Synchronicity is one of those words that gets used every time something weirdly well-timed happens.

You think about someone.

They call.

You learn a new word.

Suddenly it's everywhere.

You're considering a major change and the same symbol keeps appearing.

Coincidence?

Maybe.

Meaningful?

Also maybe.

What does synchronicity actually mean?

The term is most closely associated with psychologist Carl Jung, who used it to describe meaningful coincidences that seem connected by significance rather than an obvious chain of cause and effect.

And that's the important word:

meaningful.

Coincidences happen constantly.

Most of them disappear without us noticing.

But every once in a while, something happens that connects almost perfectly with whatever is occupying our inner world.

That's when we stop.

Wait.

What?

The event outside us seems to echo something happening inside us.

Why do we notice some coincidences and not others?

Part of the answer may simply be attention.

Once something becomes important to us, we're more likely to notice it.

Buy a certain car and suddenly that model appears everywhere.

Learn a new phrase and you start hearing it in conversations.

Start thinking seriously about changing your life and suddenly every song, quote and conversation seems to be about starting over.

That doesn't necessarily make the experience meaningless.

In fact, it may tell you something very useful about what currently has your attention.

Tarot can create a similar experience

You shuffle 78 cards.

Pull one.

And somehow the image speaks directly to the question you were asking.

People interpret that experience differently.

Some call it intuition.

Some call it probability.

Some call it spirit.

Some call it synchronicity.

I'm less interested in demanding one explanation than I am in what happens next.

Did the symbol help you notice something?

Did it change the question?

Did it make you uncomfortable because it touched something you'd been avoiding?

Did it give language to something you already knew?

Then it did something.

You don't have to turn every coincidence into an instruction

Meaning doesn't always require certainty.

You can notice a pattern without immediately deciding the universe has issued you a command.

Sometimes a strange coincidence is just interesting.

Sometimes it makes you think.

Sometimes it gives you permission to admit what you've already been feeling.

And sometimes you just happen to look at the clock at 11:11.

Either way, you looked.