The Long Arm Of Coincidence

The wit Mark Twain observed: "Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities, truth isn't."

Below is a very old newspaper clipping which expands on this thought. 

For those of us look at life, our own lives especially, and find that many of the incidents in it seem just too coincidental to be mere coincidence, we suspect there is purpose and intention. The general order of the universe is our basis for faith in the idea of a Supreme Intelligence behind it.

Life seems to have a flow, a tide if you will, within which one can swim according to or against. I'm not arguing that going with the flow of your life will mean everything is always hunky-dory. Life isn't that way in general. The price of admission to this fantastic experience is that there will highs along with lows, sadness alternating with gladness and dark places  here and there in the light places.

The patterns are all there. Our intuition can be our guide if sought and relied upon. Life has often been referred to as a game. How we play it has everything to do with how it plays out.

Sting Of The Butterfly

If there is one saying that sums up the career of the "dancing master" of boxing Muhammad Ali it is "float like a butterfly sting like a bee," as performed in the above video by Ali and his assistant trainer Drew "Bundini" Brown.

Yesterday as I was reading about plans for Ali's upcoming funeral I came across this story of the strangest coincidence.

In the late champ's hometown at the Ali Center where mourners were gathering, a swarm of bees had settled in a tree beside a sign carrying the famous float slogan. For pictures click this link.

Beekeeper Kevin McKinney, who had been called in to help, called the event an "exceptional coincidence."

But it was the CEO and president of the Ali Center Donald Lassere who perhaps put it in a better perspective:

"The Muhammad Ali Center has always experienced what we have come to know as, 'Muhammad Magic,' but I cannot even conceive as to the genesis of those bees. However, it's possible his spirit is watching over the center, and he is wanting his fans to know that he is still 'floating like a butterfly and stinging like a bee.'"

Was that swarm off bees attracted by that "Muhammad Magic" in order to make a statement?

Overlooking Four Leaf Clovers (And A Lot More)

'Twas the Druids, I believe, who originally developed the belief that four-leaf clovers had magical powers and brought good luck.

They are rare, but not extraordinarily so. Perhaps you have known someone who had a knack for finding them. I once had friend who always seemed to be able to spot one in a patch of clovers. What the heck?

As a child I would look and look and look. I can honestly report I have never found one myself. Why? Lack of patience, I'm convinced. Finally I just gave up looking, except for an occasional glance whenever I come upon clovers.

Two thoughts occur to me while pondering this. One, I would suggest that the strange happenings in our lives go by unnoticed simply because we aren't really looking for them. Synchronicites, ("Godwinks" as SQuire Rushnell has termed them), which are defined as meaningful coincidences, do happen to all of us. But are we paying attention? I believe meaningful dreams are another overlooked source of intrigue. But how many pay attention to them? Dreams are most often had and then soon forgotten.

I have begun to suggest that keeping a journal for such things is a good way to put your journey into proper perspective.

My second thought is this: just as searching for four leaf clovers takes attention and patience, so the more mystical aspects of life are only noticeable to those who are actively watching for them.

I believe - because it seems to have been my experience - that prayers are not answered (and if that word troubles you read desires instead) apart from faith. I don't think of that, as some do, as attempting to cajole a sky-genii into granting a wish.

For me it is a matter of having a deep belief that life is not an accident, but has meaning and purpose. Perhaps I should say it can have meaning and purpose if we choose to live meaningfully and purposefully. If not, it can seem a veritable jumble.

Life is meaningful and the universe will cooperate with us - if we cooperate with it. I believe we must first open our spiritual eyes.

The Mythicist And The Meaningful Coincidence

Speaking of Jesus mythicism, the very intelligent and lovely Christ Mythicist D.M. Murdock, who used the pen name Acharya S, died recently, losing a courageous struggle she had waged against cancer.

I always enjoyed reading her work, which was highly controversial, as I enjoy most work which dabbles in myth and comparative religion.

I followed her brave struggle against her illness. It seemed she was doing really well when her death suddenly came - believe it or not - on Christmas Day, 2015.

My first thought was being struck by the coincidence. Murdock's first book was The Christ Conspiracy: The Greatest Story Ever Sold. She also wrote Who Was Jesus? Fingerprints of The Christ.  Also, Christ In Egypt: The Horus-Jesus Connection.

After so much attention to Jesus of Nazareth, how strange she would die on the very day Christians celebrate the birth of Jesus!

It struck me similarly to the coincidence of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson - who both played such important roles in the United States - dying on same Fourth of July (in 1826).

Such things happen we are reassured by the rationalists. Okay. Whether it be mere coincidence or meaningful coincidence, I find these things fascinating.

I will miss Murdoch. Perhaps now she is in a position to know more fully the subjects that challenged her mind in this life.

Halloween And Houdini: The Strange Synchronicity

Nearly nine decades after his untimely death, Houdini is still remembered as a magician extraordinaire and original escapologist. Perhaps not as well remembered was his crusade in his final years to expose fraudulent mediums and spiritualists. And that provides the basis for what I consider the synchronicity between Houdini and Halloween - that time of year traditionally thought to be when the veil between this life and the next is at its thinnest.

It wasn't so much that Houdini disbelieved in the spirit world or those who had crossed over being able to reach out to those still on this side of the veil,  but after having been disappointed time and again in his efforts to contact his beloved mother after her death, he grew angry over those who would prey on the grief of others.

For years he investigated, challenged, lectured against and exposed mediums, and towards the end of his career/life made demonstrations of fraudulent mediumship a part of his magic show. The battle he waged was so fierce that spiritualists began to curse him and predict his demise. Evidently Houdini began to suspect the spiritualists were seriously out to get him.

Many years after Houdini's death his friend and associate wrote a newspaper column which tells of a premonition Houdini was having concerning this. In his article How Did Houdini Know? Fulton Oursler revealed:

One Saturday in early autumn, Houdini called me on the telephone. He was very excited.

"Listen," he began, I'm leaving on a tour in a little while. Probably I'm talking to you for the last time. They are going to kill me."

"Who?"

"Fraudulent spirit mediums. Don't laugh. Every night they are holding seances and praying for my death. "

Oursler goes on to relate how a few weeks after that phone call he received a visit from a lady he called Mrs. Hartley, who claimed to have a message she received in a trance. It was allegedly from Professor James H. Hyslop, founders of  the American Society for Physic Research, and read:

"The waters are dark for Houdini. He thinks he has only broken his ankle, but his days of attacking spiritualism are over."  

The waters were indeed dark for Houdini. Shortly after Oursler received this message Houdini developed a case of appendicitis that he ignored. It soon progressed into a full blown peritonitis. This was fairly a death sentence in those pre-antibiotic days of the 1920s.

Struggling for days and surviving two surgeries, Houdini finally gave up the ghost on Halloween, 1926.

His widow, Bess, tried for a decade to make contact with him through seances, finally giving up and turning off the light for good at her personal shrine to her husband. She became convinced that communication with dead was not possible.

But that did not keep his admirers from continuing the Halloween seance tradition. I remember well as a teenager the hoopla in 1976 - the fiftieth anniversary of his death - when once again Houdini disappointed his fans. And you can bet that somewhere there will be those trying again to reach him this Halloween. The two forever seem to be connected.

Miracle Bill

I suppose I should start with my usual disclaimer that by miracle I mean an extremely outstanding and unusual event and not necessarily something against the known laws of nature. Whether one thinks of events such as the one that is the subject of this as post touching the divine or not depends on one's worldview.

Anyway, this story was widely written about and covered in the media a few months back. Just Google Peter Bilello and you can find out all about it.

 Peter and Grace Bilello had been married for fifty years. Peter was by Grace's side through her fourteen-year-long battle with cancer, which, sadly, she lost last year.

Back in 2009 Peter came up with the idea of he and Grace signing dollar bills. He kept Grace's signed bill in his wallet, but was distressed to find out one day that he had inadvertently spent it somewhere along the way. Disappointed, he assumed he would never see that bill again.

Time went on and his beloved wife died. He had regular "visits" with her at the cemetery, but of course he missed her terribly. Then one day in June of this year - five years after he lost the special dollar - he had taken his granddaughter  to a local Subway restaurant where she had received that very dollar in change.

The family now feels that this was Grace coming back to them. And Peter has put the dollar in a special place so he doesn't lose it again.

Peter considers this a miracle. I think that to say the least it is a very meaningful coincidence or example of synchronicity. I love these kinds of stories. I've experienced many of these meaningful events in my life. To me they are little indicators that maybe - just maybe - things are not just a mishmash.

Fireworks Display Predicts Ascent Of A President

The study of coincidence, I believe, is fascinating in itself. But when you plumb the possibility of meaningful coincidences - Synchronicity, as it is known - you go beyond the fascinating into the uncanny.

Below is an old newspaper clipping I found. While the story it tells is easy enough to dismiss as mere coincidence, it yet proved to be an eerie prediction of the future.

At that same Pan-American Exposition in 1901 President William McKinley was cut down by assassin Leon Czolgosz. fulfilling the fireworks prediction; for when that tragic event occurred, the presidency fell to Vice-president Theodore Roosevelt.

Interestingly enough, just as the fireworks display gradually dissolved from Our Vice-President into Our President, President McKinley did not die at once after being shot but lingered on for a week. At that point Theodore Roosevelt was "Our President."

The Warlock And I

As a teenager my hobby was magic. Chattanooga, the city where I grew up, had only one magic shop and I soon became friends with one of its demonstrators. There was another fellow who worked there - a dark, brooding character who not only was a sleight of hand artist (and a good one), but a warlock as well. At least that was his claim. He was a male witch.

After awhile my friend had the opportunity to purchase the magic shop. He was a young man but his parents believed in him enough to mortgage their home in order to raise the funds to make the purchase. Briefly I worked for him in his shop part-time.

Mr. Warlock, I will call him, had a creepy persona. He also was a man of few words, but I always found a connection with the underdogs in life. Unfortunately his personality didn't lend itself well to his job and he soon was dismissed. Which is how I got hired.

One day when I stopped by the magic shop I found the regulars and the other employees in a huddle. They were discussing Mr. Warlock. Seems he had placed a curse on the shop in retaliation for his dismissal. This was taken quite seriously.

To make a long story very short, several months after taking ownership of the shop my friend was forced to go out of business - because of lack of sales ... or because of the curse. Believe me, many took the latter very seriously indeed.

The successful magician must be a good actor in order to put his magic over. Anybody can be taught to perform tricks. It is the ability to act the part that causes one to stand out.

Mr. Warlock was quite mysterious. There is no doubt about it, he made a convincing warlock. There was something uncanny, even uncomfortable about being in his presence. People took the curse thing seriously.

I didn't, but timing is everything, and Mr. Warlock's timing couldn't have been better. The magic shop my friend bought was an established shop. My friend didn't change the way the shop operated in any way. Yet still the curse at least apparently came to pass. Coincidence?