OK. This is weird.

The moment I posted my first entry to this blog—that is, the very second my mouse clicked the "Publish Post" button, my cell rang with a call from "N," someone who is close to Gurumayi's inner circle and whom I've known and trusted for many years. "N" had called to tell me she's in town from LA and wanted to get together. We made plans to see each other for coffee in a few days and I hung up with a lingering, unsettling feeling that the Guru knew and saw what I was posting here, and had reached out to tell me so.

Let's look at that. The way I see it, there are several possible explanations for this incident:

THE RATIONALIST PERSPECTIVE
It was a mere coincidence, easily explained by the fact that I had called "N" recently after months of not being in touch, because Siddha Yoga had begun to occupy my thoughts more and more and her perspective was, and is, one I respect. The coincidence might have been dramatic in its timing, but that only has significance if I choose to invest it with special meaning. Otherwise, it was just two random events occuring at the same time, not unlike dozens of others twin occurences that go unnoticed every day precisely because they hold no meaning for me.

THE CONCEPT OF SYNCHRONICITY
"Synchronous events reveal an underlying pattern, a conceptual framework which encompasses, but is larger than, any of the systems which display the synchronicity."

I'm quoting from a Wikipedia entry on Jung, which should be all the evidence you need that I have neither studied nor truly comprehend Jung's theory. But, it seems to me to go something like this: we are all connected by a vast collective unconscious that at times makes our shared connections plain through coincidental events that have no causal relationship. Synchronicity, then, is an invitation to look at coincidence and invest it with meaning. To pull the threads of our experience apart and examine them, following each back to see where it leads. You don't have to believe in god with a capital G to believe in synchronicity, faith in a common ground of being is sufficient.

"COINCIDENCE IS GOD'S WAY OF REMAINING ANONYMOUS"
This maxim, popular in Siddha Yoga, finds its expression in all religions. Coincidence is not merely an invitation to slow down and look for hidden connections; it is a revelation from God (Her)Self that is pregnant with meaning for the believer. It might be a sign that what you are doing is good, and you have blessings to proceed. It might be a warning that you should go back, you've crossed a boundary and are trespassing on something holy. In either case, the believer isn't the origin of the meaning invested in the coincidence; it comes directly from God.

It's tempting to look at these alternate theories as a set of Russian nesting dolls. The rationalist perspective is the outer shell; big, bright and colorful but when opened—empty of any further content. Synchronicity hides just beneath the surface; it rewards the curious who are willing to twist apart their reality in the search for a deeper significance. And God is the innermost shell; meaning in seed form, the still, quiet voice that reveals our destiny.

That's the way I used to see things. But, I'm not playing with dolls these days. Rather, it seems to me that I've stepped into a labyrinth in which any of the above perspectives can be followed, and any one of them might lead to a blind alley, become a circuit that deposits me back to exactly where I started, or be the arc that leads to the very heart of the truth.