Synchronicity & Altered States

In Bernie Beitman’s Coincidence Project and at the Coincidence Cafe, we’ve been talking about synchronicity and altered states. Are we more open to synchronicity when we’re dreaming, meditating, relaxing, doing drugs? Or, as synchronicity author Ken Harris contends, perhaps we live in an altered state already.

My synchronicities tend to happen when I don’t expect them. I’m going about my business – writing, running errands, driving, whatever, and the synchro happens. But I’ve also experienced synchros in “altered states.”

For years after my parents died, I followed their progress in the afterlife through my dreams. My mother, who had Alzheimer’s the last 10 years or so of her life, died in 2000, after two and a half years in an Alzheimer’s unit. She was 84. My dad, who had Parkinson’s, died in 2005. He was nearly 92.

In the earlier dreams, my mother was still pushing her walker through the halls of the Alzheimer’s unit, calling out for my dad. She stopped people in the hall and asked, “Have you seen Tony?”

I had several of those dreams. They made me uneasy. It seemed unfair that in the afterlife she would still have Alzheimer’s.

I think my dad started releasing his hold on life after he read Carol Bowman’s book, Children’s Past Lives, and subsequently saw her on 20/20 investigating the James Leinenger case.

By the end of the documentary, tears rolled down his face. “That’s the most convincing evidence I’ve ever seen for reincarnation.” He died four months later.

In my afterlife dreams about him, he’s sometimes running. In life, he and my mother were both runners, six days a week. He was younger in these dreams, no signs of crippling Parkinson’s. Or I sometimes saw him studying at a desk similar to the one in his home office. His adjustment to the afterlife seemed smoother than hers.

In 2008 or 2009, Rob taught meditation at a local gym. During one class, we did an eyes half-open meditation. Suddenly, in a corner of the room, I saw my mother. She looked to be about 40, vibrant, laughing. She was on a sidewalk where a long line of people were waiting to get into a theater, and she was ushering them in. She looked wonderful. Then I saw her wave and my dad walked into the image, a bounce to his walk, no wheelchair. He was younger.

I felt a sense of completion.

I believe they realized I could see them and faded away. I haven’t dreamed of them since, at least not in this sequence.

But in my usual state of consciousness – which Ken believes is naturally an altered state- I’ve experienced synchros that have changed my life. Consciousness is flexible. It’s our doorway to other dimensions, other worlds, and synchronicity is its voice.