light man
Synchronicity and magical thinking are close friends. They may even be Siamese twins who share a common heart.
But what is magical thinking?
Elias Howe had an idea about a machine with a needle that would penetrate cloth. He fiddled around with various ideas – a hole through the middle of the needle, for instance – but nothing worked. One night, he dreamed he was taken prisoner by a group of cannibals who danced around him with spears. Howe noticed that the spears all had holes near the tip. When he woke up, he realized the dream had provided the solution to his problem. By locating a hole at the tip of the needle, the thread could be caught after it went through cloth thus making his machine operable. Is that magical thinking? You bet.
A man entered a tanning salon shortly before closing time and asked the female employee if he could use the restroom. She felt intuitively uneasy about the guy and asked several customers if they would check outside. The police found the man, a convicted sex offender, waiting in the parking lot with a ski mask, handcuffs, a butcher knife, and sex devices. He had opened the spa’s back door before leaving. Instead of dismissing her unease as paranoia, the female employee listened to her intuition. Magical thinking? Absolutely.
One night, Cj bolted out of a sound sleep and in the mirror at the foot of her bed, saw an image play out: a short, bulky man with shoulder-length hair walked up a sidewalk to the porch of a Victorian house that Cj recognized as her friend’s home. The man wore a red plaid shirt and held a gun and Cj had the strong impression that the man intended to kill her friend. She glanced at the clock: it was 3:30 AM. She felt the murder would happen at that time, the next night.
Early the next morning, she called her friend and described the vision. Her friend called the police. Even though they were doubtful about the source of the information – a vision, a hunch – they assigned an officer to the property the next night. At exactly 3:30 am, a short bulky man with shoulder-length hair, wearing a red plaid shirt, walked onto the sidewalk approaching the porch to the house. The officer grabbed him. The man, a religious fanatic, believed Cj’s friend was a witch and had intended to kill her. Magical thinking? Yes. And it saved a woman’s life.
In each of these instances, individuals acted on the basis of their personal perceptions and emotions. And yet, mainstream science says that if we trust our own perceptions and experiences, if we trust what has not been proven, we’re living in the fool’s paradise of magical thinking. Really?
Magical thinking enables us to think outside the narrow box of consensus reality and creates a fertile environment in which synchronicity is more likely to occur. It enables us to undertake the hero’s journey that Joseph Campbell wrote about so movingly. Magical thinking is precisely what makes life so mysterious, so ultimately unknowable that our lives are changed in unimagined ways simply because we don’t have all the answers.
Once you acknowledge the validity of your own perceptions and experiences, you discover that magical thinking and synchronicity possess momentum that cuts across cultures, religions, ethnicities. Born within our collective humanity, this momentum sweeps outward, like a force of nature.
Gypsy, being male myself I do not like to go to a male doctor unless there is no other choice. I have a male urologist. The last two visits I have seen his female PA. When he went to Afghanistan his office assistant asked if I minded seeing her or waiting until the doctor came back. I told her absolutely I wanted to see the PA.
Clarity, I once rode a bicycle from Port Everglades (Ft. Lauderdale area) to Miami to have lunch at Biscayne Bay with some friends. Several years later I started on the same trip just for the ride. I turned back early only to find out that had I continued I would have passed a massive police presence at a hostage situation including exchange of gunfire. Not a place I would want to be on a bicycle.
Ray
https://the-mouse-trap.com/about/ From the about link to the "Mouse Trap blog."
Notice that the author claims his "expertise" psychology and neuroscience is self taught and that he is a software "major."
Moments after Trish wrote the comment about the 'train crash' we experienced our crash as the computer hacker Paul Anagnostopoulos of Windfall Software took over our g-mail account and the blog.
No apologies required, Paul. You've exposed yourself for the nutbag that you are. Sensible and logical people don't invade other people's computers. Rob
In November of 2010 Mike Perry featured a 67notout reader's coincidence story that I sent him on how I met Bono. It is very much on the line of majical thinking, intution and knowing. I can't seem to direct link to the story but it is there in the November archives in case anyone would like to read it.
Since that one majical experience my life has never been the same. It was if a switch had been turned on. Life is good and it only get's better when we pay attention to the signs, intuitions, and dreams we have come to us through life's big antenna. We just have to tap into the frequency and believe we are on the right channel!
Peace,
Becky
Cevans – the link didn't work! Would love to read the train crash story.
Ke – an amazing story!
I love this article, makes me feel like my thinking is logical (instead of ridiculous which is how most would percieve it) I dream alot of things that come true, mostly mundane things, but you never know, something important could sneak in!
KE vision continued…
The Being dropped me to the plateau immediately and strolled away down the valley. I felt I was still there on the plateau watching him walk away. I was glad he didn't destroy me but I got the impression that he was more annoyed with me and too busy to bother with me! I grew bold and wished I had a way to follow him through the valley but the landscape looked treacherous.
My eyes re-focused on my computer screen and the vision was gone. Music still played in my headphones and the room was the same. I felt my throat and it was sore. I spoke and my voice was hoarse for several minutes. I asked myself if it was real and decided that it had to have been because I just knew I was actually there.
I wasn't afraid after the vision. I was emboldened! I felt that I was on the right track in my personal search for the Creator.
My impression was that I had a "Casablanca" moment with God. Here I've been chasing actual physical proof of a Creator for years and for humanity's purpose if there was a Creator.
I feel that this Being appeared to me to let me know that he was REAL but I got the impression it was as Bogart said in "Casablanca": "…it doesn't take much to see that the problems of three little people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world. Someday you'll understand that." In other words, I felt this Being was telling me that I'd found him, now what? or so what? And that he was too busy for my folly.
Well, I was frightened at the beginning of the vision and so afterward I felt bold enough to ask God out loud if it was really him that appeared to me. I felt my life had been spared and so I was really cocky and asked him to give me a physical sign that he had really appeared to me. The first thing that came to mind was to ask him to cause a power failure in my home. Of course, that didn't happen.
But the next morning one of my children came downstairs and said they had a weird dream. He said he had dreamed we were in our house talking and that all the power went out!
I'm glad I had the vision. I'm all the more anxious to continue my search for answers to this life and the Creator. I felt that the Being in my dream was actually challenging me to follow him…that is if I could keep up! I'm looking forward to my next encounter with this Being and I'm really glad that I had it!
Thank you all for your support here and any thoughts on my experience is appreciated!
Sincerely, KE
Thanks everyone in comments section for your support!
I was so thrilled when I had my vision and felt it was REAL! So Gypsywoman that's why I searched to see if anyone else had a similar experience. The closest thing was this minister's blog about Jacob and the angel.
I was raised very religious and thought for sure I had found the right blog to comment on only because I felt I had a religious vision.
I'd like to share it with you all but it could seem disturbing to some. In short, I was sitting at my computer like now with my headphones on listening to music and re-reading a comment I had posted on an alternative blog. My comment challenged a view of God's purpose for humans.
Immediately between the computer screen and my eyes I saw what looked like a desolate red dust world that I didn't think was Earth. Huge mountainous plateaus were in the distance and for a moment I wondered if the image was on my computer screen but it was like a hazy picture in front of me in 3D.
I stared at the image and I was suddenly in it standing on a tall plateau looking down a valley between the mountains. A Being appeared in the valley in the distance that I immediately felt was God. He was enormous and towered over the mountains. He was a dusty robed figure with long hair and staff, kinda Gandalf-ish.
I couldn't see his face but I felt he was looking for me, caught sight of me and came straight toward me. I was frightened by his immensity and when he got to me he grabbed me by the throat. He never spoke to me. I felt he understood me telepathically and so I asked in my mind if he was angry with me for questioning his purpose. He never spoke but seemed aggravated with me, raised me up in the air. I honestly felt this was God and that he had come to destroy me then and there. I just knew I'd be found perhaps dead at my computer after this event. I really felt his hand on my throat so in my thoughts I relinquished and admitted that if he were God he could destroy me if he wanted to.
Continued below…
I love magical thinking…the other night my inner voice told me not put a candle on the kitchen table where I had placed it under a light fixture…and I didn't listen…sure enough the candle heat cracked the glass on the light fixture. My intuition had told me better…go figure. ha!
i'm afraid i would not dare even think of commenting on the religious sector – and my personal experiences with it/them –
and cj, yes, but my kind of riding was nothing at all that cowboy envisioned!
great dialogue here –
Great post. And so many great comments. I am glad you listened to your intuition 3322mathaddict – it must have been an absolutely frightening experience.
I have a friend who saved her family from being caught in a shoot up between gangs. They were on their way to their favourite restaurant and on the way, my friend got this strong feeling that they should go to another restaurant. Her husband thought she was beng silly but she insisted until he agreed. On their way home they passed their favourite retsaurant and there were police cars, ambulances and bodies on the ground. Since then, my friends husband takes her seriously when she gets one of her intuitive feelings.
That experience you had with the minister, KE, is not unusual, I'm afraid. Many Christians see synchronicity and signs as coming from the Devil. They believe we are out on a side track, those of us who believe in signs. I have had several discussions about this with a Christian friend who is pretty open minded. We have talked about the sense in God talking and talking to people through thousands of years and then, after the New Testament was in the box; not a word! Come on… Even he thinks it seems a bit odd. I simply can't believe that synchronicity that either leads to bringing people closer to God or to bring people to be good and kind can come from the Devil.
Yippee-ay-eh,ride 'em cowboy, Gypsy! As a medical professional myself and having had to deal with male chauvinists doctor gods often, your story has me rolling on the floor in hysterics! Love it, girl! Sounds just like you!
And KE, bible-thumping fundamentalists would probably make Jesus weep….again! You're in good company here. We're all a little bit off-the-wall, as you can see!
I loved the post, I loved Cj's and Gypsy's stories, but most of all i loved KE's story. Thanks for sharing that with us, and I am so happy for you that you have found some like minded souls.
I have been 'excorcised' at every family event for most of my life, threatened to be put in the nut house by four relos because I 'heard voices' have been CONTINUALLY prayed over, blessed etc etc. I am a medium! Though after 44 years, I just found out. Now I do all the praying for them! 😀
and i condensed a bunch, trish, and left out a lot of, uh, colorful detail – and the visual on it all was something – a moving sea of white and green blue everyday coming to check me out – then the whispers overheard in the hallways [i also roamed] – one little detail – cowboy was also short……..ok, i just won't go there on your blog…..
the other thing i did was an ethnography of that particular floor of the hospital – as a separate study while i was there – and again, so much material there just for the taking! it was a beautiful thing!!!
oh, and the final sticks and stone and names thing: cowboy referred to me as HISTRIONIC! WTF was THAT about!!!
Cj and Gypsy – your two stories are terrific. Gypsy, yours made me laugh out loud. I can just see you doing this!
Ke – your story is particularly moving. I can't imagine what sort of minister this guy is, but he's psychotic for even suggesting what he did. And hey, if you're nuts – then everyone on this blog is, too, so you've got a lot of company!
well, now, what's that about sticks and stones and all that??? one little example of our "mainstream" in medical science is an experience of my own many moons ago – as an undergraduate, i had received funding to conduct a nationwide sociological research project – it was a really big deal as no other undergrad had been funded – however, i had already conducted a local and regional small-scale project on the same subject and it was very well received within the professional sociological community – with papers being presented to several national association groups – in any event, in the midst of my nationwide project, i had to undergo some fairly sophisticated medical testing and was sent to a medical university teaching hospital in another city – since i was not "ill" and had to be hospitalized only because the testing required constant lab monitoring that could not be done out-patient, and so as not to interrupt my project deadlines, i carried all my research with me so that i could continue while i was so confined – well, you know, this was in the 70's [not that attitudes have changed significantly at all since] and there i was, a female patient in a huge medical university hospital where the white coats and green coats and other coats came round [99% male] 2-3 times a day to "examine" and "study" the confined specimens – in my room, i had unpacked all my research books – the window ledge was lined – the one chair had a huge stack in it – books covered the tray-table and most of my bed – and, being the uppity bitch that i was/still happily am, when my medications that were required for the testing, were not being administered properly [thereby negating any lab results and thereby resulting in another 2 week confinement if "they" f'd it up], i brought it to the attention of the staff who brought in the incorrect doseage – first, second, and still a third time i personally had to demand that the proper medication be administered – well, it went on – and the nurse complained to her super and the super came in to check me out – you know, the food chain thing – so when it was evident that the test administration had been compromised by their stupidity i called in THE BIG BOY – the department head who was a personal friend of my personal friend – and upon discovering that the meds had, indeed, been improperly administered, he then sent heads rolling all the way around the floor – and ultimately i was required to stay an additional two weeks in order to have a proper test result – oh, and this, may i add, was at the total expense of the medical center – in any event, the male intern on my case got the riot act as a result of his negligence in all this – and thereafter made repeated sexist remarks to me and about me – one day another intern happened in and mentioned the nightmare of it all – and then proceeded to tell me that there had been numerous negative remarks made in my chart by the other guy and he thought i should know – so he showed me some of the remarks – for example: obvious hysterical neurotic female patient with blatant hypochondria, who has brought her entire medical library with her and is constantly reading of her illness – or – neurotic female with numerous complaints about her care and insists that she knows more about medical testing than do the doctors – etc etc etc –
now, the creme de la creme of the story? the project was a comprehensive/in-depth examination of doctor-patient relationships – and guess who got to be used as a prime example of negative perceptions of female patients by male physicians – yep, the cowboy [yes, he wore cowboy boots with his white coat] intern himself, with direct quotes from my own chart –
so sorry for the rambling – must have needed the therapy!!! 🙂
Lest we forget, mainstream science compares intuition and magical thinking to psychosis. Take a look.
https://the-mouse-trap.com/2007/07/31/good-mood-intuition-magical-thinking-psychosis/
Call it what you will…it's alive and well, and living in anyone willing to tune in!
Great post,
Keri
Geeeez .. what a good question. I have multiple reasons… but these days, it's not hard to find em, eh?
On the other hand, I believe it using it whilst I'm here. For good of course, and not evil.
I like your blog!
Keri
http://www.alwayscurtsywhenyousneeze.com
Loved this post! Paying attention to our "little voice" is something man has done from the beginning of time. Only in our mechanistic view do we disallow for the intuition and synchronicity. Unfortunately magical thinking is usually equated with the psychological definition and is negative.
Just a quick comment: The Dot is shifting colors all over its spectrum so far today, rising and falling. The mass consciousness must be in a state of confusion!
i absolutely believe in my intuition and my dreams. they have proven correct too often for me to ignore them…
This is a empowering post!
Anytime I have ignored my intuition (whether it was a vision, dream or impression) I have regretted it.
wv = shivers !!!
Thank you for this post! It was just what I needed to read!
You wrote at the end:
"Once you acknowledge the validity of your own perceptions and experiences,…"
I had a vision play out in front of my eyes about a week ago. It was very powerful and moving and it even infiltrated another person's dream!
Well, I searched for a similar event on Google but all I could find was a religious reference to Jacob wrestling with the angel of God. I went to a Christian minister's blog and posted a description of my vision. The pastor replied that he almost didn't post my comment but wanted to because it was an example of the fact that a vision such as mine was not religious, not from the Lord and possibly demonic. He wrote that all communication from God has been accomplished and is located in the Bible only…there is no such communication from God anymore. The pastor also implied that I might have been mentally ill since visions and hallucinations are symptoms of psychosis.
I was very disappointed in his response because I was proud of the vision and felt empowered by it. I thanked him for his comments but deleted my comment from his post. I was concerned for my sanity after reading what he wrote and made a point to dismiss the vision as a result of lack of sleep or something.
I was so pleased to read what you wrote about the experiences of others and their visions. I have never had any other vision similar to this first one but I did have a very realistic dream that was similar to it about a year ago.
I guess I'm not "insane" after all! I jest and I'm fine but I was taken aback by the Christian blog response. Thank you for your post and I feel much better about my vision experience.
absolutely, listening to our inner voice/s is a must, i have learned – my "gut instinct" is far more frequently accurate than not – and i trust my own perceptions and emotions implicitly – without magical thinking i wonder where this civilization would be – for those naysayers, without curiosity, imagination, magical thinking, how would so many of those scientifically oriented experiments/results have even begun – somewhere, that empirical study began with someone seeing things from a different perspective – seeing things from outside the box –
Magical thinking, intuition, precognition or whatever: it's for real. And all we have to do is listen and act upon it.
P.S. I immediately removed my ad from the classifieds and only worked as a private-duty RN, from that point, by referrals from people I knew quite well.
I can state, with absolute conviction and absolute integrity, that if I have not listened to and heeded my intuitions in whatever form they may take, I would not be alive today. That is fact. Intuition may come to me in the form of precognitive dreams, or it may simply be like the woman in the tanning salon who had the "gut feeling" that something wasn't "right", and she paid attention. That gut feeling was very prescient in our ancient ancestors…in the cave people, etc. Their entire existences were dependent upon that primal instinct that has been long buried as the human species has advanced, but that still is very much alert within us, if we but pay attention and recognize its wee small voice.
Working as a private-duty RN for a period of time, and with an ad in the local paper as such, I rec'd a phone call from a man requesting a meeting with me with the intent of hiring me to care for his ailing mother. The meeting was to occur at his place of business,he said, not at his home, which I tho't was strange, but he explained he didn't want his mother to know yet that he was interviewing caregivers for her. He also asked me what kind of car I drove, and stupidly, without thinking, I told him. That night I had a dream that was extremely vivid..won't go into detail except to say that in my dream there was a man driving a dark gray compact car and he had a carving knife beside him in the passenger seat, and he was wearing a yellow cap that had NY on the front, for the New York Yankees. It was a dire warning about this man. I called a friend and asked him to accompany me to the meeting, and we arrived about a half-hour prior to the appointed time and discovered the parking lot was in the rear of a small building and was surrounded by trees on three sides, invisible from the street. I parked, however, in a place where we could see but not be seen. About five minutes before I had agreed to meet the man, a gray compact car pulled into the parking lot of an Ace Hardware across the street, and parked facing the road. My friend and I could very clearly see the driver was wearing a yellow cap altho it was too far away to se if there was indeed an NY on it.
I was so creeped out and freaked I started to cry. My friend, who was a man, and I stayed right where we were, and in about fifteen minutes the guy in the gray car and yellow cap pulled out of Ace, having never gotten out of his vehicle, and drove away. If I had NOT paid attention to my dream, or had dismissed it, there is no doubt I would be dead. That wee small voice entering my dreamworld saved my life. I pay attention!!