Mark Gagnon

A deeply religious person might call a cancer remission a miracle, but call finding a parking spot just, you know, a coincidence.

A committed atheist might insist everything is coincidental, but still feel like a little chill when they think of their dead mother and the phone rings and it's their sister saying, you know, I was thinking a lot about mom.

We all slide between frameworks depending on the intensity and the personal relevance of the experience.

And that might be the most honest observation that we can make.

Maybe the frameworks aren't about the events, they're about us.

They're about what we need

and what we need in that moment, and how much mystery we're really comfortable with.

And one more thing to mention before we wrap up, we haven't even touched on the parapsychology experiments that claim small but repeatable anomalies, or how different cultures have long, elaborate systems for reading signs, whether it's omens or oracles or divination.

Entire traditions argue that what looks like mere coincidence from the outside is experienced as guidance from the inside.

And psychologists who study grief and trauma find that people often report signs from loved ones, a song on the radio, a bird in the window, a book on the bench, as a part of how they rebuild a sense of coherence after loss, regardless of whether those signs are objectively improbable.

The need to find meaning in the strange isn't a flaw.

It might be one of the most human things about us.

So...

What do you think?

Whether you call it a miracle, a synchronicity, a coincidence, there's something remarkable about these extraordinary events, and it is that they all point to the limits of human understanding.

Whatever you call it, the next time something impossible happens, pay attention to how you feel.

Not just the event, but what is your relationship to the event?

Which framework do you reach out for first?

Because that will tell you something really important, not necessarily about the universe, but about you and what you believe happens.

about the universe, because ultimately all three, miracles, synchronicities, and coincidences are all in some way saying the same thing, that the world has more than we can fully understand and explain.