Synchronicity

Headed to the gas station after work today. I was out of gas and had 20 miles to drive to get home, but I'm still broke and I wasn't sure if I would be have the money to pay. The gas station is right next to the hospital where I work. When I pulled up I thought I saw one of my coworkers and I briefly considered borrowing $5 from her before i realized it wasn't her. I've never had to do such a thing before and I hope I never have to. In any case, I found an old credit card and was able to use it to fill up. As I was getting back in my car to leave, the coworker I had thought I'd seen before pulled up. She mentioned that she figured she might as well take advantage of the relatively warm weather to get gas (it was still freezing and the lot was a disgusting slushy mess--I definitely wouldn't have stopped if I didn't have to.) I am curious if she would have decided to stop if I hadn't been thinking about her in a kind of desperate moment...almost

On December 21, 2012, some predicted that the end of an era described by ancient Maya would be the end of the world. Others believed that it was only the beginning of a new era of greater spiritual understanding, while some believed that nothing out of the ordinary would happen. I watched a couple of documentaries about the predictions and read a few articles saying that the Maya prophecies were blown out of proportion and had little relation to the actual beliefs of the ancient Maya. I didn't expect much change on December 21, but I did allow myself to imagine that perhaps my own spiritual awakening was related to or brought about by this wider cultural shift which many were fantasizing about. And I don't blame people for fantasizing, because who doesn't want a spiritual awakening that brings about an end to violence and hate in the world?  There is an  interesting (but not very well-written) article on the NASA website  which debunks many of the myths and ideas about a

Last year about this time I was decorating the Christmas tree with my husband & son.  We decided that the lights with green wire blended into the tree much better, but we only had one set of them, so my son & I headed out to purchase a string of lights.  I was trying to decide the best store to go--Walmart was closest, and as I passed it I thought to myself: "that was dumb, why am I going all the way to Lowe's?"  And I answered myself, "it's OK, you'll probably run into someone you know there."  Even though my hair & clothes reflected a long day spent at a tree farm, I wouldn't mind running into a friend.   When we got to Lowe's I saw my friend/co-worker Mike heading into the store right in front of me.  So I caught up with him and we discovered that we were both there for the same reason--to buy one string of lights.           It was so weird that we both showed up at the same time to buy the same thing from the same place.   I r

I happened to be working late tonight, trying to finish something up.  I mentioned before that I had started noticing elevens and today when I was getting ready to leave, I got an article request with an 11 in the identifying number for it.  I said to myself, I can take care of this tomorrow, but since there is an 11, I think I'll do it today (I know, kind of illogical and silly).  But the journal was in storage, so I had to hike up to the library's storage room.  On my way, I was walking by a TV in a lounge where the faces of Elizabeth & Lyric were on the screen.  I stopped in my tracks.  A minute later, a live press conference about Elizabeth Collins & Lyric Cook-Morrisey started.  I had no idea what it was about.  The lead investigator in the case came to the microphone and after a brief ramble about the case, he announced that two bodies had been found by hunters in the woods today at 12:45.  My heart sank.  The woman next to me clutched her heart and gasped.  There

This week the theme in my life seemed to be scams and gullability. On Tuesday I ensured a buddy of mine that I am a good judge of character and that I know whom to trust.  Then on Thursday I realized that one of the people I trusted is likely a scam artist who had stolen 1000s of dollars worth of books from me.  And while I talked to him, she walked by my office and I waved and smiled to her. On Wednesday, I asked Gabe in a comment on his blog  how we can distinguish between "new age mumbo jumbo" and worthwhile models when we read mysticism.  Basically, how does he orient himself so that he doesn't get lost in all of the fantastical ideas floating around?  (His answer, by the way, was that he uses intuition and experience). On Friday, I got an alumni newsletter from the University of Iowa in the mail which highlighted  research on the brain region responsible for gullability.  The  ventromedial area of the prefrontal cortex of the brain is one of the last areas to d