Even Oprah is in on this serendipity thing

Once again my ol' buddy serendipity has popped in to say hello. Not to me this time but through me (and our good friend Oprah).

I have two friends, friends from a past life, a life steeped in religious dogma. Due to a recent relationship, one of said friends is battling with an old demon (not that demon) of the who, where, what and how of religion and spirituality. She is questioning the road she has taken. The three of us have been emailing today with cyber-hugs all around.

13 years ago I left my church. Eight years ago I came to peace with myself. Three years ago I began to understand a new concept of God/Spirit/Universe. A month ago I was finally able to sit in a church and translate the minister's words into my language.

Three years ago I made an amazing connection between journaling and spirituality; intuition, inner wisdom, and God. To sum up in as few words as possible, I believe our intuition/instinct/subconscious IS God. At that time I was attending a small Unitarian Universalist church and I was able to present my discovery to the members. I told of my journey from reading Julia Cameron's The Artist's Way at age 22 to my aha! moment at 30-something. (A link to this unrevised essay, "Wisdom Within" is here.) Also around this time I compiled a journal-writing workshop that looked at this concept from a non-religious - but inherently spiritual - point of view.

So, to get back to today.

I'm still sick and when I feel like crapola I justify watching TV in the middle of the day. I'd had enough of Curious George so I insisted on watching "mommy TV" for just a little while. Oprah came on talking about "The Gift of Fear:" how we should pay close attention to our instincts/intuition. Although I wasn't really conscious of it at the time, the thought crossed my mind, "yup, there's God again."

When I could longer hear Oprah due to the whining of the kids begging for their show, I turned the station (besides, I didn't really think it was appropriate for them to be hearing about women almost getting stabbed) and forgot about it . Less than an hour later I get an email from the questioning friend. She had been reading my essay while watching the very same Oprah episode. She wrote: "putting it all together now - perhaps that instinct is another way in which God dwells within us and speaks to us."

Weird, eh?

No, serendipitous.