Stab Me in the Heart—A Valentine to Synchronicity

Just a short and sweet post in honor of Valentine's Day.  I tweeted earlier today that the Love of Synchronicity has stabbed me in the heart.

That reminded me of a short story I read back in high school called "Greenleaf" by Flannery O'Connor. 

It's part of a collection which I was delighted to discover has the highly synchronistic title "Everything That Rises Must Converge".

It also bears this great Heart-Arrow sync wink of a cover image:

The story's main characters are two women named Mrs. May and Mrs. Greenleaf.

Mrs. May is a professed devout Christian but spends the entire story selfishly fighting to keep a bull off her private property. 

[Here in the Sync world we know that the Bull is prevalent throughout ancient mythology and culture as a symbol for the Christ/Savior archetype (see "Death of a Raging Bull").]

Mrs. Greenleaf's spiritual beliefs, on the other hand, are more esoteric.  At one point, Mrs. May is disgusted to find her writhing on the ground in the woods, overcome with frothed religious ecstasy

"Oh Jesus, stab me in the heart!" Mrs. Greenleaf shrieked.  "Jesus stab me in the heart!" and she fell back flat in the dirt, a huge human mound, her legs and arms spread out as if she were trying to wrap them around the Earth.

Here through O'Connor's vivid imagery we can see that in every way, Mrs. Greenleaf's spirituality and even her eroticism is inexorably bound to the Earth.  She is one with it, and in that oneness she is redeemed.

I think Mrs. Greenleaf is an apt metaphor for my love affair with Synchronicity.  What once started out as a mere curiosity has now become a symbiotic relationship.

Now, I find myself moving through life differently with a heightened awareness that my every ripple is a necessary part of creating this wave of existence we call Life.

And like Mrs. Greenleaf, this new found knowledge of belonging is profoundly ecstatic to me.  Truly, literally, it is as if I'm wrapping myself around the Earth and moving in tandem with every other being on it.

At the end of O'Connor's short story the stubborn Mrs. May is pinned against a car by the bull and his horn pierces her heart.  But this is not an act of violence.

Instead, like the people's recent revolt in Egypt, it is an act of grace that tears open the Heart so that Joy and peace can flow in.

Synchronicity...such an exquisite dance.

Happy Valentine's Day.