, synchronicity has become a tool I use to help me keep on track in my life, work and writing. When enough odd things start happening, I take some time to process what might be going on and what lessons I should perhaps be learning - and then tweak accordingly.

Based on personal experience over the years, I do suspect synchronicity is the Universe's way of letting us know we are getting warmer. Our job, of course, is to pay attention to the hints being sent our way.

Maryanne Pope is the CEO of Pink Gazelle Productions and the author of the creative non-fiction book, A Widow's Awakening. For further details on A Widow's Awakening or to read Maryanne's blogs, please visit http://www.pinkgazelle.com/. To sign up to receive Maryanne's Life After Loss blog series, please visit http://www.pinkgazelle.com/contact/life-after-loss-subscription/.



 By Maryanne Pope


Article Source: Synchronicity - The Universe's Way of Saying You're Getting Warmer