Why do coincidences feel so magical?

The universe might be random, but there is still meaning to be found.

“A remarkable concurrence of events or circumstances without apparent causal connection.”

–Merriam-Webster’s definition of coincidences

Mid-pandemic, I was at a real low and started asking everyone I came in contact with where they found hope. The will to go on had faded into the background with the forefront illuminating global pain and suffering. People said things like, “Kindness,” “Nature,” “Connection,” “Disconnection,” and “Ingenuity.” Ever since Dorothy Santos told me that she finds hope in coincidences, I have gotten kind of obsessed with the idea. They feel hopeful right? They feel like a form of confirmation that there is something more than the randomness of life. The fabric that binds us all in time and space shares a greater purpose and reason for being.

These moments of surprise and wonder puncture the ordinary, the stuck feeling that a life lived cannot avoid from time to time. This is not a newsletter to burst any bubbles about the actual probability of coincidence, but rather to gently add some thoughts about the location of meaning found within the delight of connecting the dots.

At this moment, I am searching for a guide through unknown waters. A way to make sense and reason how to make decisions in a world that I will never be able to understand. We are told over and over each day how important our decisions are and that they will change the nature of life as we know it. So why not use coincidences as guide posts in tapping into our value systems?

Humans are really bad predictors of the future. We are not able to project the probabilities of random things overlapping in our lives. This has been true for like, ever. I am referring currently to how we are really bad at estimating the probability that we will say, run into someone with the same birthday as us, have gone to the same school, or have been affected by the same life events…

If coincidences are not really that rare, what is the point? Why do we even care?

If I think about using this feeling as a framework for understanding internal and external motivations, coincidences offer up a lot of useful information.

They are also happening all the time. We don’t think about all that could have been and were not. We think about that one time when something did happen – in a sea of possibilities, a connection was made.

There was an attention alignment between two beings, which feels rare these days.

I have a weird tragically romantic attraction to the idea that I missed a connection. The could-have-beens have haunted me all my life. I still read the missed connections in the paper each week. Not sure why, I think I just enjoy the expansiveness of longing. And the will to connect.

Do you have a way to explain the magic of everyday life that works for you? I would love to know…

Also, found this chart on the probabilities of coincidences - super interesting, right?

-David Spiegelhalter

Thanks for being here with me today.