The Serendipity of Connection

If we could see what a total miracle it is that any person’s combinations of gifts and interests and hopes are even a part of this world’s current story, I bet we’d be much less likely to take for granted the people in our lives.

Have you ever thought of what an impossibly rare coincidence it is that the people in our lives somehow got connected to us? I know I don’t appreciate this remarkable phenomenon nearly as much as I should. But let’s take a look at this objectively.

I’ve made most of my friends at few key situations in my life: during my college years, through my work, and through community and church affiliations. That seems to be pretty typical. But what is mind-blowing, is the huge number of decisions I made and any one of my individual friends made that set them up to be where we both were when we first became acquainted.

I very easily could have gone to school somewhere other than Indiana University and Weber State University. In fact I was seriously considering a number of other possibilities. I could have decided on a different career path. Just like with the university situation, I was considering several different professional tracks including journalism, medicine, psychology, and business. Any one of those tracks might have led me to some good things and might have given me a chance to get to know other great people. But now that I am so connected to the people in my life, I simply can’t imagine living without them being a part of it. And that’s just contemplating a few of my own decisions. These dear friends made their own independent choices too that through some serendipitous intervention, I was privileged to cross their paths.

Bottom line, if we could see what a total miracle it is that any person’s combinations of gifts and interests and hopes are even a part of this world’s current story, I bet we’d be much less likely to take for granted the people in our lives. And maybe seeing ourselves that way—the way our friends generously choose to view us—would give us room to be a bit kinder to ourselves too.