Can you really change your life? There's a scene in one of my favorite movies "Waking Life" where
two friends talk about the idea of identity while sitting in a cafe. One woman says "imagine you're
looking at a picture of yourself that was taken when you were a baby." You look at that photo and
you say "that's me," but in order to connect this image of a baby with who you are today,
living and breathing in the present, you have to make up a story that describes all the things that
led to that baby becoming who you are now. There's a million different ways you can tell that story.
Many people unfortunately tell themselves a very disempowering story; one that makes them
feel trapped in the decisions they've made in the past or on factors outside their control.
And with the rise of social media where it seems like everyone else is living a perfectly curated
life, we can often tell ourselves "if only" stories. If only I was wealthy, if only I was
thinner, if only I made a different choice in the past. Life could be so different now. But
you could at any time you want, tell yourself a different kind of story; one that empowers you to
move towards the things you truly want and deserve in this world. And to leave behind all the things
that aren't serving you anymore. Because all it takes is one moment, one chance encounter, being
exactly where you are now in this exact place, at this exact time, to completely change your life.
That is exactly what happens to this man. This is Eric. At this point in his life he's
in his early 30s, and for the past decade he's struggled with addiction to alcohol and drugs.
It's been like this for a while now. He's tried and failed to quit so many times that he can't
really see any way out of his situation, and so he plans at this moment to take his own life.
He stands at his window crying; moments away from ending everything. But then something strange
happens. Through his window he sees a black bird; a raven looking at him from about 20 meters away.
Suddenly it takes flight, flying directly towards him at full speed. It comes closer and closer
until it smashes into the window right in front of him, and falls down dead instantly. Eric is filled
with shock. He has a moment of pure clarity. In his mind his first thought is that this black bird
sacrificed its own life so that he could live. He was so struck by the uncanny nature of what
happened, and the incredible timing of the bird's life-saving intervention, that he understood this
as a sign that he was meant to live. Eric already had seven other friends who had taken their own
lives in the past two years. He decided that his life would be different from that moment on.
He booked himself into rehab. Slowly but surely, he quit all alcohol and drugs. Eric told no one
about the raven. He was worried that any mention of this to a therapist would have him labeled as
crazy or psychotic. But this was a defining moment in the story of his life; it gave him
the strength and the motivation to get better. So much so that he successfully finished rehab
and he was only one of two people in his facility who was still sober a year later. As time went on,
Eric found a full-time job. He got married. They had a child. And despite dealing with a range of
tough challenges, Eric found a way to stay sober and turn his life around completely. It wasn't
until Eric met a clinical psychologist named Christopher Mackey that he decided to finally
reveal his story. As Eric tells it, he says that "I've seen these signs all my life; when i'm in
touch with my inner feelings, when I'm aware of the good things happening around me, that's my
higher power. These moments are stamped forever in my mind. Living in the present is a gift because
life throws at you opportunities every single day. The question is are you present enough in
the moment to notice them?" Ever since that night, whenever he saw another black bird he intuitively
understood that it was a symbol representing a higher power. Eric's story is completely
true. He's a real life patient described in a book called the "Positive Psychology of Synchronicity,"
written by clinical psychologist Christopher Mackey. So what is synchronicity?
Synchronicity is a meaningful coincidence. Swiss psychologist Carl Jung famously described it as
something that happens when an inner state of mind connects in a meaningful way with an event in the
outside world. They're connected not by cause and effect, but by meaning. And so when Eric was
planning to take his own life but was instantly stopped by a raven that flew into his window, he
took this as divine intervention; a sign to keep on living. It gave him a powerful sense of meaning
and that is synchronicity. Jung noticed that in his own patients synchronicities often happen in
moments of strong emotional intensity and turmoil. When we're at a turning point in our lives.
We see them at key moments like birth, death marriage, and other life transitions. And they
often happen just before we make a psychological breakthrough. And some research is beginning to
show that experiencing synchronicity can help you overcome emotional blocks, offer you new insights,
introspection and personal growth. All of this hints at the incredible power that synchronicities
have to heal the soul, and it's something that's long been known by many therapists. Many of them
tell stories of having a patient who walks into their office with the exact same problems
that they're currently dealing with in their own lives. Which brings us to our second true story.
This is a 53 year old man who works as a psychiatrist. Let's call him Bill. He's
having problems connecting with his wife. They've been arguing more and more every
day. They've almost separated and nearly divorced and their relationship is hanging
by a thread. Bill admits that he sometimes gives so much of himself to his patients, that it feels
like he has nothing left to give at home. One day Bill meets a patient; a woman about the same age
as his wife. She and his wife even have similar names. The patient's name is Maria and his wife's
name is Mary. The problems they each have with their husbands are also very similar.
Much like Bill, the patient's husband is also too caught up in his work. She tells Bill that when
her mother passed away, her husband didn't even come to comfort her at the hospital. Instead, he
left the next day to go on a skiing trip with his friends. And so there she was completely alone,
spending the day after her mother's death with no one to console her. Bill heard his patient say
"he just doesn't get it," and a light bulb went off in Bill's mind. "He just doesn't get it," is
exactly the same phrase that his own wife had been using to try to get his attention. And only now,
as he's hearing these same words from his patient, does he realize that he'd almost done the same
thing to his own wife. Bill almost abandoned her the day after she had a major surgery
so he could go on a business trip. But now after hearing these words he was suddenly moved into
realizing something he couldn't understand until this moment. "I get it now," he said to himself.
This synchronicity was exactly what he needed; a shock to a system. Not just to give him the
insight and empathy to better help his patients, but more importantly, he now deeply understood
just how badly he'd been neglecting his wife all these years. And this is consistent with research
that tells us that synchronicity can give us feelings of confirmation, guidance, and direction.
And it can be the catalyst through which we make real change and redirect the course of our lives.
Which brings us to our third story. A remarkable case study reported in The Archives of Scientists
Transcendent Experiences. In it, a man whose best friend Mike had been in a terrible car
accident. Mike had fallen into a coma and hadn't responded to treatment for more than a month. In
what came next, he describes the most incredible experience of his life. "One night, I had a really
vivid dream that Mike had come to visit me. We sat and talked for what seemed like an
hour about all kinds of different things. It was just like old times. Mike told me about the car
crash he was in. He told me that his girlfriend who was also in the car with him at the time,
hadn't actually died like the newspapers said. In fact, she was fine and I would see her again
one day. What's odd is that this dream felt completely real. Unlike most of my dreams,
it felt like a real waking moment in my ordinary life. Finally Mike stood up to leave and said,
"my friend, I won't be seeing you again for a long time. But don't be upset by this. I'm
absolutely fine." As Mike walked towards the door he turned back to me and said
"my mother's about to call you now, could you please just tell her that everything is going
to be okay?" And then I woke up. I sat up in my bed. About one minute later at around five in the
morning the phone rang. It was Mike's mother who had called to say that Mike had died earlier that
morning. She started to cry and I reassured her that Mike was okay. That he was absolutely fine.
This dream profoundly changed my life. Before Mike passed away, I was consumed by a fear of death.
I'd often cried myself to sleep because I was so worried about dying. But after this dream my fear
of death went away. And more than that, I gained a renewed love of life; something I always felt was
missing from my childhood. Psychologist Robert Hopcke believes that there are no accidents.
When he asks people about the synchronicities in their lives he finds that most people respond by
telling him a story. And that's what makes it so powerful. Synchronicity reveals our underlying
stories, the narrative coherence we find in our lives. Each of us is carrying all kinds of unseen
burdens and hardships as we live out that story. And this narrative coherence is something we're
often unconscious of until a synchronicity happens that suddenly makes us aware of what
it is. Much like any story things will happen in early moments in our lives but we only understand
their full importance later on. They awaken us to the deeper meanings that are all around us.
We've looked at some heavy subjects in this video so if you or someone you know is struggling with
addiction, or mental health, or self-harm, please take this video as a sign that there's hope.
And you don't have to do it alone. You can reach out for help. I've linked to some free
mental health resources in the description. Feel free to check it out. And if you have
any thoughts or other positive suggestions on this, I'd love to hear them in the comments.
In the next video, we'll take a deeper look at the many ways synchronicity can transform your life
for the better. If this video is available you'll see it here on the left. If it's not yet available
I think you'll enjoy the one on the right. Thank you for watching all the way to the end. If you
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As always thanks so much for watching, take care of yourselves, and I'll see you in the next video.