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| Always a van full and some are not even mine |
Meaningful Coincidences
Earlier this week, I was singing the song “If I could,” the Nancy Wilson version. The lyrics of the song reveal a parent telling their child that they would protect them from all of life’s woes, if only they could.
“If I could, I’d protect you from the sadness in your eyes. Give you courage in a world of compromise, if I could. (Listen to If I Could)
I love this song and I adore the voice of Nancy Wilson. Miss Nancy recorded the song when I was just 28; long before I took the call from my mother asking me to take my sister’s 3 children and before I took in a few more. Back then I did not understand the meaning of the lyrics.
“If I live in a time and place where you don’t want to be, you don’t have to walk this lonesome road with me. My yesterday won’t have to be your way.
I had no idea how meaningful this song would be to me now. This week in an attempt to drown out the tinnitus in my ears, I was singing it loudly. Then when I turned on the radio, the song that was recorded in 1988 which I hadn’t heard for years was playing on the radio.
This is what Carl Jung would call synchronicity. In The Roots of Coincidence, psychologist, Carl Jung described the concept of synchronicity as the experience of two or more apparently unrelated events occurring together by chance in a meaningful way. In other words, synchronicity is a meaningful coincidence.
I like to think of synchronicity as the language of God. In those Divine utterances we get to see that we are on the right track and we are reminded that everything is connected and all things work together.
I love these moments and as I get older, I tend to have many more of them. Perhaps this is due to the fact that I have more references or maybe it’s because I pay attention and look for them. But maybe, it’s because I am open and willing to see and hear.
I have had many of these meaningful coincidences and when I do, I stop and pay attention.
A few days ago, I took my daughter to get an eye exam. We were the first ones in the office so the receptionist looked at us a little funny and asked if we were early. I said no and that we didn’t have an appointment but we wanted to see if we could get in. This is something I could not have done in the past. With at least 4 of the 5 children and my mother in tow, I always tried to schedule all exams and appointments at the same time which was a logistical nightmare. With just my daughter, I decided to try to act like other folks and just walk in hoping for an opening.
The receptionist recognized me from years of coming but said that she thought I had scheduled an appointment. Just as she was looking in her records, Mr. William Berry walked in. He had scheduled an appointment for the same time we were there. Now, I have a son named William, but this Mr. Berry happened to be non-black (don’t you just love it when a writer describes someone who as not their race as a non-something or other.) The receptionist told us that we were the only Berry’s in the thousands of patients and we happened to come in on the same day. I told her about my friend and sister Bernita Berry who I went to graduate school with. We’d both been accepted at Kent State because they thought we were the same person.
While I waited for my daughter, Mr. Berry and I shared a few stories. I told him how the night before I parked my minivan outside of the grocery store and when I came out some guy was in it trying to start it. The man had the same van and thought ours was his. Mr. Berry laughed and said the same thing had happened to him earlier in the week, but he had been the guy in someone else’s sports car. He had just gotten the sports car having let go of his minivan.
I laughed and told him I got rid of my sports car when I got the van.
So what does all or any of this mean? It means there are times in life when you just have to sit, be still and pay attention. There is more to the Universe than we can see or know.
When I pay attention to those meaningful coincidences I get the message that I need to hear; that my life has been changed by the beautiful children who I have been blessed to raise. I went from a sports car to a van. The song I loved at 28 has a message for me now; I’ve watched the children grow so I could let them go.
They have changed me and I have changed them, but I am still Bertice Berry.
· What meaningful coincidence have you experienced lately?
· What could it be telling you?
· Recall a moment of synchronicity and share it with someone.
· What story did they tell you in return?
We are all connected. Every now and then, we get moments to see just how close we all are.
Be you, be well, be aware.
Bertice Berry, PhD
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| Driving solo in my mini van |
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