Synchronicity

 

Synchronicity

According to the internet, synchronicity refers to the experience of seemingly meaningful events that appear to be connected, but lack a clear causal relationship. It is to be distinguished from coincidence, which refers to the occurrence of two or more events that happen at the same time or place but are not causally related. To be as clear as possible, synchronicity and coincidence both describe events occurring at the same time, but synchronicity adds the element of meaningful connection or interpretation by the individual experiencing them, while coincidence simply notes the occurrence of unrelated events. Got that?

Consider the following account from a gentleman in the Midwest:

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My wife passed away on January of 2023.

She had a jean jacket she loved. It was filled with patches from her travels and those of our daughter. They spent many an hour arranging those patches and sewing them onto the jacket. Weather permitting, my wife would wear that jacket everywhere. Strangers would comment on how sharp she looked in that jacket. She loved the attention.

In the year following my wife’s death, I never once saw a jean jacket with patches on it.

Exactly one year later, on the first anniversary of her death, four of us went to a local restaurant to trade reminiscences. Our party consisted of me, our daughter, my wife’s brother, and her best friend.

Imagine my surprise when I glanced out the restaurant window and saw a person walking across my field of vision from left to right wearing a jean jacket with patches all over the back. I was stunned, but I managed to recover in time to point out this person to my daughter. She had also seen the person but, unlike me, had the presence of mind to rush over to the window and take a couple of pictures of this person on her phone.

Good thing too because otherwise I might have convinced myself I had imagined the whole thing. I didn’t imagine it. It happened.

Perhaps you might like to examine the evidence. My wife’s jacket is on the left. The mysterious stranger is on the right.

Let’s confront the obvious question. What are the odds? There might be some small odds of seeing someone wearing a jean jacket with patches. I suppose it had to happen eventually. But what is the likelihood of it happening exactly one year to the day after my wife died?

I have raised this question with all sorts of people, including some highly educated and intelligent people. Some people are immediately ready to see this as a sign from the Great Beyond, presumably sent to comfort me. The approach from intellectuals is more nuanced: If it comforts me, then I should embrace it.

Look closely at the image on the right, and you might make out that there is a word across the jacket just below shoulder level. The word appears to be “UNITY.” Does that mean anything?

All I can say is that if this was just a strange coincidence, then it was a very very strange coincidence. I don’t know what to make of it. I may never know.

But I think the intellectuals have a point.

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This is a clear-cut case of synchronicity. It seems to UT that the obvious question is as follows: Is synchronicity a form of self-delusion? Is it just an extremely rare form of coincidence, blown out of proportion by the perceiver? Or is there perhaps a causal connection between the events, but a nonobvious one? You be the judge. But remember Arthur C. Clarke’s famous dictum: "Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic."

Question: Have you had an experience of synchronicity like the one above? Would you care to share it? This is your chance.