What Synchronicity Can Teach Us
Written By: Sanderson Sims
Terence Mckenna, the famous ethnobotanist and protégé of Timothy Leary once said “The world is not just strange. It is stranger than strange.”
There is an air of insanity in our divisive politics and our economics. We don’t seem able to respond to this world-wide pandemic with any sense of order or ease. Sometimes it feels that we may have lost our ability to navigate or even contemplate what is coming next.
This can and does cause increased pessimism and fear. And because the news basically focuses on sensationalism at the extremes, this adds fuel to the fire. And so it goes. Stress is certainly apparent everywhere.
But is there a countervailing possibility?
In times like these, learning to develop and trust our intuition can be one of the most positive things we can do. We can intentionally seek out “ah-ha” moments and be pleasantly surprised by the ways in which our own minds and hearts can attract grace. We can have more and more wonderful experiences, if we tell ourselves we really want them.
Yet when we begin to go down this path, there can be trepidation and doubt. How do we know that our mind is not just playing tricks on us? It can be maddening!
Something helpful is to be on the lookout for recognizing synchronicity. Carl Jung defined this as “meaningful coincidences.” When one occurs, and we recognize it, this will reinforce our confidence.
One might wonder if there is truly evidence that meaningful coincidences exist. Where is the proof? Suffice it to say that absence of proof is not proof of absence. The realms of consciousness are perhaps infinitely grand and as we evolve, its fabric is slowly revealed.
So what might be an example of a synchronicity? Let us say that you are considering taking a trip to South America or to Europe, as soon as the pandemic is over. You are on a zoom call with your best friend and she says her parents have an apartment in Buenos Aires and are looking for someone to house sit and take care of their cat when this crisis is over. South America now becomes more feasible.
Sometimes it is a synchronicity that gives a piece of information a heightened sense of importance. Here is a personal example:
For a long time I have always wanted to see wild animals in their natural habitat, however, living in a city is not an ideal local from which to experience this. Recently, I was on my daily walk. The uphill road ran along a golf course fairway. I had my ear plugs in and was listening to Eckhart Tolle who was giving a talk on how the human species has perhaps reached the limits of solving problems with just our minds. We can drill down just so far and then our brains sort of exhaust themselves.
He turned to the example of the caterpillar and how it uses all of its resources to exist as a caterpillar, severely confined by gravity to an extremely slow and vulnerable pace. But then, something magical happens: it spins a cocoon about itself and within time is transformed, emerging as a beautiful butterfly, now able to effortlessly flit here and there. Did the caterpillar know its future or did these transformative forces simply express themselves as part of a greater knowing?
As I was pondering this I looked up. Coming down the fairway and towards me in the noon day sun was a fox. I had never seen a fox in the neighborhood. Grabbing my phone camera I snapped several shots as it passed by.
What was profound, however, was the rare fox sighting juxtaposed with the idea presented by Eckhart Tolle that we could experience wonders that our conscious mind had not ever imagined. It gave me pause to realize that amidst all of our calamities, we still live in a strangely wonderful world in which we can attune our consciousness to unknown possibilities.
