Dear Pogue,

So I wrote you about synchronicity and serendipity and all that good stuff. And here’s the thing. My best friend rocked up, read the letter and said; “do you realise you struggle with this”, and, “serendipitous moments come hard to you because they get in the way of your plans”.

I vigorously disputed this because, well you know how laid back I am. But I could see I wasn’t winning. I fought a noble rear guard action but the outcome was inevitable. I guess this makes me the proverbial swan, serene and calm on the surface but, apparently, paddling furiously underneath to maintain my intentions. And it’s true. Like the morning I wrote about in the last letter when we met. You rang interrupting an over long lay in bed and the plans I was formulating for coffee, and a morning in my dressing gown with a good book. But as I told you in the last letter your call was serendipity in the guise of my daughter with the invitation to a better morning. It just took me time to recognise it.

So here I am, challenged!

As you would expect, I’ve given this some thought. Actually a lot of thought. Isn’t there a text somewhere that says something like, “faith is the substance of things hoped for but not yet seen”? You’ll know the one. And that’s about where I have arrived in my thoughts. Like, I’m not the finished article. But I’m on the way.

So, if I have an affirmation and it says that things have already happened, well isn’t that faith in action? Are we agreed? Faith is not a hope that something will come about, may possibly occur. No, faith is an assuredness that something has happen. It’s the substance. No doubts. It’s seeing things as already brought into being. It may not have arrived with me yet. Maybe it’s in the post at this very moment, but it’s completed and on the way (I know, it got posted second class but…) Isn’t an affirmation the same thing. A statement of belief that something’s already in place and therefore will occur?

Well I made my affirmations, solidly bought into them and am waiting to see them all about me. I am open to synchronicitous (is that a word?) moments because my beliefs are leaning that way. Can I employ a different term and give it to you to help you understand. Synchronicity is like little moments of grace, gracelets appearing in your life. Like God just bestowing grace on you. Things just coming together. Synchronicity, serendipity, gracelets, the same thing, different words.

With me so far?

I put my first affirmation out there. It went:

Wealth comes to me easily. I receive money constantly which enables me to demonstrate generosity.

Wic

You believe God, the Universe has a sense of humour? Yeah? I had not made allowances for this. Are you familiar with the spiritual principle that we get to give and in doing so we get more and you guessed, give it away? A circle which enables blessings to flow out. Well, without thinking, I had written an affirmation that aligned with this principle and God broke into the circle, not to bring wealth and enable generosity. No, the break-in came at the point where someone was facing a domestic crisis and needed a sum of money to sort things out. I had no wriggle room if my affirmation was faith by a different spelling.

Then, two days later a promise I made over three years ago to give monetary assistance came home.

As I said, God has a sense of humour and I smile as I write this because I can see the circle in action, but not in the order I would have chosen. If you come to my door and it only opens a crack to reveal a pair of eyes peering at you with that: “How much do you want look”, please understand why.

I’ve told you I am the unfinished article and here is the finishing process in action however long it takes. No I might not be quite like the last letter suggested but I’m on the way. And so are you. Someone once told me that builders construct a frame to pour in concrete when casting a structure. That’s what I am doing. Affirmation, prayer, meditation. As the frame is constructed I watch for grace in any of its manifestations to flow in. I now expect it.

So whilst my best friend is right I still intend to go large and build a life that is a continuing answered prayer.

Maybe as time goes on I’ll paddle less furiously. But, hey, on the surface I’m still that laid back dude and only the person closest to me would tell me otherwise.

Yours, still paddling,

Wic