Tag Archives: synchronicity

Synchronicity and Writing Connections

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I’m always excited when synchronicity comes along in my life. So you can imagine how I laughed out loud when I received a Darakwon book in the mail this week, authored by my friend, Suzanne.

Um…hold on a tic. You’re going to need the backstory. So here’s what happened: I just finished the first draft of my latest Darakwon book. But when I received my editor’s notes, she requested a different format (more of a report than story format). Which would require a major revision.

Now, I don’t get too worked up about revisions; it’s part of the writing process. But I sometimes am challenged by my friends at Darakwon, mostly because we communicate a little differently. I did not want to end up doing three or four revisions until we were, quite literally, on the same page with this book. So I asked the editor to send me a sample chapter of the report format and she immediately agreed to send me an entire book.

Perfect! And here’s the book she sent to help me with my revision:

suzanne-book

 

Can you see the author’s name on the bottom? Take my word for it, it’s my friend, Suzanne. But if you want to know how synchronicity comes into this story, you’ll need to zip over and read “Writing Connections: You Never Know” over at The Muffin.

And then you can laugh out loud, too. (And P.S. Thanks, Suzanne! Again.)

 

Dreams of the Dying

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So I read an article in the Atlanta Journal Constitution about the dreams of the dying and I thought about Dad.

Dad close upDad died a month ago, but for a few months preceding his death, we talked about dreams and otherworldly stuff.

He dreamed about his mother and a picnic and he asked me what I thought the dream meant. And I asked–as I always ask when interpreting dreams–how did you feel in the dream?

In the dream, he felt happy, contented. But upon waking, he was fearful. He thought the dream was about death. Specifically, his death. I rolled my eyes at his overly dramatic assumption, though if I’m being honest, I, too, felt it might have been his mother telling him to get ready. I didn’t want him worrying and fearful, though, so I made light of it.

And then in November, there was that song he kept thinking of–In The Garden–and you know I shared the synchronicity of that event and how, once again, I felt Mom was sending him and me a message.

So when I read the AJC article, it wasn’t news to me. I knew Dad’s own psyche and his many loved ones, had tried to prepare him for what was to come. I’m not sure I was as prepared.

I mean, I’m certain that at long last, he’s with my mom again, and that truly makes me happy. But I’m feeling a tad sorry for myself and missing him terribly.

And so I work. I worked up something for the Chicken Soup for the Soul book on synchronicity and if you have a similar story, I hope you’ll write about it, too. Not because getting in a Chicken Soup for the Soul book is awesome (though it is pretty cool) but because, sometimes, writing those stories can lift the clouds that envelop one’s soul in those darkest moments.

And a sweet dream would be nice, too.

Synchronicity and a Song and Mom

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Back in the day, way back in the day, I read The Celestine Prophecy, a sort of New Age-y, spiritual journey novel that enjoyed serious best-seller status.

To be honest, I don’t remember much about the story. What I remember is the concept of synchronicity, the belief that coincidences have a meaning for those who experience them. The thing is, I’ve always ascribed to Albert Einstein’s theory, that “coincidence is God’s way of remaining anonymous.” I woke up thinking about both synchronicity and Einstein’s quote and so I’ll share my story and you can let me know what you think.

On Monday night, in my daily phone call to Dad, he mentioned a song that he’d been thinking of lately. He couldn’t remember all the words and so he asked the woman who leads his bible study if she knew the song. She did; it’s a beautiful, old Christian tune and Dad sang to me a bit of the chorus, the part of the song he remembered. “You won’t know it, of course.” But he croaked out a couple lines, anyway, “And He walks with me, and He talks with me.” And I smiled, because I do know that song and I picked up the chorus: “And He tells me I am His own.”

Dad was surprised that I knew it, but he was even more surprised how I knew it: Mom used to sing that song. Not in recent years, but when I was a child.

I have few memories of my years in Texas; we moved to Georgia when I was seven. But I can see my mom, standing at the sink at our house in Arlington, washing dishes. And I hear that song.

I have not thought of that song in years. Years and years and years. But I thanked Dad for sharing with me, because it was a gift to remember Mom singing that song. And he thanked me, because he always loves hearing memories of Mom. “Perhaps your mother wanted us to hear that song,” he said.

Maybe, I thought. So I searched for the song and gave a listen to all the words. It really is a lovely song. And that might have been the end of it if I hadn’t been watching The Voice last night when Emily Ann Roberts sang In the Garden in the Live Playoffs:

Well, you don’t have to knock me over the head with it, Mom. I got the message.

So tell me, what do you think of synchronicity and coincidences? Writers are always chastised for including coincidences in a story, that real life doesn’t happen that way. But I think it’s just the opposite, that weird things happen all the time, events that defy logic or explanation.

Truth really is stranger than fiction.