The subtle weaving of coincidences and chance

Coincidences have always aroused curiosity and caused the fascination of human beings. Sometimes everything seems to synchronize in an inexplicable way, so that two situations that, apparently, have no relationship with each other, coincide. For this reason, many have always associated these coincidences with forces from beyond.

Chance has also been a source of deep reflections and big questions. It has been studied by philosophers and even esotericists. It is a force that is present from the very beginning of life. Why were we born? Why in this family, in this country, in these circumstances and not in others? Is there something that explains it or is chance simply chaotic and indecipherable?

All kinds of theories have emerged about both chance and coincidences.. They range from those that rely on statistics to those that see supernatural intervention in these phenomena. In the framework of psychology, one name stands out in this regard, that of Karl Jung. This psychoanalyst, first a follower of Freud and then founder of his own school, dedicated a good part of his work to these phenomena. It was he who postulated the interesting concept of “synchronicity.”

What has been said about coincidences and chance?

One of the first to wonder about chance and coincidences was Hippocrates, the father of medicine. According to this Greek wise man, all the components of the universe They were linked by “hidden affinities”. In other words, for him there were laws that explained everything, but they were not yet known.

Arthur Schopenhauer, a highly relevant German philosopher, thought something similar: “the destiny of one individual invariably conforms to the destiny of another , and each one is the protagonist of his own drama, while simultaneously appearing in a drama foreign to him. This is something beyond our powers of understanding.”.

With Sigmund Freud the concept of the “collective unconscious” began to take shape. The person who gave it definitive shape was Carl Jung. It is defined as a content that is beyond consciousness and that is common to all human beings.. They are memories, fantasies, desires that we are not aware of and that are present in all of us. This gives rise to unconscious communication between people, which would explain, to a large extent, what we call coincidences.

Later the same psychoanalyst developed the concept of “synchronicity”. This is defined as “the simultaneity of two events linked by meaning, but in an acausal way”. In other words, the confluence of two situations, without one being the cause of the other, but which have a content that complements each other. Jung’s postulates, over time, led to a series of forms of magical thinking.

Do coincidences exist or are they manufactured?

Although Jung’s theory is extremely attractive, it is not the only one that explains coincidences and chance. For Freud, father of psychoanalysis and teacher of Jung, things go the other way. In his approach, coincidence does not exist by itself. It is the human being who creates it, due to his stubborn tendency to give meaning to everything that happens to him.. Also because neuroses induce the repetition of traumatic situations.

For classical psychoanalysis, no element of reality has meaning on its own. It is the human being who grants it to him, based on his desires and his trauma. In this sense, there is a tendency to see coincidences where there are none.. “I was just walking down that street one time when I collided with that person, who turned out to be the love of my life.” And that same thing happened another 30 times with those who were not her loves.

On the other hand, Neurobiology has discovered that when there is a high dose of dopamine in the brain, the tendency to create patterns in everything increases.. Patterns like seeing coincidences where there are none. To establish links, sometimes quite strange, between events that have no relation to each other.

Perhaps those situations that occur to us by what we call coincidence, rather correspond to an unconscious script.. Without realizing it, we seek to be in certain situations or live certain experiences. Perhaps human beings are not as left to chance as many suppose. Your unconscious desires and fantasies are what design what is called destiny. And giving it a magical tint, in one way or another, gives us a certain satisfaction.

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