Too Busy for Synchronicity?

Can you tell me a story of when synchronicity changed your life? You ran into the right person at the right time. You learned about something that led to a new job, passion or relationship. You were following your inner-guidance with courage and some trepidation, when support you would have never imagined showed up along the way.

Synchronicity, in the spiritual sense, is the way your inner-guidance shows you that you are on the right path or helps you get back on that path if you’ve taken a detour. The thing that can be challenging about this sort of magic is allowing enough flexibility in your life to listen, adjust and say yes to the guidance.

In 2000, I decided to go to a writing retreat not far from home in Grand Lake Colorado, it was a last-minute decision because I didn’t have a lot of money. I was questioning many parts of my life, self-employed as an artist, having just turned 30. The retreat was at a hostel and our group mostly filled it up but there were a few other travelers staying there.

One of the travelers was a man from the Netherlands, Philippe who had been hiking through Rocky Mountain National Park. He had planned to hike a loop back to his starting point but twisted his ankle and needed to exit the opposite side of the park to get a ride back to Denver. I was enjoying the discussion in the common area with the travelers when we met.

The next morning at breakfast we had a great conversation. He was getting a ride to Denver. An older woman in the writing group had been engaged in the conversation at our table. When he offered her his business card she turned around and handed it to me. She said, “Actually, I think this young lady needs it.”

After the writing retreat I went home, got an office job and ended my live-in relationship. I was listening to my guidance. A few months later I ran across Philippe’s card when I was cleaning my desk and sent him an email. We became email friends, it was before social media existed. A couple years later he came to Colorado and we climbed Mount Bierstadt together. Four years after we met, he came to visit again and we fell in love.

We had a magical and challenging time together, as many long-distance relationships go, that require one person to move countries. We loved deep and taught each other many things while together. The synchronicity and karmic connection we experienced was profound and wonderful. Each of us listening to our inner guidance lead our paths in different directions after a few years. If I hadn’t made room for synchronicity I might have missed this amazing experience.

Making plans creates the structure of your life and allows you to get many things done in a concentrated amount of time. Stuff that might not happen if there were no plans. Yet too many plans or chronic busyness can block your inner-guidance, make you overlook the synchronicity altogether or not have time for it when it shows up.

Listening to our inner-guidance and being open to synchronicity isn’t always comfortable. We might hear something that means we need to change in a way that is scary or unsettling. But living without listening is not living at all. It’s getting caught in a current that is not taking you where your soul wants you to go.