It’s said often enough to be a cliché, but I truly don’t believe in coincidences.
Carl Jung, one of my favorite geniuses, used the word synchronicity to describe “the temporally coincident occurrences of acausal events.” Basically, patterns. Unrelated things in your life link up strongly enough to give you pause, make you think, “Well, that’s odd. What a coincidence.” But as I said, I don’t believe in those.
I often have periods of serious synchronicity; they flutter around me like the white butterflies outside that like to circle my head. I forget what it was, but not long ago I heard an odd word for the first time in an audio file (I’m a transcriptionist), and then heard it again three more times over the following week in files from different clients on totally different subjects. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve suddenly thought of a song I haven’t heard in years, and guess what comes on next time I listen to the radio? Just a few days ago, I went to several stores, and each time I got back in the car, the same song was playing. I know the same songs tend to rotate at any given time, but then the same song was also playing in one of the stores. I don’t remember the song, but I was annoyed because I dislike it.
Sylvia Browne (yes, I know she’s controversial, but I loved her) said synchronicity happening in your life is a sign that you’re on the path where you’re supposed to be. It’s your chart’s way of telling you, “See these patterns? You yourself put them in place before you were born. You’re heading in the right direction.” When these validating little details come in strings to me, I give a little bow to my patron god, and say thank-you. I otherwise rarely feel that I’ve made the right choices in my life. I’m not miserable or anything. I have a nice and loving family. I like my job. I’m enjoying college. My dilemma is mostly just what my first therapist tried so hard to counsel me through – my regret that I wasted so many years in anxiety and isolation.
Synchronicity didn’t come in those years. Can I truly be on the path now if I strayed so far from it for so long? Or maybe my path was always meant to be winding, that those years of pain and doubt could be nothing else, could not be replaced by something better. It would make sense if I learned something from that sad time. I’ll have to see, if I become a therapist, if I can use that experience to understand my patients better.
Have you ever heard of Ardmore, Oklahoma? Most people probably haven’t, I don’t think it’s famous for anything. I didn’t know the name until my family was preparing to move to California, and we were looking for interesting places to stop on the way. Somehow I found out that a few of Marie Antoinette’s childhood dolls were on display in Ardmore’s public library, and so, we did stop there so I could look at them. That was years ago, and I’d barely thought of the visit there since, until two days ago when my mother found some pictures we’d taken of the doll case and gave them to me. The following day, the audio file I was working on just happened to mention a minor event that took place in, you guessed it, Ardmore, Oklahoma.
What does this occurrence mean? I don’t know. Maybe nothing. Maybe it’s one of those things where the universe or my god is just saying, “Hey, remember this?” It could just be another sign that the Antoinette life is strongly connected to this one, as I know it is. The point of that connection…well, I’m still figuring that out.
My Longing Shall Gather 