My spirit guide Holly and the Collective Wisdom played a significant role in today’s post. Here were their words leading me toward this post: We are aware that many people who read this post do not believe the stories you tell of your spiritual journey. But that is of no significance to us, nor should it be to you. People may not believe until they have had similar experiences. In fact, just the telling of your experiences may wake up others to their own synchronistic experiences. You have had some profound experiences since the passing of two significant people in your life, your brother and your best friend from high school. Others have partaken of these synchronicities with you, and so they are some of your believers. You are ready to tell these stories and add them to this visual spiritual memoir, dear friend.
It was after my brother’s suicide, nearly 24 years ago, that I began to see the power of synchronicities to answer many of my questions, large and small. Several days after my brother’s death, I started receiving what I thought to be communication from my brother. On the first Saturday night after my brother’s death, I called on him to “show me a BIG sign” that he was okay and that he was actually sending me messages. It had to be something that was so obvious no one would be able to miss it. The next morning, my husband and I were driving on our way to do grocery shopping, and we noticed a large church sign knocked over on the sidewalk. Apparently a drunk driver had driven his car onto the sidewalk and knocked over the sign. This became the first of hundreds of synchronicities that have graced my life these past two decades.
The song Angel, by Sarah McLachlan, has played a part in many synchronistic messages from my brother. It was released in November, 1998, just six months after my brother’s death, and the lyrics to the song were so similar to the events of his suicide that I have always thought about him when I’ve heard the song. After doing a presentation in Arizona for a group of parents of gifted kids, I was feeling concerned about having shared personal information about my brother’s death. He, too, was gifted, having graduated from UCLA with the honor of Phi Beta Kappa, and from law school with the distinction of Order of the Coif. Getting into our car after the session, I asked my brother if it had been okay to speak about his suicide and how intellectual giftedness doesn’t ensure a lifetime of success. My husband started the car just as the song Angel was being played. I knew that not only was it okay to talk about Ed’s suicide, but it was important. I recently looked up the story behind Sarah McLachlan’s song, Angel, knowing there had to be an important significance behind such a powerful song. McLachlan says she wrote the lyrics about the Smashing Pumpkins’ keyboard player who died in a hotel room of an overdose. She said, “I felt a flood of empathy for him and that feeling of being lost and lonely and desperately searching for some kind of release.” Just like the keyboard player in her song, my brother was also found in a hotel room. One of the most impactful synchronicities around this song and my brother’s suicide came when I was driving past the hotel where he took his life, and Angel came on the radio at that exact moment. I knew he was truly “in the arms of an angel,” and so was I.
Musical synchronicities weren’t reserved for my relationship with my brother. Many years after I lost my brother, my best friend Sue died. She had big brown eyes, and she loved brown-eyed Susan daisies. We were in high school in 1967 when Van Morrison’s song Brown Eyed Girl was released, and every time I heard it, I thought of my brown-eyed friend, Sue. She had spent many of her adult years in South Lake Tahoe while raising two sons, so although she no longer lived in California at the time of her death, it made sense that her memorial service was held in Tahoe. Several friends and family members came to the front of the church to speak on Sue’s behalf. When it was my turn, I was filled with anxiety about what I would say to memorialize a person who had meant so much to me. When I was done speaking, I didn’t notice there was a step-down from where I had been standing, and I missed the step. It was with an incredibly awkward stumble that I managed to catch myself from falling. I looked up and said that Sue was probably getting a good laugh at my lack of grace. On our way back to our car, I wondered if Sue’s spirit had been with us that afternoon. And as we pulled out of the church’s parking lot, Van Morrison’s song, Brown Eyed Girl, from more than 30 years earlier, came on the radio.
I have continued to have synchronicities with Sue and her Brown Eyed Girl song. On Friday, July 12, 2019, I wrote about this synchronicity in my journal: “I had “spoken” to Sue while I was in the shower yesterday. I thanked her and told her I didn’t know how I would have made it through high school without her friendship. Today, while in a vegan restaurant with a dear friend, the song Brown Eyed Girl came over the restaurant’s speakers while we were having lunch! Her song, from 50 years earlier, was her acknowledgment that she had heard my heartfelt appreciation of our friendship.” I will never forget these synchronicities just as I will never forget Sue. As Van Morrison said…You, my brown eyed girl!
We will encourage those of you who have never experienced a synchronicity like those shared in this post to begin to pay attention to the many and varied ways “coincidences” have been expressed in your lives. Some people call them “God winks,” and we will say they are the way those who have returned to spirit are able let you know they continue to communicate with you and love you. Soul Bridge Coaching and Holly, February 22, 2022
Other posts about synchronicities:
Synchronicities I: Soulful Love Does Not Die
Synchronicities II: What’s in a Name?
Soul Bridge Coaching 