New-Age-Center

The idea of synchronicity is that the conceptual relationship of minds, defined as the relationship between ideas, is intricately structured in its own logical way and gives rise to relationships that are not causal in nature. These relationships can manifest themselves as simultaneous occurrences that are meaningfully related.

Synchronistic events reveal an underlying pattern, a conceptual framework that encompasses, but is larger than, any of the systems that display the synchronicity. The suggestion of a larger framework is essential to satisfy the definition of synchronicity as originally developed by Carl Gustav Jung.

Jung coined the word to describe what he called "temporally coincident occurrences of acausal events." Jung variously described synchronicity as an "acausal connecting principle", "meaningful coincidence" and "acausal parallelism". Jung introduced the concept as early as the 1920s but only gave a full statement of it in 1951 in an Eranos lecture and in 1952, published a paper, ''Synchronicity& — An Acausal Connecting Principle'', in a volume with a related study by the physicist (and Nobel laureate) Wolfgang Pauli.

It was a principle that Jung felt gave conclusive evidence for his concepts of archetypes and the collective unconscious, in that it was descriptive of a governing dynamic that underlies the whole of human experience and history—social, emotional, psychological, and spiritual. Concurrent events that first appear to be coincidental but later turn out to be causally related are termed ''incoincident''.

Jung believed that many experiences that are coincidences due to chance in terms of causality suggested the manifestation of parallel events or circumstances in terms of meaning, reflecting this governing dynamic.

Even at Jung's presentation of his work on synchronicity in 1951 at an Eranos lecture his ideas on synchronicity were still evolving. Following discussions with both Albert Einstein and Wolfgang Pauli Jung believed that there were parallels between synchronicity and aspects of relativity theory and quantum mechanics. Jung was transfixed by the idea that life was not a series of random events but rather an expression of a deeper order. This deeper order led to the insights that a person was both embedded in an orderly framework and was the focus of that orderly framework and that the realisation of this was more than just an intellectual exercise but also having elements of a spiritual awakening. From the religious perspective synchronicity shares similar characteristics of an "intervention of grace". Jung also believed that synchronicity served a similar role in a person's life to dreams with the purpose of shifting a person's egocentric conscious thinking to greater wholeness.

Some fifty years on from Jung’s final published work on synchronicity it is now widely recognised and typical patterns have emerged in recognising synchronistic events and responses. Initially it usually involves suggestive coincidences that while appearing uncanny are often overlooked due to their subjectivity. Finally the appearance of some very powerful synchronistic experiences result in such a revelatory experience that a new stage in a person’s psychological or spiritual development is attained. These revelatory synchronistic experiences are usually associated with major events such as birth, death or crises. Further experiences of synchronistic events provide a kind of confirmation of the new relationship between the individual and the wider reality. In this new reality all events, both internal and external, may have personal significance to the individual either psychologically or spiritually.

Jung’s understanding of synchronicity was evolutionary and he came to the realisation that anything that occurred in time, either a birth or event, captured the quality of that moment. Jung in his later works also evolved his understanding of archetypes that bridged psyche and matter. He believed that these archetypes were ‘free-standing’ or autonomous and as such, synchronicity developed parallels with the Chinese Tao, Greek cosmic sympathies and the Hermetic microcosm and macrocosm. The archetypal pattern involved in synchronistic experiences is actually the glue. Finally Jung realised that synchronicity was not just a relationship between the inner human and the external world but also involved nature as a whole as a substitute for mankind’s inner world.

Jung also believed that synchronicity could span the divide between the modern scientific world view and traditional religions. This was part of the reason why Jung worked so hard to bring synchronicity, which can so easily be dismissed, into the intellectual debate of the 20th century. Richard Tarnas believes that Jung’s work on synchronicity is actually representative of a subtle historical shift in the modern psyche’s search for wholeness.

A close associate of Jung, Marie-Louise von Franz, stated towards the end of her life that the concept of synchronicity must now be worked on by a new generation of researchers. For example in the years since the publication of Jung’s work on synchronicity, some writers largely sympathetic to Jung's approach have taken issue with certain aspects of his theory, including the question of how frequently synchronicity occurs. For example, in The Waking Dream: Unlocking the Symbolic Language of Our Lives, Ray Grasse suggests that instead being a "rare" phenomenon, as Jung suggested, synchronicity is more likely all-pervasive, and that the occasional dramatic coincidence is only the tip of a larger iceberg of meaning that underlies our lives. Grasse places the discussion of synchronicity in the context of what he calls the "symbolist" world view, a traditional way of perceiving the universe that regards all phenomena as interwoven by linked analogies or "correspondences." Though omnipresent, these correspondences tend to become obvious to us only in the case of the most startling coincidences. The study of astrology, he argues, offers a practical method of not only becoming more conscious of these subtle connections but of testing and even predicting their occurrence throughout our lives.

One of Jung's favourite quotes on synchronicity was from ''Through the Looking-Glass'' by Lewis Carroll, in which the White Queen says to Alice: "It's a poor sort of memory that only works backwards".

'It's very good jam,' said the Queen.


'Well, I don't want any TO-DAY, at any rate.'


'You couldn't have it if you DID want it,' the Queen said.

'The rule is, jam to-morrow and jam yesterday--but never jam

to-day.'


'It MUST come sometimes to "jam to-day,"' Alice objected.


'No, it can't,' said the Queen. 'It's jam every OTHER day: to-day isn't any OTHER day, you know.'


'I don't understand you,' said Alice. 'It's dreadfully confusing!'


'That's the effect of living backwards,' the Queen said kindly: 'it always makes one a little giddy at first--'


'Living backwards!' Alice repeated in great astonishment. 'I never heard of such a thing!'


'--but there's one great advantage in it, that one's memory works both ways.'


'I'm sure MINE only works one way,' Alice remarked. 'I can't remember things before they happen.'


'It's a poor sort of memory that only works backwards,' the Queen remarked.